What I have done, I have done

Severus Snape stared blankly at the cold stone wall, his vision slightly obscured by locks of this lank black hair framing his face. "Five years," he whispered into the emptiness, his features creased, "I'm too young, it's too long." He slumped down noiselessly, drawing his legs close to his chest and holding them tightly. It was a familiar position to find the young man in, for he often felt desperately alone. Images floated into his head of curling up like that in his dormitory, bedroom, empty Common Room, even in the Potions dungeons.

Though now he felt more alone than he ever had been. The trial was scheduled for that afternoon, 'Though in this place time does not seem to exist,' he thought bitterly. Yet there was no mistaking the fact that his trial was merely hours away. The Dementors in the corridor outside his cell always became excited when they knew that the trial of someone who had no chance of winning approached. He had no chance of winning. It was his word against Lily's. Lily; he winced when he pictured her beautiful face.

How could she do this to him? He loved her, no matter how much he had tried to deny it, every fibre of his being still ached for her gentle touch, for her love. 'Look where it got me.' Almost definitely facing at least five years of Azkaban. Hell, he was almost dead after one week of imprisonment.

He raised his head, as though daring to believe that someone would be standing above him, offering him a helping hand. He had no idea how to even begin defending himself. Who would ever believe him when he told the court she was lying? She was the perfect Lily Evans (or Potter, he admitted, clenching his jaw). And she had that husband of hers to confirm her word. Who would ever doubt the unstoppable James Potter? James Potter, the one who got every damn thing that he, himself, had ever wanted, desired.

Desire

He should never have given in to desire. But who couldn't in that situation? The woman he desired more than anything was standing before him, making him feel as if his strong feelings were mutual.

-- FLASHBACK --

She stood, her cloak seductively falling off her bare shoulders, a hungry expression on her face. He itched to feel her, to kiss her, to make his own. He would never hurt her though, she was like a china doll, 'Never touch unless permitted'.

"Don't be afraid, Severus," she said throatily, "I want you just as much as you want me." He still seemed wary, so she stepped forward and wound her arms around him. Her lips found his frantically, until he returned her touch with the same urgency.

Afterwards she lay asleep in his arms, while he played idly with her fiery hair, picturing every inch of her mesmerising body . . .

-- END OF FLASHBACK --

How could he have known what the consequences of that night of passion would be? How could he imagine the headlines screaming out at him would read 'RAPE'? What had he ever done to deserve this? He could have continued forever, drowning his mind with 'what if?'. Nothing could alter the past, though.

He was so consumed in his own thoughts that he did not hear someone enter the cell. Only when he sensed her shadow draped over him did he look up. He gazed straight into the eyes of Lily.

"Severus," she said, simply.

"Come here to break my heart into even smaller pieces, destroy my life even more?" he tried to sneer, but his voice trembled as he was drawn into her intoxicating eyes. "Why, Lily?" he whispered.

"You did something you should not have done."

"But I love you, and you . . . you willed me to touch you," he gabbled.

"You shouldn't have crossed the line."

"I wanted you, and you told me . . . you told me that you wanted me too."

She laughed cruelly, shaking her head, "How naïve you are, Severus."

"How could you call it rape, though?" he asked. He prayed that his voice did not portray how his soul was trembling.

"You had sex with a poor, helpless Mudblood girl against her will," she spat.

"I would never call you such a name . . ."

"Bollocks! You called me that whenever I saved your ungrateful arse!"

"When you saved me from Potter's evil taunting. How could you marry such a monster?"

"That's rich, considering your such a monster yourself," she retorted.

"Me? A monster?"

"You raped an innocent girl . . ."

Anger started coursing through him, "You call yourself innocent? You seduced me, pretended that you loved me, then I suddenly find myself in Azkaban charged with your rape."

"Do you really want to know why I did it?"

"Yes, Lily, I do," he shouted.

"I did it because we have intelligence. Intelligence that you are going to be initiated as a Death Eater," she ignored his horrified expression, "Obviously, more Death Eaters was the very last thing the Ministry and the Order wanted. I knew getting to you would be easy enough, Severus, but to prove that you were one of them was the difficult part, seeing as you had not had your Mark seared on yet. The obvious way to get around that was to frame you for something else. You'd be in Azkaban, where you couldn't get near any helpless Mudbloods like me, and on the Order records as a Death Eater."

"You told me you wanted me," he hissed, attempting to grab her wrists. A Dementor that he had not even noticed emerged from the shadows, though Snape doubted whether it would take any action. He knew that it was only a matter of time before the Dementors would be joining Lord Voldemort, and now they knew that he was one of them, they would be unlikely to stop him from killing the girl there and then.

"Stop," she cried, pulling herself out of his reach, "You might hurt the baby."

