The voice under all silences. Chapter 9

[pekeleke]

The voice under all silences. Chapter 9

 

He startled awake with the unshakable certainty that he was in danger.

His muscles froze with the knowledge that some unnamed person was very close by, sitting quietly in the chair beside his bed. Their hand had just lifted and was attempting to breach the barely there distance between them in order to... touch him.

He detested foreign touch with the kind of passion others usually reserve for abominable reptiles.

His first thought was for his posture: he was lying on his side, curled protectively over the left half of his body in a move he only ever made when truly injured. He remembered then that his left side was out of commission, the bones shattered and rejecting healing magic.

He was in St Mungo's. Recovering from the damage caused by the botched vow that he'd been tricked into making. Tricked by Potter, of all people...

Sleep-fogged recollection brought the awareness that his wand... his wand was missing. His magic unreachable. The room opened to anyone who'd cared to enter... anyone!.

In the very next second the cold air around his face warmed slightly. The prickly awareness of someone else's magic, much too close to him, plunged his clammy skin into a fire of wild energy...

His right hand shot out to curl with all his might around a masculine wrist, thwarting whomever was trying to harm him mid-action. A startled gasp broke the heavy silence of the room, granting him the advantage of those precious seconds needed to turn his thumb around in preparation for breaking the bones that he now held, as tightly as he possibly could, underneath his finger-pads.

"By Merlin, Severus!. I have spent so long sitting beside your unresponsive body all these years that I'd forgotten how... deadly... your reactions tend to be!. Calm down, will you?. I mean you absolutely no harm...”

Ebony eyes shot open without warning and his fierce glare settled over the very amused face of the auror from Hell. His fingers flinched away from all contact with that wide hand and he waited, breath held tight, for the other man to punch him into a pulp. Puzzlingly wary features studied his own for a very long time. The disconcertingly unfamiliar silver frames of Potter's spectacles caught the faint light when his head finally cocked to the side:

"You broke my nose. Ron has been laughing at me non-stop since he found out"

If the little toe-rag was expecting an apology from him, then he'll still be waiting when Hell froze. He was going to stick by his own rules, even if the bastard decided to crush his every bone in vengeful retaliation:

"You deserved it, Potter!"

A sigh that was deep, frayed and far more weary than Severus had expected it to be broke the impasse:

"Yes. I did definitely deserve it"

Silence...

Painful. Deadly. Sickeningly uncomfortable silence.

He had not been expecting that admission. Had assumed the very worst and now he floundered in a sea of deep bewilderment. There was astonished disbelief fleeting through his mind. There was a kind of suspicious wariness that was whispering all kinds of warnings in the back of his head as he simply laid there: utterly stunned by the auror's easy acceptance of wrongdoing.

There are people in the world who'd only pounce on you when your back is turned. Not that he'd ever pegged Potter to be that kind of coward, but then...

He'd never pegged him for a deceitful, vengeful, son of a... and the jerk had just proven him wrong in the most humiliating way possible. Showing finally, and beyond a shadow of doubt, just how much like his happily defunct dogfather he could be...

"Weren't you stuck downstairs?" He growled irritably when he couldn't abide the increasingly tense atmosphere for a single second longer. His words seemed to vanish both, the very heaviness in the air that surrounded them and the rigidity that held his companion's shoulders into a fairly good imitation of a roughly-hewn monolith. They just... dissolved when the boy started chuckling, a touch of hysteria tainting the disquieting sound.

Potter's eyes danced merrily. A small smile that was slightly rueful around the edges flashed in the faint gloom of dusk towards him.

"I escaped. They were driving me crazy with their ridiculous fussing and Malfoy refused to tell me how you were..."

His brain froze, pale visage losing all color as he almost barked:

"You've seen Draco?"

The boy's features turned stony. Emerald-flashed emotions painted dark shadows in the beauty of Lily's eyes as a pair of rose-tinged lips compressed with absolutely livid disgust

"Do not start with that again, Severus!" The tone was frosty. A strange mixture of exhausted exasperation and sheer poison that rose his hackles almost as badly as it worried him. Potter straightened in annoyance and he used the new and welcome distance to breathe with relief. He did not want to lay down on his bed while the other man loomed over him like a menacing shadow...

He rolled over. Injured arm protesting dully when the ward flashed it's shimmering blue warnings upon collision of his bony shoulder with the soft surface of the mattress.

