Chapter Two
Severus and the young woman made their way down to the potions lab he'd commandeered upon his arrival. He expected her to struggle or complain about keeping up with his long strides, but she kept pace and remained silent and solemn the whole way down. In some, small way this pleased him. Too often, people felt the need to fill the silence with chatter and he loathed small talk.
They garnered a few curious glances, but his usual scowl and billowing cloak forestalled anyone from getting in their way or asking any questions. Of course, he also avoided the main thoroughfares, even if it added a few precious minutes onto their route. Better safe than sorry.
When they finally reached a door tucked away in the furthest reaches of the hospital basement, Severus opened it and motioned her inside. She moved into the room and stepped to the side so as not to block his entrance. After closing the door, he turned and watched her scan the room. Her demeanor held a subdued curiosity, that she, thankfully, refrained from acting on. Instead, she kept her hands, one over the other, demurely in front of her.
Setting the wards, he walked over to one of the worktables against the far wall. He grabbed a sheet of parchment, a small, wickedly sharp knife, and motioned the girl over to a clear space on the far end of a table. She made her way over and stood just out of his reach. Severus suppressed a smirk at this but said nothing about it.
He put the paper down on the clear spot and looked up at her. "I will be doing the Parentibus Revelio charm, which is a more specific version of the Familia Revelio. Seeing as how we do not need to go into the sordid details of your family tree since, if you are not lying, they would both be well-known at this point, only the Parentibus is needed. I will need to prick the finger of your choice, then drag it across the top of the parchment. Do you understand?" Saying so much was straining his throat, but he refused to cut someone and perform a spell on their blood without their full knowledge of the process.
She nodded, her demeanor far more relaxed than most with Severus holding a knife near their person. Stepping closer and holding out her hand, she curled all her fingers down except her thumb. Severus exerted the smallest pressure on the knife against the pad, and since he kept his tools sharp it easily cut the flesh. She made no noise at what had to be a sharp pain, but simply did as he'd instructed and dragged her thumb across the top of the parchment.
She tensed when he drew out his wand, but didn't move away.
"Let me heal it," he said, holding out his hand and waiting.
She warily gave him her hand, though somewhat slower than a moment before. Waving his wand over the wound he silently healed it. The whole interaction left Severus wondering what had happened in her life for her to not flinch at a knife going toward her, but did so with a wand. He let go of her soft, warm hand, and turned his wand to the blood-stained parchment.
"Parentibus Revelio," he rasped, and followed the line of blood with the tip of his wand. The blood wriggled and moved across the paper, swirling into unreadable script for a moment, before solidifying into three names that made him draw in a sharp breath and his gut clench.
Child:
Amalthea Riddle-Black
15 August 1980 –
Father:
Tom Marvolo Riddle
31 December 1926 -
2 May 1998
Mother:
Bellatrix Lestrange (née Black)
27 August 1951 –
2 May 1998
She—Amalthea—had spoken the truth, and in front of him stood the child of two of the most evil, devious, insane people Severus had ever had the displeasure of being tortured by. Though his face had fallen into the perfectly blank mask he'd perfected after years of spying, the horror of what faced him on the paper didn't leave his eyes as he turned to her. What he saw in her expression made his heart squeeze almost painfully in his chest.
Her smile was small and sad, and held an understanding that let him know she didn't hold his reaction against him. Then, as all the tension drained from Severus like air being let out of a balloon, her eyes widened with concern.
Faster than he could follow, either because she was that fast or he was in shock, (and he was prone to believing the latter), she pulled out her wand and moved the chair from the nearby worktable and set it down behind him. Though, when she took his elbow and forearm to help him sit down, he jerked away so forcefully he ended up falling into the chair and almost knocking it over.
She murmured an apology and backed away, disappearing from his sight for a moment. When she came back into view she handed him a goblet of water.
Severus knew he should check it for poisons, especially given they were in his de facto-lab where there were plenty of easily accessible toxins she could grab. However, at the moment he didn't have it in him to care. In fact, it would be better for him if she did poison him. No such luck, though, as it seemed to be just water.
