The silence in the room after the Dark Lord leaves it is complete and unbroken until Corban Yaxley clears his throat.
"Well," he says, "I'm a dab hand at potions if I do say so myself. Read up on it in the Rosier family library, once the Dark Lord set me on it, and we brought some texts you might not have, Snape. Catch us up."
The vial is half-empty and half eaten through in Severus' pocket, and they haven't so much as considered a lie. Out of her periphery, she can see the whites of Regulus' eyes flash.
"Unless, of course, you don't have one yet," Evan Rosier says, smiling unpleasantly.
"We do," Severus says smoothly. "Though I doubt you have the mind for it, Evan."
"Try me," he says, and his smile turns more into a baring of teeth at Severus.
The moment is delicate, too delicate, it might shatter in anyone's hands like a cracked phial.
But neither of these men is the Dark Lord. They are boys playing at soldier; watchdogs left to guard the gate, and Lily cannot muster any wisp of fear of them. Not after she knows what she is, what she has to do.
"Tea," Lily says.
Regulus is so startled at her speaking at all that he almost wilts, but Sirius' doggy head butts against his leg, drawing him towards a seat and Regulus collapses into a chair before the bench. "Yes, please," he says, sounding spent.
"What?" Rosier says, utterly thrown by her speaking.
"Tea," she says again. "How do you take it, gentlemen?"
Rosier looks back between Lily and Regulus and Severus and then finally to Yaxley, who looks amused-rather like he's just seen a parrot able to speak, or a dog walk on its hind legs. "You let her talk out of turn?" Rosier finally says, sounding bewildered and so, so young.
"As I said," Severus says coldly. "She has her uses." Severus draws his chair up across from Regulus.
"Strong, and with cream, please," Yaxley says easily, drawing up his own chair. "Evan here takes it with lemon and perhaps a bit more subservience."
Rosier is the only one standing, looking frustrated by the men around him. He glares at Lily before drawing up his own chair to the table and sitting in it with all the affect of a disappointed child.
Sirius whines as she moves toward the door and Regulus glances between them, and the old words come from him, the first words that had started all of this. "It likes the mudblood," he explains, sounding weary. "Like attracted to like, I suppose. Go on, then."
Lily bows her head in deference and leaves, trailing Sirius behind her. On the stair, the dog glances up at her, asking. She doesn't turn her face, barely moves her lips, just mutters, "Not til the kitchen."
Once she's there, though, Sirius is human in a heartbeat. "Poison," he says immediately.
"Don't be stupid. He's expecting reports," she snaps, moving through the efficient motions of making tea over the stove without looking up. "And you'd like to poison your brother too?"
"Could knock it out of his hand," Sirius says.
"And Severus?"
The glare returns in full force. "He brought this down on us."
She wants to scream, to shriek I brought this down on us, I started this, I put on the ring, I know what I am but that doesn't mean I'll let him die- but instead the handle to the teapot snaps off in her palm and it skitters across the gloved palm, the ruined one, slicing through the disguise and numb skin both.
Lily doesn't flinch. The blood that oozes out is ichor-black and foul and she watches it drip into the sink helplessly. There's no pain but the persistent one, the one eating away at her, the one of the curse. "I don't have my wand, I can't-"
"I can do it." Sirius lifts her palm in his own.. He false-starts more than once and the healing charm doesn't work, precisely; the skin doesn't knit back together so much as ooze, and while the cut goes dry it doesn't close. He seals the disguise over it anyway. "You'll have to be careful, if you cut yourself and don't feel it, you could lose a finger," he mutters as it seals itself. "Snape had better work fast, curing that."
Curing. Yes. Of course. Sirius doesn't know. She'd thought it'd be written across her face, but it isn't. Even Severus might not know, might not be able to admit to himself, might have missed it in the hard and furious work of maintaining their cover, of telling enough truth without too much.
Regulus might, though. She will have to manage him.
Lily takes a steadying breath. "And the teapot too, if you could," she says, flexing the palm again.
"Right," he says, rapping it with his wand-tip and smoothing his hair back. "What's the plan?"
