Virgin Blood

Virgin Blood

*

The Prefect rounds were almost done for that night. Remus yawned. It was not long before the next full moon, and he was already beginning to feel the exhaustion.

After what felt like forever, they completed their rounds. "Good night," he said quietly to Alanna Swift, the Slytherin Prefect he'd been paired with that night, and started to walk back to the Gryffindor Tower. However, before he'd taken five steps away, he heard Swift say, "No, you aren't going anywhere." Then, there was a quickly whispered, "Expelliarmus." His wand flew away from his hands, right into the Slytherin's awaiting fingers.

"What's the meaning of this?" asked Remus annoyedly. "Give my wand back this instant!" He truly didn't want any of the Slytherin's games right now. He was tired.

"No, I don't think I will," the girl replied teasingly. Then, her eyes flashed with something cold and hard. "You will now walk where I tell you, or I will do something nasty to you," she commanded strictly. "Don't think I won't."

And Remus didn't doubt her words, not at all. Seeing the cold expression on her face he suddenly remembered the stories of what this seventh-year girl could do. She was the worst kind of school bully; the teachers always saw the nice and polite model student, while the other students saw a monster, an uncaring beast who never got caught, no matter what she did. Well, she had taken charge of the little group of "Death Eaters in making", like the Marauders called the worst gang of the Slytherins, after their former leader, Lucius Malfoy's successor, Tom Guilt, had graduated. Very slowly they walked through the corridors, carefully avoiding all places where teachers were known to sometimes keep watch. At last, Swift made him stop in front of a room to a classroom he knew to be abandoned. "Step in," the girl commanded. And he did.

As soon as he went in, somebody quickly casted a silencing spell on him, then another to bind his wrists together. Looking around in shock and slight fear, Remus noticed that he was surrounded by five of the worst-reputationed members of Swift's gang, and a boy he didn't think belonged to the gang yet.

"I'm afraid we're going to be nasty, Lupin," said the girl with a smirk, stepping in behind him and locking the door with various spells and wards. "Very nasty." She then muttered a charm Remus could not make out, but he immediately noticed its effects as his clothes were magically torn from his body.

Then Swift went to the side of the room, looking amused as the few boys in the room started to advance on the naked, helpless Gryffindor. Remus knew what was going to happen, but he couldn't do anything; they were surrounding him from every direction, preventing escape. He did try to fight, however -- or, at least, he did try to fight until they fastened his wrists and ankles on the floor with a couple of new binding spells.

Then, there was only pain.

When they at last were finished with him, Swift stopped studying her fingernails and turned back towards Remus. "If you tell anybody, you'll be dead," she told with a cool tone that told him she was telling the plain truth. "The spells will end in fifteen minutes or so after we leave. I trust you to find your way to your dormitory all by yourself." And with a nasty laugh, she and the boys were gone.

Remus lay on the floor, his face covered with tears of pain and humiliation and blood pooling around him, unable to do anything. When the binding spells finally ended, just like Swift had told, he curled up on a ball and cried without sound.

Then, at last, he forced himself to get to his feet. Ignoring the stinging pain, he found his wand tossed to one corner of the classroom. A quick

"Reparo," and his clothes were wearable again. He tried in vain to clean the blood from the floor, but for some reason or another, no cleansing charm he was aware of could make the stain go away. Well, nobody ever came to the classroom, anyway.

Still struggling against sobs, the sixteen-year-old werewolf limped back to the Gryffindor Tower and the safety of his dormitory. When his friends later questioned him, worried and concerned about him, he told them that nothing was wrong.

Everything was just fine.

*

Later, it became worse. At first, Remus somehow managed to avoid those rounds he had with Slytherins, knowing that any of them might drag him to Swift's gang's hands. He changed turns with other Prefects to get his rounds with Slytherins as near the full moon as possible, and then feigned either pre- or post-full moon sickness to his unbelievably gullible teacher. He did not tell anyone, however, since he didn't want to die.

