Bellatrix and Severus continue their investigations...
"Severus, I am most displeased!" Snape's master's voice sounded decidedly sinister this morning. He kept his eyes respectfully lowered. It would not do, he reasoned, to provoke the powerful wizard when he was in such a temper. The older man turned and began pacing the room in agitation, occasionally zapping small objects with his wand as he muttered under his breath, making Snape jump each time something exploded. Not good, not good at all.
"Disgraceful," he heard the portrait of Phineas Nigellus hiss behind him. "Sulking like a first-year then calling yourself a Headmaster?"
"You shut up!" roared Dumbledore, swinging round with his wand raised. Armando Dippet dived behind his armchair in the frame next door. "It's taken me fifty-three years to pluck up the courage to ask Madame Puddifoot to step out with me, then before I can even open my mouth Moody's appearing out of thin air babbling about Woody going missing! It's too much!" He decided against hexing the picture and turned back, folding his arms across his chest petulantly. Snape and Nigellus exchanged a very Slytherin look.
"He is perfectly well, though," Snape ventured, into the silence that followed Dumbledore's outburst.
"What?" he snapped distractedly. "Who is?"
"Ollivander."
"They say he was kidnapped by Death Eaters!" pouted Albus, "I doubt that he's 'perfectly well'."
Snape examined his fingernails while the alleged greatest mind of the past two centuries drew its laboured conclusion. After a moment, during which the only sound was Professor Dippet's portrait asking Nigellus if it was safe to come out, the Headmaster gave a small hum of realisation.
"You kidnapped him?" he asked Snape, his tone of voice halfway between relief and admonishment.
"I asked him to accompany me to the Riddle House," he explained softly. "He is safe and sound in the basement, no chains, no manacles. The Dark Lord is investigating the strange things which occurred when his wand met Potter's."
Dumbledore swore so loudly that Dippet dived for cover again.
"Is there a problem, Albus?" Snape asked, trying not to twitch as the Headmaster fiddled with that bright yellow beard-tie which made him want to set fire to things. Snape had grown a beard once. He had worn it for two proud days until Lucius had pointed out that it made him look like Igor Karkaroff. Not wanting anything to do with the snivelling Bulgarian, he had shaved it off immediately. Not a good look. Dumbledore had a fabulously distinguished beard, in Snape's opinion, but with typical Griffindor dottiness he chose to ruin it with an array of nauseating fripperies which gave any normal person The Fear.
"No," sighed Dumbledore wearily. "Well, obviously, there are several hundred problems connected with this war, but nothing new. I had hoped that Tom would not turn his attention to this particular avenue, that is all."
"Yes another mysterious and oh-so-intriguing other-worldly connection between Golden Boy and Dark Lord, no doubt?" he sneered.
Phineas Nigellus sniggered audibly. Dumbledore glared like a basilisk in half-moon spectacles.
"Thank you, Severus, that will be all," he said coldly.
Snape rose and to leave, knowing better than to push Albus when he was having one of his bad days. He decided to say nothing about the Dark Lord's unusual behaviour for now, but then he recalled something Bellatrix had mentioned the other day after she finished blathering on about Pettigrew and Potter.
"Albus?" he ventured carefully.
"Mm?" an irritated sound – he hadn't even bothered to look up, which annoyed Snape more than everything else put together, for some reason.
"The Dark Lord has been talking about a family heirloom. Something which has been kept in a safe place for a long time. Something precious, I think." He left and closed the door before Dumbledore could ask any questions. He didn't know the answers anyway.
Investigate it yourself, you old lunatic.
…….
Potter's medical notes were almost as thick as Potter.
Severus had a wealth of experience at breaking into the infirmary. During his own schooldays, he had quickly learned that allowing Madame Pomphrey to treat the results of his fights with the Griffindors or his failed experiments led to awkward questions and trips to Slug's office. Any potions or supplies which he could not create by himself in the dungeon had to be carefully filched while her attention was elsewhere. He had successfully burgled the place whilst blinded, transfigured into an aardvark, shrunk to one-third his natural size and, on one unforgettable occasion, with a five-foot decorative javelin through his thigh.
