A Black Flower

Part I

II

-o-

It may not sound like a big deal, but finding out Tobias Snape died in an accident at the mill was actually very significant. Up until I learned this, I just assumed that aside from my existence this world followed the Harry Potter canon. I assumed that I was the first divergence from canon. Perhaps that sounds a bit arrogant, but could you blame me? What else was I supposed to think? I'd read plenty of fanfiction in my first life, and usually the self-insert or original character was the source of all the deviances from canon.

However this world was very clearly not "canon but with Pansy added in." And that changed everything I thought I knew. It meant I had no clue what was going on. Perhaps it just meant Tobias Snape was dead and there were small, insignificant changes like that, things that didn't matter too much to the plot. On the other hand, it could also mean someone like Dumbledore died early too.

I really needed to find out what the hell was going on here.

Fortunately, Eileen was more than happy to have me over to Spinner's End and teach me all about the wizarding world.

I went to the Snapes' home every weekend and also for an evening or two during the week. Eileen Snape became "Auntie" and Severus and I grew to be inseparable. I learned a lot of little things about the world from Severus. He taught me things like magical games and told me stories about Hogwarts. On Saturdays Auntie would give us lessons. Sometimes she taught us history, other times she taught us little tidbits of magical theory. I absorbed all of it like a dried out sponge.

The walls of their sitting room were lined floor to ceiling with numerous bookshelves, and Severus and I were free to read any of them, since Auntie kept all the dangerous books in her bedroom. She would even let me take a book or two home with me as long as I asked her to disguise it first.

Eileen was a bibliophile, and without her husband around to complain, she was free to spend the money she earned brewing and doing odd jobs on books of all sorts of topics.

Severus was fascinated by potions and defensive magic, and so those texts were his favourites. I was interested in magical subjects too, but I spent more time researching the drier topics. I read through history and law books like they were The Tales of Beedle the Bard. Admittedly, I wasn't particularly interested in the subjects for the sake of knowledge alone, but I was desperate to know what was going on in this world.

I learned many things in my perusal. The good news was that Dumbledore was alive and well. He also did not join his evil boyfriend in taking over the world, which was another potential disaster that crossed my mind. Many of the feats he was credited with in canon seemed to be accredited to him here, too. He was still headmaster of Hogwarts, he still defeated his evil boyfriend, he was still known for his work with dragon's blood, and he was still Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards. Aside from facts about Dumbledore, however, I didn't know much about the history of canon to spot that many differences, as most of my knowledge had to do with the near future and beyond. Perhaps I should have watched the Fantastic Beasts movies, after all.

Aside from the Dumbledore stuff, I didn't learn much else of significance from the history books. Instead, the most important revelation came from a book about modern wizarding law that was published in 1965.

What I learned was this: In 1949 Albus Dumbledore introduced a new law to with Wizengamot. This new law was commonly referred to as "Riddle's Law." It stated that should any underage witch or wizard who has muggle guardians express fear for their safety, then the Ministry of Magic must investigate their living situation, and if the situation is deemed unsafe by a ministry official, they are to be removed and alternative living arrangements must be made.

The history behind it was most enlightening.

In December of 1940 the headmaster of Hogwarts, who was not Armando Dippet, sent all of the students home for the holidays for an unknown reason. Tom Marvolo Riddle and two other muggleborn students died in The Blitz. Riddle had expressed concern about returning to the orphanage, but his concerns were ignored by the headmaster.

Despite it being the headmaster at the time who made the call, Dumbledore felt guilty, and so he eventually proposed Riddle's Law. There weren't many supporters for it in the beginning, as the law mostly held significance to muggleborns. Opinions changed, however, when Tom Riddle's heritage was revealed and the law was eventually passed and put into effect by 1953.

He may have been my favourite character, but discovering that Voldemort had died decades ago, and years before he managed to make his first horcrux, was a huge relief. I didn't have to worry about living through a civil war or about my sister being murdered before she turned twenty-two. Even in my first life I outlived the Lily Evans of canon.