She pours the hot water into the pot, watching the leaves swirl. "I know what the last horcrux is," she says finally as they begin to settle, "But we're being watched, that much is clear. He must suspect something."
Sirius taps his chin. "Do we take out Rosier and Yaxley now? Go on the run?"
"If we do, we'll only have a day to act at the very outside. Maybe hours. And the Mark-I think Severus and Regulus will have to stay under cover. We would be on our own, and you heard him. I'm of value. And if he suspects what we're doing, he'll make more horcruxes."
"What is the last one? And where?"
Lily swallows, sugar bowl and cream in her hands. "I'll tell you later."
Something untrusting flits across Sirius' face. "Lily-"
"We don't have time." There is no time to explain, no time for Sirius' inevitable grief and rage. She is thinking as quickly as she can: they must trick the Death Eaters, must sideline them without murder or raising suspicion and Sirius' words, just knock it out of his hand- "I have an idea."
Lily explains. When she's done, the leaves are all clotted at the bottom of the teapot, and Sirius' eyebrows have traveled up and up and up. "Lily, that's mad. Even for me."
"It's all we've got. The longer they stay here, the longer they might stumble on something. It's not as if Severus can keep them on theory forever and if they open that cabinet they're bound to have questions. We didn't have time to hide the spent horcruxes well enough."
"And if it fails?"
"Better to fail when we're trying something than waiting around to get discovered."
Sirius looks at her darkly, but he nods, shifting back to a dog and trotting out ahead of her. Lily lifts the tea tray in her hands and follows, but doesn't stop at the laboratory, where the voices are discussing catalyst theory. She ascends the final stair to the locked room and opens it.
The construct looks at her as if she knows what she's about to ask. As if she's been waiting this whole time, dressed in her own old servant's dress. Green eyes meet green and the fear across each is the same.
"I need you," Lily whispers to the thing that shares her face. "I have to finish this. I need you to serve them, down there, be quiet and loyal and then I'll-we'll be able to let you go."
The thing looks at her, blinks once, twice, opening and closing its mouth like a fish. And then it says, "Severus?"
Lily swallows. "It's the only way he will live through this. Voldemort-" It flinches, but Lily continues, hating herself. "He suspects. He doesn't know everything but he suspects and it's enough. We have to finish it."
The construct rises on unsteady feet. "Finish it," it says softly, gesturing first to its own throat and then to Lily's. "Live through this?"
It's not stupid. She wishes it were. "No."
It nods once, slowly. "Severus," it says again, and there is a softness there that Lily recognizes in herself.
Lily offers the tea tray. "If you're ready- I need you to spill tea on the younger one, Rosier, and then mop it up with this napkin." She juts her chin, indicating the paper. "I- I'll do the rest."
The construct's fingers brush against her own as it nods and takes the tray. squares its shoulders and strides into the hall, picks its way down the stairs. Lily follows, pulling the invisibility cloak out of the extended bag in her boot and wrapping herself in it.
The voices in the lab are discussing catalysts-Rosier really, truly does not have the mind for it, but Yaxley is coaching him along like a gentle uncle.
The construct walks in, mute as they would expect. Rosier gets his tea and his subservience, too. This much done, Lily keeps going down the stairs, beyond the kitchen, to the cellar.
Tucked in her fist there is a napkin and a knife, both taken from the kitchen. A napkin will take the note-copying charm duplix duplicis as well as parchment, and Sirius had done it the task of pairing two paper napkins while she explained the whole of the loose mess she called a plan. The mate to the napkin in her fist is tucked into the hand of the construct. There's no expectation it'll be able to write on it, but stain it, yes, stains will transfer just as well as script, and when the stain comes she knows the tea is spilled, and Rosier will push back, of course, and likely say something awful or even do something worse, and then-
The doe is still, sleeping, hanging from her pole. Sedated. The knife presses to her side and Lily waits, trembling, the napkin crumpled in her fist.
It takes forever. In the dark, Lily has time to contemplate each blessed breath, the rushing of her own blood in her ears. How little time there was to listen to that sound. The feel of the knife in her fist, even the pain in her ruined fingertips. All of it precious. All of it so close to gone.
