Can't Run But (A Winding River remix)
At first Severus has no intention of attending Narcissa's wedding; he has no desire to stand by the wall in his cheap dress robes with the eyes of her pureblood family sliding over him like he is not worth a second look, no one of consequence. He runs into her in Knockturn Alley the week before the wedding, his arms full of potion supplies paid for with the Dark Lord's coin. Her basket is full of bone-white silk, with other odds and ends nestled in its depths.
"I haven't gotten your owl," she says.
"What owl?" He doesn't break his stride, but she follows him down the street, catching at his arm.
"Of course you're coming," she says, smiling up at him; he is reminded of a white kitten, or perhaps a white snake. "There have to be some people there on my side."
"Everyone is on your side," Severus says. "What other sides are there?"
She shrugs one lovely shoulder, the bones shifting under her skin. It's the bones that make her beautiful, Severus thinks, not the flesh that clothes them. "People who are jealous. People who wouldn't mind if there were a scene."
"There won't be a scene," Severus says. "It's not like you to do anything as banal as have cold feet."
"My dear cousin hasn't been sent an invitation, and the house-elves have orders to remove him if they see him," Narcissa says. Of course Severus knows which cousin she means. "But you know what his sense of humor is like."
Severus stops in the alley, looking down at her. "You're asking for my protection?" No one would be so foolish.
"Lucius is one of you," Narcissa says. "That should entitle me to some protection, shouldn't it? Something to go with the danger, and don't tell me there isn't any."
Her pale hair streams loose over her shoulders like a child's. He bows stiffly, feeling a bit ridiculous at the formal gesture. "I am at your service, then."
"Good," Narcissa says. She studies him critically. "You ought to wear green. You'd look very handsome in green, as well as showing the colors."
"I'm sure you're right," Severus says. His only set of dress robes is black.
Narcissa shakes her head. "You never listen to anyone, do you?"
"I always listen," he says. "I don't always obey."
"Neither does Lucius," Narcissa says. "And sometimes I'm not sure he even listens."
Severus has never been entirely sure whether he and Narcissa are friends. Possibly they are, at least in the temporary absence of anyone more worthy of her attention. He glances down at the trailing edge of silk spilling over the side of the basket.
"Surely it takes longer than this to make a wedding dress," he says.
"It does," she says. "This is for the wedding bed." And she smiles and walks away, fading into the crowd and leaving him flustered, his pulse pounding in his throat; long hours later, when he is recording in a careful hand the results of his latest experiments, all he can think of is a perfect drop of blood spreading like an ink stain, red on white.
The wedding is not quite as bad as he expects it to be. The younger Death Eaters huddle in tight knots at the reception, and he does not have to work very hard to stay on the fringes of one group or another. He is aware that he is only being included because this is war, but he is beginning to see why war is attractive. They all serve the Dark Lord, and that almost makes up for his unfashionable clothes and the way his hair falls haphazardly over his collar rather than falling in a shining mass like Lucius's.
His are not the only envious eyes on Lucius; Regulus Black is leaning against the wall and nursing a drink, and for all that he is a pureblood and wealthy he is watching with hungry eyes. Lucius is handsome and graceful and confident, guiding Narcissa through the room with one hand just touching her waist. Regulus looks like an unfinished version of his older brother, average and awkward where Sirius is predatory and wild. The other one, people always say. Regulus tosses his head restlessly and runs his fingers around the rim of his glass.
The next time he sees Regulus, they are in a stinking Muggle alley, and Regulus is standing over a man whose name Severus does not know. Lucius has bound the man, pushing straying hair out of his face with one gloved hand to look down at him and see that it's been properly done. It has, of course. The man won't scream.
Severus has to fight the temptation to look into the man's eyes; there is some part of him that wants to know his name, at least, and how he became marked for death. He knows it's safer not to know. He's not the one standing over the man (the body, he tells himself ), not the one who draws his wand and speaks the Unforgivable Curse crisply and correctly, as though they were still in school. Regulus's wand flashes green and the light goes out of the man's eyes. There's no harm in looking into them now. They're only mirrors.
At the next of the Dark Lord's gatherings Severus catches Regulus's eye as Lucius reports that they have dealt with the little problem he entrusted them with. Regulus is thinking of those blank dead eyes while he tugs restlessly at the sleeves of his heavy new robes, stiff with fine embroidery. He is thinking that his father would be proud, and that he's afraid he's going to be sick in front of the Dark Lord.
Severus knows that he will do better when it's his turn. He may not have pure blood, but at least he's not a coward. The first time he kills a Muggle it's easy; he speaks the words and there is a flash of green light and the man dies. He can't believe he has so much power. That night he dreams that he has broken something fragile, and as hard as he tries, he cannot put it back together. He will be punished for sure, he thinks in the dream; he can hear his father's footsteps now.
The last time he sees Regulus, they spend a wretched night caged in a room at the Leaky Cauldron waiting for a meeting that never takes place. Instead Regulus smokes one cigarette after another, filling the room with ash, the glowing tip of his cigarette tracing out nervous patterns in the darkness. The shadows make his face look sharper. He doesn't meet Severus's eyes.
