A/N: Hello Everyone!
A thousand pardons for the unusually long wait; this chapter proved to more difficult to conceive then I had originally thought. Life has been most beastly as of late; school has been filling my spare moments with hydras of education. Just when I think that I have managed to vanquish the hydra's head known as homework, two more spring forth...(sigh) such is my plight.
Life has also taken to showering this story with complications. Little do you know of the series of misfortunes that have befallen this chapter. Bear with me as I elaborate. The first version of this chapter (one of three), was saved onto a diskette, which my roommate promptly used as a coaster, thus effectively ending its literary life. Not one to be but off by this sort of minor set back, I went off in search of a computer, in the hopes of creating version two. As I was writing version 2, using a computer at my local public library, there was a power outage-and another version fell to another unseen complication. Somewhat disheartened by this unforeseeable accident, but nonetheless determined to write this chapter, I took to writing it by hand-to avoid any other technological accidents. This version too fell prey to another "accident", one that came in the form of hot coffee in a cafe. By this point it occurred to me that the fates did not want this chapter to come to be. I do hope I have made the right decision in releasing this cursed chapter to you and I hope that this exposition has earned me a pardon from my faithful readers-I do apologize profusely for keeping you all waiting.
Please bear with me just a mite longer, I would just like to quickly thank my lovely readers-those who have reviewed chapter 23 and those who have not:
Titou Moony:-p: Thank you for reviewing chapter 23, I do hope you enjoy chapter 24!
EyesofEmerald: You are truly too kind! Really you are! I do believe you've made me blush! :)
The Grim: I do hope this will appease you, oh great Grim of literary brilliance! I am truly flattered that you took time out of your busy life to review chapter 23!
angelriseng85: Thank you for the lovely compliments. I daresay, that you are too generous! But nonetheless, I appreciate them greatly! I am sorry that I've confused you...(sigh) tis the Bain of my poor literary skills.
Neoma: Goodness! So many questions! Now, in regards to the book, Remotis Arbitris, I can safely say without giving too much away that it was not written by Remus. At this time, I am sorry to say that I cannot answer any of your other questions; just know that all will be revealed in due time. Thank you for reviewing and for continuing to grace me with such kind words.
pirate grlEe: Thank you kindly for reviewing chapter 23. And just a quick note, I wouldn't count Severus out just yet if I were you;)
This Parrot has ceased to be: "Better than chocolate"? Goodness! I would have never thought that anything could possibly be better then chocolate! Perhaps you mean the other brown substance...the less pleasant of brown substances...but nonetheless, I thank you for your review and for continuing to review.
Aerandir: Thank you so much for the compliments! It's readers like you that keep me writing:)
Astarael-Undomiel: I suppose that all writers fall prey to doubt every once and a while...but for psuedo-writers, such as myself, it is just a way of life; we hide in the guise of words and hope that no one will notice our poorly strung prose. I constantly find myself wondering if I am worthy of posting my works along side the brilliance of the other writers on this board. I am flattered by your kind words and I do apologize for keeping you waiting. I do hope this chapter will make amends for the unusually long wait.
Permanent: Thank you! I do hope you'll enjoy this chapter:)
Riaelfgirl : I feel absolutely terrible to have kept you (as well as my other long-time readers) waiting. You are too kind with your words and I've always thought that my mental lexicon was rather limited, but I thank you nonetheless for the compliment!
Chantal J: Thank you, Thank you! I'm sorry that you've had to wait such a long time for this particular chapter.
elvesmagic010: There is no need to apologize; I'm elated to just know you're reading my story. I do hope that you will enjoy this chapter. And once again, thank you for reviewing.
wotchertonks: Apologizes are not necessary. I am truly touched that you have taken time out of your busy schedule to read and review my story. Thank you; a thousand times: thank you!
Subtly Cynical Kitsune: Thank you for the kind words! I am flattered that you would bestow them upon me, as I think that you are a brilliant writer-far, far, better a writer then myself. Once again, thank you.
