Chapter 4
Relief washed over Remus when they finally reached the comfortably worn staffroom with its motley of armchairs clustered around the center table. The table's dark wood was deeply scarred in several places and had certainly caught fire at one point, but managed the regal air of a veteran soldier proudly displaying war wounds.
The core members of the Order were grouped around a plate of fruits and cheeses that graced the far end of the table. Remus had barely a moment to take in the scene before Tonks thrust her garishly colored head in his line of sight.
"Remus, how ya doin' - oof!" She tripped and fell into him. "Sorry - anyway, how was the meeting with the Gloucester Pack leader?"
"Ah, my dear, let's not speak of business tonight," Dumbledore gently intervened. "Everyone is here, so if we could all be seated, the meal can begin." With that he sat in a particularly battered chair. The rest of the Order soon followed suit, and golden plates and goblets sprouted food and drink.
Remus glanced around and found Snape two chairs down on his left, face bone white. Snape ignored his plate of steaming stew and reached out a tapered hand to curl long fingers around his goblet. Even two seats away, Remus could see Snape's hands trembling. For the second time in as many minutes, however, a now pink and green polka dotted head suddenly dominated his view.
"What's up, Lupin? Ya don't look so good." She followed his interrupted gaze and her eyes flashed green and silver when they lighted on the pale slytherin. "Ugh. He doesn't look so good either. As a matter of fact, he looks awful, even by his standards. What's eating him?"
She turned away and a moment later began regailing the table with a story about the capture of one young Death Eater. "So he says, 'wait a minute, you're an Auror?!' So I said, 'Yeah. You wanna explain that little 'tattoo?'" Remus dutifully laughed along with the rest of the table.
Remus sighed - he knew that Tonks would probably continue talking until the castle fell around their heads. Sirius would say - Sirius.
Remus felt his throat closing with grief, and he took a shuddering breath. Sirius had found the young Auror absolutely hilarious. Remus could almost see Sirius, black hair tucked rakishly behind an ear, flirting outrageously and roaring with laughter at her jokes.
A tear seeped past his control and slid haltingly down his cheek while Tonks continued to chatter. He felt fundamentally alone. No one else seemed to be burdened with the heavy grief that weighed on Remus, grinding down and pressing the essence of his sorrow out through his eyes.
Remus glanced around at the rest of the largely oblivious table until his amber eyes were snared on a pair of onyx ones. Snape gazed steadily at him and sipped at his goblet. The wolf in him lifted his nose and scented the air currents wafting around the room: Snape's cup was filled with gin and...licorice?
A sudden flash of empathy almost forced laughter past his teeth. What would Sirius say about him feeling a connection to slimy Snivellus? The thought of Sirius, with all of his desperation to escape his family and his burning, boiling hate compounded by the deep injustice of his imprisonment, turned the laughter in Remus' mouth into sour bile. He broke off eye contact with Snape.
*********
Snape found his goblet filled with gin and licorice oil. As usual, his thoughts and desires had dictated what appeared on his plate and in his cup, and he had a plate of the thick, glutinous mass that his mother had made through thick and thin and during both feast and famine. It showed up on his plate whenever he was under pressure: when Harry Potter entered his first year at Hogwarts, Snape had received it for two weeks straight.
The frenetic chatter of the Order members grated on his already frayed nerves, and he hunkered down in his chair, letting his hair fall in a curtain before his eyes. He wanted nothing more than to be back down in his cool, peaceful, and above all quiet dungeons, and to feel the painless sting - they say the Killing Curse is painless - of the needle heralding relief from the shadow breathing wetly down his neck.
He took another mouthful of gin and licorice, feeling the burning heat of the alcohol and the soothing coolness of the licorice slide down his throat. The room was beginning to sway again, but the licorice kept his stomach calm and the gin muffled the voices and stifled the memories that blew through his conscious.
*********
Remus forced himself to engage in the conversations of the other Order members. Bill Weasley was telling Dumbledore, Tonks, and Shacklebolt about his latest exploits with the goblins, and Mad-Eye Moody was laughing with Mundungus.