The downside was that this also meant that nearly everything I remembered from canon was completely useless to me. I had spent so much time thinking I knew the future, but the truth of the matter was that I knew nothing of what was to come. It was terrifying, to go from knowing everything to come to knowing nothing. I didn't like it.

-x-

Of the changes that I was responsible for, one that completely boggled my mind was that Severus had no interest in my twin sister whatsoever. In the books from my first life he did everything for Lily. He lived and died for her memory. He turned spy for her, protected her son, though he hated the boy. Now she was just his best friend's sister with mean friends. That wasn't to say Lily was mean to him. She wasn't. Really, she was nice enough to him, polite but distant. But I overheard her friends making fun of him more than once, and each time she just let them. She never stood up for him or told them to stop. It irritated me, but I knew Lily didn't want to lose her friends. I couldn't blame her completely. For the most part they didn't say anything to Severus' face and they had been good friends to her.

Perhaps it was because Severus' home life was so different from canon and he met me instead of my sister that he didn't need her the same way. I had to admit though, the Snily shipper in me was devastated that I ruined my OTP, but I couldn't force them to be friends and fall in love.

Even more bizarre than the lack of Snily friendship though, is that Severus and Petunia actually got along better than he and Lily. My best guess at explaining that phenomenon was based on a few key points.

First, Petunia found something she excelled at, so she didn't have the same inferiority complex as her counterpart in canon. Secondly, he didn't know about magic yet, so she couldn't be jealous of it. On top of that, most of her friends are the girls she met through her dance classes or music lessons, so she was likely influenced by different friends than canon Petunia was. Finally, I was fairly certain the reputation of the Snape family wasn't as bad as it was in canon.

Auntie used magic freely at home, so broken things got repaired and cleaning was hardly a chore for her. As a result, the house and yard looked much nicer than I imagined it would otherwise. Simple things like the appearance of your home could make a big difference in how people see you. So does being a widow with a child. Losing her husband to an accident at the mill and raising a young son all by herself garnered sympathy from the townsfolk.

I wouldn't say Petunia and Severus were actually friends, really. She had never been to his house, but when he came over to our place my older sister was more likely to spend time playing with us than my twin was.

-x-

One of the downsides to my friendship with Severus was that after we met my academic progress slowed. Before I met him I had much more free time, and so I used it to do school work, as that was one of the few things that could keep my mind occupied. Now that time is spent with him. That's not to say I was suddenly progressing at a rate which was typical for a child of my apparent age, just that I dedicated less time to learning anything except mathematics.

By the time I was ten, most of the school work Lizzie provided covered things I remembered learning in my first year or two of Canadian high school. I wasn't sure how that compared to British schools in the present, but I figured most of it couldn't be too different. In math though, I was finishing off topics from my grade twelve pre-calculus class, and Lizzie was running out of things to teach me. It was fortunate that Hogwarts would be coming soon.

'The point was, I was still well ahead of my peers, but I wasn't ready to graduate at twelve like I could have been if I dedicated more time to school work. Sure, I knew a lot of the material, but there were some topics that I didn't learn in Canadians schools, like British history. Furthermore, I still had to take the time to do the assignments Lizzie set for me, and take the time to sit through lessons where Lizzie "taught" me the material.

The topics I was unfamiliar with were absorbed easily, including the magical ones. I wondered if my brain hadn't just sped up completely in its development, and it retained adult cognitive functioning while coming with the benefits of a child's developing mind. Children's brains were sponges, they learned much faster than adults could ever hope to. It would appear I somehow managed to get the best of both worlds. Perhaps my magic had something to do with it.

Having adult cognition and a child's ability to learn did not help me understand transfiguration at all though. The more I read on the topic, the less sense it made to me. What was so different about gold? Why did one need a Philosopher's Stone to transfigure it? In all my reading, I never found any reference to the impossibility of transfiguring any other elements.

