literature

Smoke

Deviation Actions

ls269's avatar
By
Published:
3.1K Views

Literature Text

Severus stayed on the rooftop, simply because he couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. The Slytherin common-room would be buzzing with dark, suspicious gossip about Avery’s attack. The library was too full of painful memories. And everywhere else carried the risk of bringing him face-to-face with Potter’s chirpy grin or Dumbledore’s grave stare.   

He liked lying on the roof these days anyway, trying to pick out stars through the thick blanket of cloud. It wasn’t that he had a lot to think about. Mostly, his mind was clear of thoughts and hazy with pain. There was nothing to mull over, except his total lack of options.   

He couldn’t sink into his Occlumency state, because he didn’t know what it would do. It would probably stop the pain; it would certainly have a plan; but Lily wouldn’t like it. It would confirm her worst suspicions about him.

He felt as though all his insides had been scooped out – as though his chest was a hollow cavity, rapidly filling up with rain-water. But, for someone with no insides, there was a bewildering amount of pain. What was left in his chest to ache, he had no idea, but, whatever it was, it was doing it with a vengeance.  

He was miserably confused. He didn’t know what he could do to make it better, because he didn’t understand what he’d done that was so bad in the first place.

So, mostly, he just lay back on the roof-top and let it bleed. With the rain sifting down like a thick mist, soaking into his hair and school-robes, pearling on his feverish skin, he just smoked cigarettes and stared up at the clouds.  He was too tired to even shiver. And he didn’t bother blinking the rainwater out of his eyes.  

The only sound he could hear was the fizzling and sputtering of his lit cigarette in the rain. His mind was so clear that it echoed.  

If Lily had been a stained-glass roof over his head before – keeping off the rain, bending the harsh light into pretty colours – then that roof had completely fallen in. He was now lying, shell-shocked, in the wreckage, blinded by the white-hot sun, and pinned to the ground by shattered shards of glass that had all – miraculously but unfortunately – failed to kill him.  

It was easier if he was lying down. It felt as though the slates at his back could absorb some of the pain – like he could earth a tiny portion of the anxiety that was crackling through him in all that indifferent stone. But then, he supposed, the stones of this castle probably weren’t all that indifferent. According to Dumbledore, the place was alive, and it had a magic of its own. Any place buzzing with that much magic, and that many teenage hopes and fears, would start to absorb them eventually.

“This particular castle, despite its great age, has the mind of a seventeen year-old,” Dumbledore had explained cheerfully. “A very neurotic seventeen year-old, who feels desperately misunderstood, and will do anything to impress people. Its antics never fail to amuse me.”  

Snape had just scowled at him. It was the safest way to answer Dumbledore. The more you got angry with him, the more delighted he became. If you scowled, you got let off with one of those twinkly-eyed smiles, and you could find somewhere quiet to be sick later.

Severus took a deep draw on his cigarette and stared up at the sky. There was something which presented itself as a solution. It only occurred to him when he was very tired, or when he’d just seen Lily walking through the castle corridors, flanked by Meg Valance and Mary MacDonald, who were holding onto her elbows as though they had to physically support her – as though she was so weak with grief that she needed to be carried. Then this naggingly persistent idea would step up, clear its throat, and confidently assert that it was possible to bleed out the pain.

It was a familiar idea, from way back in his childhood  – that there was poison in your veins – and it was the poison that was making you so miserable all the time – so, if you could just open up your skin – just cut yourself a little bit – then you could let it out.

It was a bad idea. It would draw attention to him, and that was the last thing he wanted right now. People got curious about scars and bandages – especially teachers. And it was rumoured that Voldemort could smell any injury he hadn’t personally caused, and the smell was highly offensive to him.  

Severus had been avoiding attention his entire life. He knew the tricks. You had to look reasonably healthy and well-presented. Don’t give them anything to latch on to. Nature had already cursed him with a distinctly noticeable face. He didn’t want to make it worse with scars and scratches. Besides, it was so melodramatic, so Gryffindor, to do something like that. Kit yourself out in attention-grabbing crimson stripes, and just watch how quickly the world makes it up to you.