However, one night when he was coming back from his round with Jeannette Steele, a nice, though a bit plump Hufflepuff, he heard a voice whisper behind him, "Expelliarmus." And when two of the members of the dreaded gang came to sight from the nearby corridor, he knew that there was no escaping, no more fleeing from his tormentors.

After that, it was the same most of the nights. After his Prefect rounds, some of the Slytherins would catch him and force him to the horrifying little classroom, where he'd be raped. Only when he had rounds with Gryffindors and thus could walk back to the Tower with another Prefect, only then he was safe. Needless to say, he soon started to memorize all the dates on which he had rounds with his housemates, knowing those as "safe" days.

On those days, he would not be raped.

The amount of them varied, though. It was always from three to seven Slytherin boys from the three last years, mostly the same faces night after night -- oh, how he flinched in fright every time one of those faces came in front of him in a corridor or a classroom! -- but sometimes a new guy here and there, too. At first he didn't understand why these new faces rarely stayed for another night, until he began to notice a pattern. The "fresh" ones always started to hang out with the gang right after the night on which he'd seen them in that horrifying classroom. Never a day before, never a day later, but always the next day.

That was when he realized that he had become their initiation rite. The thought was sickening.

*

The seventh year brought little good to it. Remus was still raped regularly, and he still cried himself to sleep at nights when he'd put up silencing charms to prevent his friends from hearing. He still knew each and every one of his rounds with Gryffindors by heart, since only then he would be safe. Outside the Prefect rounds, he was becoming depressed, and he was even paler and more sickly than usually. Nobody could guess the reason for that, however.

He would not tell anyone.

Alanna Swift, who'd already graduated -- and was still sometimes mentioned by the teachers as a model student -- was replaced by Ivan Collins, but this brought little change to his situation. Rather, it was now worse -- while Swift had only watched herself, Collins brought many girls every night to watch. They seemed to be enjoying the sight of him being raped, and they giggled and gossiped in their tiny groups.

The blood stain that had been made when he'd been raped for the first time wouldn't fade. And he didn't tell anyone.

Then, one day, he was called to the Headmaster's office.

*

"Headmaster, I cannot become a spy for you."

The ancient wizard frowned deeply. "I understand your decision, Severus, and I respect it, if you truly are going keep it like that," he said, glancing at the seventeen-year-old in front of him. "However, could you maybe tell me why you have decided so?"

"I'm unable to pass their initiation rites," the Slytherin replied levelly, meeting his eyes steadily. "Well, not exactly unable, technically, but I refuse to do that."

"And what is the initiation rite?" inquired Dumbledore. What could be so bad that Severus would refuse, even after a Death Eater -- his own father, more exactly -- had murdered his dear mother in front of his eyes?

"To rape a student."

This startled the Headmaster quite a bit. "I -- I -- what did you say?" he asked, shocked.

"The initiation rite is to rape a student," Severus said. His calm voice never faltered. "An unwilling student, of course. From what I've gathered, they use the same student -- the same male student -- every time. They've threatened to kill him if he tells anyone about it -- and believe me, they truly would kill him, and slowly."

"I don't believe this," muttered Dumbledore, starting to furiously pace his office. "Not in my school -- right under my eyes, they are constantly raping a student!" Turning towards Severus, he then asked, "Can you tell at least some hints of who it could be?"

"Well, he's not a Slytherin, that I know for sure," the boy replied, then added bitterly, "They wouldn't want to spoil their current or future Death Eaters." After a moment of thinking, he added also, "He's seemingly also a Prefect -- that's how they do it, catch him when he's returning from his Prefect rounds, as he can't very well leave his Prefect duties without presenting a proper reason, and he can't tell anyone. At first, they simply took him whenever he was paired up with a Slytherin prefect, but as he started to claim to be sick each time, skipping all his rounds with them, they started to drag him to an abandoned classroom afterwards. After that, he stopped avoiding rounds with them."