And you didn't want to get me started on food! It was possible to summon it, multiply it, and transfigure it into other foods. It was possible to conjure water and wine, but conjuring food was impossible? Like. Dude. What the actual fuck? It made no sense at all.

Hell, you can conjure live animals, but not dead ones? How did that even work? What if you conjured a chicken, killed it, and then cooked it? At what point does something go wrong?

In my frustration, I brought the topic up to Severus, but he didn't seem to find it as illogical as I do. It was probably one of those things that people raised around magic just accepted as fact without question. Kind of like I accepted how televisions worked without questioning the finer details. (Except I knew there was an actual explanation behind it, I just never bothered to go beyond the basics, because I didn't really care.)

Evidently I would have to ask the transfiguration professor those sorts of questions when I got to Hogwarts. I wondered if McGonagall would be the one teaching in this world.

Idly, I wished I had someone I could bet on it with.

-x-

Despite experiencing reincarnation, I never really thought about death and what would happen if I died again. It seemed far off, and like something I didn't need to worry about. That changed when our elderly neighbour died. It was early December not long before Lily and I turned ten when he died from a heart attack. It wasn't a loss to me, personally. I never spoke to the man. But it made me question things.

What happened to him? In my own experience, reincarnation was what happened when you died. But where was he reborn? When was he reborn? The past? The Future? Moments after his death? Was he even reborn in this world? Or did he, like me, end up in some world that was foreign to him? One that should be fictional, but wasn't?

My thoughts spiralled, and it wasn't long before I started wondering what would happen when I died again. Would I be reborn again? Was this even really only my second life? Or had I lived many other previous lives, but only remembered the one? If I was reborn again, where would I end up? I could be reborn in the world of the Hunger Games or something.

For weeks, I dwelled on the topic. At night, I had horrible dreams of being slaughtered by enemy ninja and sacrificed to demons. Lizzie and Richard grew concerned, but clearly didn't know what to do. They tried to get my to open up and tell them what was bothering me, but I just clamped up and refused to speak whenever they pried.

They were equal parts concerned and relieved when I snapped out of it a few months later and went back to normal.

The fear of death and the unknown continued to linger in my mind, but one day in February, the (presumed) date of my death in my last life, I had a sudden epiphany.

If I don't die, then I don't need to worry about what will happen to me after death.

-x-

Obviously, the whole not dying thing wasn't exactly straightforward. So okay, known options:

First, there was the Philosopher's Stone. But Nicholas Flamel was the only known creator, and it wasn't like it was conveniently being hidden in Hogwarts any time in the near future. Or ever, since there is no Voldemort in this world. It followed that if I wanted one, I would need to make it myself in all likelihood. But alchemy was heavily based in transfiguration from what I remembered, and transfiguration made no fucking sense to me, so that was out. Not to mention the Stone only granted pseudo-immortality. I would be completely dependant on the Elixir of Life, and could still be killed or die in an accident at any moment.

The other method that I remembered from canon was horcruxes. But I couldn't remember if it was canon or just fanon that splitting your soul makes you insane, and so I would need to do a lot o f research before making one. I would need to learn how to resurrect myself before I died though, or I would be stuck as... well, whatever the hell canon Voldemort was between 1981 and 1995. Also like, creating one involves murder and apparently a bunch of other unspeakable things, so like. I'd prefer not to commit morally reprehensible acts in my quest for immortality.

My only other idea is based on pure fanon, and that is gathering the Deathly Hallows and hoping that mastering death comes with immortality. That wasn't likely, but having the Hallows could be really useful.

Evidence against the idea that collecting all three Hallows grants immortality would be canon Harry. Sure he survived the killing curse again after owning all three of them, but it was heavily implied they had nothing to do with it.

