HARRY POTTER
AND THE DEATH EATER MENACE
Harry Potter and all associate characters and situations are the property of J.K. Rowling. I make no claim to ownership.
CHAPTER 27: Dreamscapes, Memories, and Nightmares (pt 3)
Possible Trigger Warning: This chapter has perhaps the darkest scene I've written since Ron had to vomit up all those spiders. There will be an unexpected and very violent death. Sort of. Along a fairly horrific Neil Gaiman reference.
The immediate threat over, Snape took the opportunity to heal his leg while he waited for his "savior" to approach. Seconds later, the Advocatus Diaboli emerged from the forest, her red hair flashing like fire itself in the reflected glow of the still-burning tree. And as she drew near, her eyes flashed the green of the Killing Curse. Snape closed his eyes in resignation.
"Wonderful," he thought. "Twenty seconds in, and she's already angry with me."
"It's been quite a long time, Snivellus," said Lily Evans with a cold sneer. "Mind telling me what you've dragged me into now?"
Despite her apparent anger, this manifestation of Lily was not without mercy, as shown when she reached out a hand to help Snape to his feet. He regarded her cautiously. Superficially, she appeared as she did on the day when he'd ruined everything by calling her a Mudblood in front of Potter and his stooges. It was only a few months later, after he'd decided that their friendship was irretrievably broken, that he'd locked his Advocatus away deep in his subconscious. But despite her youth, this Lily's eyes sparkled with an incisive intelligence that was more perceptive and far more calculating than would have been possible for her 16-year-old Gryffindor self. In other words, this was a Lily who could have gone to Slytherin.
"I imagine you know exactly what you've been dragged into. After all, you know everything I know about our situation, albeit filtered through the lens of Lily's personality. Or as best I could recreate her personality within my own mind."
"I doubt I know everything you know, Snape. You forget how much you love to talk and show off how clever you are. I imagine I'll be denied some information here and there just so that you can smugly deliver plot exposition like a detective in a Muggle mystery novel." She smirked at him with a measure of contempt. "I know the basics, of course. Having consistently made bad decisions for the first thirty-four years of your life, you have finally decided to do what's right but only in the most over-complicated, wrongheaded way possible. I mean, we wouldn't be having this conversation in a forest that represents the twisted psyche of a Death Eater with multiple personalities if you'd just had the sense to tell Dumbledore about the Horcruxes, now would we?"
"Perhaps not," he conceded, "but in that case, you would not be here to experience the limited form of existence my Occlumency allows you."
Her eyes narrowed. "Cut the crap, Snape. I'm here because you need me. Having a fully independent secondary personality is the only way you'll have a chance against two independently functioning copies of Bellatrix. And quite frankly, considering our shared history, I was perfectly happy with a state of quiescent nonexistence. It was certainly preferable to being here with you."
"Enough, Lily," he snapped. "You know what's at stake. We must find a way to penetrate Bellatrix's memory palace and find out where she hid the Horcrux that the Dark Lord assigned to her. And we must do so together if we're to have any chance to succeed."
"Evans," she answered coldly. "You can't be on a first name basis with Mudbloods, Snape. Mulciber and Rosier wouldn't approve."
A flash of anguish passed over Snape's face before it returned to its normal emotionless mask. "So be it. Though I am curious as to why you wish to be known as Evans instead of Potter."
She snorted. "Because your brain would explode in anger if you were forced to refer to your Advocatus by that name. But that's all in my future, anyway. You have no idea why I ended up with Potter, so naturally I don't either. Perhaps he finally grew up."
"I somehow doubt that was the reason, Li – … Evans."
"Whatever, Snape. Let's just get this over with," she said as strode off confidently towards the cave entrance Severus had spotted. "Meanwhile, I'll enjoy the satisfaction of knowing that after all these years, you finally realized I was right about all those Junior Death Eaters whose approval mattered more to you than my friendship."
"Can we not do this now?" Snape said through gritted teeth as he followed. "We are deep within the fractured psyche of Bellatrix Lestrange and about to enter her memory palace where things will only grow more dangerous. I'm sure her Occlumency defenses are already adapting to your presence and developing new strategies to destroy us. It is not helpful for you to obsess over your anger towards me, and certainly not helpful for you to act like …." He bit off the end of that sentence before finishing it, but Lily noticed.
