Disclaimer: As usual, I am not Jo Rowling nor do I own the characters or concepts of the Harry Potter universe.
SPECIAL WARNING: This chapter contains slightly more harsh language, and a scene depicting child abuse which may cause triggers.
Tuesday afternoon was a free period for both Severus and Lily; neither of them had taken Care for Magical Creatures as an elective, though the same could be said for the majority of the student body. The two friends spent an hour reviewing for their shared Astronomy O.W.L. that they would take the following evening. Admittedly, Lily had more enthusiasm than Severus. The auburn-haired girl had always enjoyed stargazing and mapping the endless constellations.
For Severus, it wasn't that he had a lack of interest in the subject during his first life, but with literally decades spent doing nothing with the knowledge, he had little care in learning it all again. Thankfully, the two of them deemed themselves ready for that exam in relatively short order and moved on to study their other Wednesday exams. Lily's being Divination, while Severus would have Arithmancy.
"So…" Lily began, those emerald eyes twinkling with a playful curiosity. "Shall I give the cynical, non-believing Slytherin a palm reading to see what his future holds? Perhaps straight O's? All questions can be answered by the lovely Madam Lily!"
Severus' lips perked into a narrow smirk as he shook his head in faux ridicule. "Lovely you may be, but I don't need a bloody palm reading to know that I'm going to get straight O's. Because the numbers combined with my established history do not lie."
"Oh, but numbers are boring, Sev!" she giggled softly, so as to not attract unwanted attention from Madam Pince. Ever since third year when they took the similar, yet fundamentally different classes that attempted to chart the future, it had been a friendly feud between them.
Severus had always subscribed to the more grounded philosophy of Arithmancy, which focused on the numbers provided by history with which to map a rough future based on which sequences repeated themselves. It was also a useful tool in inventing new potions, mapping out what techniques and ingredients worked and why in order to find more potent and efficient alternatives.
Lily on the other hand, enjoyed the flair and mystery provided by Divination. Tea leaves, palm readings, tarot readings, and all other manners with which to prophesize the future were highly stimulating for such a large imagination as hers. To her, if neither of the subjects were a 100% reliable method for predicting the future, then the option with the most excitement was a preferable alternative.
Lily looked into the black steel of Severus' eyes with that ever-playful smile on her face. Without warning, she took his right hand with her left and began tracing slowly along his palm, eyeing each curve and break in the lines carefully. If she'd been less focused on her attempt to provide a reading for him, she'd have noticed her best friend's face slowly turning red, or the slight shivering he did at her touch.
Severus was overcome with absolute bliss as Lily traced along his hand. Each movement of her fingertip sent a tingle of electricity down his arm which spread throughout his whole body. Along with his growing butterflies was a building sense of apprehension.
"Is she toying with me?! It's no secret that I'm fond of her. Why do I constantly turn into a damned, blushing idiot every time I'm around her like this and she insists on touching me so delicately?!"
After a few more moments, Lily brought her green eyes back up to meet Severus'. His blush had subsided in time to not betray him as she whispered cheerfully. "Well, this line here…" she traced near where his palm met his fingers, sending another jolt of pleasure through his brain. "...Is an age line. You're fated to live an exceptionally long life."
Severus snorted at the unintentional irony of her assessment. "Well, I've got over 20 extra years in the bank, so to speak. That's certainly an exceptional amount to add to even a standard lifespan."
"This line…" she continued, tracing down the center of his palm and sending another accursed tingle down his spine. "...Is a line that describes the fulfillment of your life. There's a great many twists in the line, which signifies a great deal of personal turmoil. But it smoothes out after the middle, so it looks like it will be a perilous several years, but after a while, life will be a source of great happiness for you." she muttered, a sadness visible in her eyes despite her smile.
"Peril and turmoil are my life story, Lily. I doubt happiness is what will await me in the coming years. My only shining light in the past 20 years is seeing you alive again. If you stay that way this time, that will suffice for my happiness, I suppose."
"And this last line down near your wrist signifies the impact you'll have on the world around you. The longest line of all. Hardly surprising if Sunday was any indication." Lily added, beaming with pride.
Severus could only scoff. "Funny how you could tell me all of that just from reading my palm. Are all readings this vague, oh Lovely Madam Lily?"
Lily had not yet set down her friend's palm, and instead opted to lean closer to him, looking deeply into his eyes with that impish smile. "What's the matter, Sev? Why don't you trust a routine palm reading? Bad experience with prophecies?"
Suddenly, those words poured something out of Severus' mind, and took him back to that moonlit hilltop. The night he had doomed his beloved Lily, who had long-since severed all ties with him thanks to his outburst and use of the word Mudblood. The same night that he had also changed sides forever, turning his back on the Dark Lord to fight for Lily's side. Lily's, not Dumbledore's. The old wizard was staring down a panting Severus, who had come to relay information that she and her family were in danger, and how desperately he needed to help keep her safe.
