She walked about the house, feeling a new sense of happiness at being there.
Before she had always viewed this home as Snape's but now he might not ever come back to live in it... and she would be the poor widow left with his meager fortune. That was no matter. She could re-marry, and she would not have broken the bond her family had set in the marriage.
She knew they had no emotional attachment to him, and had only been interested in seeing her married off to a well respected pureblood, and to make it better, he was favored by the Dark Lord himself. She had always hated him, and he had known it every day he had been around her.
His humiliation had been a great triumph for her when she had refused him on their wedding night, and had even refused to be in the same room with him. He had never tried again after that night.
The Snape family line would end with him.
She immediately began to examine the living room, knowing that soon she would be able to erase every trace of his existence in the house. She would be able to start all over again. No one to answer to, no more piercing black eyes and sharp tongue. She would be able to find a man who could love her, and who she could love in return.
She walked up the flight of stares, and headed for her bedroom, when she passed by his.
She stopped in front of it and stared at the door. She knew that he probably kept it locked at all times, but she had never found out. She had never had a reason to step foot in his room. Something in her decided to go inside, and see what exactly he had left in there. Surely all his
important things were still at the school, since he had not even come home for the end of term.
She crept up to the door and slowly turned the handle, which surprisingly opened. She raised an eyebrow, wondering why he would make such a careless mistake... or maybe he had assumed that she would never go in there.
She slowly opened the door and shuffled into the room. The room was dark, and the heavy dark curtains were drawn tightly shut, so as not to allow any sort of light to enter.
"He lives like a vampire." she chuckled to herself.
The room was one of the most under decorated rooms in the house. A four poster bed was in the middle of the room. In the corner there was a bookshelf that only had a few leather-bound books sitting on its shelves.
Next to the bed there was a small black nightstand with an aged lunar almanac laying on its side.
Anaxarete walked over to the nightstand and reached for the serpent headed knob on the drawer.
She opened it and peered into it. There was a small black leather book sitting in the bottom of the drawer.
She reached in and drew it up, but as she lifted it out into the open, something fell out from between the pages.
She wrinkled her brow, and reached down into the drawer.
It was a photo from their wedding. She studied the picture with a look of disgust. She looked absolutely as miserable
in the picture as she had felt that day. He was also in the picture, but he kept looking away from her to something happening out of the frame.
She opened up the small book and saw that there were dry rose petals preserved between the pages.
They had been the ones that had been at the ceremony. They were now shriveled and dried up, lacking any of their former beauty... just like their marriage.
She quickly shoved the picture back into the book and threw it back into the drawer. She began to feel that she had been in this room far too long... it
reminded her too much of him. Cold, dark and empty.
She quickly made her way out of the room and locked the door. She would not be going back in there ever again.