"Like a Mudblood?" she asked angrily.
He grimaced. "I was going to say like an absolute bitch. Is that better or worse?"
Lily glared at him before suddenly bursting into laughter. "Oh honestly, Snape! I can't believe I need to remind you of such an important detail that I'm sure you already know but seem to have completely forgotten!"
"What?" he asked, angry at the implied insult to his cunning and memory. "What have I forgotten that's so important?"
She stepped towards him and looked at his face with surprising fondness given her previous hostility.
"That I am not Lily Evans, you dunderhead! I'm your Advocatus Diaboli which you chose to base on your understanding of Lily's character! And so, if I'm acting like 'a bitch,' it means two things. First, 'acting like a bitch' is what you would expect the real Lily to do if she were here under these circumstances. And more importantly, I'm acting that way because subconsciously you think you deserve having Lily to treat you with such hostility. Now, would you please get over all your ridiculous feelings of guilt over all the things you did that you believe justify Lily's anger so we can get on with it?"
Severus growled at his Advocatus before stalking into the cave entrance with a still-amused Lily close behind. Two wordless Lumos spells let up the cavern once they were inside, and after about fifty feet of rough-hewn rock walls, both Severus and Lily were surprised when they transitioned into a corridor with smooth marble walls, floor, and ceiling. They were further surprised when they saw the first painting hung on the wall. Lily gasped. It was a moving portrait of Alice Longbottom writhing on a floor in agony. Next to the painting was a brass placard bearing an inscription.
Alice Longbottom
November 1981
Extreme Cruciatus Torture
While Lily stared at the image of her former friend suffering under magical torture, Severus moved past her towards a second painting just a few feet away. This one depicted Frank Longbottom in similar circumstances. Nearby was a third portrait bearing the name of some wizard Snape didn't know and depicting the pale corpse of someone slain by the Killing Curse. Beyond them, the corridor stretched on into the distance with scores of portraits lining both walls
"Her victims?" Lily asked.
Snape nodded. "But are they hung here as trophies? Or as reminders that she is past redemption? Either way, I fear we have a long walk ahead of us."
With that, he headed cautiously down the grisly corridor with Lily at his side.
"What did you mean past redemption?" she asked. Snape paused before answering.
"That … is something I would not have expected Lily to understand. And so, you don't either. Every intentional murder damages the soul and degrades the murderer. But the Killing Curse does so in a more concrete manner. What most educated wizards know about the Killing Curse is that to meet its esoteric requirements, the caster must be able to visualize at least one person who he hates enough to kill. What is less widely known are the aftereffects."
"What? Death? I think most people have figured that much out."
Snape's lip curled at his former friend's flippancy. "I meant the aftereffects on the caster. Successfully casting the Killing Curse – or indeed, any of the Unforgivables – implants an idea into the caster's mind. One which cannot be fully dislodged save by the most delicate psychic surgery. And one which grows ever stronger with each successive Unforgiveable cast."
"What idea?" Lily asked somewhat fearfully.
"Those curses are called Unforgivable for a reason: They instill a personal conviction that the caster has done something for which he can never be forgiven. Something which has rendered him irredeemable. I've always suspected that the reason the Dark Lord required his Death Eaters to make use of Unforgiveables as part of their initiation ceremonies and encouraged them to use the Unforgiveables freely when on raids was to inculcate that sense of hopeless irredeemability within his followers. To make them believe that after joining him, it simply would not be possible to ever truly rejoin civilized society and thus, that it was only among the Death Eaters that they could ever truly find companionship. In other words, past a certain point, someone like Bellatrix Lestrange would have accepted the fact that she was utterly damned. And being damned, there was nothing to stop her from committing even viler crimes because there could be no worse penalty to impose upon her."
Lily was silent for a long terrible moment before she spoke again.
"How many Unforgiveables did you cast as a Death Eater?" she finally asked in a quiet voice.
"Do you not know? You are a part of me, after all."
"No, I don't know. Perhaps that's something else you didn't want the real Lily to know either."
"Then I think it best that you retain your ignorance on that point, lest your opinion of me diminish even further."
