Last time. If you don't get it now then you should stop trying because you are wasting your time. I AM NOT MAKING MONEY OFF OF WORK THAT IS NOT MINE. I hope some day to use some of my original characters in a "real" novel that I can make money off of.
Gryffindor-320 Points- Romulus receives Ten Points and a make-up quiz, because I love you so ;-) Frogfoot receives Ten Points for loving my favorite characters and making verbose reviews with thoughtful content, which is a rare thing indeed.
Slytherin-320 Points- if you reviewed and I didn't count you tell me, or review this chapter and get some points for your House.
Ravenclaw-40 Points- if you reviewed and I didn't count you tell me, or review this chapter and get some points for your House.
Huffelpuff- 10 Points- if you reviewed and I didn't count you tell me, or review this chapter and get some points for your House.
Chapter 53:
"Severa!"
Starch was sure he had come close to restarting his heart. The outburst had woken him from a light sleep and before he could figure out what was going on the man who had shouted, collapsed back onto the pillow and everything looked as it had a moment before. Hands shaking a little, Starch carefully checked the eyes behind unresisting lids.
Dumbledore burst into the room and demanded too much information too quickly.
Tensely Starch answered as best he could. "I have no idea which of them said it- neither is sustainably dominant right now and I failed to see his eyes when it happened." Before the Headmaster could gain his bearings and ask more questions Starch straightened and, grabbing his ever-available messenger bag, moved for the door. "Watch him, I'll check on the girls."
"The girls?"
"Yes you fool," Starch snapped as he crossed the sitting room. "He called out for a reason!"
Opening her eyes Severa only confirmed what her many other senses had already told her; she was lying on the Exotic doctor's couch in his borrowed sitting room with two men and a woman staring down at her.
And then The Void crushed in from all sides. Mentally she withdrew, again. As the world was being closed out she heard the slight accent so often present n Starch's voice when he was emotionally overwrought.
"Obviously she's not adjusting as quickly as I would have preferred, but on the whole I think she's doing quite well…"
His tone suggested that this was an understatement in some way, but she did not have time to even formulate a subconscious Threat Potential Rating for the possible implications.
"…Can't really say I'm thrilled with you telling her in my sitting room though, Moody."
Forcing herself to sit up, though The Void's emptiness tore at the ragged edges of her mind, Severa knew she had to act quickly. It was just about all she knew at that moment.
The stones of the floor under her feet felt strange; for the first time in her life she was aware of their temperature and texture without her telling her that they were cold or smooth. The sensation of air being drawn into her lungs in slow regular breaths was foreign. Everything was too new, it all needed to be blocked.
The light, the air, the smells, slowly everything faded into a cool nothing that he had taught her to wrap her mind in, a cool nothing cocooning her safely between sensory overload, and The Void.
Taking steps she was aware of only as vague thoughts, she made her way to the door. A flicker of presence, her Guardian, Alastor Moody, but before more than an awareness of his presence could set in she blended him out.
One foot moved to a place a little ahead of the other, then the one that had stayed still moved to a spot ahead of the first… Something she could not waist time and attention to identify as a doorknob, needed turning. Down the hall like a sleepwalker she entered the Potion Masters' sitting room and advanced toward the bedchamber door that had not been theirs.
She did not look down at the sleeping form on the bed, she merely walked until her thighs connected with the bed frame and she could no longer move forward.
She had come, as she knew she that she had needed to, but she had no Next Action to take. Very fleetingly, she risked a moment of conscious thought, and gained an understanding; the fact of her being there was what was needed.
The touch of his hand on her arm broke through her protective layer of non-focus. Like before, at the Quidditch match, he provided a new, stable point for her to focus upon.
"He will kill you, if he gets the chance," the voice was an extension of the cool skin pressed against her wrist.
The statement confirmed her understanding of the situation. "Then you must protect me," she whispered back.
"How can you survive without her?" he asked. "Without the mind, how can the body function, and how can one side of the mind turn so, on another?"
His questions were spoken with that soft 'cool' that was allowing her to function as much as she was, but the formation of answers to such weighty questions could not be done without real thought. The emptiness of being alone was still too much. When she did not respond, the male tentatively opened his own connection, to see what was happening within her.
'Emptiness.'