Anyone who treated him differently just because he was bleeding was not the kind of person he wanted on his side in the first place. If he got respect, he wanted it to be real. He wanted it to be for something he could do.

The worst part was going back to class every day and pretending everything was normal. He could have dealt with it if he’d been allowed a few months off, to live in a cave. But here he had to answer questions in class, and try to make himself care about the optimal boiling point of Veritaserum, or the conjunction of Venus and Mars.

It wasn’t fair. But that accusation didn’t carry much weight anymore. Nothing was fair. You just had to get used to it.

Severus exhaled slowly. There was some kind of commotion going on in the chimney that led back down to the castle’s interior. A couple of bats flew out of the shaft, careering around like mental patients. Their mad flapping and squeaking died down as they headed for the Forbidden Forest, but the silence they’d shattered didn’t return. Instead, there was a steady, metallic sound, almost on the edge of hearing. Severus frowned for a while as he tried to recognize it, and then he sat bolt upright, his heart in his throat. He’d been lying still for so long that the sudden movement made him dizzy.

Someone was climbing the ladder.

Don’t get excited, he told himself. It won’t be her. She hates you, remember? She practically said so.

But she loves this garden, doesn’t she? And who else knows about it? Apart from the revenge-crazed lunatic who sent you that list? And who cares about them? If you could – if she was on your side again – none of that would matter.
   

It took a torturously long time for the newcomer to climb the ladder. The top of a dark-haired head came out first, followed by the suddenly loathsome face of Regulus Black.

Severus sank back down with a groan. The aching had swooped down on him again, as though it felt it needed to make up for lost time.  

“How did you find me?” he managed to say, between gritted teeth. Hatred was burning the back of his throat like acid, and there was no-one to direct it at but himself.

That was the worst part about having hope – when it was yanked out of you it dragged all your insides with it, until you were just a freely-bleeding shell.

“I’ve known about this place for years,” said Regulus, with one of those patented Black-family shrugs. He settled down on the slates next to Severus, and made no comment about his wet hair or painful grimace.

Snape was well aware that he must have looked like he'd barely escaped from a muggle fist-fight. He had been able to heal the broken hand he’d received from punching Potter. But, for some reason, the cut on his lip, which he hadn’t even noticed until he’d finished screwing things up with Lily, was proving more stubborn. Healing it would have involved looking at himself in the mirror, and then trying to find something to like about himself – an impossible combination.  

And, needless to say, he was not going to the Hospital Wing to get it fixed.    

“I bet I found it before you did,” Regulus went on. “Anyway,” he added, in a slightly defensive tone, because Snape was giving him a look that would have been worthy of a Basilisk, “I don’t see your name written on it.”

“You’ll see my name written on your forehead with a compass if you don’t leave right now,” Severus hissed.

Regulus shrugged again. “I just thought you might want a shoulder to cr - ,” But he stopped suddenly, because Snape had whipped his wand through the air and cut him off in mid-sentence with a Silencing Jinx.   

Severus watched desolately as Regulus struggled to speak. It would normally have been very amusing, but tonight it was just as tragic as everything else. He sighed and waved his wand again, removing the Jinx. He would have thought Regulus would have been able to remove it himself. It wasn’t a problem if you’d mastered non-verbal counter-curses. But Regulus either hadn’t learned them yet, or was too drunk to remember them. He smelled of whisky – a scent that made Snape’s stomach churn.

“Why is everyone always doing that to me?” Regulus shouted, frightening another load of bats from their hiding places, and sending them skittering across the sky.  

A thousand answers occurred, but Snape was too miserable to even be sarcastic. He sighed. “Regulus, it was necessary. If I’d let you say what you were about to say, I would have had to kill you.”

“What, you would have killed me for mentioning the mud - ,”

But Snape had been ready for this. He waved his wand again, and the words were instantly cut off. He stared out mournfully over the parapet and muttered: “I think I’m going to have to kill you anyway.”