The auror's eyes looked fierce. His lips were pressed too tightly and the faint shadow of the stubble that grew so darkly against his angular jawbone did nothing to soften the impression of a man about as wild as a black panther.

"Do you need a hand, Severus?"

The question broke the stillness like a shot fired from close range. The growled quality of it's tone revealed those six words to be nothing short of a challenge. He resented them so totally that his teeth gritted with force enough to chip them. He'd look spineless if he said no. He'd feel pathetic if he complied...

Mutinous defiance fleeted through his eyes as he shot daggers into the twat's hard face.

"I don't want anything from you!" He whispered fiercely. Ashen face twisting with rancorous dislike when the creature simply shrugged it's wide shoulders.

"What you want, Severus, and what you need are two things about as far from each other as Heaven is from Hell. I'm afraid that I care not about the former, at least for the moment. Merlin knows that, if allowed, you'd vanish yourself from here without giving anyone the chance to find out exactly what could happen if you'd only opened up to life for one bloody second!"

The boy lurched then towards him, grabbing him most rudely. He'd been stunned into speechless, traumatized compliance by that berating diatribe and the unwelcome arms of his new nemesis curled so gently around him that the shield which protected his left limb wasn't given the smallest chance to flash. Not even once!.

The... the... presumption of the brat took his breath away. He could not believe his senses. He'd gladly pay any amount of gold that was demanded of him for having the pleasure of allowing himself to be convinced that he was dreaming this whole ghastly scenario.

But when one slow second irreversibly turned into another without the whole Potter-holding-him-thing having dissolved into a relieving puff of feverish imagination... he became indignant enough to chew a Hungarian Horntail's bone right off the flank of its fire-breathing owner.

Potter pulled him up so very slowly... Seemingly lost in the task of fluffing up the mess of pillows behind his back, like some kind of fussy mother-hen.

He was dragged upwards firmly. Painfully emaciated upper body pulled, blankets and all, towards the overwhelming warmth that was so casually emanating from the wide expanse of a scathingly covered chest. His forehead was directed towards the masculine-scented hollow to be found between Potter's collarbone and neck with merciless gentleness and he stiffened with paralyzed shock. He rejected the boy's very nearness with every fiber of his rigid body and tried to yank his head away, as if burned, only to be held fast by the warm and callused palm that settled against the back of his head in a careful, but firm, staying motion:

"Ssshh!... Severus, ssshh!. There is no need for you to panic. If you'd just... wait one second... I'll be done with these pillows and set you back on the bed, OK?"

Senses reeling with the shaming indignity of finding himself gentled like a two-year old toddler he pushed against that restraining hand with the kind of ever-weakening strength that only increased his resentment.

"Release me, Potter. At once!"

A gentle chuckle reverberated across that wide chest. Rolling, like thunder, beneath the length of his cheek, which was quite uncomfortably plastered against the soft cloth of Potter's too-thin top.

It was then that the disconcertingly grave voice of the little menace broke, like jagged shards of shattered glass, across his fuming senses:

"Gosh... You are so prickly!... It's like trying to help a wounded beast from the forest. You drive me mad with that stubborn independence of yours, with all that crazy hatred... You make me forget, more often than I should, that you... you are only trying to defend yourself from me... Aren't you, Severus?"

Fingers dug into his scalp, dared to toy with his long hair before his skull was suddenly seized, cradled gently against a callused wide palm that proceeded to ease him slowly backwards. His face was forced to abandon the relative refuge of Potter's shoulder. Exposed, in all it's ugly and frayed glory, to those eyes that shone like leaves...

He swallowed thickly. Trapped, once again, inside another one of those strange and uncomfortable moments that this man seemed able to create between them with such ease. He was lost, floundering within the disturbing miasma of Potter's bewildering emotions. Disconcertingly aware of the aching, desperate sadness that was so clearly visible in the depths of those beautiful eyes... and he wanted not a second more of it. He could not, would not, deal with the boy's fragility. He did not want to deal with it. There was no reason at all for him to do so and he resented the odd intimacy of the whole puzzling situation.

"Let go of me!" He demanded in the kind of frosty tone that used to make Hufflepuffs cry and the hand that was cradling his head twitched slightly.

Emerald eyes clashed with his own and James Potter's spawn had the gall to growl at him with obvious annoyance:

"I'm not doing anything awful to you. There's no reason to get huffy, Professor!"