On the other hand, one could consider that by that point, though he was the owner of the cloak and wand, he had already tossed aside the stone before facing Voldemort, and arguably had given up possession of it. So it could be argued that no one knows the true power of uniting the Hallows, because Harry never actually collected them all in one location.

Also apparently canon doesn't mean much here, so like. Does it even matter what happened with them in canon?

It was still unlikely to grant me a form of immortality, but having the Deathly Hallows would still be really useful.

At the end of the day, my best option was to start researching. Just because something was never brought up in the books, doesn't mean it didn't exist. There were quite possibly many other methods of immortality, I just had to find them.

My first step would be to check into all sorts of myths surrounding immortality in the magical world. Quite likely, I would need to look into myths from cultures all over the world, but for now I would start with what I had access to.

I scoured Auntie's books for tales of eternal life, but I didn't find anything of use. Hopefully the library at Hogwarts had something. I could probably check the shops in Knockturn Alley as well at some point... though preferably once I learn to defend myself from sketchy alley dwellers...

-x-

There were times that I desperately missed home. I missed my real mother, the one who loved me and supported me and advocated for me. I missed my best friend who was always there for me no matter what, even when we lived on opposite sides of the country. I missed my dog, who was fluffy and greying and didn't have long left herself.

I missed little things too. Like the music. My favourite songs only existed in my head, and when I forgot a line from a song I didn't even have the internet to look it up. I missed my favourite stuffed rabbit, Sir Eugene Flufflebuns III, and my favourite pair of black skinny jeans.

Actually, fashion sucked in the 60s. Everyone looked so... ugh. Sure, some of the dresses were cute, but otherwise I was actually looking forward to robes.

Maybe I would even learn to make clothes with magic, so I can make things I actually like. Then I could look a bit more like myself.

Every once in awhile I'd lock myself in the bathroom, climb up on the sink, and sit there, staring at my reflection in the mirror. It sounded vain, and like something out of a poorly written novel as an excuse to describe the main character, but I couldn't help it.

I would sit and trace the differences in my appearance, softly singing songs that had yet to be written, if they ever would be.

My eyes were the same, a dull green that had nothing on Lily's brilliant bottle-green eyes. My hair was blonde, lighter than I remembered it being as a child in my first life, and I wondered if it would eventually darken to brown here as well. My face was more oval than round this time, and my nose was narrower, my lips thinner, and I was missing the dimple in my chin.

I missed that dimple. My mom had it, her siblings had it, and all of my cousins had it too. It was a family trait.

Some differences were harder to spot since I was still just a kid. My shoulders seemed to be broader than both my sisters', so I was resigned to having man shoulders again. I wasn't sure how my height would compare. I was much shorter than Petunia, who had three years on me, but I was also a little taller than Lily.

I looked a lot like I used to, and to be honest it fucked with me. It was some sort of uncanny valley shit. The similarities were so strong, but there was just something fundamentally off, and it made things just feel wrong. It was creepy.

Often, I wondered if I had looked completely different, would I feel so disturbed with my appearance? I would probably never know.

-x-

My favourite part about going over tot he Snapes' house was using my magic freely, without being worried about getting caught by my family.

If I wanted a book I couldn't reach, I levitated it down. If I wanted something across the room, I summoned it. Each use of my magic gave me a little rush, and I relished in using it so freely.

Until Auntie said we needed to talk.

After lessons one Saturday when I was nine, she asked to speak with me in private. She ushered Severus to his bedroom and sat me down at the kitchen table.

I sat there anxiously until she finished preparing two cups of tea and sat down across from me. My apprehension must have been plain on my face, because she smiled gently and assured me I wasn't in any trouble.

"What is it then?" I asked tentatively.

"I have noticed something, Pansy, that I'm concerned about," she started.

"Did I do something wrong?" My voice sounded small to my own ears. I tried to figure out what it could have been. Situations like this always made me anxious. It wasn't as bad as it was in my first life, but I still often worried about making mistakes or doing something wrong.