This time, he let Regulus struggle for a full five minutes before removing the Jinx. But the boy kept his temper, Severus had to give him that. At least he wasn’t an aggressive drunk. If he had been an aggressive drunk, Snape would have probably hurled him off the roof. Regulus had already reminded him of Lily tonight; the last thing he needed was to be reminded of his father as well.

But perhaps it would be good to be distracted. If he could talk to someone about politics, or the weather, or the ideal nesting conditions for dragons – anything that wasn’t connected with Lily, or Potter, or Lily and Potter – maybe the aching would subside for a bit.

But Regulus, when he was able to speak again, didn’t have any desire to change the subject. He really was his own worst enemy.   

“You know, you’re a hero in the Slytherin common-room,” he went on conversationally, as though there had been no interruption. Severus gave a shuddering sigh and let him talk. There was no point fighting the current. The shore had already disappeared.  

“Everyone knows you were behind Caladrius’ disappearance, and now Pomfrey! Jennings is taking bets on which one of Dumbledore’s teachers you’ll put out of commission next. My money’s on McGonagall.”

“Great,” said Snape morosely, taking a long draw on his cigarette.

“You know,” said Regulus, scrutinizing his pale, drawn face, as if for the first time, “that cut on your lip is nasty. Doesn’t it hurt when you smile?”

“I don’t know,” said Snape.

Regulus didn’t seem to have been listening. “Hey, are any of these herbs narcotic?” he asked.

Snape frowned, trying to focus on the scene before him. “The chamomile’s a sedative,” he muttered, because the urge to show off was somehow more deeply rooted than the urge to throw Regulus off the roof.

“Really? Which one is that?”

Snape pointed it out dumbly. To his amazement, Regulus seized a handful of the leaves and started to chew.

Well, it had kept him from thinking about Lily for a few seconds, anyway. Perhaps this was a good idea after all. Not a good idea in the sense that it felt good, of course, but that was probably too much to ask at this stage.

Still, watching someone chewing a handful of leaves could only distract you for so long. Severus cast around for another topic of conversation, and then realized that Regulus might prove to be a mine of information about the names on that list.  

“Is Narcissa a Death Eater?” he asked abruptly.

Regulus choked on the leaf he’d been chewing. “How did you…? Who told you that?”

“Is it true?” Snape asked in surprise.

“Yeah. She joined up an hour ago. On probation, of course. Malfoy doesn’t know.”

“Who would know?” he asked urgently.

“Well, I thought just me and her and the Dark Lord.”

“And what about Barty Crouch?”

“How would he know?”

“No – I mean, is he a Death Eater?”

“Barty Crouch? He’s only fourteen! And his dad would kill him.”

“That’s what I thought,” said Severus.

“What is all this about, Sev?”

A sharp, nasty jolt of familiarity. Severus tried to find the thread of his thoughts, but found that he was just staring at a brick wall of pain. He knew there had been something other than pain before – and presumably, one day, there would be something other than pain again, but it was difficult to imagine at the moment.

“If you ever,” he started, trying to get his voice to stay steady but giving up half-way through, “ever call me that again, I’ll - ,”  

Regulus held up his hands to stem the tide of obscenities. “OK, I know, I know,” he said soothingly. “Sorry.”

“What do the people on this list have in common?” Severus grumbled, pulling out the letter and passing it to Regulus. The need to be distracted was burning a hole in this throat.

“They’re all Slytherins?” Regulus suggested.

“Artemisia Wormwood’s a Ravenclaw.”

“Oh, yeah…. There’s even a Gryffindor, look… Peter Pettigrew.” Regulus paused. “Why is Avery’s name crossed out?”

“I assume it’s because he was hospitalized this morning.”

“No way!” Regulus breathed. “You think this is some kind of… revenge list?”

Snape just shrugged.

“If it is a revenge list,” Regulus persisted, “all you have to do is figure out who these people have pissed off lately.”

“With these particular people, I’d be here all night.”

Regulus frowned. “You know, I’m on that list.”

