Another Story

Chapter Twelve

In which Severus remembers more

When Severus opened his eyes, he was no longer standing in the emptiness and darkness of his injured mind and talking with the delusion of his father. He was back in his childhood memories, and he did not understand how or why he had returned to these unhappy scenes from his lonely and too often painful boyhood.

He was lying on the floor in the foyer of Snape Manor. Phaedrus had just struck and began to walk away, muttering the hateful words:

"Worthless nothing."

Severus closed his eyes felt the renewed sting of tears in them and shame course through his body like a burning acid. He choked back a sob and looked up at his father, who had paused. He watched the older man's shoulders slump before he turned a second time.

"I didn't mean it. Just go and wash up for dinner," Phaedrus told him, reaching down and pulling young Severus to his feet with less than the customary amount of roughness.

He nodded and raced to the wash room near the kitchen without another word, drying his eyes on his black robes, which still seemed out of place. Severus had the idea that he should know why, but it had slipped his mind, which remained a confused jumble.

He looked at the tear-stained face of his young self in the mirror. He gasped as his reflection changed into the form of his father.

"You were a cute kid. I can't remember if anyone ever told you that. But you need to think about the things you are seeing and experiencing. The things happening here made you who you are, Severus," the familiar face in the mirror told him.

"I don't understand," he stammered. His voice was not that of a child, but rather his own tired, sharp-toned voice as an adult.

"Then you have no hope," replied the man in the mirror before the surface of the looking glass shimmered and Severus' own reflection returned.

He finished washing his hands and hurried to join his parents in the dining room, wondering what he was supposed to see or learn.

When he stepped into the dining room, Severus found himself suddenly swept into dark forgetfulness. But he was not afraid or alarmed. It was becoming commonplace for him already. It was a little like going to sleep after a long night and not realizing it. Just nodding off. He tried relating the experience to something, but he found that he could not quite grasp the thing, the memory or experience, that he wanted to recall. There was too much emptiness where there had once been so many thoughts and so many memories. He was conscious of the loss for an instant, and it caused him pain.

Then Severus was lying in bed again, the sound of his parents conversation just fading, replaced by the pounding of his heart and stifled sobs. He was frightened. The emotion was stronger than any terror that he could remember, but it seemed to draw upon many sources, not simply upon the words of his mother and father. He had lost so much, and yet he still knew that there were many terrors in the world and many of them had been or would be visited upon him.

Then he heard the door to his room creak open quietly. Severus tensed and held his breath, managing to still his sobs as he kept his face buried in his pillow. Something heavy jostled his mattress. He waited, not knowing what was happening. Suddenly he felt fingers gently combing through his long black hair. Phaedrus? He was not an overly demonstrative man nor was he raising his son to be dependent upon others nor what he considered to be weak, but he was there nevertheless that night.

"Merlin, let him be a wizard. I don't want him to die," Severus heard his father say quietly.

Severus never let him know that he wasn't asleep. He merely stayed still and quiet while his father sat on the corner of his bed for a long time before leaving. He almost wanted to say something, to tell him of his own fervent prayer to be a wizard, to be acceptable. But he remained silent instead, thinking and feeling comforted by his presence. Phaedrus had stopped tucking him in and reading him a story when he was five years old. This was unprecedented. Severus wondered for a moment if were real or a delusion. But then what was really real?

He was falling. Severus knew the sensation well enough. He remembered having dreams about falling and awaking from them in a cold sweat just before he hit the ground. More than once in his adult life a discharge of wild and wandless magic had broken small objects in his rooms. He kept only unbreakable containers by his bed for those eventualities. Trivial things to remember, he thought, when one is plummeting from a tower.

He could see, for the tiniest fraction of an instant, his father looking down at him from the turret. Then he felt a spark of something run through his flailing arms and felt himself slowing down as he crashed to the ground. The jolt was amazingly painful.

