Darkly Bound

30.

Their voices were just audible as we approached the office door.

"Are you absolutely sure?"

"Yes. I had them go over it several times. For heavens sake Severus, look at the child!"

Olivia opened the door. "Marcus? Severus? What is going on?"

Silence dropped like a blanket. Cowley looked up at us, but Snape's back was turned. I saw him sweep something off the desk into a thick envelope. He wouldn't, or couldn't turn to face us.

My mouth had been dry before we'd even got to the office, now it felt full of sand. I tried to clear my throat but couldn't manage even that. Finally, Snape turned towards me. Just looking at him told me all I needed to know. His normally pale complexion had gone chalky, actually grey. His breathing was shallow, like he was afraid to draw a full breath. "I told you not to do this," I whispered. "I pleaded with you not to do this."

He stepped towards me. "You needed to know," he said quietly.

"Not like this."

"Would it have been any different any other way?"

The room swayed and the colors blurred together as if someone had thrown water across a window. I felt a hand on my arm and shrugged it away. I took a few steps forward, towards Cowley. It was like trying to walk through knee-deep water. "What happened? You dug this up! You tell me!"

Cowley looked taken aback briefly but recovered enough to answer haltingly. "There was a fire. The authorities blamed it on the Christmas tree, but that's not entirely clear."

He found her. It found her. There was a loud rushing sound in my head. I did that horrible thing and left her alone and he found her! I could barely hear Cowley as he continued to speak. "There were no survivors. They claim it was the smoke. The entire family perished.."

"Family!" I snapped to attention.

"She'd been adopted by a couple with two other children."

"They all died?" I killed all those people!

Snape was close behind me. He put his hands on my shoulders. You did not! It was an accident. This had nothing to do with deCorbeau.

I shrugged him off me again. "When did this happen? How long..?"

Snape answered this time. "She was eight."

I swung around to face him. "That was years ago! All the time I've been trying to break that bastard's spell she's been dead!" The room was spinning violently now. I turned back to Cowley and grabbed onto the desk. "How do you know this? How do you know it was her?"

The strain was wearing on him and I could sense Olivia crumbling somewhere behind me as well. "Once we found the adoption records--there is no mistake. We found her adoptive Grandparents. They were very helpful. They--well, if you'd like, they gave us--"

"What?"

"There are some photographs."

Snape handed me the envelope. His hand was shaking. Those rock-steady hands were shaking.

I took it and held it suspended between us, unable to move my arm to bring it toward me. I watched as another hand joined mine. It was Olivia's.

"Do you want me to open it?" Her face was streaked with tears. "Come over here. You should sit down." She led me over to a sofa. "One of you find something for her to drink. Tea, brandy, whiskey...just do something!"

I watched her from my dream state as she looked into the envelope. "Olivia?" I whispered, "What should I be doing right now?"

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. Shouldn't I be screaming, or fainting or something?"

She looked at me with a tender expression "Hush. You don't even have to do this now. We can seal this up if you don't want to look at it."

" I have to."

She pulled a small stack of photographs out of the envelope and laid them on the table. I nearly stopped breathing. The first one must have been the day she'd been adopted. It was everything I had hoped for when I had performed that horrible spell. A real family had found her--a normal one that would fight and make up and not kill each other and live normal lives. She looked exactly the way I remembered her. Everyone looked so happy. Others showed how she'd been growing with her little family--two brothers! Absolutely normal with no hint of magic or curses anywhere. The last one was what looked like a school portrait. She was smiling a gap toothed grin under a crooked blonde fringe of bangs with a splash of freckles across her nose. I picked that one up and studied it. I heard a name clearly. "Rebecca. They called her Rebecca," I whispered. Olivia leaned over and looked at the photograph.

"That's you!" she said. "Oh I'm sorry!"

She was right. There was no mistake. This was my daughter. If they'd known her father they'd have seen his eyes and maybe the chin, but other than that, this was certainly my Rennie. And it was certain that this child had died in a mysterious fire years earlier. I was so drawn into the photograph I hardly noticed when Snape sat down next to me and pressed a glass into my hand. I put it on the table.

He sighed and looked at the picture. "I am sorry. I really am very sorry."

You did it. You tracked her down. As if she'd been your own.

I have never, ever felt pain like this before. Is it yours? I can't tell anymore.

I tore my gaze from the picture and looked at him. He looked even worse now then he had when I'd come in. "I should never have left her."

"You did the best you could. You did what you thought would protect her. I would probably have done the same thing."

When I felt the tears run down my face I realized I hadn't cried at all up until then. Olivia had cried. Why hadn't I? "What kind of a mother am I? You were right. I didn't deserve her."

"What?"

"You asked me that, 'What kind of a mother are you?' Remember?"