"Well, I see even Bellatrix couldn't stop herself from perpetuating her family's ridiculous penchant for using constellations for a name. Though it's interesting the magic dubbed you a Black instead of a Lestrange. Must have something to do with the infidelity," he theorized, before letting out a tired sigh. "How did you come about?"
Grabbing a stool from one of the work tables and settling on it, Amalthea crossed her ankles and smoothed her cloak before settling her hands on her lap, one over the other. Then she took a deep breath and met his eyes. "Would you prefer I tell you, or let you see?" she asked.
The shock of what she was offering sobered him like a slap to the face. She was extending him enough trust to explore her mind to gain information on her past. It was…thrilling and terrifying in turn. It was one thing to train someone to defend their mind from intrusion, like what Potter had failed to accomplish. That was more of a battle. It was yet another to allow someone in, sans defense.
He didn't have the best experience with it himself, having had Dumbledore and the Dark Lord rooting around in his mind for years. He repressed a shudder. Thinking of the Boy Wonder, Dumbledore, and the Dark Lord snapped Severus back to the present like the breaking of a wand.
"Tell me while I begin working."
She nodded as he rose and started setting up the table for brewing.
"Bellatrix had me not long after Harry Potter was born. She concealed her pregnancy through corsets, glamour, and the fact that it was her first pregnancy and not everyone gets very large their first time. It also helped her that I was a month premature."
Severus grimaced at what she said. Corsets could be terrible, let alone for pregnant women. It also wouldn't shock him if the insane woman did something to induce her pregnancy early, that way she could be free to torture without being encumbered by a child in her womb.
"After I was born, Belletrix conspired with one Antonin Dolohov to use one of his houses and his house elf to watch me until Bellatrix could present me to the Dark Lord. Once he won the war, they would offer me up as his 'heir', and the cherry on top of his victory. They also didn't believe it wise to divert the Dark Lord's attention from overcoming the prophecy, which is why they waited. As you know, this did not come to pass. The Dark Lord was temporarily defeated, Bellatrix went to prison not long after, and shortly after my ninth birthday, Dolohov was also caught and sentenced. Most of the waiting I believe to be Dolohov's influence, since my…experiences with my mother did not lead me to believe she was much of a planner."
She paused here. As she'd told the story, she'd slowly hunched her shoulders, as though preparing for a blow to land. When she stopped, however, she straightened and pushed her shoulders back.
"There's more to my story, but that is how no one knew I existed. Bellatrix and Dolohov tried to play the same strategy once the Dark Lord returned, but once again it did not work out in their favor. I saw the article in this morning's paper and thought I could help, so here I am," she finished, and turned her hands palm up, spreading her arms.
Severus suppressed a scoff. Of course there was more to the story. Roughly seventeen years of it, in fact. But with the literal deadline they were working with and her identity confirmed, he couldn't waste time hearing the whole, likely sordid, tale.
"Very well. Before I get started on the potion, I need to get fresh blood from Potter." Thankfully, he didn't have to admit to this woman that Granger's notes on the previous attempts for using a potion as a cure had indeed been helpful. Loathe as he was to admit it, even to himself.
"When I return I'll need some from you. I don't know how much I'll need, though," he warned, his gaze fixing on her and never wavering. He wasn't sure how effective someone with only half of the Dark Lord's blood would be, and as such, if he'd need to take more to compensate.
Her eyes were somber as she nodded. "Take as much as you need."
XxXxX
It took everything Hermione had to not hunt down the caustic professor for an update, but it would do nothing except annoy the man. She didn't believe he'd truly abandon Harry to his fate, but thinking back on those dark, angry eyes and his scowl, she wasn't willing to bet her best friend's life on it.
It was sometime not long after mid-morning and Hermione was well beyond exhausted at this point, as she hadn't slept all night. As she'd watched the sun inch its way toward the distant skyline of where the secret wizarding section of London was, she wasn't sure that would change anytime soon.
Having taken the seat next to Harry's bedside, she finally had to close the book she'd been reading when the sentences were moving around the page in a sleep deprivation induced hallucination. Glancing from the cover of her book to her best friend's pale face, tears burned in her eyes as she laid her hand over Harry's where it lay motionless on the bed from the stasis charm.
"I'm so sorry, Harry. You deserved so much more, and better," she whispered. Hermione lay her head down on the side of his bed, closing her eyes, too tired to fully cry.