Dark Vampiresss: Thank you for reviewing chapter 23! I do believe you will find Severus in this chapter-as requested. I do hope that you will enjoy this chapter. Once again, thank you for reviewing and for continuing to do so.
Kani: Welcome to my little story! I'm sorry to have kept you waiting! I do hope you'll enjoy this chapter. And thank you for reading and reviewing:)
Lady Rheena: Goodness! You are too kind! Your words carry beauty, as well-they are eloquent in their simplicity and lovely in their nature. Thank you for sharing them with me:)
Nerfi-Tiri: Welocome to my meager story! Thank you for the lovely compliments. I do hope that you will enjoy this chapter and that you will continue to read and review. And once again, I do apologize for the lateness of my update.
danfan14: Welcome back! I was so worried that you had lost interest in my story...that it had grown stale. I thank you kindly for reading and reviewing and for putting my worries to rest.
I would just like to quickly welcome the following new readers to my story (though I doubt that they have gotten to this chapter yet, I would like this thank you to be here when they arrive at this point):
Packed Flowers
Huor Elendril
Calixte Taylor
micartne
Thank you one and all for reading and reviewing my story! Words cannot express how much your reviews mean to me. Please keep this story alive...please keep me writing by submitting a review-even if it is just to let me know that you are reading.
One final note, this chapter is in a rather raw form-much like past chapters. I do hope that you will forgive any mechanical errors that you should stumble upon.
Again, thank you,
Ninde Annare
Chapter 24:
This moment...
This simple gesture...
This feeling...
This thought...
To put them into words...
To grant them immortality through the guise of ink would require me to bleed every last drop from not only my quill but also from my very soul. My world has become engulfed in the beauty of Remus' presence...lost in a haze...a mist of the unknown.... It is a primal redolence that fogs my thoughts-a deadly scent that sends my mind reeling. Beneath the delicious aroma of Remus' velvety skin lies the aesthetic allure of a beastly bouquet-a feral fragrance. I can feel my heart race in its wake; spurred on by the lusty scent. A purr threatens to slip forth from my lips...a sensual answer to the untamed howl of Eros. A shameful cry; and yet, it is but a quavering note amongst a diapason of longings.
Our hands are intertwined in a seductively innocent embrace. His palm is warm and soft against my skin; my hand seems to tingle in its wake. Perhaps it is the fact that it is so innocent, so unassuming, that makes his touch so bewitching. He gently strokes my hand with his thumb; unknowingly sending me into deeper fits of intoxication.
My mind scrambles to find words that would properly convey this sensation-I want to remember this moment always.... The quiver in my steps; the warmth of his touch; the feeling of utter contentment...I want to remember my...
...Descent into humanity....
That's it...
...That's what Remus does to me....
He makes me human.
The very thought disgusts me...the thought of being frail...of being weak... of wanting something that you cannot provide for yourself...of needing someone. The whole concept is appalling to my nature. It is like a poison that has stripped me of my essence rendering me mortal; leaving me wanting.
Have you lost all reason?
Have you lost all logic?
Have you taken leave of your senses?
If only that were the case, if only I could take leave of my senses, for they are what have led me astray. They have allowed me to fall into this trap of humanity, into this emotional drain. They have tricked me into following them willingly, hiding the true face of mortality under their cloaks of falsehood.
My limbs harden in the biting frost of my ambivalence...of my surfeit-quickly sucking the softness of mortality from them. Sensing the rigidity of my hand, Remus tilts his head quizzically towards me. His eyes fall upon the clasp that binds us, upon our twisted fingers. With a nervous smile mingling amongst his words, he says softly, "Sorry...." Releasing my hand, he quickly wipes it down the side of his tattered robes. "My hands always get a tad...um...clammy when I'm all..." He blushes a lovely shade of pink as he struggles with his words, "nerves...just a tad nervous..." Remus smiles feebly at his clumsy attempt at exposition, gently biting back the pout of his lower lip. In that instant he seemed to glow with not only rapidly reddening skin but with innocence as well. And in the wake of this radiance, the frost of my immortality and indifference deliquesced-once again, leaving me exposed.
