Author's Note: Sorry this chapter's so short. Hopefully they'll get longer in the future. I'm really happy at the moment, because I've passed the 150-page mark, and I'm still going strong. :cheers: If it keeps going like this, though, the Finished Work will be considerably longer than 300 pages.
So – I'd like to thank everyone for their wonderful reviews, and I'd also like to state that feedback is wonderful. (I'm not begging! I swear!) Also, does anyone know of any good Lily/Snape lists that are still, you know, alive? I'm on at least one, but it's dead as a doornail. A little help would be hot. Or, possibly, I could start a Livejournal community of my own – anybody interested in joining, if I do decide to do that?
If you'd like news of updates, you can check out my journal, which is at givemethechild livejournal dot com. (Or go to my author's bio page for a much more convenient link!)
I hope to see a comment or two from you in the near future!
For now, though, please feel free to enjoy the latest chapter. Thus commences Part Two of Dark Side of the Moon, "Breathe."
part two: breathe
chapter twelve
It was late. Far too late for a young wizard to be standing alone on the platform – but what could he do? Where was his escort home? Had his parents forgotten they had a son at all? Or had they taken a liking to his absence and were just content to abandon him here?
His escort was an hour and an half late. He'd been sitting on this bench for so long, he was beginning to think he was growing into it. He tried to reassure himself that this was nothing – it was some car trouble, probably, nothing to be worried about – but something about that thought rang false in his mind. For Merlin's sake, they were wizards. They didn't have car trouble. And traffic didn't exactly hinder them, either. Damn it, why couldn't they use the Floo like normal wizards?
…But wait. There. In the crowd. A familiar figure. But… but that couldn't be right – Achaicus Snape, at King's Cross? Never. Severus wouldn't have believed it, had his father not directly come up to him, snapped an order by way of greeting, and marched off again, leaving his son to catch up, his luggage in tow.
Out on the street, in Muggle London, Severus was distinctly unsettled. Achaicus went directly to a strange old car – Severus had little to no knowledge of Muggle machinery, but this thing looked older than Merlin himself, not to mention small – and opened up the boot. Severus wasted no time in loading up his things, and crawled into the front seat beside his father. The back seat was heaped with a hundred old books and scrolls he well recognized from his father's study.
Strange as it might sound, this was when the chord of fear first struck in Severus' heart.
He didn't speak a word throughout the car ride, though there were things he was dying to say, questions he was dying to ask – he knew his father would neither appreciate nor answer any of his queries, so he kept his mouth shut. Even when his father drove in a direction contrary to the path they'd always taken to and from the station and the Snape house, he didn't make a sound.
However, when they pulled up in front of a dilapidated old apartment building and Mr Snape switched the car off, Severus had to speak.
"Father – " he began, but Achaicus cut him off. The man didn't speak, didn't glare at him, didn't even turn and slap him. He merely ignored him. He opened the door and slid out of the car as if his son hadn't even spoken. Severus' heart beat angrily, and he scrambled out of the car, slamming the car door hard.
"What is this?" he said, his temper flaring momentarily.
Achaicus turned and fixed Severus with an expressionless look. "We're home."
Severus' horrified eyes flickered from his father's face to the old building and back again. "What?"
Achaicus wasn't looking at him. He was heading toward the building, taking out a key, unlocking the front doors.
Severus hurried after, heart and mind ablaze with confusion.
It wasn't filthy.
It was cluttered, cramped, sweltering, and otherwise uncomfortable, but it was clean. The windows, warped as they were, were scrupulously scrubbed; the walls were smooth and white, the carpets were relatively spot-free and dustless, and the furniture, while awkward-looking in the small apartment, was in good shape.
Severus still hated it.
To make a long story short, his father had gone bankrupt due to an unscrupulous accountant and bad planning. It had begun just before Severus had left for his fourth year of school – he well remembered Mason and Dewey's absences in that week – and had finally wrapped up soon before the end of the school year. Achaicus had moved here, because it was cheap and there were very few wizards in the area to scorn the once-powerful old-money businessman. Penelope, apparently fed up with the disorder and shame, had left him, disappeared without a trace. Achaicus cursed her when he spoke of it.
