Foreword : Well, here's a little piece I wrote about Snape spontaneously, while I was supposed to be working on something else. I think it could be considered a standalone one-shot, rather than a sequel to "A Few Shards of Glass." But while writing it, I couldn't help but think of that old story I wrote about Severus Snape a long time ago, and in my mind, the two texts sort of resonate with each other. That's why I'm presenting it as a kind of follow-up, "15 years later." I haven't written anything in a long time about Harry Potter, and writing for October 31. I hope I haven't made any missteps with the timeline or left too many typos lingering around. Enjoy! ^^
At seven years old, Severus Snape no longer cried.
He didn't think it would have made much difference if he had. Perhaps his tears still flowed somewhere inside, carving almost invisible grooves beneath his skin. Scars so pale he couldn't feel them. His emotions were carefully locked away, under key. He clung to his silence, the only shield no one could take from him. Crouched in a corner of the room upstairs in the dilapidated Spinner's End house, he stared at the cracks in the ceiling, pretending not to hear his parents' endless arguments. He pretended not to smell the scent of cheap alcohol and stale cigarette smoke that soaked the walls and seeped through the floorboards. He tried to forget the biting cold as he curled up under a moth-eaten blanket. He feigned indifference to his father's occasional blows, pretended not to care about his mother's insults. Severus stayed there, mute, increasingly numb to their outbursts, and, by pretending to be indifferent, he gradually became so. He was simply waiting for an escape. He clung to the idea of an "elsewhere," a home where he would be welcome, a world in which magic would no longer be a shame but a pride. A promise of power. Already, the thirst for it was awakening within him, along with a spark of hope—a mere glimmer, but more radiant than anything he had ever known. He counted down the days until he would receive his letter from Hogwarts and be allowed to leave the hovel on Spinner's End. That house he hated, where everyone pretended that magic didn't exist, even though—as far back as Severus could remember—it had lingered as the main motive behind the simmering war between Eileen Prince and Tobias Snape.
Severus waited for his way out; as he waited, he did not cry.
At nine, in his bleak world, Lily Evans had burst in like a single patch of bright color: in the dismal area of Cokeworth, she couldn't have seemed more out of place with her shining smile, big green eyes, and violently red hair, like a fairy-tale princess amidst a garbage heap. He had seen her playing by the muddy lake, on the vacant lot littered with trash, making pollen flowers dance all around her. That vision changed everything. The girl had magic. When Severus explained everything he knew about the wizarding world and told her about Hogwarts, she looked at him like no one ever had. She admired him, made him feel important. She wasn't afraid of him, didn't despise him, didn't insult him. She made him smile, even laugh. It was as if he could breathe a little easier again; as if the walls he hadn't realized he'd built were cracking, letting in a little air and light. She awakened something new in him: a feeling precious and inexplicable. In the miserable Muggle town they lived in, they found each other. And they bonded with a silent pact: "We're different from the others, better; one day, we'll go into the magical world and do great things." And as the months passed, he loved her more. Already, he was reluctant to share her; he grew jealous when she spent time with her mean, insipid Muggle sister. She was everything he wasn't: bright, joyful, radiant. She gave him everything he'd never had: affection, compassion, friendship.
Back then, Severus could never have imagined that magic—and all the wild, optimistic dreams around what their life at Hogwarts would be—would one day separate them. Or that it would make him want to cry.
At eleven, the School of Magic he had so dreamed of finally welcomed him, and then came the sorting ceremony. A new home full of promise. A world he thought was made for him. He had deluded himself. Even there, he remained a ragged child, a kid from the poor neighborhoods with ill-fitting clothes, a bad temper, and an unattractive face. He put his walls back up and pretended to be someone else: it wasn't enough to make him likable. And Lily and he were placed in different Houses, which complicated everything. The teasing began. The Slytherins despised him for his lack of social status, his Half-Blood heritage, his unkempt appearance, and his friendship with a Mdbd. The Gryffindors saw him as a strange, ugly, and sneaky boy who should have stayed in the shadows instead of hanging out with one of their own. Unwanted, out of place. Hogwarts wasn't a refuge for him: taunts and insults followed him in every classroom; lurked around every hallway corner. James Potter and Sirius Black, the wealthy heirs of old respected wizarding families, with their arrogance and mocking smiles, were the worst. They took a dislike to him from their first encounter, and, under the guise of entertaining the crowd, they never missed an opportunity to humiliate him… with the professors' complacent indifference.
If his Muggle father had taught him one thing, it was that pitying yourself in the face of injustice didn't make it go away. So, he didn't complain, and above all, he didn't cry.