He snorted at the memory. The Best Days of His Life? Unfortunately, they probably had been. Certainly, there had been no significant improvements, unless you count the deaths of James Potter and Sirius Black. He stopped brooding and plunged into Potter Junior's freshly-stolen file.
Quidditch injuries. An unpleasant reaction to the Dark Lord's spirit passing through him in his first year. Pain in his scar. More quidditch injuries. Measles, aged 5. Chicken Pox, mumps, anaemia…whooping cough? Merlin, even the most neglected kids of the the muggle factory workers in Spinner's End had been vaccinated against whooping cough, and that was decades ago! He racked his brains for a reason why Potter's relatives had allowed him to be so ill. The National Health Service was still free to muggles, just like the National Healing Service was free to wizards, so it couldn't have been financial reasons.
The floo flared and Bellatrix's voice, though muffled, still managed to screech through the wards. He sighed and let her come in.
"It's like trying to get into Gringott's!" she snapped, exaggeratedly brushing dirt off her robes. "Why are you so paranoid? Merlin, Snape, this place is a dump! Where are we anyway?"
"Good afternoon, Mrs Lestrange," he bowed with mocking politeness. She snarled, cast a thorough cleaning charm on a rickety chair and eased herself into it carefully, lip curling in distaste as she examined the room. "Welcome to my home and welcome to the North of England. The winters are colder, the people friendlier and unlike you Southern aristocratic types, we do not deem it necessary to pronounce the word 'bath' as though it rhymes with 'hearth'."
That broke her mood and she cackled out loud.
"Hogwash, Snape, you have the poshest accent I know. Your mother sent to for private speech lessons, didn't she? Didn't want you to end up talking like the Longbottoms! They have frightful Northern accents," she cackled again, enjoying the way her last comment made him grind his teeth.
"Frightful Lancashire accents," he hissed the correction painfully - as a rule he liked to banish the very notion of the existence of Longbottoms during the summer holidays.
"Oh, Lancashire, Yorkshire, it's all the same isn't it? Hard to tell the difference from just the screams," she waved a hand dismissively.
He fought the urge to hex her. Then he fought the urge to treat her to an hour-long lecture on the hostility between the two neighbouring counties, from the fifteenth century Wars of the Roses to the present day, with at least twenty-five arguments concerning the perfidity of Lancastrians. Then he remembered the reason she was in Yorkshire in the first place.
"Here," he said, gathering up all three volumes of Potter's file and thrusting it at her. "The brat may have survived Avada Kedavra but he has hardly been the picture of health since then."
"Anaemia?" she read aloud from the earlier part of the records. "Didn't those stupid muggles bother feeding the little swine? Or did they loan him to the vampires?"
Snape indulged himself with a short flight of fancy centring on the latter idea. Then he shook his head and filed it away for next time Potter flew rings around the Slytherin quidditch team.
"Pleasant as it may be to discover the extent of his suffering, I see nothing which would account for the Dark Lord's current…situation," he secretly hoped she would give up on the idea and just leave the serpentine megalomaniac to his eccentricities.
"Damn," said Bella. She put the folder back onto the table, but slipped one page inside her robes. Snape raised a questioning eyebrow. "I want to find out how Lockhart removed his bones so neatly. Every time I try that curse they die before I can enjoy the effect."
"Fine," he tried not to shudder. "So where does that leave your theory about the Dark Lord's odd behaviour?" She scratched her prominent chin and ticked off the points of the resurrection spell on her fingers.
"The Servant – nothing was transmitted from Wormtail; the Enemy – Potter seems clean; that leaves the Bone of the Father," Bellatrix frowned. "Who was his father? Do you know?"
"Er," said Snape. He wasn't certain what the crazy witch would do to someone who told her the truth about her beloved master's parentage, but he had a fairly good idea that it would involve pain. Large amounts thereof.