The lack of thought, feeling, or even currents of awareness caused him to flinch back, but he did not release his loose hold on her. Pulling gently on her arm, he wordlessly guided her to lay next to him. Placing on arm across her middle he held her close enough that contact would not be broken. "I'll keep watch," he murmured into her stringy black hair. "You need to rest…"
Potions was canceled for the day. The only points of note were that The Bloody Baron held court over study hall, Draco Malfoy did not harass anyone but kept stealing glances at the door, and Ron, with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm, made light of the fact that neither Potions Master appeared for lunch or dinner. When confronted later by Hermione he escaped by claiming a Study Overload Headache.
The male pulled his eyes open, with great effort, and managed to acquire a thin sliver of sight. Dumbledore and Starch were by the side of the bed; the Headmaster standing closer and Starch leaning on a post at the foot. The female was still resting by his side, at some point a blanket had been drawn over her. Black tears, like ink, were slowly running from her eyes as she slept, they stank of decay. He felt a deep revulsion to them and struggled to pull away, but he needed to maintain contact with the female, she needed him. The male managed, at last, to sit up without waking the female or drawing attention from Starch or the Headmaster.
"Haven't you noticed?" Starch scoffed. He was responding to something that had been said, or should have been said but wasn't. "He never took the Plasti-juice at six this morning and skipped the noon dose as well. It is nearly six again and he won't be able to take it a third time. It's nearly out of his system."
"Then, I need to tell him. Now." Albus took a steadying breath and seemed startled to find that the male was observing him.
The male began to slouch back toward the pillow again. Their conversation meant nothing to him and staying awake for something he had missed the plot of, seemed pointless.
"Severus. Before you go back to sleep, there is something I must tell you. Finland F-five; it's your wildest dreams." The Headmaster's voice was steady and strong, but when the male collapsed Albus looked away and squinted his eyes to force back the tears. "I'm sorry."
Distant, as though he were no longer actually within the body he was watching over, the male fought to keep hold on something real. Something with substance. But even the pillows he was laying on felt only dimly soft, faintly textured, smelled hazily of old linen. As the feeling of a lack of feeling intensified he retreated from it, deeper into his mind.
Aware of his surroundings, but also aware that what he was perceiving was not what was really going on, Severus slowly looked around the room.
Somehow, it was wrong. The furnishings looked the same, but they held no familiarity. The people in the room had nothing to do with him and their actions had no meaning. The room itself looked somehow 'right' but, like the chairs, tables, and decorations, the room was also foreign.
"She was my sister," a voice behind him said. "And you killed her."
As he moved to face the opposite direction the room blurred slightly; the lines lost their clarity and the colors became less distinct.
Now that he was facing the speaker, Severus knew something was seriously wrong, but in someway it still had nothing to do with him. Liquid black eyes stared back at him from an overly pale face. The man was about his own height and equally underweight.
"Garom." The man made the word a damning curse as he also looked over his near double.
Severus tried to make sense of it. "Snape?"
Snape did not acknowledge the use of his name. "You killed the only member of my family that I had left."
"But…" He sought the reason why the accusation sounded wrong. "I, didn't kill her…"
"The other one, like you," Snape made a dismissive gesture that seemed too fluid, too smooth, to be real. "You're both guilty." The shadows in the room didn't darken, so much as spread like an obscuring fog as Snape advanced with slow, deliberate steps.
Severus glanced down as he tried to focus again. "She died, in the fire…" Looking up he met Snape's eyes. "You both did."
"We chose to live." Snape's eyes reflected a strange, flickering light. "He was too late to save us from the fire, but he offered us a chance to carry on."
"The fire was an accident," Severus said, still confused by the fact that there was more to the story, and he seemed to already know it… If he could only focus enough to find the pieces.
"He was our godfather, and instead of protecting us, he was off defending a bunch of sodding Muggles." The air began to take on a slightly acrid, smoky scent.
"Protecting, Muggles?" As Severus thought, Snape stepped forward again. "No," he said slowly. "No, he wasn't protecting them…"
"He wasn't protecting us; my father, my mother, my sister, me!"
The room had been taking on a familiar heat, when the air began to chill and clear. "No, they weren't trying to protect the Muggles…they were trying to kill, Voldemort…"
The haze of grey smoke became a painfully white glare; light shining from above and reflected off of white walls and smooth flooring.
"You see it, don't you?" Snape continued his own point. "He failed us, he wasn't there to help us. A fire?! Who dies of fires now?! All of the fire proofing charms and Wizard-fire that puts itself out when the candles get knocked over, or the fire alert charms required to be installed in every home built within the last three hundred years! Who the hell dies of fire?!"