Just for a moment, she thought.
"How touching," a voice said in a familiar drawl.
Hermione shot bolt upright in the chair, her heart pounding wildly. Professor Snape stood on the other side of Harry, looking at her with barely concealed disgust.
"You startled me, sir," she said, voice shaky from adrenaline.
"Your statement seems to indicate that I care. Now move, so the healers can take more blood."
Two healers had moved into the room behind Snape and over to Harry's frozen form. Their expressions were grim, but resolute. It took a team of two people to take his blood, so that the process could be done quickly and avoid further spreading of the curse.
Hermione moved to the window and well out of the way, chewing her lip as her stomach turned thinking about the curse. It was a nasty combination of sepsis and necrotizing fasciitis, or a flesh-eating disease. Of course, wizarding folk weren't exactly scientific in the way they came up with their curses, but what they lacked in science they made up for with brutal imagination.
If Hermione were reading the symptoms correctly, the Unitates Hostium Sanguis infected the person's blood and weakened the immune system and their magic. When their body released chemicals meant to fight the infection it triggered an inflammatory response throughout the body. Then as his organ systems failed, his immune system hit a critical low, and when his magic was almost wholly depleted, the curse would finally be able to eat its way through his body.
Unfortunately, the curse also ate its way through the stasis spell. While Harry's body did not necessarily need nutrients because it was, in effect, 'frozen', it also meant that there was no energy going into his body to help fight the curse. It was a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.
One healer took out their wand. They would make a small window in the stasis spell, and hold it open enough for the other healer to move in quickly and draw the blood. As they prepared to do so, however, Hermione wasn't looking at the healers. She was looking at the professor.
While the man always carried an air of intensity as though he wore thunderclouds for robes, and cruelty crackled about him like lightning, there was a simultaneous relaxing of the muscles around his normally scowling eyes and a pursing of his lips. It was a curious juxtaposition of emotions: relieved yet worried?
"Sir—" she started, when a commotion in the hallway pulled her attention to the door.
The professor didn't turn, but he must have heard something she hadn't, because a sneer curled his lip.
"Hermione!" Ron shouted and burst into the room. "Have you seen—" then he stopped as he realized who was also in the room. His graceless entrance was only upstaged by the way his mouth hung open as though he'd been raised by an ill-mannered fish. "What's the greasy git doing here?" he growled as he came back to his senses.
"Ronald Weasley!" Hermione admonished, only somewhat shocked at the redhead's words. "I don't even know where to begin with you," she said angrily, and promptly pushed him from the room into the hall, and away from the glares of the healers and the Potion Master.
"'Mione, stop!" he said, finally resisting and moving away from her shoving.
"No, you stop! First, how dare you barge into a hospital room, shouting and disturbing the healers and Harry!" she accused, her eyes sparking with anger.
"To be fair, Harry can't—"
"Not the point, Ronald!" she declared, shrilly. "Second, you will not insult the only man that can save our best friend!" she continued to scold. Though she did not increase her volume, her words were alight with such intensity, some of her magic was leaking through. It crackled around fingers that itched to reach for her wand, and send a curse of her own at the blundering buffoon. The only thing that stayed her hand was that it would be hell on poor Molly to have to visit three hospital rooms.
"Come on, 'Mione, you could—"
"No, I can't," she stated flatly, cutting him and his argument off. "Snape could brew his way around me three times over with his eyes closed on a bad day, and this curse is bad, Ronald. Add to that he said he'd leave if any of us bothered him too much—"
"He wouldn't dare," Ron seethed, but cringed away almost immediately from the fury radiating off Hermione in waves.
"Yes, he would, and don't think for a moment he won't. We've all made each other's lives awful for years. Professor Snape's obligation toward Harry and Lily Potter died with Voldemort. He doesn't have to be here, and there you are, insulting him!"
"You mean he'd just stand by while Harry dies?" he asked, his expression mulish and causing Hermione to wonder if ulcers were a thing for eighteen-year-olds.
"I'm saying he has no responsibility towards Harry's health now that he's defeated Voldemort and Harry is an adult in the eyes of the wizarding world. Professor Snape is not his keeper or guardian."
