Drums of War

- Severus, my boy..." Dumbledore puts his palm on my shoulder, and I jerk away from his touch, looking at him almost hatefully. The old man pulls his hand away, sympathy swirling in the blue eyes behind the half-rimmed glasses, and he speaks softly, as if to a child who's been robbed of a toy: - There was nothing we could do. He's... dead. I want to throw my head back and laugh, I want to leap to my feet, and reach over and grab him by the pecs, growl right into his wrinkled face: - It's Harry Potter! Harry fucking Potter who couldn't even be taken by Avada! He couldn't, he couldn't die, Albus, okay? Turnkey apartment move. Payment after the move But I don't allow myself to let myself slacken. Just squeeze my own knees under my robe with my fingers and close my eyes. Mages die every day. Especially Aurors. And when an Auror is a brainless Gryffindor who's as much of a cursebreaker as Potter, the chances of surviving are nil. It's okay that we didn't make it. It's okay-we often don't make it in time, he's had enough dark magic spells for ten Potters like him. It's normal. Wizards die every day. And if Britain's national symbol died today, well, that's fine. That's normal. I didn't make it. There was enough potions to get Potter to Mungo's, but beyond that, there was nothing. It's okay that he's dead. Who was he? He was just a boy. A black-haired copy of Lily. An idiot willing to give his all for a cause that wasn't worth a finger. The idiot who'd pressed his cheek against my thigh, hugging me until his fingers were bruised, pressing his lips against mine, demanding-why haven't you kissed me yet? - half moaning, half sobbing, bleeding in my arms and stroking my fingers with his wet tongue. Idiot... The peace I'd given up for eternal battle. Albus doesn't call out or see me off as I rise on stiff legs and walk away. A pale, tortured wizard with a pile of papers stands in my way and asks: - Would you like a last look at him? Then he looks up at me. He recoils. Silence. I step around him in a wide arc, my robe whipping around my ankles-almost cutting him. "It's normal," I tell myself, closing my eyes before I apparate. - This is normal, Severus. Get your head out of your ass and pull yourself together." "It's normal! - I almost growl, finding myself in a dark house that has never seemed so empty before, and I rip off the robe that's choking me. - Even the all-powerful Harry Potter wouldn't have been able to pull something like this off." I soothe my unknowingly raging heart, pedantically counting the beats as I stand under the jets of hot water, and I don't understand why I'm reacting this way. Did I love him? Merlin forbid I love a Gryffindor! He was just here, he was here every spare moment - climbing under my arm like a mischievous puppy and not objecting to being shooed away; dangling his feet up on the stool and sneaking bits of meat from a future meal; burning his fingers and putting them in his mouth childishly (I didn't care about the roast being cooked at the time); sagging under the demanding touch, spreading his legs wide, lowering his head, moaning so pitifully as if he were in pain, the little pretender; and I took him, took him - here, in this most uncomfortable Muggle shower stall, for which he had an inexplicable tenderness, and on the kitchen table, and on the soft hide in the living room, and on the window sill... and anywhere else-he was willing to rest his cheek against a cold wall or wrap his legs around my thighs, holding onto the armrests of a chair. I wash the day away almost fiercely, hating the stupid boy and his stupid death. Merlin. I can live perfectly well without him. I should be thinking with my head-not my heart, deciding to wake up after a hell of a lot of years. I go down to the lab, slamming the door loudly, and hold my breath for a few seconds, waiting for him to poke his shaggy head through the doorway and ask, grinning at me with his white-toothed grin: - Are you raging again? And I'll throw a flask at him, which he'll dodge with a quiet laugh. Nothing happens. The stairs don't creak as the boy runs down them, the door doesn't open, the chubby-that's more female than male- lips don't stretch into a smile, the swarthy fingers don't grip the doorknob. I stand alone in the laboratory after years of fighting for the right to be here without strangers, and the flask clenched in my fingers first shakes, and then-explosion! - and then, with a bang, it shatters into my palm. I treat myself, pulling out the stuck pieces of glass and thickly smearing ointment on my hand. I treat myself, and no one tries to do it for me, amateurishly wrapping bandages around my palm. For the first time in years, I spoil the simplest Pepper Potion. And the next day I emerge from the fireplace in Dumbledore's round study and, without sitting down in the guest chair offered to me, spit it out