For an instant his senses seemed to come alive, and he imagined that he saw a room decorated in green and silver colors and a four-poster bed. It was much more real than the manor and misty lawn, or even the pain caused by his fall. And there was a young woman with curly hair dozing next to him. Then he blinked, and the vision was gone.

There was a soft popping sound next to him. Severus turned his head weakly, almost surprised that he still could. Phaedrus was standing there, looming over him with a satisfied expression on his face. He knelt in the damp grass next to Severus and began methodically checking the boy for injuries. His eyes would dart away from time to time. Severus felt a lump in his throat as he realized something that he had never known when he was a child. His father was not uninterested in him or indifferent to his condition. Phaedrus was holding back tears.

"Am I a wizard now, Da?" he questioned.

"You performed a satisfactory Levitation charm, son, though I believe you may be sore for a few days. It wasn't quite enough to stop your fall, but it was magic," Phaedrus informed him.

"I'm a wizard," Severus whispered, letting a smile creep across his face. That was one of the happiest moments of his life. He knew for certain that he wasn't a squib and that he had pleased his father.

Phaedrus had nodded coolly, a smile tugging at his lips, as he picked up his son securely in his arms and carried him back inside the manor. Severus closed his eyes and rested his cheek against his chest, savoring a moment that he knew could not last forever.

Severus climbed aboard the Hogwarts Express, ducked into the first empty compartment that he found, and sat down by the window, looking down at his jet black robes, wondering why they plagued him so. His father had just given him a stern dressing down and threatened not to let him come home for the holidays. He was miserable. He missed his mum, who had only been gone for two months' time. Severus leaned his head against the cool pane of glass and willed himself not to cry, not to show weakness. But everything seemed so wrong.

Suddenly there was a tapping on the window. He jerked upright and stared as his father rapped a second time on the glass. Severus hurriedly opened window.

"Son ... you can come home for Christmas," Phaedrus told him, trying to sound stern. "If you still want to," he added.

"I do," said Severus quickly.

"Your mother was very proud when you got your letter. I know you won't disappoint either of us," he said.

"I won't let you down, Da," said Severus.

His father nodded and grasped his hand for a moment. Severus smiled and leaned out of the window to hug him good-bye, but the train began moving, pulling them apart all too quickly.

"Good-bye, Severus! And be careful!" Phaedrus called as the train pulled out of the station.

"I will, Da! I promise!" he yelled back, waving farewell to his father.

The image of Phaedrus standing on the platform, a pale and solemn figure in gray and muted green traveling robes, stuck with him. They were so alike, and yet so different.

Severus could taste blood, and he didn't mind the taste of it. There was the sound of a rushing wind in his ears, the sound of his own blood pumping furiously, as he stood there under the influence of unbridled hatred and fury. Severus sneered at Phaedrus, who clutched his wand in a white-knuckled death grip. If the son was furious, then the wrath of the father was like that of an angry god.

He felt a thrill as he moved through the door. He also felt an enormous amount of shame and regret. Part of him knew that Phaedrus was right about Voldemort and the Death Eaters. But the part of him that was only a memory wanted his father to do something stupid so that he could use some of his newly acquired knowledge on him. Severus was unwilling to cast the first spell, but he would rise to any challenge Phaedrus offered.

"Son, my temper, I ... Perhaps if we talked this out sensibly. Maybe there is still time or something ..." said Phaedrus, reaching for his son with his empty hand as his anger dissipated, as he realized that he was losing his seventeen-year-old son forever.

Severus slapped his hand away and said, "I'm through with you. I am giving you a piece of advice: stay out of my way. Don't ever try to speak to me or see me again. You will regret it."

Phaedrus looked at him with the steady gaze of a Slytherin lord and said, "You may not find it easy to return, Severus, but I would welcome you back, no matter what may become of you out there." With his final words he looked past Severus toward the entrance of the manor.

Severus sneered at him. He wanted to close his eyes, but it was like one of those muggle movies. The images and sounds continued whether he wanted them to or not. He wanted very much to scream.