"I - I come with a warning, no, a request, please!" The frantic tone in Severus' voice was a far-cry from the quiet cynicism of the boy he had been, but also vastly different from the charismatic, intimidating Potions Master he would grow up to be. This was the bridge between the two, where the wayward soul had finally discovered what was truly important to him.
"What request could a Death Eater make of me?" The coldness in Dumbledore's voice lacked his warm, inviting tone that he had exhibited to everyone else who had known him.
"The - the prophecy...the prediction...Trelawney…" Severus muttered to Dumbledore, shame etched in his very fearful eyes.
"Ah, yes," said Dumbledore, suspicion growing towards his companion. "How much did you relay to Lord Voldemort?"
"Everything - everything I heard!" Severus stammered, using all of the self control he could muster to not be rendered a weeping child. "That is why - it is for that reason - he thinks it means Lily Evans!"
It took all of Severus' strength to tear himself away from that terrible memory of what he had done, and his futile attempt to keep Lily safe by going to Dumbledore. Barely managing to lock himself once again behind his Occlumency (a task that proved more difficult and ineffective with each passing day), he realized once again that his mind had betrayed him. He could see the terror ingrained in Lily's green eyes. It was clear that she had once again seen a memory that had forced itself out of his mind.
For Lily, yet another terrible image of Severus, this time slightly older, only brought with it more confusion and dread. If it had just been a vision, it would indeed scare her, but she could merely brush it off. The fact that it was obvious Sev had seen it too, and that he once again seemed less shocked and more ashamed than anything, only furthered Lily's panic.
Her lower lip was trembling as she looked at her friend's downcast eyes. "Sev, what the hell keeps happening?! A meeting with Dumbledore? And he called you a Death Eater! Why do all of these...things...feel more like terrible, real memories than a vague, possible future? Prophesy? About me?" The questions continued to multiply in Lily's mind, and this time, she would not brush off what happened. Still with her hand gripping Severus', she got out of her seat and pulled him by the arm in a haste, leading him outside the library.
By the time they barely passed the threshold and made it into the hallway, Lily turned to Severus, eyes ablaze with a hard desire to get to the bottom of what they were seeing.
"Severus…" she muttered, glaring at him. He couldn't tell what hurt more, her burning glare that stained her normally sweet eyes or the fact that she had used his full name. "Do not attempt to dance around this subject anymore. You know exactly what I just saw! Why did I see an older you?! Why did Dumbledore call you a Death Eater?! Why, in that first memory on Sunday, the one that resembled the day you got hurt, did you call me a Mudblood?! And WHY DID I SEE YOU TAKE THAT WRETCHED MARK?!"
Lily's voice was positively fuming. None of what was happening made sense, but that knowing look in Severus' eyes could no longer be ignored. There had been three incidents of this memory sharing, each of them so terribly vivid and grim. And she could see in his eyes that he wanted to be anywhere but in front of her right now.
"Lily, I told you, I have to figure it out for myself. Please, give me a week when we're back in Cokeworth, I can't explain it no-"
"No, you WILL explain it now, Severus!" she hissed, her eyes swimming with conflicting emotions, seemingly on the fence with whether she was about to explode or break down in tears. "You have no idea what happens every time I get one of these...visions...from you. I can feel shame. I can feel sorrow. It's not just seeing them for myself that causes these things, it's like something is pushing all of that into me! I'd rather hear an explanation from your lips rather than see another one of those frightening moments! Now out with it!"
Severus shook his head slightly. It couldn't be here. It wasn't supposed to happen here, not yet. He couldn't tell her now with the stress of everything else at Hogwarts; it would destroy both of them. But it was clear that she wasn't going to relent, and he refused to lie to her. Even if he tried, it would likely turn out impossible.
She inhaled a sharp breath, almost in disgust. "I can't believe it...my best friend doesn't trust me enough to tell me? I told you yesterday, Sev, I want to know...Have the goddamn respect for me to tell me when I ask!"
That scathing remark caused something within Severus to snap at her words. The black beads of obsidian hardened as he returned her hiss. "The respect to kneel to your curiosity about something that I can't even yet explain to myself?! I have told you, promised you, that I would tell you when the time was right. And I still intend to, and I WILL NOT lie! That here, ESPECIALLY here in the bloody school where the walls have ears, is not the place for something so important!"
Lily's anger shrunk in response to her friend's outburst. Her voice became soft, devoid of anything but sadness and regret that she had crossed a line which caused Severus to erupt exactly like he used to. But unlike all of those times he'd snap in the past, it was clear that he was out to make a point about how intrusive she was acting.
