Disclaimer:
Obviously the characters aren't mine or this would be a book rather than a fanfic ;) I'm not making a Knut out of this!
Chapter II
Fateful Meetings
Severus shivered against the piercing cold wind that blew through his torn cloak. Giving himself a swift mental shake, he cautiously swept the cloaked and masked figures around him with a quick, measuring glance. Thankfully, no-one seemed to have noticed his momentary lapse. Everybody was preoccupied with putting up their own façade of strength.
'Merlin, that was close!' Severus thought, resisting the urge to heave a deep sigh of relief. With the strong wind howling over the graveyard it would have gone unnoticed, however, that hadn't been Snape's primary concern in this case.
His throat and lungs were giving him a lot of trouble at the moment. Breathing was still quite difficult, even though he was no longer anywhere near the hot air and thick smoke of the orphanage the Dark Lord had ordered his Death Eaters to burn. Why he'd been so adamant to destroy it, along with all the Muggle children that lived there, Severus didn't know. Though he did suspect that this last mission was, like many others before, strongly related to Tom Riddle's past.
'That's just pathetic! And He calls Himself a Lord.'
The distance between Severus and the orphanage did nothing to quell the churning of his stomach. 'Not now, damn it! Not now!' He thought frantically as bile rose in his throat. Severus tried desperately to drive away the horrid images, the screams… He kept his mouth firmly shut, even though he was close to blacking out. Snape's head seemed to be on the verge of exploding as every next rush of blood increased the intensity of the pain and nausea.
"I am greatly disappointed in you, my loyal Death Eaters." Lord Voldemort's hissing voice broke in on Severus' thoughts.
Cold dread replaced all coherent thought. 'He knows! He suspects!' Severus momentarily panicked. Fresh sweat drenched his entire body. The icy wind blew harder, the freezing air on his clammy skin instantly helping clear the fog that had settled over his mind. 'Impossible. If He even suspected my disloyalty, I'd already be dead or tortured, with a death sentence hanging over my miserable head. Get a grip on yourself, Severus, not everything's about you! Our Master is just getting increasingly paranoid!' Severus sneered inwardly.
Sufficiently calmed, Snape cleared his mind of any excess thought and information. If someone could look underneath the Death Eater mask he was wearing, they'd see that his features were schooled to a look of humility and submission. It almost caused him excruciating, physical pain to swallow his pride during these gatherings.
Having ascertained that he wasn't in an immediate danger of being exposed as a spy, Severus took a moment to examine his physical and medical condition.
'My nausea and headache are probably more due to carbon monoxide than anything else. I've seen death countless times, it shouldn't affect me like this anymore. I've caused it often enough. Besides, there was nothing more I could have done for those kids. I'd managed to save more of them than even I thought possible…'
His black eyes followed the purposeful movement of his Master… former Master.
The Dark Lord had entered the large circle His Death Eaters were forming and was making His way along the ranks of His cloaked followers. The Inner Circle, thoroughly depleted after the fiasco at the Ministry of Magic last June, stood on the inside of the larger circle made out of Death Eaters of lower status. The Dark Lord always examined and questioned the Inner Circle last.
'One of the few things a person can be certain of in His service. The Dark Lord always follows protocol.'
Severus grimaced in a mixture of disgust and contempt as a Junior Member of the Outer Circle fell to the ground with a series of blood curdling screams. He couldn't help but feel proud of his position in the Inner Circle. 'To be on the same level as that trash… Unthinkable!'
At the same time, Voldemort lifted the Cruciatus Curse off the youth. His mask had slipped from his thin, tanned face during his mad thrashing in the dirt. There were tears in his huge, blue eyes.