"So, he's doing this all out of the goodness of his heart, then?" Ron asked, scathingly.
Hermione had never wanted to simultaneously rip out her own hair and someone else's in frustration as much she did at that moment.
"I won't presume to know why he decided to help, as it's not pertinent to the current situation. I'm only thankful that he is here, because he's the only one that can save Harry. So, either grow up and keep your opinions to yourself about the man, or leave. But so help me, Ronald Bilius Weasley, if you do anything to make Professor Snape reconsider helping Harry beat this curse, I won't hesitate to curse you so soundly, Molly will have to live at this hospital because you'll never leave it!" she hissed, the venom of her words causing Ron to flinch away and gulp.
She spun on her heel and headed back to Harry's room, leaving Ron standing in the hallway, her words ringing in his ears as though he'd just been subject to an in-person howler.
Unfortunately, the two had been so focused on each other, neither noticed the exultant beetle stationed on a chair in the hallway outside Harry's room.
XxXxX
Severus grimaced inwardly at the conversation between two of the three headache-inducing teenagers he'd had the unfortunate displeasure of teaching. Well, perhaps that was being slightly uncharitable to Granger, but only just. He hadn't felt the need to ponder his expected behavior towards the students as anticipated by both Albus and the Dark Lord, but he couldn't disagree with Ms. Granger's assessment. Though he'd fired the initial volley with his distaste for the reincarnation of his childhood bully, the children had been their own brand of heart-stopping nuisance almost since they stepped foot on the grounds.
The sound of angry footsteps heading back toward the room slowed and became lighter, as Severus supposed the girl was taking the time not to bring the whirlwind of her anger into Potter's room. She tended to leak magic like an umbrella full of holes when she was angry, and it wouldn't do for her 'run-off' to interfere with anything the healers had in place.
When she came back into the room, Severus noted that she was mostly composed, the only remnant of her anger was the tightness around her chocolate-colored eyes.
"Sir, I just want to—"
"If you are apologizing for that dunderhead, do not waste your breath. I care not what a fool thinks of me, and I care even less to hear you give platitudes on his behalf."
She stopped, her nostrils flaring slightly at his words, but gave a jerky nod.
Severus sneered. "Perhaps you Gryffindors are teachable. I scarcely thought it possible any of you would know when best to keep your mouths shut," he continued, his voice crooning as his words caused the girl to grind her teeth. He couldn't help needling her. She had poor taste in friends and house affiliation, and he wasn't going to give up an opportunity to remind her of such.
The healers, studiously ignoring everyone as they went about their work, finished drawing Potter's blood.
"Here you are, Master Snape," one of them said. She handed him the vials, and the two healers inclined their heads before leaving the room.
Severus held the vials delicately in his long, nimble fingers. Before he could turn and leave the room, Granger stepped forward until she was a couple feet away from him, looking up. Her eyes were pleading and hopeful, and it made his stomach roil with nausea.
"I know you said not to ask—"
"Yes, I did. You persist in showing some glimmer of promise, and then dashing it all the next when I told you—"
"Please," she interrupted, her voice no more than a raw whisper, and begging.
He hesitated. He wasn't one to foster hope where there might not be any. The Dark Lord was known for going to absurd lengths for revenge, and he wasn't sure if the man had keyed the curse specifically to him, and as such Amalthea's blood would be worse than useless.
He also wasn't one to fall for wide, pleading eyes, but even as the thought crossed his mind, his resolve wavered.
"Do not take these words to heart, and if you do, you will not blame me for the fallout of such foolishness, but," he paused, trying to consider how to word it, "there has been an unexpected development, and I am pursuing it."
The relief that washed through the girl was visible in the way her shoulders slumped and she took a ragged breath.
"Thank you," she whispered, the words strained but grateful.
"Do not thank me, Ms. Granger," he said, sweeping around her.
He left the room, his throat sore from all the talking, and his mood inexplicably blackened more and more as he considered the girl. Silly child! Wresting that information from me, and damn me for a fool for giving in and saying anything.
Though the day had worn on enough that the halls had more people than when he'd left the lab, everyone still managed to find a way to move from the path of Severus. When he made it back to the lab, he came through the door with such force that it banged against the wall and the wood groaned in protest.