They continued in silence for a moment before she spoke again.
"Do you think you're … irredeemable?"
Snape snorted. "Your namesake certainly seemed to think so."
"Don't be so sure … Severus."
He stopped and looked at her in surprise. "What do you mean?"
The Advocatus unexpectedly smiled at him. "There are things I don't know because you don't want to believe the real Lily could know them. But there are also things I know, or at least suspect, that you don't know because you won't allow yourself to consider them as possibilities."
"Such as?"
"Well, as you no doubt recall, Frank Longbottom deduced that you only called Lily a Mudblood to curry favor with Mulciber and Rosier because you were tired of being picked on as a blood traitor. But seriously, has it never occurred to you that Lily might have realized the same thing? That she didn't cut you off for good solely because she was offended at that word but rather because she finally realized how untenable and even dangerous your position in Slytherin House was so long as you two stayed friends?"
Snape stared at her. "Are you suggesting that the reason Lily cut all ties with me was … a way of protecting me from my own housemates?"
"Well, honestly, Severus, I don't actually know, since I'm not Lily. I'm just saying that's a possible explanation for the way she treated you for your last two years at Hogwarts. After all, having her as a public enemy really did improve your standing greatly in Slytherin. In fact, it was only after you and she parted company that you were seriously targeted for recruitment into the Death Eaters. And now that we think about it, that's also exactly what she did with Harry, isn't it? Cut him out of the Potter family completely and for his own good because she thought that was the best way to protect him? Come now, Sev. For all her virtues, you know one of Lily's least attractive features is her need to be a martyr for the cause."
Snape narrowed his eyes. "Even if that is … a possibility, how is it that you have considered this theory but I never have?"
The Advocatus laughed. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe because at the end of the day, you've always been far too in love with your insecurity and bitterness to ever look past someone rejecting you and wonder why they did it! And consequently, the idea that Lily would hate you forever because of a single insult appealed to that Romantic-Gothic persona you've been crafting since you were out of short pants."
"I have not been crafting …!"
"When you first met Lily, you literally appeared to her from inside the hollow of a tree. Like Ariel from The Tempest except that you were ghostly pale and wearing all-black old-fashioned clothes. Percy and Mary Shelley would have each written a novel about you if they'd been there to see it."
Severus snorted contemptuously but said nothing. The two continued on down the long corridor. Lost in his own thoughts, Snape was only barely aware of the graphic portraits depicting the dozens and dozens of Bellatrix's victims. He could afford the introspection; Lily was studying everything intently (as she always did), and so in time, he would remember everything she saw. Finally, after just passing just under a hundred paintings of torture and murder victims, the two at last came to a massive iron door with no visible lock or handle.
It was at this point that Severus made what he later realized was a very serious mistake: He asked his Advocatus a question.
"If Lily didn't really hate me at school but was only pretending to out of a foolish desire to protect me, why did she continue the deception for years after? Even after the Dark Lord was defeated and I continued to serve Dumbledore?"
The Advocatus hesitated and then looked at him sadly. "Because, Severus, by then she knew you had actually become a Death Eater. She knew that you had told Voldemort of the Prophecy to win a seat in his Inner Circle. And she knew that in doing so you had sent him to murder her entire family. So you see, by that point, you'd given her a real reason to hate you."
Snape was left speechless by what the Advocatus had said, while the Advocatus could only watch as the pain of her revelation washed over him. Then, as one, they recognized their mistake – Snape had inadvertently distracted his Advocatus with his painful question, which meant that neither of them was paying close enough attention to their surroundings to prevent the mental landscape from arbitrarily changing. They had just enough time to realize the danger when suddenly, the floor dropped out from beneath them, dropping them both into a deep pit.
As one (naturally), Severus and Lily pointed their wands at each other and cast. "ARRESTO MOMENTUM!" Their sudden fall slowed down to that of a leaf dropping fluttering down slowly on a windless day, and after a few seconds, they could see a floor some twenty feet below. The two allowed themselves to fall slowly for another few seconds before they simultaneously dismissed their spells so that they could drop to the ground in preparation for an ambush.