"Now," Lily breathes into the ear of the doe. "Come on. Please. Don't make me wait any longer."
And then a stain blossoms on the napkin, and Lily slides the knife in with something that almost feels like relief.
The doe doesn't know to struggle. The blood gouts from the wound and Lily touches bloody fingers to the thing's throat, feeling the heartbeat flutter once, twice, like a trapped thing, then disappear as if it never was.
Without the doe-the resonant object in place of herself-the construct must fall apart. Must dissolve into nothing but gore and screaming. It'll ruin Rosier's shoes.
And on cue, there is a dog, barking. Evan Rosier's voice gone shrill; Yaxley, shouting. Good. Better than they'd anticipated.
Behind the basement door, she can hear them recriminating one another, Yaxley against Rosier, Regulus' high-pitched worry and the heavy basso of Severus' voice providing chorus. But they are both being hustled to the door, hustled out.
Lily creeps up to the door to the cellar, to the door to the entrance hall, and she can hear them:
"-But how will you explain?" asks Yaxley, sounding troubled.
"She pushed herself into me," Rosier trills. "Or tripped or-"
"Yes, we will see if the Dark Lord accepts such an excuse," Severus snarls.
Regulus interjects, "It's not so bad, you see, Severus can fix it."
Rosier can't help himself; he's audibly frightened. "Can you? The Dark Lord said-"
"The Dark Lord knows the mechanics of what I have done," Severus says. "He values the girl as she represents an experiment gone correct, and she can be replaced. Nothing has been done this day that need concern him."
Yaxley seems unconvinced, though. "This must go in my report."
"Your report may be delayed, perhaps. We worked late into the night," Severus proposes. "You may report back that we spent the day on theory."
"Please," Rosier backs up, sounding on the edge of panic.
A breath, and then, "Very well. If the girl-or whatever that thing was-is dead and cannot be recreated, she will be just as dead tomorrow. But if by tomorrow evening you haven't come up with a solution, Snape-"
"I already possess the solution," Severus says easily. "I must merely do the work. For which I require peace and quiet and Regulus' assistance."
"He's done it more than once," Regulus adds.
Rosier gives up a little sobbing noise and his thank-yous are messy, very messy. And they are shooed along the way and the door is shut.
Lily waits a breath before easing the cellar door open. When she sees there are only co-conspirators in the entry hall, she pulls back the hood of the cloak.
"Brilliant," Sirius says. "Broke all the teacups, though. She thrashed as she-"
"We have purchased a day at the very most," Severus interrupts. His arms are crossed and he looks stormy; the lines between his drawn brow tell her that he's working on it, but may not have come to the realization.
"A day is more time and more freedom than we had," Regulus says.
"I know what the last horcrux is," Lily says, a quiet finality in her voice bringing the conversation to a standstill.
Everyone is watching her. Waiting. Expectant, full of a hope Lily can't feel.
"Bellatrix-when she attacked me, she pressed the cup against my face and said something about the light." Lily presses a thumb into her ruined palm fretfully, and the disguise wrinkles unnaturally, entirely unlike skin. "That was how she talked about the book, too. Filthy hands snuffing out the light." She lifts her head, looks directly at Severus. "Is it possible make a living thing into a horcrux?"
Severus follows her logic, fast as he always does. "No," he says sharply.
She turns to look at Sirius, at Regulus. Regulus won't meet her eyes.
He knows, then, or guessed. "It is. In theory. The side effects-"
Lily cannot wait for the explanation; she must pursue it or lose her nerve. "A possible transfer of power? If the original person making the horcrux were a parselmouth, the vessel might have the same power?"
Regulus nods along, quiet but with a certain strength. "I have suspected for a time. Ever since-you said you spoke to the basilisk."
Severus' eyes are burning into her own, and she advances on the clot of men before her until she is among them. "You heard him. They aren't allowed to hurt me. No one is," Lily continues, relentless. "Why would he care? Why would it matter?"
Sirius' voice comes out strangled, lifting one hand as if to take her shoulder and offer comfort, but the motion is aborted as he truly begins to think it through. "God, Lily, I-no."