"Has the door done something to offend you?"
Severus snapped his attention toward Amalthea sitting on the stool on the other side of the room. Her head was tilted slightly as she considered him, and his brows drew down in a scowl. She simply raised an eyebrow in response, and it threw him off his stride for a moment. He was used to people doing whatever they could to avoid looking at him when he was angry, (Albus and Minerva notwithstanding), and uneasiness settled in his bones.
Of course, a voice in his mind mused, she lived with Antonin Dolohov and her mother was Bellatrix Lestrange. Next to those two psychopaths, he supposed his scowl might be downright tame.
"The door has done nothing, as such," he conceded, closing the abused door. "It is merely the object I was venting my anger on instead of a person. Harming a door will cost me nothing. Harming a person, no matter how idiotic, might land me in Azkaban."
"It would cost you the price of repairs for the door," she pointed out.
It took him a moment to realize she was teasing him. He, Severus Snape, who could cause people to cower at twenty paces was being teased by this mere slip of a girl. He went to growl, but refrained at the last second to rest his throat, and merely clenched his jaw.
"You seem to have found some impertinence while I was absent," he snapped, heading to the worktable.
"I was leery of speaking with anyone about who I am. It's not exactly an easy thing to admit to; 'Hello, I'm the daughter of not only the vilest woman of our times, but my father is the man who tried to destroy all your lives for decades. Care for some tea?'"
Severus's eyebrows shot up at her words, and a sputtering laugh nearly escaped him, but she continued. "Now that you know and don't seem inclined to hex me or throw me in chains, I suppose I'm more willing to be myself." She shrugged, and looked down at the vials as Severus set them on the table. The blood was darker than it should have been, and her lips pursed as her eyes glittered with anger. "How much blood will you need?" she asked, already rolling up the sleeves of her dress.
"I—" he began, but he stopped as her skin came into view.
Almost every available inch was scarred. Some scars were shallow, and blended well enough into the skin, while others were raised and from larger wounds. Heavy silence pervaded the room for a long moment before Amalthea cleared her throat. His eyes moved from her arms to her face, and she sighed in resignation at whatever she saw in his expression.
"I didn't do it to myself, if that's what you're thinking. Dolohov fancied himself a pioneer in trying to come up with dark curses, specifically with blood. Torture was his go-to for entertainment when he wasn't experimenting. And the few times my mother decided to grace me with her presence, she did so with a knife," she finished, her voice emotionless, as though she were reading from a textbook.
Severus wasn't one to flinch from violence. After all, he'd seen the Death Eaters and the Dark Lord at their utter worst, and had himself participated in activities that were better left in the past. He knew there'd be penance, possibly in this life and most certainly the next, for his actions in both wars and the long years in-between, but that was for another day.
Also, he was no stranger to scars, since he had a fair few himself. His father started a trend for marking his flesh that his peers and then the Dark Lord continued throughout his entire life. He barely kept himself from reaching up to his throat, where his most recent addition to his collection was still somewhat tender to the touch.
"I'm not sure I understand why they would do this to the Dark Lord's heir apparent," he said, not exactly calling her a liar.
"Well, they're both gone 'round the bend in terms of sanity. Dolohov would simply say he was training me to be 'tougher'; 'The Dark Lord does not suffer weaklings, moya zvezda.' Whereas my mother made it quite clear that her capacity for long-term planning was sorely lacking. Who was more of a threat to her perceived place at the Dark Lord's right hand? Triumph at giving the Dark Lord an heir made way for jealousy. Then, the final nail in my proverbial coffin was the slap in the Dark Lord's face that my existence would be. Who would question the Dark Lord's immortality enough to give him an heir?" she finished. As she spoke, she'd clenched her dress in her hands, before releasing the fabric and smoothing it out once more.
Severus, not knowing what to say, conceded her points with a slight tilt to his head. Turning away, he pulled out Granger's notes with his additions scratched out in the margins. It would take some hours to brew, and there was little time for a second batch if this one did not succeed.
"Once I begin brewing, I expect complete silence. If you can't hold your tongue, you'll find yourself unable to use it. Understood?" he asked, falling back into his usual acidic nature like donning a well-worn cloak.
She didn't appear put-out by his words, and simply nodded.
