One Young Heart
Author's Note: Please review! flames are good, feedback is great, and praise is splendifferous! so please review.
Disclaimer:The character, the world, all belong to JK Rowling. And she deserves every bit of it. I'm just expressing my admiration here. Don't sue me.
Chapter 1: The Castle
Beneath the floors of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, there was a small palace. Red velvet curtains disguised a bed of lavish green silk, a room was lined with bookcases filled with books of lore and potions, a bathtub the size of a small lake was contained in tiles of violet and turquoise blue, and the ripples danced upon the walls, with their paintings of the founders of the school. An artificial atrium displayed its feathered wonders to a greenhouse heated by a nonexistent sun. A dressing room with elaborate bronzed mirrors and countless jewelry boxes with their chests of clothes quietly collected dust. An abandoned laboratory held old-fashioned vials, and a study was piled high with age-old records of times gone by.
In times gone by, Salazar Slytherin had built his wife a paradise beneath the dungeons. A poor woman with beautiful eyes and a pureblood's forceful personality, she had lured him with her beauty and dominated him with her mind. She had never left the rooms until the day her husband abandoned his school in a storm of controversy, but the students spoke in whispers of a pale woman gliding out from behind tapestries and beneath fireplaces in the dead of night.
Hundreds of years later, thousands of books were added to those left behind by the wayward founder, a tradition continued by countless wealthy pureblood Potions Masters, who came at the end of their lives to the honorable task of disdaining the muggle-borns and exalting the Slytherins, to die in honorable solidarity to traditions that could not survive. Jewelry and gowns were added too, and records passing through the ages. The passages no headmaster could find remained there, protected by the same Fiedelius Charm that hid the rooms, leaving the apperarance of only a meager keep for the Slytherin Head of House.
But not for Severus Snape was the glamour and splendor of the secret rooms. He lived in the visible world, ignoring the beauty of the realm beneath. He never had been one for deceit, preferring wit and sarcasm to lies and betrayal. "You, sir, are a hypocrite" he had told his reflection, once, laughing humorlessly at the shadow life he had built for himself after Voldemort's alleged death. He was meant to be at the tournament, but he did not much care who won. It would be a Hogwarts student, he guessed, and he didn't truly care if it was Diggory or Potter. Though, if it was Potter, he would have to come up with new insults, and new vindictiveness. The boy could be a bother at times. Now, if it was a Slytherin who was competing, he would have made an effort. Severus was a loyal Slytherin, and Slytherins always did their duty.
----
Two years later, as the train brought students to Hogwarts, Severus hid behind a handy stained glass window and watched the Potter boy, arrogant in his sixth year, climb down from the train. That day before the mirror was a misty memory, shattered as the mirror had been, as through one of the many secret passages he heard Potter whisper "He's back. He's back. Voldemort". As he heard his life break and shatter, worthless, irreparable. Looking back on that day, he wondered bitterly how he could have ever been so happy.
He looked away from the window, and so missed the brunette woman who climbed down behind Harry. A woman who was still very much a girl in many ways.
Author's Note: Please review! flames are good, feedback is great, and praise is splendifferous! so please review.
Disclaimer:The character, the world, all belong to JK Rowling. And she deserves every bit of it. I'm just expressing my admiration here. Don't sue me.
Chapter 1: The Castle
Beneath the floors of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, there was a small palace. Red velvet curtains disguised a bed of lavish green silk, a room was lined with bookcases filled with books of lore and potions, a bathtub the size of a small lake was contained in tiles of violet and turquoise blue, and the ripples danced upon the walls, with their paintings of the founders of the school. An artificial atrium displayed its feathered wonders to a greenhouse heated by a nonexistent sun. A dressing room with elaborate bronzed mirrors and countless jewelry boxes with their chests of clothes quietly collected dust. An abandoned laboratory held old-fashioned vials, and a study was piled high with age-old records of times gone by.
In times gone by, Salazar Slytherin had built his wife a paradise beneath the dungeons. A poor woman with beautiful eyes and a pureblood's forceful personality, she had lured him with her beauty and dominated him with her mind. She had never left the rooms until the day her husband abandoned his school in a storm of controversy, but the students spoke in whispers of a pale woman gliding out from behind tapestries and beneath fireplaces in the dead of night.
Hundreds of years later, thousands of books were added to those left behind by the wayward founder, a tradition continued by countless wealthy pureblood Potions Masters, who came at the end of their lives to the honorable task of disdaining the muggle-borns and exalting the Slytherins, to die in honorable solidarity to traditions that could not survive. Jewelry and gowns were added too, and records passing through the ages. The passages no headmaster could find remained there, protected by the same Fiedelius Charm that hid the rooms, leaving the apperarance of only a meager keep for the Slytherin Head of House.
But not for Severus Snape was the glamour and splendor of the secret rooms. He lived in the visible world, ignoring the beauty of the realm beneath. He never had been one for deceit, preferring wit and sarcasm to lies and betrayal. "You, sir, are a hypocrite" he had told his reflection, once, laughing humorlessly at the shadow life he had built for himself after Voldemort's alleged death. He was meant to be at the tournament, but he did not much care who won. It would be a Hogwarts student, he guessed, and he didn't truly care if it was Diggory or Potter. Though, if it was Potter, he would have to come up with new insults, and new vindictiveness. The boy could be a bother at times. Now, if it was a Slytherin who was competing, he would have made an effort. Severus was a loyal Slytherin, and Slytherins always did their duty.
----
Two years later, as the train brought students to Hogwarts, Severus hid behind a handy stained glass window and watched the Potter boy, arrogant in his sixth year, climb down from the train. That day before the mirror was a misty memory, shattered as the mirror had been, as through one of the many secret passages he heard Potter whisper "He's back. He's back. Voldemort". As he heard his life break and shatter, worthless, irreparable. Looking back on that day, he wondered bitterly how he could have ever been so happy.
He looked away from the window, and so missed the brunette woman who climbed down behind Harry. A woman who was still very much a girl in many ways.