Snape didn’t answer him. There was no point. You couldn’t convince Regulus Black that he was anything other than charming. It was a notion that had been hammered into him from a very early age.

“Where did you get it, anyway?” said Regulus, who could never hold a grudge for long.

“It was over there.” He nodded towards the Rosemary bush, with its clusters of pale blue flowers. “It was addressed to me.”

“Then someone’s either trying to freak you out of tip you off,” Regulus declared excitedly.

Snape hesitated. He’d never considered that the writer of the list might be trying to help him. And, if it was Lily - ,

Oh, he was being stupid. Lily was more direct than this.

Except that she loved puzzles and riddles. Maybe she was still too mad to talk to him, but she wanted to warn him about this. And, if she was that mad, she wouldn’t want him to know it was her who warned him.

And it really did look a little bit like her handwriting…

Oh God, he was starting to hallucinate! He was so desperate for some kind of contact that everything looked as though it was a message from her.

This had to stop. She was not going to change her mind. She loved her Gryffindor friends more than she loved him and that was the end of it.

“Maybe, they’re not all Death Eaters now, but they will be someday,” Regulus mused, “and the writer of this list is a seer or something – like that Trelawney woman who foretells grisly deaths for house-wives in that tea-shop in Diagon Alley.” He paused, and then got a euphoric look in his eyes. “Or Caladrius!” he exclaimed.

“Don’t be stupid,” said Snape. “He’s long gone.”

“But where, though? Nobody knows, do they? I heard he’s an Animagus and he can turn into a bird.”   

Slowly, as though drawn by magnets, both boys’ eyes turned to the low-hanging sky. There were no birds visible, but the clouds were so thick, there was no telling what could be lurking in there. A Hippogriff could have been hovering a few feet above their heads, for all they could see.  

Snape shook himself. “You’re being dumb, Regulus. Caladrius wouldn’t attack Death Eaters.” He cast his mind back to the night they’d kidnapped him, and added. “He’s useless, for one thing. Don’t think I’ve ever seen him perform magic in my life.”

But Regulus’ short attention-span had kicked in again. “Are you going to show this to Dumbledore?” he asked abruptly.

Severus looked at him as though he was crazy. “God, no!”

“You don’t think he’d want to see it?” Regulus prompted.

“I think he’d want to see me dangling from a noose,” said Snape. “That doesn’t mean I have to make it happen.”

Regulus gave another one of his cheerful shrugs. “Fair enough. Hey, what if Dumbledore’s organizing this? You know, cleansing his school of all the Dark Lord’s supporters?”

Snape raised his eyebrows. “I’m impressed,” he said. “That’s genuinely the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. I should make you some kind of a trophy.”

Regulus genially accepted this abuse. He was used to it. He suggested a few other half-baked theories, but Snape just greeted them with shrugs or more raised eyebrows. His heart clearly wasn’t in the conversation anymore. So Regulus wandered back down to the Slytherin dormitory, wishing that he hadn’t already drunk the last of his Firewhisky.    

As soon as Regulus had gone, Snape opened his journal. He’d taken to carrying this around with him everywhere. It was one of a pair, and they were both bewitched with a Proteus Charm so that, whatever was written in one journal, would show up instantly on the pages of the other.

He and Lily had been using it since the beginning of the fifth year. It was full of hastily-scribbled notes designed to make one another laugh in class, or games of noughts and crosses, or unflattering sketches of James Potter, with stink-lines emerging from his over-sized head.

But nothing new had been written in there for a while now. Severus had wanted to write lots of things, but those Slytherin instincts for self-preservation had always restrained him. He wanted to write that he loved her, but he didn’t want to look stupid – and he wanted to write that she was a cold-hearted bitch, but he didn’t want her to get even madder.

So, mostly, he just stared at the empty page, as though staring at it hard enough would cause words to appear. Ideally, they would start with: ‘Oh, Severus, I’m so sorry, I miss you so much’, and they would end: ‘meet me in the rooftop garden in five minutes and bring that contraceptive potion’.