'A baby,' he thought, 'Oh Merlin, a baby?'. "Is it mine?"

"Do you think I'd let myself get pregnant by the likes of you?" her words cut at him like a knife.

"And do you know why I was going to become a Death Eater?" she was silent, so he continued, "Because I loved you so much, Lily. So much that it was killing me. Yet you never returned any of those feelings, while they took over my life. I loved you so much that I hated you for it. I grew to hate you even more, I never hated you as much as I loved you, but still, I hated you. I began hating all of your kind, Muggles, Mudbloods, even Half bloods. And hate, Lily, is one of the traits of a Death Eater. I knew I was becoming one, even before one of the Dark Lord's servants sought me out. It's all your fault. If you had never existed, I might be working as a Potions researcher, developing new ways to help people," at the look of doubt on her face, he added, "Not all Slytherins are bad."

"Do you still hate me?"

"What do you think? But that wasn't really the question you wanted to ask, was it?" she shook her head, looking every bit the poor, helpless girl she was claiming to be, "The answer is yes, I still love you. Possibly even more than I ever have done. I still want you, yearn for you."

"Please don't . . ." she said, shaking, now with a tear snaking its way down her face.

"You're crying, Lily," he said, "Shall I lick the tears away, and kiss you better?" her green eyes were wide open in terror. He trailed his tongue slowly across her cheek, then brought it to her mouth.

"Lily? Lily?" a voice came from the doorway. She quickly pushed Severus away and ran to James Potter's side. He hugged her tightly, looking over her head at Snape. His stare was full of hatred, remorse, and regret. "Ssh," James comforted her, "Why were you here anyway?"

"I told him the truth," she said, in a small, quavering voice.

"Lily, what do you mean?" he asked her quietly, before looking at Snape once again and, as if disgusted at the sight of him, pulled her closer.

"He . . .he didn't rape me."

"Lily, you're confused, I remember you running to me, telling me what he," he glared at Snape, "Did to you."

"I let him . . ."

"WHAT?" James shouted, now looking at her as if she had lost her mind, "Let's get out of here, this place is making you go crazy. We'll go home, and you can calm down . . ."

"I let him so that we could frame him."

"Lily, you put yourself in so much danger," his expression softening, "You should have told me, I could have framed him for hexing me or something . . ."

"You were busy with everything else we had to do," she said, still enfolded in her husband's arms.

"Still . . ." she cut him off.

"James?"

"Yes?"

"Could you leave for a moment? I'll meet you outside."

"With him?"

"I'll be fine. Please . . . I need to say something to him." James looked flabbergasted at the very suggestion, but he nodded and left.

"Don't you see how much I love him, how much he loves me?" she said, turning to him.

"Not as much as I do." This time, he approached her gently, and slipped his arms around her as if she was the most precious thing on earth. She did not recoil, and met his lips in a sweet kiss. He wished the moment would never end, he had never felt so complete in his entire life.

A gruff man's voice broke his moment of bliss. She broke away, as he announced, "Severus Snape, the time has come for you to travel for your trial. If you would leave now, miss."

She walked towards the door, but when her hand touched the brass knob, she turned and whispered, "Quod feci, feci", before opening it and vanishing from sight.

"What I have done, I have done," he whispered in her wake.

I did it! I actually wrote an entire story without mentioning Hermione or Draco once! My friend bet me that I couldn't because those are my two favourite characters ever, and I've never written anything that did not contain one of them. Anyway, I'm pretty pleased with myself for actually finishing this thing, but I don't actually know whether it's good or not. So please, review . . . tell me what you liked, what you hated, what you didn't understand, what was rubbish, what didn't make sense, if it shouldn't be AT, whether you think the Latin is wrong (even though I know it isn't) really, I don't even mind if you flame me as long as its feedback! So go on, do the right thing . . . REVIEW! Thank you.

If you've never reviewed one of my fics before (whether it be "Fighter", "Don't Stay", or "Naked"), please just go ahead and review now because you don't really need to read this .I would just like to say thank you to ALL of the people who reviewed those fics. Your comments meant a lot to me (even the one's who said something like "you have no flow"), and I took them all on board. To those who asked for sequels of the fics, they were all one-shots, and I'm not really sure how to write a sequel that follows on but is original as well. Basically, I think I'll mess it up if I try! Anyway, I am actually writing another longer fic, which will star . . . Hermione and Draco, but everyone else as well . . . and will be one of my classic depressing dark angsty fics. So, if you're disappointed that this has been SS/LP . . . fear not, because now that I have proven my evil friend wrong I can go back to writing how I normally do. Right, well, I just wanted to say that, thank you for remaining awake! Please do review!

Thank you everyone, for taking the time of day to read this!

hogwarts hun xxx