On either side of the hall there was a series of dark, vertically oriented, slats that could not be clearly identified because of the over-bright light. The dark rectangles were an endless row of doors on either side of the main corridor.
Severus' eyes glittered harshly. "I'm not you." The remnants of the room he had been in faded, he faced Snape in the hall…and then the hall shattered.
Panic strangled him as The Cage closed. Now, The Cage made a sickening kind of sense; it was the deepest recesses of his own mind. The place he had been trapped in for so long had started as a temporary retreat from what had happened the night Snape had gained enough control to actually lock him away.
The night he had found Ruth, being tortured by masked Death Eaters. The night he had momentarily taken over and killed men who greeted him with sick smiles of distorted pleasure. He had tried to tend Ruth's wounds and had been cut in the process. His blood, mingled with hers, and had still been alive within her system when she had lain with her new husband several weeks later. The child conceived bore his own DNA- not that of Ruth's mate. The child was the first 'First Generation Wizard' born since the time of The Great Purging.
Years, ten in all, of being locked away in The Cage had eventually fettered him with insanity. Two years had been spent following Snape's occasional thoughts of him, brought on by the reappearance of Voldemort. The last two years had been spent trying to recover through interacting with people like Lupin, some of his Marks, and a few Undercity contacts.
This awareness of things in their proper perspective flashed through his mind in an instant.
Now, a darkness he could feel, swirled around him, slithering into his ears and nostrils, flowing through his hair, and pouring itself down his throat and into his lungs. Absorbing him. Devouring him. This was not The Cage as he knew it. These were not the empty passages leading to places he could not remember.
This darkness was not originating within him, but it was being drawn to him. Somewhere, nearby, Snape was struggling against the darkness.
Severus reached out. His awareness brushed against Snape and the other reacted immediately, grabbing, clutching, strangling. Not in an effort to escape, but in an effort to bring the male down with him. He reached in another direction, any direction; away from the Darkness.
The Dark was complete.
He stayed connected to Snape until he could feel nothing but the unending, insatiable hunger of the Darkness. Snape was not enough. It wanted him now.
Thrashing wildly he tried to escape the invasive contact and the resultant press of emotions and thoughts he could not escape from. It showed him things he had done while he was in school, things he had done as Potions Master, things that were small, and things so obvious that no one could dispute them. Every cruel word and intentional slight, every time he had hurt someone beyond what was technically necessary, or turned away when he could have relieved suffering. All of it drew the Darkness to him.
Futilely he struggled against it, as Snape had done. The emptiness of it consumed his every attempt at action. In desperation he reached out. Snape was gone, there was no one there to answer him, but he reached through the Darkness anyway. Something outside of the Darkness had to be out there. If he could reach it, he might be able to follow it out.
Something answered him.
Where it touched the fringes of his mind the Darkness retreated. For a moment he tried to lean closer to the presence that drove back the Dark. But then this new presence began making enough contact.
As real as the Darkness, and as enveloping, this new presence also knew everything he had done. Everything he could never atone for but had tried. Real things and things he felt were his fault but hadn't actually been responsible for. It knew more. He stopped moving toward it as this knowledge was entering his awareness. Like a bright light it brought out clearly everything he had done, felt, or intended. And the Light forgave him.
He pulled back sharply. Forgiveness? His Human sire had loved him, but he had never earned even kindness, let alone forgiveness for the things he had done, for the secret he hid, or hid behind. Starch had never met anything but debts that needed paying or pain, freely accepted maybe, but never with a full return. How could someone who knew all of everything forgive his Blood Debts so easily?
The Darkness returned, agreeing fully with him. What of the child? He hadn't lain with Ruth, but he had never acted better than his own Human Sire when it came to treating the child well. He had provided money, and created accounts that would continue to pay in the event that he could not, and it had all worked well while he was locked away…but the evil he had chosen to do to earn the money for those accounts…the pain those choices had brought to Starch. He had broken Starch's own wishes the first day they had met, by feeding the injured Vampire fresh blood. Not to mention the fact that it, being his blood, had also infected the Vampire, creating a false, one sided at best, Sire/Childe link.
He could not feel where the real pain ended and the pain that the Darkness wished upon him began. Blindly, dumbly, without thought or reason he struggled away from the pain. And reencountered the Light.