"Take a look at our resident Death Eater, 'Dung. He looks like something's eating ::him,:: doesn't it?" He elbowed Mundungus before turning to confront Snape, who was a few seats down on the other side of the table. "Eaten any death recently, Snape?" Mundungus wheezed a laugh.
"I dunno if'n 'e's bloody well eaten any death, but 'e sure looks like death warmed over t'me!" He chuckled around his pipe.
"Well, he does appear to be trying to wash the taste of something out of his mouth," Moody growled. "Snape, take a word of advice - you can drown your sorrows, but you can't drown your sins!" Snape ignored the old Auror. Now that he had enough gin under his skin, Moody couldn't get under there, too, he mused fuzzily.
Remus turned to try and engage Tonks in a conversation. She was staring at Snape, who looked like he was on the verge of passing out.
When she heard Remus' voice, she turned back to him and twisted her face into a sneer as her nose lengthened and lank black hair fell into coal dark eyes. With an exaggerated wobble she dropped to the table and lay snoring into her cup, and Remus couldn't help but chuckle at the young witch's impression.
She sat back up, her face cheery and her hair spiked purple, and bowed. "I knew I could get you to laugh!" She glanced back at Snape, who took another unsteady swig from his goblet, his hooded eyes unfocussed and his pallor accentuated by a flush across his high cheekbones and hawk like nose. "What's his problem, anyway? He usually doesn't drink that much. I'd ask if what's wrong, but knowing the sort of people he hangs around with..." She left the statement unfinished as dessert bloomed on their plates. "Ooh! Bread pudding!"
*********
The dinner wound down after dessert, and Order members with families began to head home. Moody and Kingsley Shacklebolt were conferring quietly in the overstuffed armchairs facing the crackling fire, its fitful light flickering over the deep craters and ravines of Moody's face and bronzing Shacklebolt's dark visage.
At one end of the long table, Dumbledore and McGonagall had their heads together with Bill Weasley and appeared to be plotting something. At the other end, Snape was snoring softly, head pillowed on his arms and hair flopping over the pitted wood of the table.
Remus sat back in his armchair, feeling vaguely lost. His thoughts began to stray towards Sirius, and in the quiet anonymity of the warm, dark staff room he let the tears fall silently.
Relief washed over Remus when they finally reached the comfortably worn staffroom with its motley of armchairs clustered around the center table. The table's dark wood was deeply scarred in several places and had certainly caught fire at one point, but managed the regal air of a veteran soldier proudly displaying war wounds.
The core members of the Order were grouped around a plate of fruits and cheeses that graced the far end of the table. Remus had barely a moment to take in the scene before Tonks thrust her garishly colored head in his line of sight.
"Remus, how ya doin' - oof!" She tripped and fell into him. "Sorry - anyway, how was the meeting with the Gloucester Pack leader?"
"Ah, my dear, let's not speak of business tonight," Dumbledore gently intervened. "Everyone is here, so if we could all be seated, the meal can begin." With that he sat in a particularly battered chair. The rest of the Order soon followed suit, and golden plates and goblets sprouted food and drink.
Remus glanced around and found Snape two chairs down on his left, face bone white. Snape ignored his plate of steaming stew and reached out a tapered hand to curl long fingers around his goblet. Even two seats away, Remus could see Snape's hands trembling. For the second time in as many minutes, however, a now pink and green polka dotted head suddenly dominated his view.
"What's up, Lupin? Ya don't look so good." She followed his interrupted gaze and her eyes flashed green and silver when they lighted on the pale slytherin. "Ugh. He doesn't look so good either. As a matter of fact, he looks awful, even by his standards. What's eating him?"
She turned away and a moment later began regailing the table with a story about the capture of one young Death Eater. "So he says, 'wait a minute, you're an Auror?!' So I said, 'Yeah. You wanna explain that little 'tattoo?'" Remus dutifully laughed along with the rest of the table.
Remus sighed - he knew that Tonks would probably continue talking until the castle fell around their heads. Sirius would say - Sirius.
Remus felt his throat closing with grief, and he took a shuddering breath. Sirius had found the young Auror absolutely hilarious. Remus could almost see Sirius, black hair tucked rakishly behind an ear, flirting outrageously and roaring with laughter at her jokes.