"Do you think he's coming?" Regulus asks finally.
"Not likely," Severus says. Evan Rosier is their contact; Severus wonders if he is dead, or has simply abandoned the meeting after some distraction or delay.
"Maybe he's had enough," Regulus says. His hand holding the cigarette is starting to shake, the cigarette end guttering like a candle flame. "Maybe we've all had enough."
"Be quiet, Black, for the love of --"
Regulus laughs, so close to a familiar laugh that it sets Severus's teeth on edge. "God? Merlin? The Dark Lord? Who do we love?"
"No one," Severus says. He thinks of broken bodies and midnight duels with friends. He presses his hand down over his Mark until it hurts. There's no one that he loves.
"I'll bet you don't," Regulus says, turning back to the window. The smoke is staining the glass. Severus wants to push Regulus aside and wash it clean. It's hard to remember, later, that he had no idea Regulus would be dead in a few weeks. It's hard to remember that he never saw Regulus dead, that when he saw him that night he was alive.
At first Severus has no intention of attending Regulus's funeral, because he is getting tired of their constant perverse worship of death and is afraid someone will notice. Lucius finds him in Knockturn Alley; the merchants there are used to Severus by now, and they give credit because they're afraid not to. Lucius ducks under the hanging herbs in the doorway and stands very carefully, as if trying not to touch anything in the dingy shop.
"You'll be there tomorrow, I'm sure," he says abruptly.
"I wasn't aware that Divination was your forte," Severus says, shoving money at the shopkeeper and glaring at her as she fumbles with it awkwardly.
"How amusing," Lucius says. "Do you think this might not be the moment for jokes?" Severus glances back at him. He can't possibly be shaken, but there are lines of strain around his eyes, and his smile seems more forced than usual.
"How did he die?" Severus asks. It's safer to have this conversation in a public place than anywhere else. The Dark Lord spies on them all, but he can't have spies everywhere.
"I don't know," Lucius says. "I don't need to know." He brushes back his hair with one hand, the only nervous gesture Severus has ever seen him make. "He was a traitor," he says finally. "It's only to be expected."
"Who is it you want protection from, Lucius?"
Lucius glares at him, and then smiles like the sudden appearance of the winter sun. "I just think it's best for everyone on our side to stick together."
"Am I on your side?"
Lucius rests a hand on his shoulder, very warm through the thin fabric of his robe. "Of course you are," he says, and meets Severus's eyes. Severus tries to look at them and not into them; they are the blue of the winter sky as seen from a very high cliff. He looks away before Lucius does, turning out of his grasp.
"Fine," he says. "I'll come."
"Gracious as always."
"You can only expect so much."
"Apparently."
The house is dark and grim and horrible, which Severus finds a little satisfying; the Blacks may have money, but they don't seem to like to spend it. Mrs. Black is sharp-voiced and strange, and Severus is glad when she doesn't meet his eyes as he mutters something meaningless about her son.
Her other son is here too, his little gang gathered around him like bodyguards. Sirius looks pale and red-eyed and furious; he has clearly been crying, and Severus is glad. He hopes he's humiliated to have everyone see it.
It's not enough, though. The more he looks at Sirius, the more he wants to walk across the room and punch him in the face, or throw his glass at him and scream. He knows if he does, people will laugh. His hand tightens on his glass so hard that it hurts.
"Quite the little family reunion," Bellatrix says, coming up beside him. "Isn't it charming?" She has clearly been drinking, and as he looks at her he thinks that she has been crying too. That makes him angry, somehow. It shouldn't work like that.
"I can't see much resemblance," Severus says, although he can. Her face has the same sharp bones as Sirius's, and her fuller mouth curves into the same smile.
"We're all Blacks," Bellatrix says. "Blood will out." She leans up abruptly and kisses him, her mouth warm and wet against his for a few confusing seconds. She bites at his lip, sending a shudder through him, and then pulls away, smiling not at him but at Sirius. Sirius glares back at her, Potter's restraining hand keeping him from heading in their direction.
"Was that entertaining?" Severus asks, with all the scorn he can manage.
"It passes the time," Bellatrix says. Her face is pale under her makeup, and her eyes are rimmed with red. She laughs and draws her nails down the back of his hand.
"Bella, come and have another drink," Narcissa says, taking her by the arm and pulling her away. Narcissa meets Severus's eyes for just a moment, a mute apology, and then smiles at Bellatrix, her arm going firmly around her waist. "You can't expect to bear this without more to drink."
The night that everything begins to go wrong, Severus has only stopped into the Hog's Head to get warm; it is raining, an unseasonably cold rain. When he catches sight of Dumbledore, he edges up to the door and listens on the off chance that he might hear something valuable. He leaves in a frantic rush, clinging to the remembered words. This will make him worth something. It's something the Dark Lord can't forget.