At thirteen, the bullying he endured became unbearable. Severus clenched his fists, taking each insult, each spell with a bit more fury, retaliating fiercely, striking back. Potter's little gang—the coward!—was now calling themselves the Marauders and regularly ganged up on him, three or four against one. The House of Courage: what a joke! Severus still had Lily's fiery support and unwavering friendship back then, but they had few moments to spend together outside classes, and Lily—very popular, unlike Severus—spent more time with her circle of Gryffindor friends, where he was isolated within his own House. He became frustrated and brooding that she didn't have more time for him, unconsciously pushing her away with his bitterness. They didn't realize it then, but they were already starting to drift apart. Severus began to throw himself wholeheartedly into his studies, inventing vicious spells to defend himself against his enemies and creating complex potions to earn the favor of the wealthy Purebloods in his House.
They all thought he was a nobody, but one day, he would show them just how wrong they were. And they would all be forced to recognize his talent. Severus was lonely, but he overflowed with ambition. And he still didn't cry.
At fifteen, there was the time when Sirius Black pushed him to the brink of death, literally throwing him into the werewolf's jaws. For a laugh. Black got off with barely a slap on the wrist. Severus's life apparently wasn't worth more than a week's detention. And Dumbledore had extracted an unbreakable oath from him so that poor Lupin—a collateral victim of the joke—could peacefully continue his schooling. He couldn't even confess the truth about the incident to Lily, who was increasingly siding with the Marauders in their arguments, reproaching him for using borderline Dark spells in their scuffles; he couldn't even tell her that two of them had literally almost killed him. He was the one suspected of being a future Dark wizard, while Black saw his death as entertainment. The double standard filled him with fury, made him nauseous. Severus's terror didn't matter, and James Potter—his lifelong tormentor—could now strut around, claiming he'd saved his life. Of all the injustices he had endured since birth, that full moon night was the worst. The one most deeply etched beneath his skin. He brimmed with resentment, consumed by injustice… and terror-stricken.
In the weeks that followed, when nightmares woke him every night—the memory of Lupin's monstrous form lunging at him with bared fangs, slipping into his sleep—he trembled to the point of teeth-chattering, clenched his fists tight enough to injure himself, cast Silencing Charms as a precaution to muffle his cries and not wake the whole dormitory, but even then, he didn't cry.
At sixteen, the last shreds of his friendship with Lily had crumbled. It had been one public humiliation too many, and—for an instant—he thought he saw Lily smile while Potter performed his act and put him down. She had tried to defend him, and he felt more wretched than ever, so he insulted her. He said the word. Mudblood. Out of pride, out of stupidity, out of despair. More from anger than conviction. At the last person in the world he would have wanted to address it to. A word he had never spoken aloud before, which he wished he could take back the moment he spat it out. Lily took it for what it was: the last remnant of their relationship, thrown to the ground. He tried to apologize, but his words were insufficient. Lily turned away, and what he had hoped for all his life slipped through his fingers forever. With her, he lost his dream of another world.
And, after all, she hadn't been wrong when she accused him of supporting the ideals of the Dark Lord, of following in the footsteps of those who sought to join him. For a long time, he'd lived in half-truths about this, but he had finally stopped wavering: on the side of the light, he would always be treated as a pariah, would never rise, could never become anyone; darkness pulled at him with an almost irresistible allure, and his peers from the most influential families swore by the Dark Lord. The man was a brilliant politician, and sooner or later, he would rise to lead the Wizarding World: it was better to play his cards wisely, to adopt the language of his followers and try to gain his favor now than to swim against the tide. After all, his program wasn't nearly as bad and dangerous as what the Ministry and its supporters wanted people to believe. All those stories about murders and disappearances... it was just propaganda! Later that week, when his Slytherin comrades congratulated him for finally ending his friendship with the Mudblood, he was furious, but he merely shrugged and gave a silent, twisted smile.
The last breaches in his walls were patched up. Nothing held him back anymore. He was more alone and bitter than ever, but he didn't cry.
At eighteen, he had no attachments left, his parents had died in a car accident the previous year—needless to say, he hadn't mourned them—and he had just finished his studies. Finally, he'd had his chance to prove himself before the Dark Lord. Introduced to him by Lucius Malfoy, he had been able to shine: he wasn't a Pureblood, but he was more talented than most of them; the man recognized his power and smiled at his ambition. The Dark Lord had whispered promises of greatness and stoked his dreams of glory. He had offered him everything he had ever wanted, and Severus—usually so cautious—was only too happy to kneel and take the mark. He hadn't realized the price of his voluntary servitude. The war then took a new turn for him, and he donned the Death Eater's robe almost with pride. The murders and raids attributed to the Dark Lord's supporters were a little more than Ministry propaganda after all. It was regrettable, but in a war to seize power, some collateral damage was necessary. Severus hadn't hesitated long. He threw himself wholeheartedly into the battles, crushing his last qualms and embracing the darkness gnawing at him, finally letting loose the rage he had so long tried to suppress. For the first time, his life had meaning and he had a purpose: to make the Dark Lord—the man who had recognized his worth—the Master of the Wizarding World.