A tear seeped past his control and slid haltingly down his cheek while Tonks continued to chatter. He felt fundamentally alone. No one else seemed to be burdened with the heavy grief that weighed on Remus, grinding down and pressing the essence of his sorrow out through his eyes.
Remus glanced around at the rest of the largely oblivious table until his amber eyes were snared on a pair of onyx ones. Snape gazed steadily at him and sipped at his goblet. The wolf in him lifted his nose and scented the air currents wafting around the room: Snape's cup was filled with gin and...licorice?
A sudden flash of empathy almost forced laughter past his teeth. What would Sirius say about him feeling a connection to slimy Snivellus? The thought of Sirius, with all of his desperation to escape his family and his burning, boiling hate compounded by the deep injustice of his imprisonment, turned the laughter in Remus' mouth into sour bile. He broke off eye contact with Snape.
*********
Snape found his goblet filled with gin and licorice oil. As usual, his thoughts and desires had dictated what appeared on his plate and in his cup, and he had a plate of the thick, glutinous mass that his mother had made through thick and thin and during both feast and famine. It showed up on his plate whenever he was under pressure: when Harry Potter entered his first year at Hogwarts, Snape had received it for two weeks straight.
The frenetic chatter of the Order members grated on his already frayed nerves, and he hunkered down in his chair, letting his hair fall in a curtain before his eyes. He wanted nothing more than to be back down in his cool, peaceful, and above all quiet dungeons, and to feel the painless sting - they say the Killing Curse is painless - of the needle heralding relief from the shadow breathing wetly down his neck.
He took another mouthful of gin and licorice, feeling the burning heat of the alcohol and the soothing coolness of the licorice slide down his throat. The room was beginning to sway again, but the licorice kept his stomach calm and the gin muffled the voices and stifled the memories that blew through his conscious.
*********
Remus forced himself to engage in the conversations of the other Order members. Bill Weasley was telling Dumbledore, Tonks, and Shacklebolt about his latest exploits with the goblins, and Mad-Eye Moody was laughing with Mundungus.
"Take a look at our resident Death Eater, 'Dung. He looks like something's eating ::him,:: doesn't it?" He elbowed Mundungus before turning to confront Snape, who was a few seats down on the other side of the table. "Eaten any death recently, Snape?" Mundungus wheezed a laugh.
"I dunno if'n 'e's bloody well eaten any death, but 'e sure looks like death warmed over t'me!" He chuckled around his pipe.
"Well, he does appear to be trying to wash the taste of something out of his mouth," Moody growled. "Snape, take a word of advice - you can drown your sorrows, but you can't drown your sins!" Snape ignored the old Auror. Now that he had enough gin under his skin, Moody couldn't get under there, too, he mused fuzzily.
Remus turned to try and engage Tonks in a conversation. She was staring at Snape, who looked like he was on the verge of passing out.
When she heard Remus' voice, she turned back to him and twisted her face into a sneer as her nose lengthened and lank black hair fell into coal dark eyes. With an exaggerated wobble she dropped to the table and lay snoring into her cup, and Remus couldn't help but chuckle at the young witch's impression.
She sat back up, her face cheery and her hair spiked purple, and bowed. "I knew I could get you to laugh!" She glanced back at Snape, who took another unsteady swig from his goblet, his hooded eyes unfocussed and his pallor accentuated by a flush across his high cheekbones and hawk like nose. "What's his problem, anyway? He usually doesn't drink that much. I'd ask if what's wrong, but knowing the sort of people he hangs around with..." She left the statement unfinished as dessert bloomed on their plates. "Ooh! Bread pudding!"
*********
The dinner wound down after dessert, and Order members with families began to head home. Moody and Kingsley Shacklebolt were conferring quietly in the overstuffed armchairs facing the crackling fire, its fitful light flickering over the deep craters and ravines of Moody's face and bronzing Shacklebolt's dark visage.
At one end of the long table, Dumbledore and McGonagall had their heads together with Bill Weasley and appeared to be plotting something. At the other end, Snape was snoring softly, head pillowed on his arms and hair flopping over the pitted wood of the table.
Remus sat back in his armchair, feeling vaguely lost. His thoughts began to stray towards Sirius, and in the quiet anonymity of the warm, dark staff room he let the tears fall silently.