dryly: - I quit. And all Dumbledore does is hand me Harry Potter's wand. A useless piece of wood lying coldly in my palm. I squeeze out a grin and stash the wand in my left breast pocket. Back home, it takes me a long time to recover the protective spells. Potter always put them on, but now that he's... now that he's left my house - I decide to call it that - the unstable structures have weakened, and I don't want them to collapse at the worst possible moment. It's strange-I've almost forgotten how to do it, but the words come on their own, and the wand writing monograms in the air doesn't waver. One spell against unwanted guests coming in through the fireplaces. One against pesky Muggles. One against Ministry trackers. I learned that last one from... Merlin, what is this! I stagger back, breathing hard, climbing up the porch, grabbing the railing - I'm shaking, my legs aren't obeying me, my arms... for one long, unbearably long second I think I'm going to step into the unlit hallway, and I think I'm going to be knocked over by this walking misunderstanding, who hasn't even grown up at twenty-two, and he's going to hang on to me, and he's going to reach out almost resentfully: "Where do you walk so much?" And he would slip his cold fingers under my robe, and I would let him drop to his knees, and stroke his greedy mouth over my stomach, and go lower, and tangle my fingers in his hair, and squeeze out with my naughty lips: "Dirty, horny boy." And he'll laugh, wiping his mouth. I am greeted only by the deafening silence of a funeral. The association makes me sick, and I squirm, and then, angry with myself, I force myself to stand up straight and stride with confidence. My heart pounded slowly and measuredly-I counted the beats-as I made my way up to the second floor and stood at a loss for words in front of the bedroom door. I slept in the living room last night. I didn't have the guts to come up here. A petty, shameful cowardice that I allowed myself for some reason then, but can't allow myself now. I turn the doorknob, cross the threshold. That's it. No big deal. No big deal. Just a couple of Auror robes in the closet. Think of the stupid Muggle clothes piled by the bed (he's a pig, Harry Potter). What about his smell, the smell of his hot skin, the smell of youth and desire, the smell that makes me dizzy, like it did when I breathed it in, with my nose pressed between Potter's shoulder blades and Potter giggling and wriggling.... I almost run out of here, locking the door with a spell, throwing every spell I know just to seal it, to cannibalize it-I'm not ready yet. I can't. What a coward you are, Severus Snape. I don't pack. I don't need them. Everything I need-the tinkling vials of healing potions, the slender flasks of blood-forming potions, the bulky vials of battle potions-is scaled down to fit in the pockets of my robe. I pick up the wand, the one that no one else owns, sliding my fingers almost lovingly over the smooth surface. It flinches subtly in my palm-not the same response I get when a wand chooses a wizard, but this one-his-will obey me. I know for sure from somewhere. I say a long goodbye to the hallway, pressing my cheek against the doorjamb. It's weird - it's hard for me, who's never had a home of my own, to leave this place. And it's not because it's all about Potter. It's not because it's all about Potter. And it's not because of him that I'm muttering, trying to keep up, the complicated formulas of almost forbidden tracking spells that no one should know except perhaps a few Ministry employees, and it's not because of him that I'm apparating to Gaddley. It wasn't because of him that Goyle was writhing at my feet days later, and it wasn't because of him that I squatted down and pulled my old colleague's face up by the chin and whispered: - I'd rather you rot in Azkaban in peace. - Changed... masters, S-Severus? - Goyle asks, barely out of breath after another torture. He smiles with broken lips - he's banged himself against the wall. He pulls almost intimately, powerless, bereft of his wand but still able to sting: - We managed to do what even the Dark Lord couldn't... oh, how proud he would have been of us... the boy stood there for so long that we... even thought he was beyond our spells... and then... fell.... And laughs: - Come on, Severus... you've always been a coward.... I rise to my feet, Goyle's wand crunching in my fist as it breaks. I clutched Harry Potter's wand in my other hand and exhaled, feeling the half-forgotten Darkness coursing through my veins: - Avada Kedavra. He dies almost confused, like he didn't expect me to do it. Like he didn't think I'd risk using a spell that now - and forever - puts the seal of the criminal on me. I'm sure the Ministry already knows where I am. Or rather, where I was a second ago. I apparate at once, leaving Goyle's breathless body and broken