Gradually, targeted raids against Ministry agents and the Dark Lord's political detractors multiplied, then turned into civilian massacres. Large-scale massacres. Everything had accelerated within a few months, and the threshold of what Severus might have once considered an acceptable crime had insidiously shifted: from killing enemies, he quickly moved to participating in raids against civilians and Muggles; to attending parties where innocents were tortured and executed right before his eyes. When he realized the true nature of his Master, of what he had really committed to, of what he had already done and would continue to endorse, his hands were covered in blood. Severus cared little. Sheltered behind his Occlumens shield, his own emotions felt foreign to him. He had almost convinced himself that the righteousness of his actions no longer mattered. Feeling more numb than guilty as he indulged in abjection, stacking crime upon crime. It was far too late to seek repentance or turn back. And if, sometimes, just for an instant, his hand trembled before casting a spell; if, sometimes, his throat tightened when he heard the screams of the tormented; if he was always unable to meet his own gaze in a mirror without feeling a surge of disgust; it wasn't remorse or compassion, it was weakness. And his weakness, he could easily crush.
After all, he hadn't had tears for a long time. No more pity for his victims than he had for himself, so, no, he didn't cry.
At nineteen, it was already far too late for regrets. Lily Evans—now Potter—was in mortal danger. And it was he who had placed a target on her back. For the first time in a long time, he felt something wanting to break through his walls: it was terror. Because it didn't matter that it had been over three years since Lily and he had exchanged a word; it didn't matter that she had—of all people—chosen to marry James Potter, his personal tormentor; it didn't matter that he had become a monster and that she hated everything he stood for; it didn't matter if he never saw her again. Severus suddenly realized that none of this changed how he felt: he still loved her and couldn't imagine living in a world where she no longer existed. So, he renounced everything and abandoned his ambition, in a matter of seconds. He had crawled at Voldemort's feet and begged for her life, even if it risked his own; then, sensing it would not be enough, he prostrated himself before Dumbledore, pleading for a forgiveness he didn't want. He received only Voldemort's mocking disdain and Dumbledore's angry disgust. He didn't care. He had begged the two greatest wizards of his time to spare Lily's life and agreed to take on the role of a double agent to give her a chance.
He couldn't change what he was, nor repair what he had done, but he could at least try to save her. If crying could have given him a chance, he would have done it.
At twenty-one, Severus wanted to die.
On the evening of October 31, 1981, he Apparated to Godric's Hollow, near the Potter manor, the moment the Fidelius Charm fell. He knew he was too late even before he crossed the threshold. He walked like a puppet, moving through the place without seeing it, stepping over what was left of James Potter on the stairs, stomach churning. Reaching the upper floor, he saw a lifeless figure lying in the center of the room, and he felt the ground vanish beneath him. He collapsed on the floor next to the body. He heard cries coming from the crib behind it, but his brain barely registered that they were the wails of an infant. There was a moment of suspension, where all he felt was a gaping void, as if he had only a vague awareness of his surroundings.
Then the realization struck, shattering him. In a sudden burst, all his walls fell. A dull pain twisted his insides. Severus hadn't allowed himself to feel anything since he'd become a Death Eater and committed his first murders. He never would have thought he could still feel such a violent emotion at the sight of a body. He was surprised by his own suffering. Everything around him unraveled: he felt like he was suffocating and felt his hands tremble.
He looked at Lily's face and felt as if the world had gone dark. The skin of her face was still warm under his fingers, her green eyes no longer held any light, frozen forever in an expression of terror and despair. She was dead. She was dead, and she had suffered. And it was entirely his fault. He held her in his arms, clutched her close. He started to scream. To plead. To repent.
It was too late. She was dead, and nothing mattered anymore.
So, kneeling beside Lily's body, Severus took her head in his hands and began to cry.*
Notes : Fifteen years without tears—it must be exhausting, especially when life is so cruel. Alright, I'll stop torturing Severus ;)
*The final line of this piece is a subtle nod to Prévert's poem Déjeuner du matin. At the time I wrote A Few Shards of Glass, I was reading a lot of french's poet, Jacques Prévert and—consciously or not—trying to emulate his style. With this small reference, it feels like things have come full circle. Who knows... I may soon add a next chapter to this story:)