Severus turned away from her, his mind locking away everything and going to an almost trance-like state as he began the arduous and seemingly endless task of keeping The Boy Who Constantly Puts Himself in Mortal Danger alive yet again.
XxXxX
Lucius Malfoy was nothing if not a proud man. He'd been born and bred into a certain set of ideals that he'd embraced wholeheartedly with a fervor tempered only by manners and an almost hereditary grace. He'd surrounded himself with like-minded individuals, even if some of said individuals were less than couth. He'd come to view some of these people as extensions of his family, albeit lesser ones. He was a Malfoy, after all. No one could hope to rise quite to their station.
More importantly, he'd found a lord who embodied everything his family had stood for over the long centuries, and in spite of the encroachment of mudbloods and muggles. Sanctimonia Vincet Semper: Purity Will Always Conquer.
Then the foundation upon which he'd built his entire world crumbled beneath and around him, as though someone had used a reducto spell on his life, wielding it with malicious glee on everything it could reach. Nothing had been spared its wrath, whatever or whoever 'it' was that punished him. His pride had been the first to go, the Dark Lord tearing through it like hippogriff claws through paper mâché, and he found the muggle saying to be wholly true: pride goeth before the fall.
After his miserable failure in the Hall of Prophecy, Lucius's life was thrown into a downward spiral he couldn't pull out of. Then his wife managed to do what he couldn't and saved them all. Not just the three of them, though that was her primary goal. No, she'd practically saved the wizarding world by proxy when she lied to the Dark Lord about Potter.
After the dust settled, Potter had been quick to come to his family's defense, which was yet another mark against Lucius's reputation amidst a sea of marks. He'd complied with their demands: give names, free your elves, pay restitution, and surrender your wand for no less than five years, after which it would be returned pending review of his 'good behavior'. The first three he could handle. He had no pride left. And Malfoys had built their fortune from the ground up, and they could do so again.
No, it was taking away his wand that took him as low as he thought he could go. It was what made him a wizard. It defined who he was. Without it, he was nothing. Then, Narcissa had taken Draco and filed for divorce, and Lucius had to once again move the bar down. He was looking down the many, long years and seeing nothing but a man who was penniless, wifeless, and in essence childless. Still, this had to be it, yes? Nothing more could be done to take him any lower.
That was when Potter's mudblood had called, and Lucius discovered what it meant to feel lower than dirt.
If someone had told him, even a year ago, that he would be answering her summons, he'd have eaten his cane, wand and all. Crow, as it turns out, tastes fouler than the wood of his cane likely did. Instead of protesting, as he knew she expected, he'd agreed to meet her. The surprise on her face was almost worth how insufferable the situation was to him, but not quite.
He'd gone out to his 'guards', explaining the situation to the aurors, and they'd apparated him there by side-along. When they landed and he stumbled, barely catching himself with his cane, they did nothing to help him. Simply stared at him, waiting for him to move.
That indignity was simply the first of a long day. He'd gone to see Potter and the mudblood and told her what he knew. He'd even been…polite. Lucius might think the girl unworthy and ignorant of centuries of wizarding tradition that she tread upon with little more consideration for her actions than a rampaging giant, but she was the darling of the wizarding world. He, on the other hand, was reviled and shamed. The world really had gone sideways.
When he'd looked the boy over, there was no doubt in his mind that Potter was doomed. He thought he'd be happy to see the Boy Who Lived dying, barely clinging to life, but he was still empty. Even the evidence of Potter's impending death could not fill him with the vindicated happiness he knew should have rushed into him the moment he saw the boy's ragged form.
After he'd left and gathered the initial books he'd mentioned to Ms. Granger, he'd continued to scour the library with one of only two elves that had remained behind after being freed—Topsy.
"Topsy thinks that be all there is to find, sir," she said, her squeaky voice ringing with certainty.
They'd been instructed by the ministry official, who'd overseen Lucius freeing all the elves, that they were to call him sir and not master.
"As you say, Topsy," Lucius said, his voice tired and body sagging back into the chair. "Auror," Lucius called to the man standing by the library doors, keeping his voice as neutral as possible. The six on rotation as his guard had refused to give him their names, denying him even that small courtesy. Lucius had spent more time with the politicians, and not the DMLE, Department of Magical Law Enforcement. He couldn't be expected to know all the aurors on sight.