Severus couldn't speak to his father. His father, who had lost everything – his money, his house, his prestige, even his wife – Severus couldn't sit in the apartment, knowing that his father, the man who hadn't spoken a fatherly word to him in a year, hadn't even bothered to inform his only son of the radical change that had taken place during the school year, was sitting just beyond a thin wall of plaster, but more distant from his son than he had ever been in his life.
Severus couldn't take it. He had to get out.
He didn't care how conspicuous he looked in his wizarding robes; he only knew he had to walk off the emotions that roiled just beneath his skin.
'You'll have to get a job if you want to go to school next year,' Achaicus had informed him without ceremony, sympathy, or shame. Unspoken: 'I can't pay.'
A job. Support yourself. Severus couldn't believe it. He gone in mere hours from being a well-to-do, old-money pureblood with Galleons to spare to being little more than a common, blue-collar working boy. Get a job. Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined something like this happening. A job? What in Merlin's blasted name could he do?
The Leaky Cauldron, as it was, was only scant blocks from their front door. Fine by Severus; he'd to Diagon Alley to find himself a job. He had to do it. He had to go to school next year. He'd slit his wrists before he willingly gave up his education.
He was decided.
June 12th, 1975
Happy early birthday to me. Though it's not for another two weeks yet, Aunt Leona sent the birthday money early. I got this journal from Flourish and Blotts this morning. It was quite cheap, too – just a Galleon and an half, a very good deal for such a nice binding. And it's refillable, too – even better.
Anyway, the hols have been boring so far. I mean, London's nice sometimes, but in the summer it's unbearably hot. I've been keeping up with my school friends – enclosed are the letters I've gotten so far – but it's been unsatisfactory correspondence so far. I don't know how it's happened, but I feel
distanced from them, somehow. As if I were
I don't know. I don't know what happened. I mean – I think I know, but I
I'm just not sure.
I think it's got everything to do with Snape, though.
The books he lent me! They're scary. But they're addictive. I can't get enough of them – it's as if I've finally discovered Life On Mars. Or rather, it's more like I've always known that there's life on Mars, but now I've discovered that it's nothing like what I always thought it'd be like. Or rather, it's exactly what I thought it'd be, but it's all different somehow.
I don't know. I didn't think that the Dark Arts required so much philosophy. It probably doesn't. But Snape did say that his way of teaching me would be different from everybody else's. Is this what he meant?
"…there is a gap between how one lives and how one ought to live that anyone who abandons what is done for what ought to be done learns his ruin rather than his preservation…. Hence it is necessary for a prince who wishes to maintain his position to learn how not to be good…."
That was one of the things he taught me. And
I enjoyed our lessons together. I wish he I wish he was more approachable.
I hope what James said in his letter wasn't true. I hope Sirius was just reporting misinformed gossip. But I'm still really worried. I hope Snape's okay.
Maybe I should write to him?
– No, he probably wouldn't appreciate it. I'd best just be quiet and wait until next semester.
Hi Lil!
How is your holiday going? Mine's great – my cousins came down from Scotland and they're staying the summer with us. They're a hoot – all boys, you know, and they're nutty about Quidditch – good for me, hey hey – and they brought their brooms down and everything. Wish you could be here, though you'd probably hate it and spend all your time inside reading.
My music tutor's here again, which is a drag. I've got a lesson EVERY SINGLE BLOODY DAY now, which means, of course, less time for Quidditch. But it's okay. The cousins keep finding ways to get me out of lessons. See, they're good for something! Ha ha!
Hey, since you're in London, can you check out that new specialty shop in Diagon Alley? It's called WizzHard Gear, sells Quidditch stuff. I got a catalogue in the mail – they had some nice gripcharmed gloves for sale, but owls are so expensive – I wonder if you could pick me up a pair (size 8) and send them to me, and I could pay you in my next letter? That would be so great if you could do that for me.