"The only things that came here from that house is my wedding ring, my engagement ring, and me."
"You aren't a thing," Sirius protests, but it sounds weak. He's very nearly convinced. Severus, though-
"What happened that night, Severus?" Lily says, tone soft but hands in fists. "Did he ask for you to leave me there when he killed my son?"
He could be a statue but for his anguished eyes, full of a fight he cannot win.
"And after, he told you to keep me safe." She ticks them off on her fingertips. "Like the book. Like the cup. A reward for faithful service. You asked for my life, which meant to him that you'd guard it with your own."
Severus is brave. There is that mercy, at least. He holds her gaze, honest and almost wild with it. He doesn't look away and she can't. They both know the truth and he cannot speak it.
She wills what strength she has left into her voice, meeting each Black brother's gaze in turn. "We know what the last horcrux is. He just told us." She splays her ruined palm across her chest, spanning her collarbone, wishing her voice weren't so broken and so bereft of hope. "Me."
"Then we are lost," Regulus says.
"No," Lily says, hand on her front turning to a fist. "We aren't. We destroy it like the rest."
"How do you suggest we destroy-" Regulus begins, but he can't finish. "It's not as if we can pour basilisk venom down your throat."
"Why not?" Lily snaps.
The silence reigns, and it's Regulus who breaks it. "You'd die," he whispers, horrified.
Something in her face makes him blanch away.
"Snape," Sirius says, voice sounding deadly. "You're not going to let her go through with this."
Severus doesn't respond. It's as if he hasn't even heard. He looks as if all the blood has been drained from his body.
Lily's soft words are for Sirius, but her eyes are all for Severus. "This isn't about any of you. This is about my choice. About making an end. And if either of you presume to get in my way, I'll bring you down with me. All of them must be destroyed and you'll have to figure out how to kill him among yourselves, once I'm-"
"Stop." It's the first thing Severus said in long and horrible minutes and it comes out brutal, harsh, as if the word tears his throat. He lets the silence spiral longer, wider, expanding to fill the room. He presses his fingertips to his temples. Into silence, Severus says, softer now, "This is an opportunity."
Sirius snarls out a long string of profanity and starts toward him. "I knew you were a monster, Snape, but this is beneath even you. Lily, don't listen to him, come on, let's go back to ours-"
Severus goes on, speaking over Sirius. "Your goal was to rip the magic or the lives from every Death Eater in order to topple the world they have built. Is it still?"
Regulus gasps. There's no point in hiding the truth. Not anymore. "Yes. It is."
Sirius curses again, but she ignores it.
"This is an opportunity," he says again, his voice gone even and flat and affectless. "We are out of time, and the conflict has been forced as I have failed him too many times. Even together we cannot hope to defeat the Dark Lord in open battle, and Regulus and I cannot trust that the Dark Lord would not be able to hobble us or even turn us against you in battle using the Mark." He takes a breath and it's so even it's very nearly peaceful. He must be locking it all away, pushing it all down. She knows the feeling intimately. "But if you do, in fact, house a fragment of the Dark Lord's soul, there is a simple way to access all the power the Dark Lord himself has access to. Even if he is not truly destroyed in the coming battle, even if you do house a horcrux that must be destroyed to complete his destruction, he will be diminished, weakened, perhaps even disembodied-it will buy us time, and destroy the systems and powers that be that he has put in place with one stroke."
Lily's throat goes thick with hope. "How?"
He unbuttons his cuff, rolling the sleeve, exposing the ugly black skull and snake etched on his forearm. "The Mark."
Regulus interjects, voice gone thin and reedy. "The Dark Mark cannot be removed. You and I both know that, Severus, it cannot be damaged or removed, not even if you remove the limb-"
"No, you're right, it can't." Her reading said as much and Lily finally catches up, finally, finally, and understands what Severus is saying. "Severus-are you saying the Mark can be tricked?"
"Perhaps." Severus offers his bared forearm to her as if it isn't even part of his body, as if it-and him, all of him-is already hers. "If you are right-if you are a horcrux-the Mark may respond to you as its master."