'Pathetic! Even though he's still just a kid as far as I'm concerned.' Severus looked on in distaste. 'As long as His new recruits are like this guy the Light stands a better chance at winning this war.' He smirked behind his mask, but a brief pain gripped his heart as Snape recognised the boy as a former Slytherin who'd graduated only the year before. He'd been a very bright student, exceptionally so. He could have easily chosen another career. 'At least he could have, if he hadn't been a Slytherin or if he'd had ties to people of great influence in the Ministry.' Severus thought bitterly. 'A bookworm, I don't think he'd ever had a fight with a member of another House, much less his own. He usually kept in the dark but his Housemates liked him nonetheless. And that certainly means a lot. Anthony Drake. No parents, raised in an orphanage, comes from a pure-blooded family that has died out from in-breeding. Merlin what irony! The last hope of a family, whose ancestors reach back as far as King Arthur, grovelling at the feet of a Half-blooded upstart!'
Severus gave himself the second mental shake this night. 'Thoughts like this are suicide!' He chided. 'Carbon monoxide, that's what it is. I'm on the verge of losing consciousness and here I am, forced to stand in this freak cold! How am I supposed to pay attention anyway?'
Meanwhile, Voldemort had made His way to the centre of the IC.
"The Inner Circle shall stay. The rest of you are dismissed! Get out of my sight!"
'Quality time with the Dark Lord, just what I needed.' Severus thought bitterly. He couldn't help but feel worried. Spending any amount of time in the Dark Lord's presence was a terrible hazard, at all times and under any given circumstances. Severus was very much aware of the difficulty he seemed to have with concentrating.
It wasn't normal for his thoughts to wander from the situation at hand. He was supposed to gather information. It was his responsibility to stay alert at all times. It was even more than a responsibility – it was a necessity. If he let his defences down – he would be dead. As simple as that.
The sense of guilt and regret in regard to that Junior Death Eater was certainly out of place, as was his inner narrative of what was going on around him.
Automatically, Severus followed his fellow Death Eaters towards Riddle's house. Usually, he would have used this opportunity to study his companions and listen in on their conversations. As responsible as he was, Snape's heart wasn't in it tonight.
Putting one foot in front of the other and keeping his head from drooping was all he managed to accomplish.
Severus tried taking deeper breaths – he needed air, even if it was cold and even if it hurt like Hell to breathe. On top of him nearly suffocating, some debris had fallen on him while he'd been trying to shield a group of small children from the all-consuming flames. He'd cast a protective charm over himself earlier, but its effectiveness was limited to preventing him from catching fire and getting burnt. His cloak, on the other hand, was torn in many places and there were multiple lacerations all over his body. He was fairly certain that his ribs weren't broken or cracked, but they were definitely badly bruised.
Listing his injuries was difficult enough. The splitting headache wasn't easing at all. Even thinking was painful.
'What is wrong with me? I've been in a worse state on many occasions and I hadn't had this sort of trouble concentrating.'
Severus nearly moaned aloud as he stumbled on one of the steps leading to Riddle's residence. He managed to catch himself on the wall.
Snape hadn't noticed it before, but he'd been lagging behind. There was no-one else behind him. Grateful for this fact, the tall man leaned against the hard, rough stones behind his back. Under the hideous white mask charcoal eyes closed tiredly.
He only had a few seconds; he shouldn't be allowing himself to seek comfort here at all. Unfortunately, it was one thing to be able to rationally analyse the situation and come to these obvious conclusions, yet to force his traitorous body to cooperate was an entire different story.
Luckily enough, Severus had always been careful not to develop too many habits while he was amongst the Death eaters. His position was precarious enough for him to be extra careful in everything he did.
If, for instance, his colleagues got used to him being at the front of the group, or in the middle, or near the end – then that is where he would always have to be, especially now that Voldemort truly was getting more and more paranoid. Severus shifted his position randomly in order to remain inconspicuous.
Lucius Malfoy, arrogant as he was, always kept to the front. As did Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange.
Severus often accompanied his friend in the first line, but with Lucius still locked away by the Ministry, there was no point suffering the Lestranges' company. The hostility between him and Bellatrix was common knowledge to the IC and the Dark Lord, so that gave Severus a plausible explanation.
It wasn't uncommon for him to stay a little behind either. He sometimes used the opportunity to contact Dumbledore under the pretence of being engrossed in his latest research. After that, he usually had to actually have something to show Lord Voldemort, but that was something he was always prepared for.