By the way, I really liked that book you lent me – we'll have to get together sometime soon and I can return it to you.
Take care,
Cordelia
Hey Lily –
Having a good holiday? Poor you, stuck in the city, no Quidditch pitch to be seen for miles – bet you're green with envy. We've been on the field every day, and it's been great weather – is it as nice there in the city as it is here?
Honestly, I don't see how you can hold up in Muggle London. I've been there, and there's nothing to do, except shop and look at things. I hope you're not studying too hard. You should take a break. It's summer. You shouldn't overwork yourself.
Guess what Sirius told me? Well, he overheard his parents talking about a certain someone we both know and detest – that's right, Snape. Anyway, it turns out that his dad's gone bankrupt – ironic, eh? And now they're living in Muggle London, too, in a flat. In a Muggle flat. And Snape's dad's unemployed. Sirius also mentioned something about Snape getting a job cuz his dad can't pay the school tuition anymore. It seems like he's working at an apothecary in Knockturn Alley. (Dodgy place, Lily; I'd stay out of there if I were you.) Sirius and I thought about going over there and trying to get him fired. Think of it – if the slimeball can't pay the tuition, we won't have to put up with him next year!
I'm joking, don't worry, Lily.
Anyway, have a good one. You'll have to visit sometime. We could go flying, we've got a great field out here.
Best,
James
PS. Don't let your sister get you down!
Dear Lily,
I hope your holiday is going nicely. Mine's been enjoyable, so far – I've got a job working for my uncle at his novelty shop in Devonshire. I can Floo there every day, and it's very nice – the work's enjoyable, and my uncle's a fair boss. The customers are nice, too – mostly we get Muggles, but sometimes we get the occasional wizard, and it's so fun, because they have no idea what anything is. (I shouldn't laugh, because up until a couple of weeks ago, I was pretty ignorant, too.)
I wonder if Professor Frame will accept my working here as extra credit. Probably not. Helen says he doesn't believe in extra credit. In any case, I feel more educated.
Read anything good lately? I'm currently working through a pile of science fiction (is that right?) that I found in my uncle's shop. It's good! I think I'm developing a passion for it. It's so different from everything else I've ever read. I think wizards really miss out on a lot when they boycott Muggle stuff. Purebloods don't know what they're missing. It's a shame, really – I think the wizarding community could really benefit from Muggle influence. I mean, the purebloods and the rest look down on them for being – what, nonmagical? Different? It's silly, if you ask me. I mean, even James and the rest – who are pretty all right, otherwise – even they kind of look down on Muggles. All those remarks James made about your sister – I mean, he thinks he's got an excuse because you've said she's so mean sometimes, but really, he just makes fun of her because she's his stereotype of a Muggle – mean, stupid, and self-centred. Not that she is. I don't know. But that's what James thinks. You know what I mean.
Anyway, keep your spirits up. Let's meet in Diagon Alley sometime next week, okay? (You're so lucky, you get to live so close!) How's Thursday sound? Meet in the Leaky Cauldron around noon? I'll be there anyway (Mum wanted me to pick up some stuff from the astrology shop, yuck) so it'd be nice if we could just meet and have an ice cream or something.
Love,
Eliza
"Hey Mum?"
Lily shut her journal and tossed it on the bed. It bounced on the mattress. Lily rattled out of her bedroom and after her mother, who had just passed down the hallway to her sewing room. Her feet were bare, and the wooden floor felt smooth and cool beneath her toes.
"Mum?" she said again, coming into the sewing room, and this time Mrs Evans glanced up from the pile of cloth in her hands.
"Yes?"
"Can I go to Diagon Alley tomorrow?"
Mrs Evans took off her reading glasses. "What for?"
"Eliza's going to be in town," she said. "I thought it'd be nice to meet her there. Well, actually, she asked me. D'you think I could?"