"Sev...I want a clue...just give me a bloody clue as to what all of this has been and I'll drop it until Summer...but please, you're my friend, PLEASE don't leave me in the dark like this!"
Severus merely snorted, the seething fire in his eyes barely relenting. "You want a clue? Fine. Let's just say I've seen my future, Madam Lily," he spat. "And it's nowhere near the wonderful picture that you were so happy to paint for me." The young Slytherin's face contorted into indescribable anger; he was determined not to break down in front of Lily even as his fragile Occlumency continued to crumble.
Severus slowly approached the shrinking form of Lily, who was beginning to tremble and back away from his anger. The pain of her innocently-placed palm reading felt like an insult to what he knew to be his reality. "I'll die at a considerably young age...everything that was truly important and worth living for to me? Gone! Dead! And not a soul will care about the marks that I leave on the world when I'm gone; no, they'll all CELEBRATE!"
He took several deep breaths before the reality of the situation struck him. His anger immediately evaporated when he saw Lily wilting in fear against the marble wall, fright and hurt etched on her freckled face. She was afraid of him…For a moment, he saw her wide, green eyes and red hair both turn black...
The six year-old boy opened his bedroom door and made his way through the hallway with a playful hop every couple of seconds, his imagination running wild. He made his way down the shabby, carpeted staircase with a cheerful spring in his step. He couldn't wait to show his parents what he had done last night when he came down for a sip of juice. He was so happy! He could cast magic after all!
As he rounded the corner and hopped to the kitchen, the boy stopped and was petrified at the scene before him. His father, Tobias, was towering over his mother Eileen, who had huddled into the corner of the room near the pantry. In the elder Snape's hand was a Quaffle, though the boy couldn't tell what was more red, the Quidditch ball or his father's steaming face.
"The bloody hell were you thinking, woman!" the imposing man spat, disgust in his eyes at the cowering witch before him. "That football was signed by the ENTIRE Lions championship team! That was priceless and yet you have the nerve to turn it into this garbage?!"
Eileen was stammering at her husband's suddenly violent behavior, wincing as he slapped her across the face. "Sweetheart...I-I didn't…" she trailed off, noticing their son had arrived in the kitchen and was still as a stone. Her eyes widened in dread-filled realization as she gasped, now in fear for the little boy that had walked in.
"Y-yes, Tobias...I did it, please..! Please punish me and let that be the end of it!" Eileen broke into a defeated sob as she was slapped again.
"You swore to me that this nonsense was over! That this freaky shit was done when you married me!"
"Daddy, stop!" cried the little boy, whose arrival had gone unnoticed by his father. "Mummy didn't do it, I did! Please stop hurting her!"
Eileen's fear multiplied ten-fold as the boy doomed himself to the fate she tried to save him from. "Severus...no, baby, NO!"
Tobias stared at his son with wide eyes, his whole body quaking. "M...my boy...no...no, you can't be one of them too!" The intimidating man stood silent, raking his hands through his dusty brown hair as his shock morphed into absolute hatred. "Think it's funny, do you?! Transforming my property into something from your filthy, magical world?!" He marched towards the young Severus, whose own tears of fear started to flood outward.
"Toby, please, no!" Eileen screamed, gripping onto her husband's wrist. "He's so young, it was an accident! He didn't mean to!"
The stronger man simply threw his wife off of him, her head crashing against the hard refrigerator door as her legs gave out. She sat on the floor, sobbing as she weakly stretched her arm, trying to reach for her son.
"Now, pay attention, woman!" Tobias bellowed as he grabbed Severus by his thick, black hair. "This is what happens to freaks who do magic in my house!" The man brought his fist up to meet the child's nose as a sickening pop could be heard amidst Severus and Eileen's cries. Both adults could see from how their son's nose contorted that it was broken, but only the mother seemed to care.
Tobias cruelly threw the boy down to the ground and stormed out the door, muttering obscenities with each step he took. All the young Severus could see amidst his tears and blood were his mother's terrified black eyes as consciousness slowly left him…
That was the day that changed everything for Severus. His meager family hadn't been well off, but he never felt unloved before that day. He and his father always listened to the radio to support their beloved Football team, the Aston Villa Lions. On the rare occasion Tobias had a day off from his job at the mill, he would take his wife and son on a picnic to the park in Cokeworth, playing Football happily with his boy.
And his mother, Eileen, was such a wonderful woman. She had always put Severus to bed with a fantastic story about Hogwarts and the wizarding world. Quidditch had been the little boy's most requested subject for stories, and he always dreamed that he could one day play. His habit of hopping around was his innocent impression of a Quidditch Chaser on a broomstick, and he hoped that he could be sorted into Gryffindor House so he could play Chaser for them. He thought that his father might enjoy that he had joined a house so reminiscent of their favorite Football team and prayed that he could make a good Lion himself.