There was a light burning in the window of the Hospital Wing, but then, there always was. It was traditional, apparently. Lily had explained it to him once. In the days when witches and wizards were fleeing muggle persecution, they often managed to get away on their broomsticks. They had to flee across miles of unpopulated countryside, often at night, in horrible weather conditions, and while seriously wounded. Magical healers would keep a light burning in their windows at all times to guide the broomsticks down.

He looked back at the page, and saw that it was wet. Little crinkled patches were appearing, as though drops of rainwater were falling onto it. But the rain had stopped ages ago. He looked up to see if it had started again. Scottish rain was insidious. You didn’t realize it was even there until you had pneumonia.

But the sky was quite clear, quite empty. As an experiment, he held his hand over the paper to keep any rain-drops off, but the wet patches still appeared.

And then Severus felt his pulse quicken with that horrible, sneaking, climbing feeling of hope.

This was her. It had to be. She was crying over her own journal. The page was absorbing her tears and, because it was bewitched with a Proteus charm, the tears were showing up in his book too.

Hands shaking, he reached for the quill in his bag.

Please talk to me, he wrote, almost tearing the soggy page in his haste. The pen slipped – the ink ran – now even his own possessions were trying to keep him from reaching her.  

He had to fight a mad desire to shake the book frantically, as though he thought she was going to fall out from between the pages, like a long-forgotten book-mark.

He stared at the page again, willing letters to appear on the blank and crinkly surface. But there was no reply. Of course there was no reply. One of her Gryffindor mates had probably yanked the pen off her.

He stared at the page for another ten minutes, without any hope, but with a kind of wretched, resigned persistence. Then he pressed his forehead against the damp page in complete and utter desolation. He wanted to let out the scream that was building inside his chest. If he howled into the page, would she hear it? Could she feel the indentations made by his features? Was she stroking his forehead, even now?

Or was she laughing?

And this thought was magical. It made him straighten up, careful not to let any of his own tears fall onto the page, and close the book.

This wasn’t helping. If he wanted to get her back, he needed to show her that he was capable.

He put the book back in his bag and stood up, without any clear idea of where he was going to go. It felt so shudderingly wrong to let her go on crying – to leave her to be comforted by one of those Gryffindors – Meg Valance, maybe, or - ,

Don’t even think it. You’ll go mad. Get a grip.

Anyway, it’s late. She must be in her dormitory, and men aren’t allowed in the Gryffindor girls’ dormitories.

Still, he wouldn’t have put it past Potter to ooze his way under the door.

No, he needed to get a hold of himself. He needed to show Lily he was sorry. A soggy page full of apologies was not going to cut it. So he turned to the place he always turned when he was in trouble. The library.

And now his head was very clear. If he could treat this like an academic problem – a question of magical theory that required careful thought and copious research – then it would be back within his comfort zone. Academic questions never stumped him. Of course, there was a part of him that thought this course of action was too slow. There was a part of him that wanted to do something wild and crazy – kidnap her, maybe – then tie her to a chair until she was prepared to listen. But, on the whole, he preferred it this way. It was more organized. It was more… Slytherin.
Continuing from Day and Night [link]
And with 100% immature content this time! :)
Does anyone know where the fan-fiction category has gone? Is that just a blip? Or am I being discouraged from writing fan-fiction? Et tu, DeviantArt?
Hmm... if JK Rowling herself told me to stop writing fan-fiction, would I stop? Probably. I guess she's the only one who has a right to ask me to stop.
But I'd probably write stories with very Snape-like characters, for a while, until I got over it.
© 2009 - 2024 ls269
Comments57
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
polkadotpeony's avatar
I really loved this chapter, everything that you wrote in it was so enlightening to his inner physique. I feel like my brain is being overloaded with so much interesting Severus insight that I don't even know what to do with it or where to store it. I fee like I should be taking notes. lol

I actually liked the blood letting part. It reminded me of a fan art I found here of Sev lying in the snow, blood poring out of his wrist and Malfoy standing above him. I thought that there was a whole story there behind that.

I have no idea what Sev is planning on doing to get Lily back but I really hope it is good and that it works!