"No, neither do I," she mused, taking his silence as a denial.
Snape brain began a little preliminary scheming. Tom Riddle Senior. This was going to be the hard part.
…….
A few hours later, Snape was lying flat on his face in Little Hangleton. Voldemort had not spoken since his arrival, which concerned him slightly. Not daring to look up, he shuffled forward as elegantly as is possible using only one's elbows, and tentatively kissed the hem of the Dark Lord's robes.
There was a muffled sniff from above him.
"Oh, Severus!" Voldemort exclaimed. "You're such a good servant to me!" Then he burst into tears.
Too alarmed for words, Snape desperately searched for the appropriate course of action when an evil overlord started crying. When his students cried, he gave them detention. When Sybill Trelawney cried, he left the room, or if possible, the country. When Narcissa cried, Lucius went to the pub. When Rodolphus cried, Bellatrix hexed him. Hmm. None of those options seemed appropriate somehow. Aha! He remembered happening upon the youngest Weasley boy and that bushy-haired know-it-all during one of their typically emotionally-incontinent moments. Much as he hated imitating any of those sickening redheads, he had to admit to their superior knowledge in the touchy-feely department.
He straightened up and patted the Dark Lord gently on the shoulder.
"There, there, Master," he whispered, as soothingly as he could. This had obviously been the wrong thing to do, because the sobbing grew even louder.
He took a step backwards but a spidery white hand shot out from the red velvet robe and dragged him forward towards the throne. Voldemort buried his face in Snape's chest and wept all over him.
Snape stood absolutely still, all his Slytherin's cunning, spy's resourcefulness and teacher's adaptability suddenly failing him. After five agonising minutes, the sobs transmuted into little sniffs and the Dark Lord's grip on Snape relaxed.
"They don't understand me, Severus," he blew his nose on Snape's flowing sleeve.
"Who don't, Master?" he ventured, too afraid to move.
"Everyone," Voldemort moaned. "Everyone hates me."
Snape remained silent. He wasn't foolish enough to contradict that. He adopted a pro-active approach instead.
"What can I do to help, my Lord?" he asked in a suitably crawling tone. The evil one pondered that for a minute.
"Kill Dumbledore," he demanded firmly. Both Snape's eyebrows shot upwards. As if he could ever manage to pull that off!
"Er, what about a more…attainable task?" Voldemort blew his nose again.
"Kill Potter?" he suggested hopefully. Snape shook his head firmly, wondering at how easy it was to deny the Dark Lord's wishes when he was in this state. Do it yourself, you old lunatic, he thought, with a hint of déja vu. Here was a weakness which the Light side could make use of. He really must find out what was causing it, though.
Heaving a martyred sigh, Voldemort accepted the disobedience with good grace. The demands had been rather unreasonable, he supposed.
"How about a nice cup of tea?" Snape was borrowing from a different Weasley this time. Voldemort looked up at him with puffy eyes and nodded gratefully. Snape continued; "With chocolate biscuits to dunk in it?" That one was from Lupin, the hyperglycaemic monster. Voldemort beamed.
"Yes. Lots of chocolate! Mmm, chocolate," he licked his lips as the potions master conjured a kettle and a suitably sinister-looking gothic-style teapot.
"Milk or dark chocolate, Master?" he asked without thinking.
Apparently, Voldemort was feeling a bit better.
"Stupid question, Snape!" he hissed, eyes glowing redder than usual. "Crucio!"
In between spasms of brain-crippling agony, Snape reflected that for once he did deserve that cursing for his dunderheadedness. Dark Lords only ever eat Dark Chocolate. Schoolboy error.
…….
A/N: I know, I know, still no ice-cream! Won't be long now though. Hopefully the biscuits will tide you over until then!
Next time, more Ollivander, and more Death Eater incompetence, heh heh.
PS Apologies for the hideously long delay in updating, haven't been feeling silly enough for this silly fic. Thanks for reading x