"I will become a great wizard, father, and even if you aren't proud of me, there will be others to celebrate my achievements, my friends and my lord," he said coldly, turning on his heel and walking from the manor.

Severus was crying when the darkness consumed him and the memories ended. He was lying down in the darkness and wanted nothing more than to lie there until the pain and shame disappeared, if they ever would. He imagined that he could smell Dark Magic and even the accompanying guilt on his clothes as he covered his head with his arms. So much that he couldn't remember and now so much more that he could. And only a few pieces here and there added up to anything good or pleasant. He had never meant to disappoint his father. He had never meant to become one of the bad guys. But there it was. He had seen it all for himself.

Then there was something poking him in the ribs. It felt like the tip of a boot. He kept his eyes closed and his face covered, hoping whatever or whoever it was would go away and just let him be.

"Get up, Severus. We don't have time for this," said a familiar, impatient voice.

"No," he said, looking between his arms to see Phaedrus, or rather the delusion of him, standing there in the surrounding darkness.

"You cannot hide from yourself, Severus. Not here of all places."

"You aren't me," he snapped, lowering his arms, but remaining where he was on the ground, or whatever the hard surface beneath him was. He was almost certain that it was part of the delusion.

"Then who I am if you know so much?"

"You're ..." and Severus was lost for words.

"Only the uninjured portion of your mind," said Phaedrus. "Are you forgetting things? That would be a very bad sign."

"I don't know," said Severus, touching his face and finding it dry despite the tears he had been shedding moments before. Was nothing real? Not even his own tears?

"It's strange, and you aren't in a good position to understand what has happened and is happening to you. We aren't, I suppose you could say. We are in the same boat, after all."

"How long has it been since ..." Severus began to ask, slowly climbing to his feet.

"We last talked? Can't you tell?" asked Phaedrus.

"No."

"Hours do you think? A single heartbeat? Five years? Ten? A day? Care to take a guess?"

"You said we don't have time," said Severus, glaring at him in irritation.

"For this perhaps we do."

"Hours then?" he questioned.

Phaedrus nodded and said, "I'll accept that as an answer."

"Can you tell me what's been going on ... out there?" asked Severus anxiously.

"Why so concerned? Your worries are all in here," chuckled Phaedrus. "Or are you thinking about a girl at the moment? Young? Curly brown hair that falls around her face just so?"

The brief image that he had seen, that had provided a momentary respite from his memories, flashed into his mind for an instant.

He raised his eyebrows in surprise and stammered, "She is the one that loves me then?"

"Indeed," nodded Phaedrus, crossing his arms over his chest.

"I must have connected somehow with the outside world ..."

"With your senses, my dear Severus," Phaedrus corrected.

"How?"

"If I had all the answers, we wouldn't be having this conversation. I would simply have put everything right for you and enjoy the results," said Phaedrus. "But I highly suspect that it was the pain, if you must know."

"The would make sense," said Severus.

"No, it certainly would not! It was pain that brought you here in the first place. I should think it would be incredibly ironic if it was pain that took you back out again," objected Phaedrus.

"Tell me about her," said Severus after a protracted pause.

"She loves you. She's napping right now. Couldn't even crawl to her own bed. Just dozed right off where she sat watching over you," said Phaedrus, shaking his head.

"I know nothing about myself that would make me in any way worthy of such attentions," said Severus, looking down at his robes.

"But then you know very little," Phaedrus reminded him. "Take off the robes," he suggested.

"Why do you want me to?"

"This perception you have ... that you are bad, perhaps even evil at heart, it doesn't suit a man who is loved by a such a sweet and intelligent young woman and who struggles so arduously for his own redemption. Self-loathing is a impediment in every struggle."

"And a philosopher too," sneered Severus.

Phaedrus bowed in a mocking fashion and said, "I do what comes naturally." An impish smile tugged at his lips as he added, "And that is something from which you could take a lesson."

"Why do you appear in the form of ... my father ... and act ..."