His love for potions had saved his life countless times. The list of poisons he'd developed was unbelievably long. What he liked most about those potions was that he was the only one who could actually make them. They were more than ten times more complex than Wolfsbane and that was saying a lot. It stroked his ego just the right way.
Plus, from a moral and ethical point of view, the complexity of his poisons made them quite harmless to society. While he was the Dark Lord's personal brewer, it was expected of him to produce poisons on a regular basis, but it didn't matter whether these poisons were new ones he'd researched, or old ones. They were used just the same. The fact that the arsenal was rapidly growing didn't change anything, as long as he was the only one who had the entirety of it at his disposal.
Even Dumbledore understood this reasoning.
'Dumbledore!' Severus felt as though he'd been awakened from slumber. He whipped his head around. The rest of the Death Eaters were still close by.
It had felt like an eternity.
He wished it had been. Maybe then his body wouldn't feel so heavy and utterly drained.
Severus felt blackness claiming him.
His consciousness screamed for him to fight it… to no avail.
In a last ditch effort to regain control, his mind supplied the memory of the day which had changed his life…
It was a warm, sunny day in October. Hogwarts' students were all on the grounds. Some were studying on the grass, among fallen leaves, while others were simply enjoying themselves. Making the most of what had to be one of the last days of fine weather this year.
A flock of brooms was hovering over the Quidditch pitch. A group of older students was practising transfiguring fallen leaves into rats and sticks into snakes at the edge of the Forbidden Forest.
Students, who looked to be Fourth and Fifth Years, were playing tag by the lake.
First Years were having a wild fight against Second Years, levitating or simply throwing leaves at each other.
All of this was accompanied by laughter and a huge dose of shouting.
Only one person remained unaffected by the wonderful weather and the cheerful atmosphere it seemed to evoke in everyone and everything.
Wearing a heavy, black cloak with the hood covering half of its face and casting the rest in shadow, a tall figure stood just inside the Forbidden Forest – far away from the students attempting their transfigurations.
Hidden from sight by the thicket of trees and bushes, a terrible war was taking place. Terrible, because it would affect many lives. Terrible, due to its personal, internal nature.
Severus Snape, a twenty year old young man of extraordinary intelligence was about to make a life-altering decision.
He'd come here to think. He'd come here because he had doubts. He'd come here, because these doubts were making his life impossible.
Severus kept to the shadows. He felt safe and quite comfortable there. The light of the Sun hurt his eyes, which had grown accustomed to the dark, and it burnt his pale skin too easily for him to be able to enjoy its warmth. These symptoms were the courtesy of his father. He'd kept his son locked in the cellar and dungeon in his castle too often and too long.
Of course, Severus' interest in Potions had paid off. He'd been able to make a special cream to protect his skin from sunburns or to soothe existing ones when he was seven. He hadn't had the opportunity to test any of them until he was ten, though. All of that hadn't really dampened Severus' spirits when it came to spending time outside. As a ten year old, he was allowed to spend two hours, every Saturday and Sunday, on the grounds surrounding his father's castle. Before that, outside excursions used to be a rarity at best.
When Severus' mother was still alive his childhood had been a normal one. He'd been five when all that he knew was changed dramatically. Severus hadn't seen how it had happened, but he'd heard it. His mother and father were having an argument, which, in itself, was entirely normal and very frequent. Snape Senior often used violence in order to "better explain" his views, so Severus hadn't thought much of his mothers screams and cries. He'd felt as scared and achingly helpless as ever, but he'd seen no reason for this particular argument to end differently than they always did.
He'd been wrong.
With that had come the end of Severus' normal, happy childhood.
Even though the light hurt him, Severus was always strongly drawn to it. It reminded him of his mother. His memories had faded over time and only images were left – the clearest, brightest of them all was the image of his mother playing with him outside, in the warm and bright sunshine.
Darkness was something Severus attributed to his father, first and foremost, but also to the Dark Lord. It had never made him truly comfortable. He'd always been afraid of it. He knew now that he'd been wrong when he'd believed the Dark Lord's words when He'd told him that the greatest secrets and the greatest knowledge could only be found in the Dark and through the Dark.