wand in the dirty alleyway, the drums of war pounding in my temples. * * * They're hunting me down. I knew this would happen, I guess you could say I've been waiting for it-now that my whole life is taken up with catching some and running from others (much like my past), I don't have time to think about Harry Potter. I don't want to think about him. I don't want to think like I'm avenging him - I'm just destroying the bastards who escaped Azkaban once and will escape again. Bastards who have no place in my world. Bastards who deserve to die. They're hunting me down. I knew this would happen, I guess you could say I've been waiting for it-now that my life is all about catching some and running from others (much like my past), I don't have time to think about Harry Potter. I don't want to think about him. I don't want to think like I'm avenging him - I'm just destroying the bastards who escaped Azkaban once and will escape again. Bastards who have no place in my world. Bastards who deserve to die. Cardiff greets me with grayness and gloom. It's unfriendly (and similar to Cockworth), it spits the waste of Muggle factories. It's a maze of dead ends and dumps. It's easy to get lost, but even Jagson can't: I weave search spells, adding light - what Potter taught me - and darkness - what I learned myself. And at the end, I cut my palm and seal the spell with ancient blood magic; he wouldn't forgive me if he found out, he probably wouldn't.... Let him. Harry Potter didn't recognize dark magic-where is he now? The thought made me sick to my stomach. I kill Jagson without further ado, even if it costs me potions - he managed to hurt me, the scratch on my shoulder aching and bleeding. Whatever. I stand over his body until the paranoia that's been hammered into me starts signaling that bloodhounds will be here soon. Only then do I apparate. And then I wash away the hatred and rage for a long time, and my home, my home that the Ministry can't find, feels uncomfortable and harsh. It's like it doesn't welcome a murderous master. But did I stop being a murderer when I was acquitted? "Harry" pounds in my temples as I lie in bed, cold and prickly as a pile of spruce needles. "Harry" burns in my mouth as I, clenching my teeth so hard my jaw starts to whimper, try to sleep. "Harry" melts my mind as I sleep, and I dream that he - the sunny boy with the green eyes, the bloody madness I had no right to succumb to - is alive. That he's asking me to find him. I wake up with my heart pounding, I build endless constructs of search spell knots, I weave a map, I cut my fingers again and add my own blood again, my magic - wild, dark, evil - surges through me, ready to find Harry Potter anywhere in the magical world.... The map doesn't flash - it sways, weightless as a spider's web and equally dead, the colored threads woven into the frame fade, slowly succumbing to the law that has no exceptions, the basis of the spell decomposes. A second more, and there are melting particles of magical ash on my palms. Harry Potter doesn't exist. That should bring me relief, but somehow it brings only bitterness. I forget myself in the search-the Eaters are good at hiding, and some of them take months to find. It took me two years to find Dolokhov. And it's worth it. Worth it, despite the fact that I'm still a criminal and they're still looking for me. * * * I hardly ever appear in magical London: here all the poles are full of endless "WANTED" and my face - the cardboard me with a snide eyebrow and an eagle nose. The real me, the aged replica, rests my flaming forehead against the post and hunches over, and the glamor's charms slowly dissipate and I have to leave London very soon. I'm going into my fifth year of living like this when it occurs to me that I don't even know where Harry Potter is buried. Maybe it's that - a silly thought swirling around in my subconscious - that pushes me to a recklessness worthy of a Gryffindor. I decide to go see Ms. Granger. It's easy to find a wizard in this quiet little town, crowded with muggles - but no one will be looking for one here. And so I can, unrecognizable to anyone, sit at the farthest table in a run-down café and stir bitter cheap coffee. Hermione Granger - tightly compressed lips, mane of unruly hair, perfect posture - sits down across from me. She waves her wand, checking the spells I've cast, nods contentedly. And then he blurted out before I could open my mouth: - Do you have any idea how much the Ministry is promising for your head? - I suppose it's enough to feed the entire Weasley brood," I answer dryly, and I'm almost glad for the hurt indignation that flashes across her face. But Granger is too smart to walk out of here playing outraged innocence. She orders a cup of tea and, intertwining her fingers in a lock, says: - What did you want, Professor? - I haven't been your professor for a long