It purged the Dark from whatever he allowed it to touch, but it did not advance on him. The Darkness reminded him, with his own memories, that he had never earned compassion, that he was flawed in some way that even his former classmates had been aware of. If he were worthy then why had everyone who encountered him decided that it was alright to make him suffer? To make him hurt or fear? Good people were not deserving of pain, only the flawed…like him.
Confused, he focused on the Light. It knew him too, could see his flaws and offered forgiveness.
Acceptance.
But the pain he had caused, he deserved to suffer for that!
Forgiveness.
It was true, he couldn't dispute the wrongs he had done.
None of that counted because the Light drove the taint of Darkness away.
He needed to make the choice.
Starch beat against Tala's hidden door with his fist. A growl escaped his lips as he spun from her door and swiftly returned back down the hall in the direction of the Potion Masters' private chambers. Before reaching their shared sitting room though he stepped through a charmed panel in a blank section of wall, entering his sitting room.
Tala and Lenore had their heads bowed and hands clasped together in mutual support as they knelt on the rug. They looked up when Starch entered, Tala's warm bronze skin was pale and fear glittered in the tears running down her cheeks.
Lenore swiftly rose and reached to embrace her husband, but he pulled back. "Tala, can you still contact the rest of his Marks?"
On her feet Tala grit her teeth at the unintentional slight. "Of course I can reach them all. We're Clan."
His eyes had been gold but now they flared violently red. "Get Black."
Tala ran.
Lenore knew not to move, but she focused on reaching out to calm Starch through her empathic link. When he calmed and his eyes were their usual clear-grey she softly approached. Gently embracing him she offered comfort.
Starch lost his rigidity all at once. His knees buckled and Lenore tried to support enough of his weight to keep him from injuring himself on the stones of the floor.
With a ragged gasp Starch leaned his forehead into the curve of Lenore's neck. "It hurts. Like loosing my Clan again."
Through their link Lenore could feel his pain, and the pain and emptiness he associated with the betrayal of his Sire's Clan.
Quickly Tala, Black, Lupin, Starch and Lenore were assembled in the Potion Masters' sitting room, waiting.
"I thought-" Lenore broke off her own words. Some stirred at her unexpected speech, and she felt compelled to finish her question to Starch. "I thought you had said his Manna strength, would…"
Starch looked away from the bed containing the nearly identical, and motionless, figures in the next room. In a voice like wind through a graveyard he answered, "I had counted on his having time to cope with being made aware of his separateness, before the Plasti-juice went completely spoilt."
Tala looked away and Black was the one to offer her comfort, instead of Lupin. It was a Clan issue. Lupin knew that.
Starch's eyes wandered back to the male and female on the bed and he leaned against the doorframe. "Psychologically it's like growing up with a conjoined twin, and after growing to maturity together, separating them. It's just not done. Each mind becomes too dependent on the other being always there."
Lenore silently held her hand out to him and Starch drew himself away from the door to join her and Tala in prayer.
Starch heard the rhythm of Severus' heartbeat change to a slower, quieter pace than was right for a Human. When he rose to check on Severus, Tala followed, her heightened Were senses had been trained on the same pulse.
"The tears are just the last of the Plasti-juice being flushed from their systems," Starch informed Tala.
As he awoke the male, moved with spasmodic twitches as though startled by every touch of linen and silk.
Starch held himself back long enough to gather gauzes and a bowl of cleanser, then he began to remove the traces of the long dead Snape twins from the male and female's cheeks.
Tala came to herself suddenly and gasped. "Benefit!" she cried.
Starch spared her a glance, then realized what she meant. Pulling down the blanket and opening Severus' shirt he quickly revealed the tattoo like form that the pet Paramorph took when it was resting. The creature was covered in oozing black sludge. At Starch's familiar touch it struggled to raise itself from Severus' skin.
Tala stepped forward and gently cradled the weaken dragon-like animal close to her chest, regardless of the damage being done to her shirt. "She has one too, very young. It's probably around her ankle or upper arm." When Starch found and removed the smaller Paramorph from the female's skin Tala took them both out to the sitting room.
Starch returned to cleaning and preventing Severus from hurting himself.
The male clutched the female tight to himself as he came awake. "B-bloc-"
"Blocker," the female spoke for him.
Starch stilled his motions. "Oh, Little One," he shook his head, "You know I can't do that for you."
"M-make the Empty quiet," he insisted. He was jerking about with more obvious control, but still he was unable to move with his usual grace.