The boy's words raised horrible thoughts to Albus's mind. Minerva's voice, telling him how Remus Lupin had managed to change turns so that he was paired with Slytherins only around the full moon, and then telling to be too sick for his rounds. Then again Minerva, telling with delight -- delight! If she'd only known what the change truly meant -- that he'd stopped doing so, doing all his rounds regularly and dutifully. James Potter's worried face, telling that Remus seemed to be depressed, but wouldn't tell anybody the reason. Poppy Pomfrey mentioning with wonder how Remus had blushed and whispered, "No," when she'd tried to ask whether he was still a virgin -- and Remus wasn't even involved with anybody, how could he lose his virginity otherwise with his character? Such a nice and quiet boy he was... And many, many other things, all seemingly inexplicable or unimportant at the time. Suddenly, all things clicked to their places. And the image that they formed was not pleasant. In fact, it was horrible.

"Merlin," Dumbledore whispered, covering his eyes with his hand. "I've failed him. By Merlin I have failed him, and I fear I'll never be able to repay him for it." It was his fault, in a way, at least. It'd been him who'd told Remus and his parents that the boy should come to Hogwarts and not be home schooled. They'd been worried about whether he would be safe at the school, and he, Dumbledore, had told he'd be absolutely safe. But that he wasn't -- not because he was a werewolf, but because the Headmaster had trusted blindly his students not to do anything so horrible off-bounds.

"You cannot punish them," said Severus quietly, the black eyes intent on the ancient wizard. "If you punish any of them, the others will kill Lupin. You know they will."

"You -- you know it is Remus?" asked the Headmaster, startled a bit. "Just a moment ago you claimed you didn't know exactly who it is!"

"Not exactly, no," the Slytherin replied smoothly. "But I did have my own suspicions. Given Lupin's behaviour this and the last year, he seemed like the most obvious choice. And your reaction just proved my suspicions correct."

"But what can I do?" exclaimed Dumbledore then in desperation. "They will kill him if I punish any of them, on that you are unfortunately correct. The only way to keep him safe from that would be to send him away from Hogwarts -- to fail him again. But I can't allow this to go on any longer, not without betraying everything I pride myself on."

"Relieve him of his Prefect duties," replied Severus laconically. "Without the Prefect duties, he could go around with his friends all the time. And not even our dear junior Death Eaters are stupid enough to attack him when he has other people around."

"Yes," Dumbledore said gloomily. "Yes, maybe you are right."

"We can always hope." And that was all that the young wizard said before exiting the Headmaster's office. Dumbledore watched him go, but didn't notice the hands that were clenched to fists so tightly that blood ran from where the nails dug to the palms.

*

"I'm what?" asked Remus disbelievingly, staring at the Headmaster with wide eyes. He couldn't believe that what he'd just heard could be true. It was like a dream, a bittersweet dream, but yet something he didn't want to wake up from, ever.

"You're relieved of your Prefect duties," Dumbledore said with an uncharacteristically tired voice. Oh. So the werewolf had indeed heard right the first time.

"But... why, Headmaster?" he then asked, even though he only wanted to jump up from his chair and cheer. Maybe, just maybe, he'd finally be free of the nightmare he had to face almost every night. "Why am I not a Prefect anymore?" he elaborated, trying to get a properly surprised tone to his voice. 'Don't let him suspect anything. Not anything.'

"Because I want to keep you safe." And when Remus looked up, startled by the serious words, he saw the blue eyes twinkling with a sadness and gentleness that told him instantly that Dumbledore knew. He knew.

That, however, was more than Remus could bear. He broke down, crying, crying hard with tears of relief and sorrow and fear. He hadn't cried for a long time, he'd felt like his tears had been drained because he'd been constantly pouring them during and instantly after the few first rapes, and besides, he'd learnt not to cry because it just excited his tormentors more. But now he cried, cried so much that he almost didn't notice the arms that were wrapped around him.