"So very contrary to his nature? I've already confessed to being a delusion. What more do you want from me?" he asked impatiently.

"Don't finish my sentences," said Severus.

"Easily done. Glad we've gotten that cleared up. Now, on to more important things," said Phaedrus, plucking at Severus' Death Eater robes.

"And this is important because it's an impediment?"

"To many things," nodded Phaedrus.

"Then why don't you subdue me and take them?" asked Severus.

"I never thought of that," said the delusion with a momentary contemplative look. "But really, I don't think we would like the outcome. You are injured already, if you recall. I might do more harm than good. And if I did manage to subdue you, I think that poor girl out there deserves a fair head start."

"Repugnant!" snorted Severus as an unholy leer lit his companion's face.

"Someday you'll like girls, I promise," said Phaedrus, putting a mock-fatherly hand on his shoulder.

"It always comes back to sex for you, doesn't it?" asked Severus.

"Mostly, but a bottle of brandy or a nice lie on a warm beach would not be unwelcome," he replied with a shrug. "Of course, all three ..."

"Don't we have more important things to discuss?"

"You keep changing the subject. But I suppose I shouldn't blame you, being hurt and all," sighed Phaedrus.

"Can you tell me why I returned to the same memories ... only to see more of them?" asked Severus.

"Did you like what you saw?"

"Parts of it, but mostly, no."

"Did you learn anything?"

"I'm not sure."

"Tell me about your father. We can go from there," suggested Phaedrus.

Severus looked down again and shook his head slightly. He didn't want to think about that. It was too difficult to understand what he had experienced in those long buried memories. Even before the madness he would have been reticent even to think upon his childhood for such an extended period of time. It was very painful, and he understood so little of what he felt.

"You must," said Phaedrus.

"Or you'll what?"

"Try to send you back to those memories until you cooperate," he answered succinctly, though with the hint of a threat in his tone. "This is the most important part of putting your mind back together, after all," he added.

"I can't tell you anything," said Severus, shaking his head.

"Try," he insisted. "These are some of your strongest and most personal memories. I can understand why you don't want to dwell on them as they seemed to be mostly unpleasant, but they are the key to all of your other memories, including the good ones that you don't even know you're missing," said Phaedrus gently.

"Like the ones of her?"

"Exactly."

"He ... had a temper," said Severus, after taking a deep breath. "He wasn't exactly what one would describe as a pleasant person." He paused. "But I'm not either, am I?" he questioned as though it was a revelation.

"He wasn't a saint and neither are you, Severus. He was and you are only human. And you do all right," said Phaedrus with a chuckle.

"This would be easier to talk about if you were someone else."

"Beggars can't be choosers," he said.

"And I suppose I am no better than a beggar here," Severus replied quietly, rubbing his eyes and struggling with what he had already remembered.

He was suddenly aware that he could think more clearly, that things were coming back to him. Snippets of conversations with different people. Strangers to him, yes, but familiar nonetheless. Flashes of images from what he could identify readily as his school days. Severus was frightened for a moment. Were these things that he wanted to remember?

"Don't fight it, Severus. You have neither the strength nor the time to waste."

"It's rather uncomfortable ..." he answered, listening to whispers of forgotten voices.

Then Severus heard a softer, kinder voice among the chorus. She was whispering to him, saying his name in warm and tender tones, almost lovingly. Her voice grew louder than the rest, and he savored the sound of it. Soothing and familiar, though he could not give her a name. He closed his eyes and smiled.

"You are remembering her voice," said Phaedrus.

"This is her speaking? The woman you have called my beloved," said Severus softly, listening to her, but not quite understanding her words.

"Yes, that is she. At least you recall her voice now, and that is something," said Phaedrus. "Is hearing her voice worth the discomfort?" he questioned with a smile.

"Yes," Severus breathed as the comforting sound faded again and he opened his eyes.

"Then I ask you again to tell me of your memories in hopes that you may be with her again," said Phaedrus.