Mrs Evans looked indecisive, so Lily spoke in her sweetest tones. "I don't even need a ride," she added. "I can take my bike. It's not too far. I wouldn't be gone all day, either – just a couple hours."
Mrs Evans seemed to be considering this. "Well," she said at last, "I don't see the harm in it. As long as you remember to take your bike lock. What do you two plan on doing there?"
"Oh, have some ice cream, do some shopping… the whole girlie thing." Lily grinned. "Have some fun. I have that birthday money from Aunt Leona, and my savings – "
"I hope you wouldn't try to spend it all at once," said Mrs Evans. "Sure, you can go."
Lily let out a happy shriek and danced about. "Yes!"
"Now get," said Mrs Evans sternly. "You're distracting me from my sewing."
The next day, armed with an empty satchel and a purse full of gold, she pulled her bike out of the carport and pedalled the mile and a half it was to the Leaky Cauldron. Eliza was there waiting for her; Lily greeted her with a hug and, having locked her bike up outside in Muggle London, they proceeded into the more magical side of the city.
It was a weekday afternoon and Diagon Alley wasn't crowded. The two girls were free to wander about, and they did happily, first stopping at the ice cream shop and then continuing on to the plethora of bookshops that peppered the district.
The would have been content with this for hours, but Eliza, unfortunately, had to make a trip to the astrology shop – Sulla Saturninus' Stars and Spheres – and was thus obliged to leave Lily to her own devices for a little while. Lily didn't mind – she had an scheme of her own, one that required a kind of secrecy, and complied willingly when Eliza elected to depart.
As soon as the other girl was out of sight, Lily shouldered her satchel – now full with various tomes of interest she'd found at a variety of shops – and headed straight for Knockturn Alley.
She'd seen the decaying sign before, the skeletal hand indicating a narrow alleyway that bridged the two streets. Lily found it without trouble, and picked her way through the dank, filthy alley with an insistent curiosity beating in her breast. The very air seemed to grow colder as she entered the dark district, and her screaming mind recalled everything she'd heard about the place – that it was frequented by vampires, werewolves, and worse; that the shopkeepers would hex you as soon as look at you; that Muggleborns, of all people, were most at risk there….
She ignored her brain's warnings, and hugged close to the walls as she walked down the filthy walk.
The gutter was clogged with garbage; she saw more than one dead rat lying stiff in the damp, twisted and decaying, jagged little bones poking through mottled skin and snarled hair. The smell was atrocious; it hung heavy in the air, thick and damp and sour-sweet; it permeated her clothes, and later that evening she would still smell it and squirm.
The neuroticism of the place was apparent in the architecture. Shops were crammed together tightly, with scant metres separating doorways; windows were appropriately narrow and crooked, and more than one were boarded up tight. Structures tilted on their foundations, and most looked as if one good, hearty shove would topple them right over. Lily walked quickly past these buildings, looking for some place in particular.
She'd never been here before, and she was reluctant to step into one of those weird shops and ask one of the storekeepers for directions. She was exceedingly relieved when she stumbled upon the place by accident, not five minutes into her walk: she happened to glance up and see a sign bearing the familiar mortar-and-pestle symbol that denoted an apothecary.
She ducked into the shop without further dallying. No familiar silver bell rang to announce her arrival; rather, she was immediately assailed by a thousand different odours – pungent and sour – and her senses reeled for a moment. This was a far cry from the apothecary on Diagon Alley, which boasted wares that were fairly innocuous, if not always recognizable. This, however….
Strings of dried things hung from the ceiling in abundance. Not all of them looked herbal, or, for that matter, entirely animal. Pots of scorpion carapaces and doxy teeth stood at attention on the counter, accompanied by a plethora of bottled powders ranging in various colours. Along the walls were shelves stocked with a wealth of vials containing everything from wrinkled, blackened tongue of banshee (at least, that was what Lily thought the crabbed, gothic script advertised) to goats' eyes floating in thick green slime. The one thing all these strange ingredients held in common was that Lily had never used any of them in her potions-making.