"I'm sorry, Remus, I'm so sorry..." Dumbledore whispered, petting the young werewolf's hair gently, like a loving grandfather comforting a child. "I'm sorry that anything of this had to happen. If I had only known, I would have helped you earlier. It's just a pity that I cannot do anything..." Remus nodded, tears not ending. He knew that the Headmaster could do nothing past taking him away from his Prefect position. If any of the participants were to be punished, there'd always be somebody who would be ready to kill him. But he didn't care whether they were punished or not. All he cared about was to be safe, to be able to know for sure that he wouldn't be raped that night, or the next one, or the next.

He was so relieved that he didn't even think to wonder how the Headmaster had found out what was going on.

*

Remus quietly opened the door he had come to dread during his two last years in Hogwarts. This time, nobody would await him there. This time, nobody would bind and silence him. Nobody would rape him, not this time. Still, he couldn't help but shiver in quiet fear as he stepped over the threshold. Everything was just like he remembered it. The old, dusty desks in a neat row along the far wall. The teacher's desk, on which Swift and, later, the few other girls had coolly observed the rude torture. There was also the empty fireplace that had never given him warmth when he'd been curled in a ball on the floor, cold, dirty, and crying in shame, humiliation, pain, and fear. Yes, everything was just like he remembered.

There was even the old, large bloodstain on the floor. It seemed like it'd been there forever, even though it had been there only for a bit more than twenty years. Only, for Merlin's sake! Well, that was a short time, after all, at least compared to what it had felt like.

Suddenly, a voice startled him from his thoughts. "Daydreaming, Lupin?" asked Severus casually, leaning against the doorframe.

"More like daymaring actually," muttered Remus quietly to himself. With a sigh, he added, "I just wanted to see whether it looks as horrifying as I remember." He knew that Snape knew what he was talking about. The other wizard had maybe officially joined the gang only after he'd been "saved," but surely they'd told him about the initiation.

"It just doesn't have the same effect without the Slytherins there, does it?" asked the Potions Master calmly, walking to his side. The onyx eyes were studying the classroom coolly. Then, just as Remus was about to reply, he suddenly added, "It would have been my turn the following night, you know. If Dumbledore hadn't released you from your Prefect duties." This made the werewolf turn towards him. "It was you who told Dumbledore, wasn't it?" asked Remus very quietly.

"Of course," replied Severus levelly, not batting an eyelid. "I told him that I was ready to become a spy for him, but not a rapist. True, I did want you back then -- who didn't? -- but not that way. Never that way," he added softly.

"You wanted me?" asked Remus disbelievingly. The Slytherin certainly hadn't behaved like that back then!

"Of course," said the other man again. "Everybody wanted you, Lupin, males and females alike. You were sweet, good-looking, intelligent, and so pure and innocent. Everybody wanted to break that perfectness, to steal a kiss from you, or maybe more. To break that innocence." With a deep sigh, Severus then added, "Unfortunately, some wanted it too badly. Far too badly."

"True," said Remus quietly. For some time, they both just stood on their places, silent and deep in thought. Then, in an attempt to break the silence, the werewolf managed to utter, "I -- I -- well, thank you. If it had gone on any longer... I would have soon killed myself." Remus meant every word with all his heart.

"Don't thank me," Severus replied with a slight frown. "I only did what I had to. Should I have raped you, maybe? Or got us both killed by trying to get some of them caught?"

"You know, there's one thing I've always wondered," the werewolf then said quietly. "After I -- after they stopped using me -- did they get another victim?"

"No," the Slytherin replied, his tone again very soft. "There was never any other than you, not at least one I'd been aware of."

For a moment, there was only silence. Then Severus broke it. "You know," he said with a simply conversational tone, "every time a Death Eater's child has had a detention with me, I've made them wash the floor of this very room. Odd, really, how a thousand children in a ten thousand detentions can't clear what one of their fathers created in less than ten minutes."