time, Ms. Granger," I smirk crookedly, and she raises her chin proudly, showing me the ligature of her magical bracelet and replies in my tone: - I'm long past Miss Granger, Mr. Snape. I know all too well the exquisite crest woven into the pattern of the marriage jewelry. But for a long time I cannot believe it. My world - my magical Britain that I knew and had forgotten since Potter's death - was limited to a rather meager knowledge of his friends, but he had said more than once that Granger was going to marry a Weasley. And, frankly, that was what I'd been expecting. - Should I congratulate you or sympathize, Mrs. Malfoy? - I finally ask, and the mudblood, whom Lucius would never have accepted as a daughter-in-law if he hadn't been in Azkaban, subtly relaxes into a smile and says: - And you don't change. Wrong, I want to tell her, you have no idea how much I've changed. That's a good thing. I always thought she was the smartest of that obnoxious trio of friends: Granger-Weasley-Potter. But the Granger I knew wouldn't go to meet the murderer the Ministry was looking for. Nor would she smile like she didn't care that I had so much blood on my hands. I wonder why. She interrupted my musings as if she'd read my mind; if my mind hadn't been securely shielded, I'd have thought the girl had mastered legilimency. - It's because of him, isn't it? - she says, and puts the crumpled flyer on the table. I glance at the cardboard me and grin at the corner of my mouth. She looks at me with anxious impatience. - This is about Harry, isn't it? I don't answer. I suppose she doesn't need my answer - she knows already. Her squint is confident and sly in an almost Flying-ish way; she's changed-and I'm willing to bet that Hermione Granger works for the Ministry of Magic. Hardly an Auror, not the same alignment or temperament, and hardly a politician. - Unspeakable," she answers my mute question as simply as if there's nothing wrong with it. - I didn't want to come here, you know. It's kind of weird to get a letter asking to meet from the person the whole of magical Britain is looking for. Draco insisted," her face softens subtly for a second, her fingers dropping to the knitting of her bracelet in a mechanical gesture. It's what those who have had to fight too long for their right to love do, and once again I'm amazed at how much I've missed out on. - He would have come on his own, but... I interrupt. I shake my head. I press my lips together into a thin thread. I'd have nothing to say to my godson if he asked why I'd left him. Why I left everyone who mattered to me in one way or another. - Where was he buried? - I ask before she can say anything else. Her eyebrows come together at the bridge of her nose, and she wrinkles her nose, shaking her head. - You don't follow the news in Britain, right... well, yeah... the body's missing. No one can find it. Do you understand? No one. They buried an empty coffin. She wraps her arms around herself, and I get an unexpected shiver - nothing is ever easy with Harry Potter. And if a body's missing, there's a chance that.... - Look, Severus," she covers my hand with hers, squeezing my fingers a little, and I'm surprised to note the unfeminine strength of the grip. Hermione Granger-excuse me, Malfoy-is looking at me carefully, bitterly, but without compassion. And holds me tightly, so that I don't pull away. - Harry Potter is dead. Or hiding so well that he's impossible to find. Not even you can. Don't look for him. - Don't you hate touching a murderer, Mrs. Malfoy? - I grin, releasing myself gently from her grip, and she looks at me incomprehensibly, as if seeing me for the first time. Then she shakes her head, covering her eyes. - I'd do the same thing if I were you. I'd find everyone. And I'd kill them," the woman I knew to be an unkillable Gryffindor says very quietly and very clearly, and I can see the hard creases around her mouth, and the wrinkles around her eyes, and the implacable, eternal hatred in her gaze. And for the first time, I wonder what must have happened to her to change her like that. She says suddenly, as if in passing, to herself, thoughtfully and hoarsely: - I sometimes think that Harry... you know... was our world. Peace in the sense that his mere existence made people better. Reconciled them to others and to themselves. And now we're, how can I put this? - At war," I say, grinning wryly. - Nonsense, Miss Gr... sorry, Mrs. Malfoy. There's no way I'm going to tell her that her words are a reflection of my own thoughts. That all of Britain without Harry Potter is falling lower and lower. That he pulled me out of the darkness, and now I'm deeper and more secure in it than I've ever been before. That he taught me to forgive, and now I'm taking revenge, and there's no sweeter feeling. That I'm willing to start a war for him and fight alone against the world if it will bring him