And then she saw, to her horror, that tacked to one wall was a stretched centaur hide. Prominently displayed over a crate of withered claws that might once have been attached to selkies' fingers, it was huge and silver and gleaming, obviously painstakingly… detached. Her heart turned to ice in her breast at that, and her breath caught roughly in her throat. I must have been insane to come here, she thought wildly, remembering all the horrible things James and the rest had said about Knockturn Alley. She thought they'd been exaggerating out of plain dislike, but now – now it seemed that what they'd said was really true. A thrill of terror began to twist up inside her like a spring.
Once she had torn her eyes away from the feast of Dark components, she realized that the shop was otherwise quite deserted – and that the only sound that touched her ears was that of the floorboards creaking beneath her feet.
But then, a hand on her shoulder caused her to start and utter a small scream – she whirled to see a beautiful, pale-faced woman with hair the colour of ripe strawberries and eyes like glittering smalt. "What do you lack?" said the woman softly, and her voice was husky and rich and sensuous, and Lily shivered involuntarily.
"I – I just came in to look around – "
The blue-eyed witch studied her for a moment, and then a smile quirked at the corner of her coral lips. "What could a sweet young thing like you desire from my humble shop?"
"Um…." The woman's eyes pierced her like a frozen blade. Lily squirmed uncomfortably, and the witch let go of her and moved over to the counter, retrieving something from below. She straightened up, a small porcelain jar in her hands, and set it on the glass countertop.
"An envy potion," she said, with a mischievous, conspiring sparkle in her eyes. "For the young man whose eyes are wandering, perhaps?"
Lily suppressed a snort, fearing it would be indelicate. "No."
"I didn't think so," the witch murmured. "You don't look like the vengeful type." She pushed the jar out of the way, and retrieved another. It was fashioned out of rose-pink glass and embellished with curlicues of silver.
"A glamour, perhaps?" said the witch softly, and her lily-white hand caressed the lid of the pot. "A strong one, I guarantee you."
Lily shook her head. "No, thank you."
The witch gave her a heartbreaking smile, and Lily felt her heart skip in trepidation.
"No, of course not," said the witch, and moved the bottle to the side. "You obviously don't need anything as paltry as bottled beauty." Smirking, she produced a third vial, this one no bigger than Lily's little finger and perfectly clear, but filled with a blood-red, viscous fluid that glittered, rubylike, even in the dim light.
"This, then," said the witch, in a voice that was almost a whisper. "The drink of desire."
Lily's cheeks flushed the colour of the potion, and she took a step back. "I – I really don't want – "
"Evans?"
Lily broke off, staring at the silhouetted figure standing in the door behind the witch. Though she couldn't see the wizard's features, she knew his voice and his inflection – she was sure that he was just as surprised to find her here as she.
"Snape."
Still standing between them, the witch's eyebrows went up. "You know my apprentice?" she said to Lily, and Lily shrugged.
"It appears I do," she said, and stepped forward.
The witch's smile broadened. "Well! What coincidences! Or were you actually looking for a potion when you came here, girl?"
Lily blushed again. "I wasn't looking for anything," she protested, and the witch merely raised a single, insinuating eyebrow.
"Whatever you say, darling," she said, and, turning, glanced at Snape. "I'll make myself scarce for a few minutes, boy," she said. "But don't be long; there are stacks that want organizing."
"Don't bother," said Snape, and Lily was too surprised to be hurt by his cold tone of voice.
But the witch didn't hear, or at least pretended not to, and disappeared through the door though, leaving the two alone in the front of the shop.
"What are you doing here?" he asked her right away, and Lily's brows furrowed at his unusually hostile tone of voice.