The young Severus never understood why his mother only spoke about the wizarding world when she put him to bed and never around his father. He always remembered asking her when she kissed him goodnight if she thought he'd indeed be a wizard, or if he'd just turn out to be a Squib that couldn't cast magic.
Eileen's response was always the same, a sad smile on her lips. "Of course you'll be a wizard, Sevvie. You're a Prince…"
After that day however, Severus' life changed drastically. He no longer dreamed of playing Quidditch and flying a broom. His naive hopping had ceased and made way for a cautious, spidery sneaking. He no longer loved Football, quite the contrary in fact. Anything that reminded him of his father only brought forth traumatic memories of the man's frequent abuse. No, anything that triggered his memories of Tobias was met by the boy's rapidly growing hatred.
As for his mother? Eileen tried to stop Tobias' beatings of both her and her son, but resistance proved futile. The woman had long since abandoned her wand at her husband's request to live an ordinary life, and the torture on her psyche made wandless magic quite impossible for her.
After a few more beatings, Eileen had given up and locked herself in her room during Tobias' rampages. Such tirades became the norm thanks to his recently acquired habit of drinking heavily. She tried, in vain, to cover her ears to block her child's screaming from downstairs. Though after a few months, Severus no longer cried out. This stubborn defiance only served to heighten her husband's hostility, though the boy never broke down again, never wishing to give the shell that had once been his father the satisfaction of seeing tears.
The horrible years of abuse continued flashing through his memories uncontrollably. Being whipped with Tobias' belt, having his ribs broken by a vicious kick, the shattered glass that sunk into his arm when his father threw empty beer bottles at him? It was all there, pouring outward, right into…
"NO!"
Severus winced, breaking his eye contact with Lily as his hyperventilating resumed just as harshly as last time. He could see that her frightened posture had slackened, and her mouth hung open as limply as the arms that dangled at her sides. She had seen it.
"No...no...no, no, no, No, NO, NO!"
It had been the one thing that Severus would never confide to Lily, that no matter how much she asked, he wouldn't let her know the horrors that occurred in that house. He couldn't bear the thought of bringing that much fear and anxiety into her otherwise carefree Summers. She, unlike Severus, had parents who loved and accepted her in spite of her magic. He didn't want her to fear for him, and he certainly didn't want her pity.
It was clear to Severus as he looked back up to those devastated green eyes and quivering lips of Lily's that he now had both.
With the slowest, most gentle of motions, Lily pressed her hand to Severus' cheek, her eyes swimming with tears. "Oh, Sev…" was all she could mutter before the sobbing and sniffling commenced, the tears now flowing down her cheeks.
Severus was shaking, recoiling at her touch as he stepped back out of her reach. He didn't deserve her pity. He had made Lily cry. He had terrified her. In that moment, all he could feel was self-loathing and a growing sickness in his stomach as he sprinted off in fear of what he had done...He had been many things in his life, but the one thing he had prided himself on was that he never resembled Tobias Snape...Until he saw that terror in Lily's eyes.
Author's Note: My apologies if any part of this chapter may have upset readers. It is not my intention to remain so morbid moving forward with the story, but as I said, quite a lot of Severus' past must be established before I can move forward at a sufficient pace. It is clear that Severus did not live a happy or easy life, and that stretches back to before he met Lily as a child.
For starters, I wanted to portray flashes of a Severus who lived before his accidental magic started to occur, and thus presumably incite his father's wrath. A happy little boy who had dreams befitting a happy little boy before they were shattered by his father's abuse. It explains why Severus drew inward and attempts to link memories of his father with his dislike for Gryffindor using the real-world Soccer Team, the Aston Villa Lions. Given that Cokeworth is located in central England, I wanted to give the father and son a team to bond over, and consequently, an outlet for Severus' bitterness.
It's clear to me in reading The Prince's Tale that Severus tried to keep his conversations positive in the early days with Lily, hence my belief that he would be openly vague about what kind of relationship he truly had with his father. Given that he keeps to himself and obviously does not wish to speak of things that really bother him, I have little doubt that Lily would be completely ignorant of Severus' home life beyond the fact that his father had been his Boggart during 3rd year DADA classes. If she weren't in the dark, perhaps she might have been a little more understanding of his attitude and made more proactive strides towards keeping him on the path of light.
The next chapter is going to pick up IMMEDIATELY after this one left off, I just prefer to keep them at relatively the same length so that I can release them at my usual pace and not slow down.
As always, please Review if you enjoyed the chapter, any feedback offered REALLY helps. Thanks so much for the feedback and momentum that Tempus Vita has been receiving. It's already at over 10k reads and over 100 Follows and Reviews! Let's keep rolling!