back to me. That I was tired of waking up and fumbling for the other side of the bed, repeatedly bumping into the cold, untouched sheets. That I was tired of looking for him around the house, looking in every room but the bedroom, and finding nothing but emptiness. That yesterday I'd killed an Eater who'd managed to start a family; and left a four-year-old fatherless; and I wasn't sorry, because it was worth everything they'd taken from me. I drink bitter cheap coffee, she drinks bitter cheap tea. And we are silent, and the silence is so pleasant that I can't remember why I only now suggested we meet. When we say goodbye, she rises from the table and says: - Malsiber. Portsmouth. I don't ask how she knows that, just a short curt nod, and those two words sting my chest with a swift retribution. Hermione holds out her hand for me to say goodbye and whispers, clenching my fingers with force: - I won't come again. It's too dangerous. They're always watching, I don't want to risk it," her palm rests on my stomach in a purely feminine motion, and I'm almost ready to smile genuinely. She releases my fingers, and suddenly she's hugging me-quickly and tightly, smelling faintly of perfume, and I suddenly realize I haven't touched anyone in so many years, and I hold her against me in return, and stroke her tense back, and when she pulls away, there are tears in her eyes. - Take care of yourselves. And try to live with what you've done when you get your revenge on everyone," she tells me softly and walks away. I sit at the table alone until a disgruntled waitress informs me that the café is about to close. That night I dream of Harry again: the curves of his body, the heavy breathing, the hurried movements. The way he hugs me, hurriedly, as if he's afraid I'll go somewhere else. The way he burns my collarbone with his exhale, relaxed and tired. The way he whispers "love" and then, as if ashamed of his own frankness, hides his eyes. And I think I'm closer than ever to answering him in this dream. I wake up with a muffled "Harry, Harry, my Harry" on my lips, and disappointment gathers in my throat in a bitter lump. * * * I kill the bloodhound who stumbled upon me. He must have been a good kid, that white-haired guy, but I don't feel any pity as I draw my wand. Only a deafening satisfaction. If you looked for Harry Potter the way you look for Severus Snape, you must have found him. Anywhere. I'm killing Malsibert. He's a crazy bastard - laughing and saying that even revenge has an expiration date. He's a crazy bastard, he throws curses at me, he hurls curses at me, he gets me, and in a semi-conscious state, I fall apart, and it takes me a long, agonizingly long four months to recover from the tangentially tangled Cutter, and my injured arm is almost unresponsive for those four months (and badly so afterward), and new scars are added to the picture of my body, which is all angles and chips. I think about whether it would have repulsed Harry. I wonder if he could live with a murderer. And for some reason, the thought occurs to me: he could. If only he could. I can't breathe. Nothing to live in. I kill Rowley. A Rowley puppy ready to shit himself with fear; a Rowley puppy facing death with his eyes closed. He makes me sick, and I don't even waste time talking about it. He was hard to track down, but too easy to kill - I feel cheated. I kill Travers. Travers is costing me my legs-I'm re-learning to walk like a little kid, even though I'm fifty years old, and all my potions and modifications and enhancements are worthless because they don't save me, just like dark magic doesn't save me-my body is falling apart like Voldemort's soul once fell apart, and even the great Merlin can't put it back together. Not even the great Harry Potter. I'm killing Rookwood. Avery. Yaxley. I kill-I'm almost crippled, I'm almost Voldemort, I live a life of hate and revenge. And when I run out of people to hate and revenge, there's nothing left in me. Twenty years of my life - a precious, useless, worthless life - I've spent destroying everyone. To find - on every continent, in the mountains, in the caves, in a different guise, protected - every one of those nine who destroyed my world. Goyle. Jagson. Dolohov. Malsiber. Rowley. Travers. Rookwood. Avery. Yaxley. I make my own List of Names, and when I cross off the last one, I'm left with nothing that makes sense. I go back to my forgotten, dusty, lonely house. I return - sixty years old, not yet old but graying, not yet out of date but ready to die. I come back - and after twenty years, I break the spells that once sealed my bedroom door securely. Our bedroom. And I breathe in his scent. And remember. And laugh. The borrowed dark magic splashes and plays in me, nervously stroking my fingertips. It can't wait to take its percentage, to milk what's left in my bruised body, but I calm it. Calming her