No attack came. Instead, the two found themselves in a thirty-by-thirty room with a very high ceiling. On one wall stood a massive iron door that looked identical to the one they'd seen above. Indeed, Severus thought it was likely the same door existing in both locations, for that was often how geography worked in mindscapes. Environments changed, but landmarks were consistent. This door marked the boundary to the next level of Bellatrix's mind, and so it would appear the same wherever they sought to cross over it.
The room was sparse but not empty. There was a small raised platform near the wall opposite the door. On the left side of the platform was a side table bearing an empty candleholder and a long piece of what seemed to be cotton string. On the right side was a matching side table bearing what appeared to be bottle of wine and a small book. From the space between the two side tables, it appeared that some absent piece was meant to be placed there, most likely a chair of some kind. Along the wall behind the platform rested three cauldrons.
Then, from up above, they heard a grinding sound as the hole that had dropped them into this room closed itself up. Barely a second later, there was a loud clang as metal spikes popped down from the ceiling which then began to slowly drop towards them.
"Seriously?" Lily exclaimed as if offended by the nature of the trap. "That is perhaps the most cliched thing I've ever seen in my entire life. What, are there no train tracks for Bellatrix to tie us to?"
"No," answered Severus, "this is quite serious. It is the very fact that it is a cliché that gives it power over us. Quickly! The door!"
As one, Severus and Lily fired their most powerful Alohomoras at the iron door, but there was no effect. Annoyed, Severus swiftly turned his attention to the objects in the room, though he could make no sense of their purpose or arrangement. Even a quick check of the book on the side table revealed its pages to be blank.
"Think! There most be a reason that these items are here. Some clue that can help us escape."
"Why though?" Lily asked while trying unsuccessfully to transfigure a hole in the wall which seemed immune to such magic. "You realized back at the start of this whole thing that Bellatrix wasn't obligated to give you clues. And moreover, that what seemed to be clues were probably traps. What makes this room different?"
"It is the nature of the scenario. It forces us to accept the reality of a death trap with, as you noted, the ridiculous cliché of a spike-filled ceiling that slowly descends to kill us. So slowly in fact that we have time to casually discuss the matter. There must be a clue, a secret way to escape that we can only find through cleverness and ingenuity, because by force of narrative, that way is the only way out, with all other strategies doomed to failure. If she tried to cheat us here with false clues, the narrative structure of the trap would collapse, and the Alohomoras would have worked to free us. But where is the clue?"
As if in response to his question, the mad girlish voice of Bellatrix Lestrange rang out from somewhere above.
"Awww! Does widdle Sevie-Poo want a clue? Ahahahaha!"
"Oh, for God's sake," Lily muttered under her breath.
"Let's see what you make of this then –
To open the door and pass beyond
and go where you want to go,
Just sit with your Love and drink with your Love
and read by your Love's warm glow."
"More riddles," Lily said sarcastically. "How … adorable. Any ideas what all that rubbish means?"
Severus went very still with his back to Lily, while the spiked ceiling slowly continued its descent. Finally, he spoke softly and almost haltingly.
"Do … do you think it is actually possible ... for Lily and me to be friends again?"
The Advocatus was gobsmacked. "Seriously? You think this is the proper time for discussing that?"
He turned to face her and glanced upwards. "It is possible we may never have another chance?"
Lily huffed angrily. "Fine. Speaking as your Advocatus, I would say it's not about getting her to forgive you for your sins anymore. You both need to understand and accept and forgive each other for your mistakes. Lily was and is justifiably angry that you joined Voldemort and that your recklessness and impulsiveness and desire for power endangered the lives of her husband and children. And you were and are justifiably angry that she cut you off so completely that it practically drove you into Voldemort's arms. And, worse, she later did the same thing to Harry, and in both cases, it was because she arrogantly decided to do what she thought was best for her loved ones due to her lifelong martyr complex!"
Then, she wrinkled her nose thoughtfully. "And I suppose you're also still angry that she married someone you despise with the heat of a thousand suns. Can you ever forgive her for that, Severus? Moreover, do you really think you could ever maintain a friendship with her while James is in the picture? I mean, it's not like Lady Potter would put up with you continually insulting her husband in every single conversation. And I haven't even gotten to the matter of the Other Potter, as you still like to call him. Considering all that, do you even want to make up with Lily?"