After that things change; he is on the inside of doors that were once closed. Lucius claims to be his friend, and may actually be his ally. They sit up late talking over drinks, a chessboard between them with the wounded pieces lying in forgotten heaps on the board. He's doing so well, playing a game he once thought he could never win. He doesn't understand until Lily Potter dies what there is to lose.
The first time that he sees the inside of Dumbledore's private rooms, he ends up kneeling on the floor, his wand in Dumbledore's hand, stammering out his story -- what he heard, who he told --
His knees ache, and his skin feels stretched too tight over his bones. "I didn't know," he says finally. "I swear I didn't know it was her." He remembers her laughing with him in Potions class, the curve of her smile that was different from anyone else's, special, irreplaceable --
"But you knew it was someone," Dumbledore says, his voice gentle and implacable.
Severus wants to escape the truth of that, his hands twisting in the air, but there is no way for him to get out of his own skin, ugly and worthless and stained. He has killed a friend. He has killed so many people and he cannot bring them back, cannot fix it --
"Will you kill me now?" he asks. It seems an absurd question to ask of the man he used to be afraid would give him detention or take house points from Slytherin. But the master of the Order of the Phoenix has him on his knees, and Severus is aware that house points are not what are at stake.
Dumbledore's hand lifts his chin, gently but firmly. He looks into Severus's eyes. His own eyes are bright and impossible to penetrate. "Why should I kill you?" he says, finally. "After all, you are my agent, and if you have taken ... extraordinary measures to maintain your cover, these things happen in wars."
"But that's not true," Severus says. It's one of the few certainties he can cling to.
Dumbledore looks at him steadily, and Severus begins to understand that this may not be mercy. "It will be."
The first night after Dumbledore's death, Severus does not sleep. He knows they are being tracked, and he pushes Draco furiously through a series of Apparating jumps that he knows are dangerous to an unpracticed child. Near midnight Draco fails to appear at his side after they Apparate, and Severus spends a frantic three hours hunting him through a filthy Muggle town, his whole body braced against what he expects to find. When he does find him, whole if bedraggled-looking, Severus lets out a shuddering breath before dragging Draco out of the bush where he is cowering.
"Keep up," he snaps.
There is a cottage on the moors where they can go to ground. It is small and old and smells of musty sheets that have probably been on the beds for years. "You've got to be joking," Draco says, staring at one of the beds.
"Do you really think this is the moment for jokes?" Severus says. Draco stumbles a little; perhaps he hears the echo of Lucius, too, and thinks for a moment of his father in prison. Or perhaps he's just tired. He deigns to lie down on the bed then, in any event, shoving away the dusty pillow and resting his head on his elbow. Severus turns away to see to the spells that will keep them safe here, ignoring the boy.
By the time he is done, Draco is asleep. He looks bruised and tired, but the strain on his face is mingled with a kind of relief. The thing that he has been dreading is past, Severus can see. He is seventeen, and he does not have to kill anyone, and now he can sleep.
Severus knows he will have to sleep, too. He can feel himself starting to shake with weariness, the last of his desperation-fueled energy fading -- but he knows there will be no real rest now. He knows what he is looking for, its image cast up from the depths of Albus's eyes. A gold locket in the shape of a heart. Who do we love?
"No one, you stupid boy," he mutters, but he goes and lies down on the floor in Draco's room instead of in a bed, putting himself between the sleeping child and the door. He knows that if the Death Eaters find them it hardly matters where he is, but it's still something he can do.
In the morning he wakes up to find Draco sitting on the bed watching him with a strange new revulsion in his eyes. It's apparently just occurred to him that Severus is a murderer. He wants to shake him by the shoulders and say you knew. Surely with Lucius for a father he must have known.
"How did you do it?" Draco asks, weeks later, on a day when the bright July sunlight is pouring in over the cracked kitchen table. "How did you kill him?"
It is a remarkably stupid question. "An Unforgivable Curse."
"Well, obviously," Draco says, but his usual arrogant smirk falters. "I mean ... it was Dumbledore."
Severus turns away from Draco. The faltering words are bad enough; he doesn't want to see the real question in his eyes. "I had to."
"I was going to do it," Draco mutters.
"You were not." He looks down at the boy who is burning with shame for having failed to kill his teacher and wonders if he would have killed a stranger without a second thought. He wonders if it would have sickened him, afterwards, or if he would have enjoyed the power it gave him. He's glad neither of them will find out.
"I suppose you think I'm a coward," Draco says, in a tone of voice that makes it clear that he thinks he is one. Severus thinks he probably is, but he knows perfectly well that there are worse things to be.
"I think you're human," he says. Draco is clearly not satisfied with that answer. He pushes his chair back from the table and paces restlessly to the window, staring out blindly into the sunshine. The light throws sharp shadows under his cheekbones, and for a moment Severus expects him to light a cigarette and turn toward him with a dead man's smile.
"You look very like your father," Severus says, because that's also true.
"I know," Draco says. He doesn't turn away from the window, and Severus wonders what he sees.