I feel so lost...so lost in my own mind...my thoughts are so unclear...
...Everything is but a blur...a haze...
Except for you...
...Remus...
Dear Remus...
For you, I would fall...
...For you I would tear open old wounds...
...Risk burning them with the acid of my broken tears...
For you...
How foolish you sound...
Like an invalid calling to the Gods for a dream...
...A fickled hope...
Is it worth tearing down your defenses?
Is it worth giving up all you've become?
All that has made you strong?
Just for this passing moment of infatuation...
Is it worth risking the pain to feel again?
These wounds of the past will never heal if you keep opening them in these pitiful attempts to find something that may not even exist...
...This coloured bird of paradise...
...This fowl of love...
Remus continues to walk silently by my side, unaware of the carnage of my thoughts. He seems to be lost in his own world-preoccupied by what appears to be doubt. Perhaps his soul carries gashes of time as well; wounds that refuse to heal, that loom over him casting doubt upon all his actions. Quietly, he whispers to himself, "Dumbledore knows about the Whomping Willow...But does he know that Black's a...." His musings fall on my deaf ears as the inquisition of my bewitched mind pulls me back into the depths of my uncertainty...as I slowly drown in a swirl of queries that scream above the silence of the halls.... as reality begins to settle around us.
Your love can never be...
You are creatures of different times...
You are dead...time has stopped for you...frozen forever...
While he continues to breathe...to live...to move in its flow...
Can you bear to part with him when the flow of his time stops?
Can you bear to watch as time ravages his body?
My pace begins to slow as the weight of my thoughts crush the swiftness of my steps. For a moment my vision flickers as though black moths have been placed over my eyes-fluttering their delicate wings of poisonous scales. The silence of the corridor begins to ebb away, as the massive doors of the Great Hall come into view. Bombarded by random snippets of conversation, my thoughts begin to waver and secede.
The professors have amassed and are chattering amongst themselves, waiting impatiently for the Headmaster's oration to begin. Blanketed in his own doubt-filled wraiths, Remus is soon engulfed by the dark cloth waves of the professors' robes.
I watch as Professor Dumbledore makes his way into the centre of the crowd; with a wave of his wand he conjures up a soapbox. Casually flipping it over, he perches atop its crumbling wooden frame. Standing at the flank of the congregation, with baited breath, I wait in the shadow of a statue for the Headmaster to begin his oration.
Those beyond my inner circle do not know of my existence. To them I am merely a legend...a ghost story that lives only in the fabric of their imaginations-an illusion I am more then willing to entertain. For if they were to know of my presence, panic would undoubtedly ensue.
My eyes, upon their own accord, search for Remus' lithe form amongst the sea of strangers. He stands just an arm's length from me. I bask in his shadow, admiring his allure. My left hand, addicted to the sensuous feeling of his body, reaches out to touch his broad shoulders. Tentatively it haunts his sybaritic frame-harrowed by carnal desires. I can feel the heat of his skin upon the palm of my hand as it hovers just inches away from its quarry. Suddenly an icy claw latches onto my wrist and pulls me aside.
I pull against the offending manacle-like manus. In that brief moment of struggle, the crumpled fangs of my brooch have managed to sink their sharpened tips into his forearm. They bite into him-tearing through his robes...through his skin.... He winces from the laceration but does not relinquish his grasp. Bringing his left hand to the wound, he stops the flow of blood; but it is too late, a metallic aura has already taken form. The bittersweet scent of his blood pours into my vampiric lungs-they hunger for its fragrance.
"Kaida!" Severus' voice is soft, allowing the deadly tone of his timbre to wash over me in beautifully terrifying manner. His face is flushed with a sickly blush. His skin is moist with mortal dew.
In an apologetic tone, I whisper, "Severus?! Is something the matter?" I fight to maintain a steady voice-the metallic aroma of his blood causing a crescendo of hunger to rise inside my depths. His blood continues to bloom upon his robes-a crimson sheen upon dull ebony.