"The stones never forget virgin blood," whispered Remus quietly. "They never forget it. That's why the stain remains."

"They never forget?" echoed Severus dryly. "I dare to disagree with that notion." With these words, he drew a tiny phial of potion from his pocket. Opening the phial, he then dropped four drops of the potion to the old blood stain; only four drops, and not more.

The potion shimmered a bit on the cold stone floor, then started to spread into a thin film over the stones. It became exactly the size and the form of the stain, nothing more, nothing less. And, under Remus's disbelieving eyes, the stain indeed started to fade.

"Unbelievable," the werewolf whispered. "That's just unbelievable. I thought it would never fade."

"All shadows fade," said Severus, raising an eyebrow. "And so do scars. Maybe they don't disappear, like this one didn't --" he pointed at the floor, where indeed was still a faint shade of red to be seen, "-- but enough to allow us to get over it and go on."

"And what should I go on to, now that I have supposedly got over it?" asked Remus, his tone only a bit uncertain.

Severus took a couple of careful steps forward, until he stood right in front of the werewolf. "What about convincing yourself about the fact that it's not that bad after all?" he suggested softly.

"I -- I don't know. I love you, Severus, I really do, and I'd do anything for you. But this... I... I just don't know." Remus dropped his gaze, feeling suddenly ashamed under the scrutinizing of the sharp onyx eyes. However, Severus would not take that. In an instant, he'd taken a step to close the gap between them. Then his strong arms were wrapped around the shorter man, and Remus fell forward to lean against his chest, tiny sobs that he couldn't stop escaping from his lips being the only sound there was to be heard.

"Shh, Remus, shh," whispered Severus, one hand caressing the werewolf's back while the other still held Remus firmly against his body. "I'm sorry I even said that. I know that it's difficult for you to even think about the possiblity of sex, and I know that this place brought on a lot of painful memories. I'll take this as slowly as I can. And even if you'll never be ready to make love with me, I can wait. Forever, if need be."

"You are more than I deserve," muttered Remus, his hands clutching Severus's robes like he would die the moment he let go. "You're far more than I deserve."

"You deserve only the best," Severus said with an uncharacteristic smile.

"I'm hardly the best."

"Oh, but to me, you are." And with that, Remus ended that particular discussion, then led them out of the classroom he had no intention to return to.

*

Severus lay quietly in his bed, thinking. The sheets clung tightly on his skin, which was covered by a thin layer of sweat. There was another body next to his, the regular breath of his sleeping lover being the only sound in the silence.

It had taken five years. Five whole years, two to get them together, three to make Remus finally accept Severus into his bed as well. But at last, he'd accomplished that, and was glad he had.

Leaning over to kiss his lover's cheek, Severus allowed himself to smile a bit. Questioned about it he would have denied the whole thing, of course, but smile he did. And a warm smile it was! The kind only Remus could ever coach to his lips. For anyone or anything else, there were only cold smirks on his face. His true smile was reserved to Remus, and Remus alone. His mind drifted back to that day over two years before when in that abandoned classroom he'd told Remus that he would wait forever, if need be. He'd meant that, with his whole heart. Having Remus there beside him was more than he'd ever dared to even hope for. He could have been absolutely content without anything else, with no need for sex to be happy. But now, when Remus had finally accepted him as a true lover in every meaning of the word, he was overjoyed.

"I'm glad," he murmured, leaning over to place a light kiss on Remus's cheek, one of his arms snaking around the slender waist and holding the werewolf close to him. "I'm glad that you could finally trust me enough." Remus did not reply with words, being asleep, but he did let out a content sigh and pressed his body further into Severus's embrace.

Somewhere deep within the castle, in an abandoned classroom, a faint stain of red on the floor seemed to fade a bit. Then a bit, and yet a bit more, until there was nothing to be seen anymore.

*

THE END

*