"I didn't mean that! I didn't mean this!"

"You should have meant it. It was a good, honest question. What kind of mother abandons her child to an unknown evil then changes her name and disappears?"

He looked at me, astonished. "That is not what you did. You know those were not your intentions. Look at these photographs. Look at what you did for her."

"I should have kept her with me. It should have been me in that house, not those innocent people. What did they do to deserve being killed in their sleep?"

"You'd have died with her."

"Yes. Exactly."

He tipped my face up to his with his hand and held it, our eyes locked "No," he whispered.

My silent tears were becoming wracking sobs now. I'd fallen into Snape and let myself be wrapped in the desolate black of his robes. Olivia was sat at my other side. I could feel that she was uncomfortable as only a woman with five healthy youngsters could be in the presence of one who had just lost her only one, but her presence was comforting and I was grateful for it.

"What are you going to do, Severus?" she asked.

He was quiet for a long time. "Do? I don't know. What am I supposed to do? This really--"

"Oh yes it does!"

I wasn't sure if I was hearing a full conversation or not. I didn't care. It had become freezing cold in the room.

"She's like ice, Marcus, bring that cloak."

I felt something warm and heavy being draped over me.

"Well she can't go back to that school!"

"No, I suppose not."

"She was going to stay with us this weekend. But in a house full of children? Now?"

Now the tears had started it didn't seem likely they'd ever stop. I was vaguely aware of a discussion going on and decisions being made on my behalf but I was in a place where none of it mattered.

*

I knew someone was watching me. I was in a frilly bedroom in the Cowley house. Someone had decided that would be a good place to put me. I'd been left alone. I spread out the photographs from the envelope and found that it also contained some newspaper clippings detailing the 'mysterious Christmas tragedy'. I'd read each one a dozen times searching for any answer that might have been hidden in the old type.

"Claudia?"

I heard a little gasp.

"It is Claudia, isn't it? Come out where I can see you."

Olivia's eldest daughter crept around the doorframe, her eyes as big as saucers. "I'm sorry. Mum told us we weren't to disturb you. I didn't disturb you, did I?"

"No, you didn't. I was thinking I might like some company. This is your bedroom, isn't it?"

She smiled shyly and came into the room. "Yes, but you can stay as long as you like. I like keeping with Julia. And the lady in the library said you were very nice."

"The lady in the library? Who's that?" I was sure I knew.

"The lady in the library at the big house. The one in the picture. She told me she talks to you."

"She does. But she hasn't for a little while now."

"Yes, Miss."

"Do you know who she is? Do you know why there's a picture of her in the big house?"

"Not really, Miss. I suppose she must be a relation."

"You should tell your Mum about the lady. It's important."

"I will, Miss."

"Claudia, is your uncle still here?"

"Yes, he's downstairs. He's been writing letters."

"Would you go and tell him that I'd like to see him when he's finished with his letters?"

"Shall I go now, Miss?"

"Yes, if you don't mind."

I was going to have to catch him off guard or he'd never do it. Even then it would be a longshot but I had to try. I couldn't continue like this.

Claudia must have raced down with her message because it wasn't long at all before I heard a soft knock on the door. I took a deep breath and steeled myself.

"Severus," I reached out for him as he came in.

He crossed the room with an uncertain expression. "My neice said--"

"Yes, I sent her." I made up the distance between us, wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed him. He pulled away.

"Are you alright?" He barely touched me. It was as if he thought I was made of glass.

I sat down on the frilly bed and looked up at him. "Won't you just hold me?" He sank down next to me and gingerly gathered me up. I kissed him again, deeply this time.

"Mel...."

"Shhhh" Our embrace tightened, and when he broke away this time he looked into my eyes.

"You've just had a terrible shock."

"That's why I need you." He kissed me this time.

I felt my own resolve falter then, and for a moment, just a moment I thought how easy it would be to just let go, to let him take me to that place where there were no memories, to let me be empty for just a few blessed minutes of peace. But there would be the return, that hateful return and the game was already afoot.

I pulled back and caressed his cheek. "Severus, make me a promise."

He blinked, looked at me and leaned in to kiss me again, pressing me backwards down onto the bed.

I let him, teasing him with caresses, then pulled away. "Promise! Say it!"

"I promise."

I slid down, further under him and reached down, grabbing his hand as it made its way up my thigh. "Severus, look at me. Stop one minute and look at me." Our eyes locked.

"What is it? I want to help you."

"I want you to go back to Hogwarts. I want you to find the fastest and most deadly poison you have and bring it back here to me."

Until then, I had thought the worst moment of my life, the moment when I had felt the most profound sense of loss and hopelessness, had been that afternoon in Marcus Cowley's office.

I could not have been more wrong.