"Not at all," Auntie reassured me. "I just need to ask you a few questions, okay?"

"Kay." I nodded, but despite her words, I still felt the cold tightness of anxiety flood my lungs.

"When you use magic, what does it feel like?" she inquired.

My nosed scrunched up. That wasn't what I was expecting, and I didn't know where she was going with this line of inquiry. "It feels... good. Like I can feel the magic flowing through me. It's invigorating. Why?"

She ignored my question and responded with one of her own. "Do you find that you have to use increasing amounts of magic to get that feeling? For example, something simple, that used to give you that feeling, no longer gives you as strong of a feeling?"

"Yeah, I guess." I answered, wondering where she was going with this.

At my response, she closed her eyes and exhaled. "It's as I feared then."

I chewed on my lip and stared at Auntie, the cold feeling inside me swelling up to the point I couldn't bear to speak.

"I had a brother." she said, staring blankly at the wall, clutching the handle of her tea cup so tightly her knuckles were white. "He was three years younger than me, and when he was seven, he died."

Auntie took a deep, shuddering breath and let go of the tea cup. "His name was Severus. He had amazing control of his magic and frequently used it, much like you do. He would start doing more and more complex things, using more and more magic. We were all so proud of him for having such mastery of his magic. We were sure he was going to be one of the most powerful wizards in the world. Then one day, while using his magic for something—I can't even remember what—he collapsed."

She clasped her hands together tightly, and swallowed. "I—the thing is, we use a wand for a reason. We do have our own magic, but it's generally not much. Wands let us use the ambient magic around us. This let's us do powerful magic without draining us.

"But wandless magic, including accidental magic, uses our own. And my brother—my little, baby brother—he used all of his up. That wasn't the problem though. You can recover from that, it just takes time. Our magic replenishes with rest and food. But, you see, Severus was using so much magic because it felt good."

My breath hitched, my eyes widening.

"He would have been fine, except he kept trying to use his magic when none was there." Her voice warbled. A tear slipped down her cheek. "The stress he was putting on his body in his attempt to use his magic when he had none... his body couldn't take it."

"He died from it." I whispered, my hand rising to cover my mouth.

"Yes." Auntie said solemnly. "You see, the reason he tried to keep using his magic when there was none... He wanted—needed—the high using his magic gave him. It's called magic addiction."

"You think I might have it."

"Yes."

-x-

Magic addiction was a rare condition. The first recorded case of it was sometime in the middle of the nineteenth century. Since then, there had been eighteen documented cases, including the case of Severus Prince. Of those cases, fourteen were in muggleborns.

It wasn't known why the condition occurred.

Fortunately, Severus Prince's fate was not typical of magic addiction. He was an extreme case. Most of those afflicted didn't manage to drain themselves. They lived long enough to get a wand which helped prevent that. Like Auntie said, wands allowed you to manipulate ambient magic. You still needed to use a bit of your own, but the amount was minuscule compared to how much magic it would take to accomplish the same task without a wand. A magic addict still got the same high though, regardless of if they performed the magic with a wand or not.

To magic addicts like myself and Severus Prince, magic was like a drug. One that you needed increasingly higher doses of to get the same feeling of euphoria. The more powerful the magic you cast, the higher the "dose," so to speak. That was where the condition became dangerous for witches or wizards with a wand. It drove many of them to practice dark magic.

Of the eighteen documented cases, thirteen died before their fiftieth birthday. Severus Prince's fate was shared with two others, while the others died because they lost control of a dark spell and accidentally killed themselves, or they were killed because their use of dark magic made them a danger to society.

The other five managed to lead fairly normal lives.

-x-

Notes: To reflect the original notes, I will state that aside from Pansy/OC all other ships are up in the air.

Important Changes: reordered scenes and made adjustments to when some scenes occurred in order to reduce how non-chronological things were. Some things were hard to fix and so there is still some slight jumping around.