Travels with Severus

Book One: After the Fall

Prologue

Voldimort was dead and gone.

Freshly dead, his time in the world was still too horrible to talk of, but he and the war he caused would, over time become the stuff of legend. The tragedies suffered at his hands would eventually become fairy tales, told to young witches and wizards to keep them from choosing darkness over light. The heros in his defeat would be glorified and fitted with god like qualities, their faces plastered on Chocolate Frog cards. 'Merlin help me.' The dark robed Potions master muttered at the thought of his face on a Wizard card. It was too late for that, however. His face, along with those principal players in The Dark Lord's downfall, was already memorialized on the blasted things.

He was, normally, quite comfortable in his own skin, and held no illusions about himself. He was a Death Eater, turned spy for Albus Dumbledore and The Order of The Phoenix. A double agent. He knew that he was not a 'classically' handsome man. He was too wiry, his skin too sallow from his time in the dungeons and the exposure to the many potions he had been exposed to through his teaching and his work as a Master. The darkness in him was genuine and from birth, as was the goodness he was capable of. His nose, once aquiline, was now slightly crooked from one too many breaks. His eyes were dark brown and were, usually unreadable. His lips were rather nice, however, the upper lip being just a bit too thin, whilst the lower being fuller. They were quite sensual, actually.

He also knew that he was no hero, in spite of what the wizarding community thought. Yet, he had been plied with all of the trappings and adjectives that went along with his 'hero' status.

And trappings there were. After more than a decade of unwilling females struggling against him, he was suddenly the object of attention from more women than any sane wizard could hope to deal with. Not that he minded, of course, but some of those witches! Not to mention the occasional offer from a wizard, best not to go there. Severus was uncomfortable. Uncomfortable with his status as hero, his face on the cards, his Order of Merlin, Second Class (his Death Eater days had to be taken into account after all, as well as Fudge's hatred of him), the witches throwing themselves at his feet, even Dobby's praises all made him want to run and hide away from it all. Potter and his friends might be thriving on all of the attention, but he had never sought it. He had merely done what he felt he had to do for the war effort for one reason: redemption.

He still hadn't found it. After twenty odd years, he realized that he probably never would find that elusive thing called redemption, in spite of what Albus Dumbledore said. In spite of what Minerva said, or what Rita Skeeter said in her articles about him and his days as a "Spy for the Light". Severus Snape did not feel redeemed.

For the first time since his taking his teaching position at Hogwarts it no longer felt like the sanctuary that it had once been for him. Even his Dungeons were no longer a place of refuge. He had to get away, far away. It was time to retire from teaching, time to travel the world. He would miss nothing about Hogwarts, except for Albus. Yet he knew that Albus would understand.