He clutches me to him as he steers me away from the throng of professors, and into the umbrage of the stairs. His touch sends a shiver down my spine, like a gelid athame pressed to my heart. There is no warmth in his embrace; it is cold and vice-like-an eerie cage. And yet this fear is soothing in its nature...this fear that courses through me. There is solace in this familiar terrain-in this unlikely sanctuary. I swoon in the wake of the pungent aroma of his dark essence...in the wake of a frightened arousal.
I press my palms to his chest, in a desperate attempt to distance myself from his awkward coll...from the sickly sweetness of his blood. I can feel his erratic heart beat furiously against the confines of its bony prison. A beastly voice buried deep within my mind calls for me to wrap my claws around it...to tear it from him...to suckle upon its fibrous form...to drain it of life....
Give unto me your inhibitions...
Follow me into the darkness...
Into the realm of flesh...
And blood...
"How could you be so foolish?!" His words pull me from the lusty thirst of my thoughts. I look deeply into the hallow of his eyes; I try to mask their lustful gaze with a look of would-be confusion. "I found the robes...." The hungry flame that only moments ago burned inside me, now flickers and flatters in the wake of my panic...my fear...my asylum...
His breath is irregular; coming in waves of random gasps. Holding me at an arm's length, he studies me-his piceous eyes blanketing my body in a ghastly shroud. I shudder at his icy touch, at his edacious gaze. My trembling form seems to escape his notice as he pushes me against the chill of stony wall.
A soft cry passes over my lips as the biting ridges of the stone sink their dulled talons into my body. With arms at either side of me-barring me from the view of all that surrounds me, rendering me invisible, he continues, "What if someone saw you? All these years of secrecy and stealth would have been for nothing! What would possess you to take such foolhardy risk?" The soft hiss of his words resounds in my mind, as my body continues to tremble. "Could you not have waited for me in my office? I am flattered that you would take such risks to find me...but it would not have been worth being seen for."
"...To find me"?
With a sigh, he whispers in an unnaturally tender timbre, "Have you forgotten what they do to...to your kind?" His hold upon my shoulders tightens, as puce contusions effloresce in their wake. And yet, my mind is drawn to only one thing...above all the panic...above all the pain...above all the confusion, hangs the scent of his blood as it drips onto the cool marble floors. I can almost hear the hiss of the blood as the frost of the ground cools its fevered droplets. I hunger for this Mortal claret.... His left hand is smeared with his own essence; I long to run my tongue across their pallid surface...to lick them clean of the lovely elixir.... My body begins to convulse with not only my longings but also with disgust-disgust at my feral desires.
The low murmur of the Headmaster's words fill the cavernous void-the soft rhythm of his utterances, once the labored heartbeat of this assembly begins to wane until finally it dies. There is a moment of silence. I can feel Severus' ragged breath upon my face as I watch his darkened eyes dart from side to side.
Pulling me back into the snare of his arms he leans into the wall-shielding my trembling form from the eyes of the passersby. I feel his weight upon me and stifle a scream. It sickens me in a way I could have never fathomed, the feeling of his body upon me; the sensuous feel of his delicious heart upon the ice of my own, sends my insides writhing with a virile disgust. The sound of hundreds of hurried steps echoing through the hall almost escapes my keen ears, for the sound of my own erratic thoughts seem to drown out their cries.
Deliciously sweet...
Seductively warm...
You long to partake of his blood...
To drink...
To quell you thirst...
No...
Deny it now longer...surrender to your desires...
Never...I will never surrender to you...I will fight you until my last breath...
Then it won't be long...
It won't be long until you are mine...
Until you become what you have always been meant to be...
Desperately, I search the room for some form of distraction...something to draw my attention from the agony of my thoughts.... My eyes flutter from one thing to the next-the gray of my surroundings does little to ward off my mind's grotesque colloquy. Finally they fall upon Severus' throat. I can see a tendril of reddened skin creep up over the tight collar of Severus' robes. It twists and turns, grows and burns, until finally his face displays its blooms in the form of a crimson glow. The hall grows silent once again. With the corridor now devoid of treacherous eyes, Severus releases me from his clutches. Stepping back, he pauses-the silvery glint of my brooch lures his gaze to me...the esurience call of my eyes ensnares his attention. A look of bemused pleasure washes over him, as his obsidian eyes flicker with the smoldering remains to his timidity.