"I – I was just passing through – "
"Rot," Snape said icily. "This is obviously your first time here. Don't you know what danger you could be in, being what you are – "
Lily was extremely irritated, mostly because she hadn't prepared an excuse as to exactly why she had come, and was consequently finding it difficult to come up with a convincing lie. "Why shouldn't I be here?" she said instead, and Snape's black eyes flashed angrily.
"Are you really that stupid?" he said.
Lily turned away abruptly. "Thank you, Snape, it's nice to see you too."
She could hear Snape let out a cross, windy sigh. "Don't be an idiot, Evans," he snapped. "Go home."
Lily was silent for a moment as she took a strengthening breath. When at last she turned round to face him, it was with a calm expression and a composed mind that she addressed him. "What I want," she said, "is to talk to you. Like we did at school. Don't glare at me! It's a perfectly decent request. I swear, just three minutes and I'll leave quietly. I've someone waiting for me in Diagon Alley, anyway."
She could see a muscle working in Snape's jaw, but he finally acquiesced with a curt nod of his head.
Lily smiled at him, unconscious that the relief showed so strongly on her face. "Thank you," she said.
"Get to the point, Evans."
Lily sniffed, but decided not take offence at his snappish tone. "Are you really apprenticing here?" she asked instead, rather interested.
He shook his head, looking disgusted. "No. Catilina thinks of me as such, but all I do is organize things and stock shelves."
"I'm sure you're good at it," said Lily, recalling how organized he could be, but he sneered.
"It's vile work."
"Why do you do it, then?"
His expression soured even further then. "My father wished that I get a taste of the real working world this summer," he said. "Presumably so that I might discover for myself how very abhorrent it is and seriously pursue a higher vocation."
Lily frowned. "And have you discovered how very abhorrent it is?"
"Unquestionably," said Snape, and she detected a slight softening about his wicked sneer.
Lily gave a small, encouraged smile, and moved to one side of the store to examine a bottle of what looked like grey-green hairs floating in lamp oil. "At least it pays," she said, and remembered that Snape really didn't need the money; from what she'd gathered, his family was richer than Cresus.
Snape gave a hum of assent, and Lily glanced back at him. He looked pensive as he leaned over the counter, elbows resting on the age-spotted glass top. A faint sneer barely curled his upper lip, as if he was remembering something mildly distasteful, and as she watched, a strand of his black hair – it was getting so long! – fell forward into his face. He didn't seem to notice, but his eyebrows furrowed, deepening the crease between them. His delicate hands, covered to the knuckles by the black sleeves of his robes, flexed absently.
On a reckless whim, Lily asked, "When do you get off work?"
"Five-thirty." His eyes snapped sharply upwards to meet hers, as if only just realizing that he had spoken. "Why?"
"I was going to ask if you'd like to come over for tea," said Lily, turning away again. "But…. Well, never mind. It wasn't really…."
Behind her, Snape made a noise that could have been a snort. "Go home, Evans," he said, his voice faintly sardonic. "Your three minutes are up. There's nothing here you want."
Lily gave him a look of consternation. "I was just asking," she muttered, and turned to go. When she got to the door, she couldn't help but turn and give a small wave of her fingers, and bid him goodbye. He stood straight and tall behind the counter, and didn't respond, but the witch, who had come out of the store room and stood behind him in the shadowy doorway, gave a silent nod.
The broken bell above the door made no sound as she went out.
"Scaring off customers, Snape?"
Severus did not jump. By now, he was used to Catilina sneaking up on him. "She was no customer," he said, and his voice was carefully blank.
"You know her," she stated.
"From school," he said stiffly. "We're in the same year."
"But not in the same House, I take it."
"No."
Something in his tone must have given it away, for Catilina's slow smile broadened, and her eyebrows raised knowingly. "A Gryffindor."
Severus didn't answer. He brushed past her into the storage room.
Her words met his ears as he came to the back of the room to continue his previous work. "I think," she said, her voice soft but carrying well through the dusty, stifling air of the room, "that that girl wants more than you would sell her, Snape."
Severus ignored her and continued his work.