31

It must have been about midnight. Sleep was impossible. I had spent the rest of the day and evening in such a state of wretchedness I can't define exactly what my conscious state was by then, but I was jolted fully aware by a sudden change in what little light there was in the room. The air crackled with electricity; the whole room faintly shimmered with it. It was the same room I'd fallen asleep in, yet it wasn't. I was jolted again when the door flew open and Snape strode in, looking murderous. He held up one hand and pointed at me. "Not one word. You will have the courtesy to hear me out."

I nodded mutely. I slid off the bed and stood leaning against it. He'd managed to completely block his thoughts from me.

He reached into his robes and pulled out a small cut-glass bottle. "This is what you asked for. It's fast and by all reports, relatively painless." He held it out to me. I reached out and took it. "You needn't worry. It is what you wanted. I am, despite my reputation, a man of my word. No matter how that word is obtained."

I tried to form the words 'thank you' but he was speaking again.

"I brought you this as well. Do you recognize it? He held out his other hand. Something gleamed in his palm. I leaned forward to see what it was. When I recognized it I looked up at him in horror. It was my old wedding ring. "It is yours, isn't it? He did well for a student, there's even an inscription: 'Evermore' How appropriate." He took my left hand and slipped the gold band onto my finger. I was paralyzed with horror. "You'll want this when you get where you're going."

"Where did-- Why?" I managed to whisper.

He was more furious than I'd ever seen him but he kept his voice at a calm, but menacing tone. "Why? Because he's won, of course. He'll want to claim his prize. After all these years you have chosen to deliver yourself to him. The fire that took your daughter was an accident. A horrible, tragic accident. This is not. This is surrender. This is cowardice."

He stepped back, he seemed to be losing some momentum. "So, Madame deCorbeau, the hour is yours. I will stay and see you off if you wish. Adieu, Madame la docteur. Le corbeau est mort. Vivez le corbeau."

His black eyes drilled into me. He'd drawn a curtain of energy across the room between us. We were in the same room, a room removed from time, and yet stood in separate places. He seemed to be speaking, but I could make out no words. I gripped the bottle of poison tightly, but I couldn't keep my eyes open. I was being forced into a place of remembrance. My vision filled with scenes I hadn't allowed for years. I smelled the heavy, sweet and humid air of the rainforests. I heard crying and was filled with fear and dread. I felt the searing heat of flames much too close, and the sting as a blade bit into my flesh.

"No!" I heard myself scream. "No! I won't do this! I won't let you win. Never!"

I dropped the bottle. "You son of a bitch! I won't let you do this to me!" I yanked at the old wedding band. It snagged on the knuckle, taking some skin with it but I got it off and threw it. "You took everything I had once before! I won't let you do that again! You will not have my life!"

An icy blast of wind passed through me, taking my breath away, followed instantly by an angry blast of heat. I grabbed one of the tall posts of the bed and hung on, bracing for another blow. It never came. After a few minutes of silence, I forced my eyes open. The light in the room had changed again. A few candles burned normally. The remains of the fire glowed in the grate. The room had been returned to it's place in time. I swung around to where Snape had been standing.

He was holding the little bottle of poison. I stood nailed to the spot holding onto the bedpost.

"You won't be using this then?" He asked, expressionless. "I wouldn't want one of the children to find it."

I couldn't answer.

"Or this?" He held the ring between two fingers. I turned away from him and leaned my forehead against the cool wood of the bedpost. "No," he answered himself. Whatever he did to it when he got rid of it made a very satisfying 'snap!'

He moved to the bed and sat down, facing my post. "It's over. You know that. It's finished."

"What?" I felt as if I'd been kicked in the stomach. "What's finished? What are you saying?"

He held out one hand, clenched in a fist, and looked up at me.

I reached out and opened his fingers. In the palm of his hand he held a single, jet black, nearly blue, glistening feather. It had come from the wing of a raven. " Le corbeau est mort. The spell is broken." he said quietly.

"But Rennie is..."

"Yes. I'm sorry. But this was never about her."

"How did you know?"

"I didn't really. But you did. It was all in here." He reached out and placed his hand on my head, then let it slide down to my shoulder, and down my arm until he took my hand.

"You were using some sort of hex, I saw you. What was it? A Lethe curse?"

"Just the opposite. What did you see?"

"I saw what he'd done to me. I saw what he'd turned me into. His victim. I can't be that anymore."

"Take it. Finish the job." he held out the feather. I picked it up, gingerly. It glistened pure black in the firelight.

"Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken" I flicked my fingers at the feather and it ignited into a plume of flame, burning brightly for just a moment leaving me holding its charred shaft. I continued to the last line and he joined me.

Take thy beak from out my heart, and Take thy form from off my door!

Quoth the Raven 'Nevermore.'

End