Gently, with trembling fingers he reaches forth to stroke my flushed lips. His finger has been coated in his own blood. Tantalizingly close to my ardent mouth, it forces my lips open with an unseen sinew.
My name lingers on his lips; he thrusts it forth with a silky moan, "Kaida..."
The sultry sonance of his voice coupled with the heady scent of his blood, slowly tear at my inhibitions; carefully severing the thin threads that tie the logic of my mind to my unruly body. And slowly but surely my body forsakes my mind; surrendering its will to its unnatural instincts-mesmerized by the promise of blood.
What am I doing?
It's the blood...you hunger for it...
I can't do this...I can't drink of Severus...
Why not? He would make a most wonderful Lover...Drink of him and seal your fate...
No!
He was made for you. Perfectly suited to you.
A dark, tainted soul-not unlike your own.
Come now, drink from him...he longs for you to do so....
Drink...
Drain him of his mortality...
Fill him with your darkness...
And make him yours forever...
I force my eyes closed, shielding them from the dalliance of his blood...of his bait. A searing pain fills my chest. The hunger tears at my insides, as it claws desperately, trying to escape the caverns of my dead heart. This darkness within me is filled with animalistic desires...filled with corrupt longings.... It covets destruction and death...but above all it covets gratification. It is a siren's song...and yet, I refuse to yield to its grotesque demands, to surrender my mind to its perverse call.
"Urr...Professor Snape, Sir?" My eyes flutter open at the gentle rumble of Hagrid's voice.
"What is it that you want, Hagrid?" His words escape in a low hiss-spitting out Hagrid's name with venomous annoyance.
"If it isn't ter much trouble, the Headmaster would like a word with you."
With shifty eyes, he weighs his options and defeated he snaps, "Very well." Frustration hangs heavily upon his words. A low growl emanates from his throat, as he releases me into the calm of the silent sepulcher. He turns to follow Hagrid. Suddenly my hand darts forward, catching his wrist just as he is about to turn his back to me. A look of surprise quickly melts into intrigue as he whispers my name, "Kaida?"
No, I will not allow this to continue...
Silly child...
Has it not occured to you that you no longer have a say in the matter?
I pull back the black velvet of his sleeve to expose the sallow skin of his forearm's underbelly. A sanguinary slash sits enticingly upon his pallid flesh. My free hand snakes into his robe, over his heart, to nestle in his breast pocket. Slowly, almost seductive in its movements, it extracts an emerald kerchief-a gift that I had given him. It still carries my scent.
A moan catches in his throat as its verdigris form slithers over his chest. With rancorously slow movements, I tie it around his wound-sealing it with a swift pull of its cloth ends. He draws his breath through gritted teeth-pleasantly surprised by my aggressive aide. Blushing at his own arousal, he takes my hand, bringing it to his mouth he whispers, "Thank you..." In an act reminisant of chivalry, he brushes his parched lips upon my hand, "My Lady..."
The scent of his sickly sweetness evanesces and with it, it takes the haze that clouded my judgment. With the source of my torment sealed, I indulge him in his game, "The pleasure was mine, Dark Sir." Curtsying, I deliver the coup de grace and for the moment, defeated my demons.
A/N: Now that your literary thirsts have been quelled, I would like to deliver some most unfortunate news. My computer, who has been in the shoppe for the last little while, has taken a turn for the worse...to be exact, it is no more. A power surge has delivered the final blow to my ancient laptop and thus ended its 'life'. I will do my best to post as soon as possible...I cannot at this time give you a definite time as to when that will be but know that I will never stop writing this story...I won't give up on it...and I hope that you won't either. I will do my best to live up to all your kind compliments and praises, so please be patient, for I will post. Promise.
Ninde Annare
P.S. For those of you, who would like to be notified by email when I post my next chapter, please include your email address in your review or email me directly.