"No, shhhh," Starch touched Severus' hair, trying to get his attention. "No, listen to me." Severus forced his eyes to obey and meet Starch's gaze. "The Light will take the emptiness, just give it over to the Light."
"C-can't f-feel it," he stuttered back.
"Then know it." Starch placed his cool hand on Severus' cheek. "If your heart can't feel it then know it with your mind. Set your will to acting in your knowledge of it and the Light will be with you."
Severus closed his eyes and slowly his tremors subsided, he stopped twitching in reaction to the touch of the fabric of the blanket and pillows. Opening his eyes Severus relaxed his hold on the female. "We are going to battle." His voice was a little strained, but he did not stutter,
The female hesitantly rose and stood with her hand still touching the male's, but ready to leave. "We need to get dressed and call the House." He nodded and released her hand. The female left, a little unsteady, but under control.
"Benefit?" He asked softly.
"Tala and Lupin are taking care of Benefit and Merrit," Starch soothed.
"I have to get dressed." He pulled himself upright with difficulty. "The battle will start soon."
"What do you mean?" Starch helped him to rise and steadied him for a moment.
"The horses," Severus enigmatically replied. He moved toward the chest of drawers but continued to rely on Starch for some support. "What do you think the horses are for?"
Starch answered readily. "You said they were for the coming conflict."
Severus triggered a manual lever hidden within the serpentine scrollwork of the bureau. A secret compartment opened and he reached in, pulling out his Skinlette and Harness. "Voldemort can not afford to wait for us to recover. He must strike soon or risk encountering us on the field."
"He means to come himself then?" Starch questioned.
The clothes, as the male took them off and dropped them to the floor, made wet sounds as they hit the stones. "The Death Eaters will not face the great Albus Dumbledore and Auror Alastor Moody without his being present. And he cannot afford to wait and plan too much or we will have time to heal. So he will come today or tonight."
"What would you have me do?" Starch asked when Severus was done and standing on his own.
"Get the horses." He tested his balance a little, walking a straight line toe to heel. "And make sure Pomfrey doesn't actually allow her prejudice against Slytherin to cloud her judgment enough so she makes a mistake she will regret." The Vampire understood the unasked plea to take care of the children under his care.
The male and female met again in their sitting room. They ignored the others present, even Tala and Lupin who were working at the table to clean the Paramorphs.
The male stopped at the door and tilted his head so that he could see a little over one shoulder. "Black, get Potter to the lake."
Together the Garoms soundlessly moved down the hall, ascended the staircase, and entered the Dining Hall. The noise and commotion ended abruptly at their appearance. As they passed the Head Table Albus half rose but resumed his seat when it was obvious that both were not going to acknowledge him. They stopped when they stood in front of the middle of the Head Table.
"Slytherin, to your Common Room." The male announced.
As one the entire House placed their goblets, forks, serving spoons, everything in its place on the table. They pushed their chairs back and rose. In a double line they exited the Hall. The Garoms were the last of their House to leave.
Sirius made it into the Hall just as the Garoms were leaving. He rushed, unnoticed, to Harry's side and grabbed his godson's sleeve. "Harry," he whispered, "Trust me, just do this and ask later. I need to take you some where else, and there isn't time to explain."
"He's coming, isn't he?" Harry dully asked as he rose at Sirius' urging. "Voldemort, I mean, he's coming."
Without answering Sirius half dragged him from the Hall, moments before everyone began to realize that something very bad was happening, and panicked. As they reached the stairs Harry came to his senses enough to run down them without falling.
The male cast a fog-haloed blue gaze back to make sure his Mark was following orders, then he crossed the invisible barrier that guarded the entrance to Slytherin Common Room.
The Slytherin students were arranged into companies, each Year having four, with a leader chosen for each company, and an overall leader for each separate Year.
"First and Second years," he began. "You will remain within the dungeons and act as the last defence. Third and Fourth Years. You are to remain above. Make sure that the Inter-House Operatives get their respective Houses down to the dungeons. Then remain above in the event that the upper portion of the school is taken. Any that pass you will be faced by your lower classmen. Go."
Looking over the remaining students, Fifth to Seventh Years, children still, he drew a slow breath before addressing them. "You will be facing your fathers and brothers, your uncles and cousins. You must remember; your heritages- your blood lines, mean nothing. Only the right or the wrong of your cause matters. They will kill. You will kill. They will not offer you a chance to surrender and if they should win, you will not be killed quickly. I think that's all. Lets go."