Severus gritted his teeth. Black eyes narrowed with displeasure when he growled right back, feeling utterly peeved:

"I dislike being manhandled by anyone, Potter. I want you to remove your hands from my person, right this second!"

That brilliant gaze became visibly colder. A veritable world of awfully dark shadows filled those verdant depths with sombre, distressed gloom.

"Malfoy touched you every bloody second that he was here!. I didn't hear you complain a single time then... Nope!. I remember it quite clearly, Sir, not even a twitch of annoyance left those prissy lips of yours, Professor."

-What the Hell...?-

That bewildering tirade was turning more agitated by the syllable and he blinked in disconcerted anxiety. He didn't know how to react to the strange situation. Was absolutely mystified by the inappropriate tinge of... Possessiveness?... that he'd sensed somewhere among all that disturbing pile of nonsense. He had never before been on the receiving end of a... Potterish... break-down, at least not one that he had to endure right down to it's dearly-wished-for conclusion...

Lily's child seemed to have no need for his input at all, though, and proceeded to... rant... even further without granting him the chance to cut him off.

"You were more than happy with the blasted Ferret's smarmy smiles and his touchy-feely approach to godchild-like concern. He plants those paws of his All. Over. You, and you don't even bat and eyelash!. But when I so much as help you sit up... then the whole bloody world must come to a stop!. Gosh... It must be the apocalypse!... How could you possibly be expected to endure such awful ordeal? Well, tough luck, Snape!. You'll have to take it like a man and stop whining, for Godric's sake!. It's not as if my touch alone is going to kill you, you know?"

He was stunned into speechlessness. Bewildered beyond all reason and all response. He had not a single clue about what in the bloody Hell was wrong with the utter menace. He blinked once. Twice.

Then he swallowed uneasily before trying to free himself again...

Potter flushed as he squirmed, but held on, clearly attempting to keep contact. Then the boy allowed that overly familiar hand of his to fall away with a sigh of desperate frustration. His back was left bereft of the auror's support so suddenly that it plopped against the pillows like an emptying balloon, and a fierce flash of blue rose from the ward on his arm.

Green eyes settled over the limb with a distressed kind of agony:

"Did I hurt your arm?. Gosh... I'm so sorry!"

The words rang in the growing silence when Severus didn't bother to respond. He was too busy frowning at the steadily paling face of his companion. Dark brows furrowed together into elegant lines of thoughtful reflection as he pondered the headache-inducing conundrum of the auror's inexplicable behavior:

"What game are we playing at here, exactly, Potter?" He demanded at last, pronouncing every single word carefully. Concisely. With a frosty tone that clearly implied that he'd take no more nonsense from the child. Potter sat upon the mattress like a statue. A distressed kind of moan broke away from slightly trembling lips as the auror's wide and tanned hand raked strangely twitchy fingers all over that wild mop of black hair.

"We are not playing any games, Severus"

The answer was quietly voiced and the green eyes that settled over his own, offered him nothing but sincerity. No... No. Apparent sincerity.

"You used Felix Felicis against me. That doesn't sound like a game that we are not playing, Potter. There are all kinds of ethical reasons why that potion should be banned. It should have been condemned into obscurity years ago, carefully locked inside the same cabinet as the Amortencia and all the others just like it"

Bright green eyes widened in sickened dismay.

"You are taking all of this out of proportion, Professor. Felix Felicis doesn't force you to do anything against your will"

Severus' own bark of laughter was a croak of bitter derision:

"Doesn't it?. It allows whoever drinks it to get away with whatever it is that takes their fancy. They all get the instinct they need in order to manipulate everyone around them into giving them exactly what they want. Do you really think there's any power on this Earth that would have convinced me, ME, Potter!, of agreeing to swear any kind of Wizard's Oath with you, let alone one that requires my own continuing lack of free will, to top it all off?"

Ashen features seemed to crumple before him, green eyes becoming awash with a sorrow that seemed to be heavy enough to break their owner:

“Yes. I know. I know that I was a bastard, but I honestly never imagined that the potion would take that God-awful path!. I wish it hadn't done that, but it did and I... I am not sorry!... Do you hear me, Snape?: I. Am. Not. Sorry!. I tried so hard to get you to listen to me... But no. Oh, no!, listening to Harry-Bloddy-Potter must be the ultimate sin to the Greatest-Prat-Who-Ever-Held-A-Grudge in this wide Earth. It was just... IMPOSSIBLE! to even say a word to you without hearing you spout those ridiculous accusations all over the place!...”