Snape stood still in silent thought as the spikes drew ever closer. "I don't know," he finally said quietly.
"Well then, how about we set that aside for a while and work on solving that riddle instead?"
Snape closed his eyes and took two deep breaths before he spoke again. "I know the answer to the riddle. I knew it as soon as Bellatrix uttered the words."
Lily's brow furrowed. "What? What's the answer? Wait. Different question. How is it possible for you to know the answer but not me?"
He opened his eyes and looked long and hard at Lily's face, as if memorizing an image of her from happier days long since gone.
"You don't know it because it's a cruel riddle with a cruel answer. And I think it would break my heart if Lily were here and could have guessed the solution at once."
She shook her head in confusion. "I don't understand. What …?"
"SECTUMSEMPRA!" he cried out in an anguished voice before she could finish the question. The spell struck with pinpoint precision, and Lily's body dropped to the ground, her head neatly removed from her shoulders.
Instantly, he turned away and clamped his hand over his mouth while he struggled to retain his composure.
"It's not really her. It's not really her. It's not really her."
He whispered the words again and again like a mantra until his emotions came back under control. Then, he moved quickly towards the body and severed head, his wand already in motion. In turn, Lily's clothing was vanished away and her head and nude body levitated over to the waiting cauldrons. Then, using spells that every good potion master knew but which were customarily meant for animal ingredients rather than human corpses (at least among every reputable potion master), he set to work as the spiked ceiling inched ever closer.
One spell scoured the head down to a bare skull which he levitated over to the table holding the bottle of wine. A second spell deboned and disassembled the corpse, with the bare bones going into one cauldron, all the body fat going into another, and everything else unceremoniously dropped into the last. A third spell instantly rendered the body fat into tallow before he summoned the cotton string from the table next to the candleholder. With a wave of his wand, some of the tallow flowed up around the string and hardened to make a candle.
Finally, at his command, Lily's bones flew up out of the middle cauldron towards the platform before assembling themselves into the shape of a ghoulish and uncomfortable-looking stool that he reinforced with powerful Sticking Charms. By now, the ceiling was barely ten feet above him. Steeling his resolve once more, Snape sat down on the stool ("sit with your Love") and poured some of the wine into Lily's skull ("drink with your Love") which he then lifted to his lips and tipped back. The wine burned slightly, but there was no poison. This trap was meant to harm him in far worse ways. Finally, he placed the candle into its holder and lit it with his wand before opening the book once more. By the light of the candle ("read by your Love's warm glow"), words now appeared which he read aloud.
Open, door, that I may pass beyond and find my doom.
Severus sneered at the banality of the pass phrase even as the iron door slide open. The spikes were mere inches away as he strode out of the room without so much as a backward glance at Lily's defiled remains.
Beyond the iron door was another dark corridor, and despite his Lumos, Snape found the gloom oppressive. After a few minutes' walk, he was surprised to see what appeared to be a Gringotts vault door ahead. He focused his psychic power and cast the strongest Unlocking Charm he knew. The door slowly opened. That, Snape thought, was a bad sign. That the vault door was susceptible to any Charm meant that the true danger was within and that he was being lured towards it. Cautiously, he made his way into the vault.
Inside, he found a cavernous area full of golden coins and valuable antiques and arcane objects of all kinds, the skins of strange creatures (some of which Snape didn't even recognize), several enormous rack of potions in jeweled flasks, and a skull wearing a crown. There was no order or method to the vault, just great piles of coins and precious objects that were two, even three times as tall as a man. The only thing Snape could see that was not priceless in some way was at once incongruous but also oddly appropriate for the demented mind he was exploring – on the far side of the room was an incredibly ornate iron maiden that was decorated with Bellatrix Lestrange's face and bound with heavy chains.
He took a few steps towards the iron maiden only to dive for cover when a high-pitched voice shrieked: "CRUCIO!" The curse flew over his head, as Bellatrix Lestrange emerged from behind one giant stack of gold. Simultaneously, Miss Demeanor stepped out from behind another stack on the opposite side of the room and opened fire as well. He ducked and rolled, slashing out towards Lestrange as he did. As his wand struck a pile of gold coins, he transfigured them into an enormous flurry of gold dust which he sent towards Lestrange as a dust storm (similar to the attack he used months before at Longbottom Manor, the one that ruined Augusta Longbottom's beloved Hepplewhite table). With Lestrange distracted for a few seconds, he turned to Miss Demeanor and engaged in a furious duel with her even as he tried to move towards more effective cover. His brief one-on-one battle only lasted for a few seconds, however, before Lestrange dispelled his dust storm and lashed out with a Cutting Curse that caught him in his side.