down with a light caress. It's still early. It's so early. I fall asleep right here, on the floor by the bed, face pressed into his pillow, which, after all these years, still has the scent of his hair. I fall asleep right here, exhausted, torn, and when I wake up, I can't move from the pain. I swallow the potion and struggle to get to my feet, only strong enough to collapse into the chair. Dark magic doesn't like it when its debts aren't repaid. First comes the pain. But it's so insignificant that I shrug it off easily. Then comes the darkness. I can still see, but vaguely, as if my eyesight had decided to fail me overnight, my tired eyes catching only isolated outlines of objects that don't add up to a picture. Then comes the silence. I hear nothing but my own heartbeat, subtly slowing with each counted beat. But that's okay - I've hardly heard anything else before. He comes last. I don't wait for Him, but I hope - and He comes. He leans over me, eyes as green-green as fresh leaves, his breath burning my cheek, my wrinkled, scarred cheek, and I whisper, afraid to blink: - Harry... He hasn't changed or matured one bit-it's like he hasn't even been twenty years. He's wearing the same uniform robe he was wearing when they dragged him to Mungo's. He's got the same gaping hole in his chest that I've tried to patch with potions, then spells, then raw magic, swallowing curses and panic... He's looking at me, wary and tense. On my hands is the dirty brown crust of Yaxley's blood. The last one. I killed him without magic, I killed him the Muggle way, because he was the one who first attacked Harry Potter. And the last one, too. Granger lied to me. Harry Potter's body wasn't missing. And he must have been buried at Hogwarts. As a Hero. As the Chosen One. As the Boy Who Didn't Survive That One Time. I can't even be mad at her. I'd lie, too, if it gave me the slightest hope. What else can a man live on if not her? - Harry," I say again, barely moving my lips, and I laugh hoarsely. - It's been twenty years, Harry. He's looking at my hands, my feet, my face, he's looking at me, dying, at me, the killer, and it hurts to look at him, so light, too light to touch without risking burning my palms to flesh. But I touch him anyway. I put my fingers on the back of his neck, stroking it, feeling it destroy me from the inside, and he falls to his knees, and buries his face in my lap, and is silent. - They said you were dead," I say, still refusing to believe it. - They said they didn't have time to do anything. I didn't have time to do anything. But I repaid. I repaid. To everyone. My fingers leave scarlet stains on his face, ugly and dirty, so unbecoming of him. He looks at me with tenderness and horror. I stroke his collarbones with the sticky paint of my own fall. And I whisper almost pitifully, almost apologetically: - Look at what I've become. His lips move, but I can't hear a word - only my own heartbeat. Knock, knock, knock. Knock. Knock. I don't need to hear Harry Potter. I already know what he's saying. And I put my palm over his lips. Soft lips I haven't kissed in twenty years. And I close my eyes. And he's trembling, like he's waiting for me to hit him or kill him. Can you kill someone who's already been killed? Can someone who's already dead be afraid of someone who's still alive? - Look at what I've become," I repeated insistently, almost angrily, clutching his chin, tears glistening in his eyes, tears of deafening misery on his face, and I was suddenly relieved. Like he's taken some of the darkness away from me. Like he'd taken a stinking lump of hate out of me and thrown it away. - Harry," I said again, and suddenly forgot myself, remembering the stupid, sentimental nickname I'd called him only once-when he was dying. And that I'll call him now, when I'm dying. - Harry. My angel. My beautiful angel. He's silent. Silent-with that bright blush on his cheeks, that life in his gaze, how is it that he's even more alive than I am now? He is silent, only trembling desperately and nervously, clinging to my thighs with his fingers, looking eagerly and impatiently, waiting for something, clinging to me like a beast, like a naive bird, brushing the blood from my palms and the blackness from my soul, Don't, silly, you'll get stuck in the soot. Don't, silly. His lips-hot, supple-open just as responsively to the touch of my tongue twenty years later. I kiss him deeply, kiss him hurriedly, kiss him leaning in so that it hurts, kissing him with my hand around the back of his head, a ridiculous and miserable stump. I kiss him as if I were drinking life-saving water in the desert, kiss him as if I were saying goodbye to my war, and he lets me tear his lips and soak up the bitter salt, and he covers my palm with his, and says: - Let's go. You've had enough of your war. We've got to go. And then comes the Light. And Silence. And Peace.