"These the last of them?" the gruff man asked. His bearing and appearance were much like his voice: rough around the edges, dark, and hairy.
"They are," Lucius said with relief.
The man grunted and picked up the tomes with far less reverence than they deserved, but he doubted the DMLE would be so caring when they finally came tearing through his home to scour it for anything they considered dark. What were a few books manhandled now, when it would likely be so much worse when they finally got around to scouring the manor?
"What's to be done with them once she's finished?" the man asked, his dark eyes boring into Lucius', as though daring him to say the wrong thing.
Lucius shrugged, not in the mood to play. "She can keep them, donate them, turn them in, burn them, or whatever she pleases," Lucius said, his voice and demeanor apathetic. He waved a hand dismissing the man, who scowled at the gesture, but turned around and left the library.
They couldn't be caught delaying any precious information to save the Potter boy.
"Would Sir be liking his lunch now?" Topsy asked, and tilted her head as she watched Lucius.
"That will be fine," he said.
Topsy disappeared with a small pop, and Lucius was once again left in the mire of his thoughts.
He'd been taken from his sturdy ship in familiar, smooth waters and thrown into a turbulent sea without even his wand to help him. He was drowning in unfamiliar territory full of mudblood- and muggle-loving dogma that turned his stomach in such a way he wasn't sure he'd be able to eat what Topsy brought him.
The real question was: after losing everything, where did he go from here?
XxXxX
Rita Skeeter couldn't hear what was being said on the other side of the door. All she knew was that Snape was in there talking to someone, and that someone sounded female. She'd already gained so much juicy material from the fight in the hall earlier, she wasn't sure she could stand the excitement and utter shock of finding Snape with a woman. Especially while he was supposed to be saving Harry Potter.
She supposed it could be someone helping him, but through all her careful research of the man, he'd never been known to work with anyone. At least not willingly. While she knew that this might be considered by some to be his most important potion ever brewed, Rita doubted that Snape considered helping Potter worthwhile enough to ditch his usual habits. The man was arrogance personified when it came to brewing potions, and he thought no one could help him do better. He might be right, and thus that theory did not explain who this woman in the room with him was.
Rita was itching to get in there and get the scoop on the mystery woman, but she knew from painful experience that Snape was meticulous in his protections of his personal space. She'd tried to get into his personal quarters and lab when she'd been there during the Tri-Wizard Tournament, and had been summarily zapped for her efforts. Phantom pain ghosted along her body in reminder, and she shuddered.
Though she doubted his wards were as strong here as they had been in the school, where he'd had years to layer the protections, she wasn't sure she'd bet her luck against his painstaking precautions in his work areas.
She'd thought briefly about following Ronald Weasley when he'd stormed off. The boy was deliciously easy to prod into saying something unfortunate in regard to his friends when he was riled, and Little Miss Perfect sure knew how to rile the boy.
In the end, she was glad she hadn't. She'd been here for the whole sordid affair thus far: the dumbfounded healers; Granger's demand of Lucius Malfoy to toddle in and tell her what's wrong; his surprising offer for his books; her moment where she realized she isn't as perfect as she thought she was; and finally calling in Snape. The only thing she cursed herself about was the fact she'd stayed near the room instead of keeping an eye on Snape. He must have met with the woman somewhere and she'd missed it.
At any rate, the girl had to come out sometime, since she didn't think the labs had bathrooms. It was a waiting game, and though Rita wasn't a terribly patient person, when she was on the scent of a major story she could give muggle saints a run for their money.
It was yet more to add to the large manuscript on Snape, ready for the opportune time to release. She kept such things on all the major players, and released them not long after their deaths. It was a system that had worked out nicely for her so far.
She'd planned to release something on Potter soon, especially since no one had expected him to survive against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, but he'd lived. Again. She'd adjusted the ending to fit with that, and was getting ready to go to her publisher with a release date when Harry had taken ill. These people were giving her a veritable gold mine of book-worthy material, and all she had to do was be willing to endure some tedium.
Oh, yes, she could wait. She could be patient. And then she'd watch the veritable explosion once the story came out.