In the real world, a massive gash opened in Snape's side, and blood spurted forth. Instantly, Regulus tried to heal it, but Snape by this point was already deathly pale from blood loss, and it was not possible to feed him a Blood Replenisher while the Legilimency probe was ongoing. All Regulus and Lucius knew was that if Snape couldn't withdraw from Bellatrix's mind soon, he would die of his injuries regardless of what healing magic they brought to bear.
Snape screamed and fell to one knee as the Cutting Curse tore into him, but he managed to cast one more spell towards Miss Demeanor, a Blasting Curse that she easily dodged. Unfortunately for her, he was actually aiming for a huge mound of gold coins behind her which the explosion caused to fall on her. She tried to leap out of the way, but the coins still landed on her with enough weight to bury her from the waist down and keep her pinned. But that minor victory only opened him up to another attack from Lestrange who disarmed him and then bound him tightly. He was briefly surprised when Lestrange's Incarcerous spell manifested not as thick ropes but as barbed wire that cut into his skin (and produced a stigmata-like effect on his physical body that horrified Lucius and Regulus). But then, he remembered who he was dealing with and decided the alteration made perfect sense.
"Silly Sevie, Silly Sevie!" Lestrange giggled in her disturbing high-pitched voice. "Clipped your wings at least, haven't I! No trouble at all now that you don't have your filthy Mudblood around to protect you! What would our Lord say about you being a disgusting blood traitor if he could see?!"
From across the room, Miss Demeanor shouted to Lestrange even as she fought to free herself from the gold coins. "I imagine he would say 'Quit dawdling and KILL the blood traitor instead of making a show of it!' That or 'Free Miss Demeanor and let her kill Snape if you can't be bothered to!'"
"SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP!" Lestrange screamed hysterically. "YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO! NOT AFTER YOU HID LIKE A COWARD IN THE CATACOMBS OF MY MIND ALL THESE YEARS!"
While the two parts of Bellatrix's mind screamed at each other, Snape considered his options. They were quite limited, especially since he was fairly certain his physical body would bleed to death soon if he couldn't end the battle quickly. He could free himself at least if he moved quickly and stealthily, but it was still a two-on-one fight with no way for him to even the odds.
"… or is there?" he thought as he was suddenly struck by both realization and inspiration. With a subtle gesture, his wand flew back to his hand without either woman noticing. But then, instead of immediately dispelling his bonds, he carefully turned so that his wand was pointed towards the iron maiden. He steeled himself and focused all of his psychic strength on one single (and singularly unexpected) spell.
"ALOHOMORA!"
At that, both of his attackers turned in his direction and screamed in fury, as the shackles on the iron maiden fell away and the device itself flew open. A lithe emaciated female staggered forth and nearly fell … before she realized where she was and who stood before her. And then, the face of Bellatrix Black, aged 18, lit up in utter fury.
"FULMINATA!" she cried out while pointing the wand she'd somehow produced towards Lestrange. Snape quickly shut his eyes and braced himself as a massive bolt of lightning flew over him towards his attacker. At the last possible second, Lestrange apparated away to the top of another pile of coins on the other side of the room, but the entire vault shook from the strength of the blast, causing that stack to shift beneath her feet. Lestrange lost her balance and fell off the pile which also buried Miss Demeanor under even more coins.
By that point, Snape had freed himself from the barbed wire and made his way towards the younger Bellatrix, clutching his still-bleeding side as he ran. Instantly, she trained her wand on him.
"Do I know you?" she asked suspiciously.
"I … don't know," he answered. "That's a surprisingly complicated question coming from you. But I was the one who freed you from confinement."
A dark cloud passed over her face. "That won't last long. They're too powerful even together. They'll lock me away again and kill you when they return."
Then, she looked Snape up and down. "Who are you and why are you here?"