Temper flared in his chest with the empty excuses. He disliked the implications that he could hear and his tone became just... Arctic... when he growled:

"Ridiculous?. Really?. Was I being ridiculous when I doubted the intentions of the man who so very callously told me he'll rob Draco of his whole soul?. Was I being absurd in becoming suspicious of the monster who was, as a matter of fact, actively TRICKING me into SLAVERY?. Do you really have the gall to call me names after your repellently deceptive behavior, Harry Potter?"

There was a gasp of shattered remorse. Green eyes filled with bright tears that refused to drip down. The auror's face turned chalky pale and the hand that had dared to restrain him fluttered, quite aimlessly, in the space that separated them.

"I only wanted you to listen to me!. Just... just listen!. It was not so awful a thing to wish for. I've waited for you to wake with so much hope... but you... you wanted nothing, NOTHING WHATSOEVER, to do with me and I... I didn't know what else to do!"

His eyes zeroed in on that flushed face. Attempted to discern just... what the meaning of that senseless diatribe could possibly be, but he failed the task miserably. Gryffindors were, by their very thoughtless nature, quite impossible to analyze. Understanding them or, even more accurately: trying to understand them, was as futile an endeavor as attempting to grab moon-rays with one's bare hands...

"I had nothing left to say to you, Potter. I took care of all of that when I thought that I was dying. I'd passed on Albus' final instructions to the best of my ability and the rest, as they say, was plainly irrelevant!. There was nothing I'd have cared to hear that could have possibly fallen from your lips. I was finished with you. Completely and totally finished!. The Lord was dead. The war was over. You were finally safe and sound, despite my own expectations, and that set me totally free from the self-imposed task of looking after you. What on Earth led you to believe that there was even the need for us to meet, Potter?"

Silence rang and rang and rang in the awful quiet that ensued.

Potter seemed to have been paralyzed by his response and he, in all honesty, did not care to continue with such difficult and truly discomfiting conversation. He expected the hard moment to stretch on, endlessly. The very air to turn bitter with resentment and unvoiced, virulent accusations. He expected Potter to remove himself from the edge of the mattress and abandon the room in a storm of fierce silence, but the boy just... sat there. Mournful eyes blinking painfully through a virtual sea of trembling, crystalline tears...

"What about what I wanted, professor?" He finally whispered in a low and ferocious whisper. "What about the fact that I have things to say to you?. What about the idea that I deserved at least a second of your precious time to tell you that I... I was wrong about you all along, and you were gone before I even knew it!...

What about allowing ME to tell YOU that there was a time, probably among the worst weeks of my life, when I thought that you had died for real in that blasted shack. Died because I hated you, during those last moments of your life, enough to Not. Even. Bother. Trying. To. Save. You!"

Severus' heart had come to an abrupt halt.

The unexpected apology scrapped against his senses like a million poisoned daggers...

"You were never meant to feel guilty, Potter. Albus and I... we had an agreement. You'd be kept as far away as possible from me and I'd... I'd protect you from the beast who murdered your mother.

I had no expectations of loyalty from you and, as I didn't really die anyway, there is now no reason at all to tie you to those feelings any longer..."

Potter's chuckle was exhausted, a fragile little sound that faltered too easily:

"You are so blind..."

Trembling fingers breached the space that separated them to card through his hair carefully, a single lock of midnight-colored hair was looped with utter gentleness behind the curve of his left ear and he frowned. Paralyzed and all but floored by the strange, intimate touch.

"I want to be tied to you, Severus Snape... I am, thank Godric!, actually tied to you quite tightly through the wording of our vow, a vow that would have never happened without the potion. So... don't even try to make me regret having the good sense of grabbing onto that one chance with both hands.

Felix Felicis might be more of a weapon for scoundrels, thieves and manipulators than I'd ever given it credit for before, but it did give me exactly what I wanted. It brought US here, to this point where your future is virtually entwined with mine. Things might not be exactly how I wanted them to be... but, on the bright side, I have now far more time than I ever thought you'd grant me.

You can't leave me now, Severus. Will you try to understand that part, at least?. You'll have to listen, not only to what you want to hear, but also to the things that I am actually saying... and I'm praying, Professor, for the day when you'll do more than that. I am hoping for the moment when you will also see..."

 

TBC...

 

Ch8

Ch10