The Light hid as many secrets as the Dark, and there was also just as much knowledge in the Light as there was in the Dark. It was different, true, but it was there.
The Shadows were somewhere in the middle – that's why they felt safe. They were different shades of grey, but there was no true distinction between black and white, Dark and Light, wrong and right, evil and good…
There was a balance there and everything needed balance. The whole world was constructed that way.
Severus knew that he didn't belong to the Light, he couldn't belong to the Light. Yet neither did he belong to the Dark. He couldn't belong to the Dark, if he was afraid of it and hated it with all his heart.
What should he choose?
The Shadows were a good place to hide, to seek refuge, even to live amongst. They were a good place to think, but it was impossible to commit to them. And a commitment was what Severus had to make. A commitment to the Dark, or a commitment to the Light…
A life of endless fear and hate, or a life of endless pain…
The choice was his and it would change his life forever…
Bracing himself, Severus moved past the last row of trees in the Forbidden Forest. With quick, confident strides he made his way towards the Castle of Hogwarts.
He would have his entire life to deal with regrets, he would have the Shadows where he could stay; but, most importantly, he would know where his allegiances lie, even if he knew he couldn't belong there with them.
A/N
I know it sucks, but please, please don't send any Howlers! Reviews are always welcome though, especially those containing an honest critique… Oh! Now I really am scared!
I wasn't sure if I could attribute Severus' raspy voice just to the Haemorrhagia Intra Curse – probably not – plus I had to elaborate on the "rough day" as Severus called it in his letter. I hope I didn't mess it up. This chapter sort of edited itself while I was typing it onto my computer so I had to split it in two. I'll have to rewrite the second part.
Phinea Rogue: Thank you very much for your review! I wasn't really expecting any response so it came as a huge (though very pleasant) surprise! ;D
Internal bleeding wouldn't have taken as long to kill a person, but that's why this Curse was special – it dragged it out as long as possible. The way I see it, the bleeding wasn't proceeding steadily. It lasted a short while, stopped and then started again. That's the point of suffering after all… I'm so cruel! ;)
Flashbacks? Most assuredly! There are also two ways I could possibly go with this story, so sit tight. ;D
Porcelain Prayer: Thank you very much for your review! It meant a lot so I hope to hear from you again.
WeasleyGirl-ca: Thank you very much for your review! I hope to hear form you again because it was very inspiring!
No, I'm not a science student… yet. I hope I'm going to be though. ;D
Well, I am planning to elaborate on those individual reactions, now that I'm probably going to continue, in a large part, thanks to you. ;) I thought it would be a good idea to settle some other things first. Severus' past is a great unknown and since I've decided to create it, I might as well show what I have in mind. Uh oh… maybe I've said too much?
Lilith11: Thank you very much for your review!
I'd like to see him live with the repercussions too! LOL! ;D
As you can see, Severus is not dead… yet. He wasn't even cursed… yet! LOL! Just wait and see. I can technically go either way with this. ;P
Btw it makes me very sad to see those elegant hands of his being almost completely out of order :'( so we should be even. ;P
snarkyroxy: Thank you very much for your review!
WOW! I don't think I really deserve all that praise… correction: I know I don't! Thank you very much! I'll look into that invitation later this week because I've got a lot of studying to do. ;(
I was worried that Snape was totally out of character and that the letter wouldn't be believable even if you take into consideration that he's dying a slow and painful death… You've eased my fears, maybe now I can sleep at night. Oh wait! I won't because I've just sent another chapter to haunt me! ;P
I hope to hear from you again!
Oya: Thank you very much for your review!
I don't know, most people would like him to be saved wouldn't they? Let me sleep on it. ;)
Btw: what's this C2 you wrote about? Sorry, but I really haven't got a clue. I've probably made an idiot out of myself… ;D
lucidity: Thank you very much for your review!
Don't worry, if it doesn't work out well, I'll just remove the next chapters and it'll be a one-shot. ;D
I have three tenses at my disposal, don't I? I don't necessarily have to write about the future. At the moment we're stuck in the present while relieving the past. No harm done to the story, I hope. ;)
You're too kind! I hope you review this chapter too.