Before he could answer, the girl spat out an expletive and made several violent slashes with her wand. One bodily yanked Snape to her side while another caused a wave of gold coins to rise up into the air and solidify as a shield just before a Killing Curse from Miss Demeanor could strike him dead. Snape hissed in pain and clutched his side once more.
"You don't have much time, hero!" Black shouted. "Answer the questions or get out of here!"
"I am Severus Snape. You don't know me, but your other selves do and consider me an enemy. I am here searching for information about a golden chalice that the Dark Lord gave to one of your other selves."
While he spoke, Snape slashed his own wand in concert with Black, and the two of them were barely able to maintain their protective cover against the attacks now coming from both Miss Demeanor and Lestrange.
"What? That cup perhaps?" She spared a gesture towards the far side of the vault, and a chalice that did indeed resemble the Hufflepuff Cup sat atop the tallest pile of coins and artifacts in the vault.
Snape snorted. "Well, that was surprisingly easy."
"What's so important about that cup? It's not a Black artifact!"
"All I can say is that it is essential to the final destruction of the Dark Lord Voldemort!"
Black looked at him in shock. "Then what are you waiting for?! If this is my … her memory palace, then obviously the real cup is in my real vault! You know what you needed to learn, so get the hell out of here!"
Snape hesitated. "No, I can still help you …."
"Oh Morgana's Tits!" Black exclaimed angrily before drawing back an arm and slugging Snape across the jaw as hard as possible.
Instantly, Snape came to his senses back in Bellatrix's cell in Longbottom Manor as the force of the girl's blow knocked him off his chair. At the same time, however, the paralysis that held Bellatrix in place also broke, and the insane witch screamed and flung herself towards the three wizards with her hands outstretched like claws. Luckily for them, after fourteen years in Azkaban, the dreaded Bellatrix Lestrange was nowhere near as formidable in real life as she was within her own mind. Lucius casually stunned her and then conjured a straitjacket and gag to contain her.
"Merlin's bones, Severus!" Regulus exclaimed as he carefully helped Snape up off the floor. "You look like death warmed over. What the hell has been happening all this time?!"
"I will … I will be happy for a debriefing /cough/ once I … am out of this bloody dungeon and have had proper medical treatment." Snape looked down in confusion. "Where are my shirt and coat?"
Regulus blushed slightly. "I, um, had to vanish them. they were too blood-soaked."
Snape nodded. "Then, we can add getting a hot bath and replacing my attire to medical treatment in the list of things I want now!"
The three men left Bellatrix's cell and locked it solid with the woman's unconscious and bound body still on the floor. Moments later, they had made their way back up to the main floor of Longbottom Manor with Lucius levitating the barely conscious Snape and Regulus leading the way. For his part, Snape knew he needed medical treatment and rest before he returned to Hogwarts, as his current condition would invite far too many questions. Still, he'd survived to bring back invaluable intelligence, and at last, it seemed his suffering was over for this day at least. Naturally, it wasn't that easy.
"SNIVELLUS!" screamed Sirius Black in a rage.
And through his blurry vision, Snape could make out the face of perhaps his most hated enemy pointing a wand at him from across the room.
"Of course," Snape thought blearily. "It seems none of my sufferings will ever be complete while there's a Marauder around to make things worse."
NEXT: All the Harry-centric stuff that got removed from this chapter because it undercut the tension and drama.
AN 1: Tentative Publication schedule.
Jan 12 - Upload of this chapter here and at AO3. Also, a full teaser of the next chapter will be posted on the Discord server
Jan 18 - Next SIB chapter on TSM's website for all Patrons.
Jan 25 - Next POS chapter (Ch 28) posted at TSM's website free for all Discord members.
Jan 28 - Ch 28 of POS posted here and at AO3.
AN 2: The ghoulish riddle was from "The Books of Magic #4" written by Neil Gaiman for DC's Vertigo Comics Imprint. For those unfamiliar, "The Books of Magic" is a comic book series about a British boy named Timothy Hunter who has black hair and glasses and is tapped to become the most powerful sorcerer of the Age. He also has an owl. All of this came out in 1990.
AN 3: Milestones! The Sinister Man's Discord page now has over 1000 follower!