The voice under all silences. Chapter 11

[pekeleke]

THE VOICE UNDER ALL SILENCES. Chapter 11

 

He floundered as the lift lurched to a stop. Right hand curled, almost ferociously, against the wide metal bar that ran along the back of the claustrophobic muggle contraption.

His vague suspicion that he must look like a scarecrow was confirmed when he caught a fleeting look at his own reflection, flashing across the polished metal surface of the austere box.

He had turned into a terrible entity born from dark nightmares. A ghostly being, owner of a pale face that was tight with distress and sheer exhaustion. With anxious, utter terror. With absolute misery...

On his right Harry Potter stood solicitously, waiting patiently for him to regain his balance as he attempted to convince himself to uncurl his clenched fingers from the relative safety of that flat bar.

There was a soft, melodic “ping” when the contraption complained that the doors had remained opened for too long, but his rigidly-faced companion didn't even turn a hair as he stood there: ominously silent. Wide, tanned hand determinedly splayed across the doorway in order to lock the mechanism in it's current position.

With a deep, shuddering breath Severus forced his reluctant legs to take the single step forward that would, hopefully, kick-start all the rest. The strange shoes that he was wearing, so soft and light that they might as well had been mere socks, unbalanced him once more. He was used to his own boots, heavy things with wide soles and thickly warded leather. He was used to the feeling of his own footwear hugging the bony protrusions of his ankles as he walked and to the comforting weight of his tightly knitted socks shifting, with his every step, under the sturdy cloth of his serviceable woolen trousers. He was used to the balancing effect of his voluminous outer robes swishing gently around his limbs as he walked about, marking the subtle rhythm of his steps.

Now the lack of that familiar support felt simply... alien. Alien enough for him to stumble anew just as he'd finally managed to let go of the cold, wide metal bar.

Potter's arm shot towards him and he flinched, unconsciously scuttling backwards and earning a ferocious glare from the Head Auror:

"Relax, for goodness sake, Severus!. I'm only trying to steady you, all right?"

He gritted his teeth in absolute frustration, reminding himself harshly of the vow he'd given to the man: Public respect. Servile obedience. Submissive humiliation and isolating secrecy...

He had sworn on Draco's life, no less. It didn't actually matter that he'd been tricked into doing so by this... scoundrel. The fact still remained that the oath had been both offered and accepted. It was now utterly binding, a perfect trap in which he'd been caught. One from which he could see no clear way out, at least not for now...

The reminder served to silence the cutting response that he'd been on the verge of delivering. He swallowed the poisonous words that he'd been about to utter and felt the bile of their demise rise in the back of his throat. His black eyes burned with the indignity of conceding, but he was a man of his word even if he wasn't much else...

A curt nod of his head was all that he could manage as a way of apology, but it seemed to be enough. The green eyes softened so slightly that it could have very well been a trick of the awful light.

The pinging of the lift became more urgent, an irritatingly rhythmic reminder of their need to move away from their current position, but they both ignored it.

The silence that grew between them was so strange... It had some sort of expectant, breathless quality to it. It seemed to become... almost suspended in eternity as they looked into each other's eyes without ever moving a muscle. Severus was thoroughly uncomfortable with it. Unsure of what it was, exactly, that Potter waited for and utterly reluctant to step forwards himself. To move past the auror: out, into the shadowed hallway beyond...

Swallowing the thick knot of sheer unease that was threatening to choke him he shifted his head minutely to the left, their gazes lost their hold on one another and whatever link had held the child so still broke with a blink.

Potter's free arm rose towards him again and a hand that was blessed with callused fingers settled firmly around his good elbow. There was a compressed, almost challenging cast to the thin, pink slash that the man's mouth had become and a glint that was cold and hard and emerald in color shone from eyes that looked so startlingly unlike Lily's that, for the first time in his memory, he was unable to link mother and son inside his mind.

"I don't know why you are so unbalanced this morning. You are struggling to remain upright and you can't see that you don't have to do any of it alone, not while I am here!. I'll support you until we reach the apartment. You'll be able to rest then, Severus. There's no reason for you to fear my touch, I promise!"

The implication that he feared the brat, in any shape or form, rose his hackles and he struggled with his temper. He had to swallow a retort, so cutting, that it slashed his own throat to ribbons when it remained unvoiced.

The unwelcome digits curled around him tightly once again, pulling his body forwards into a small and wobbly step. His own hand was forced to abandon the cold safety of the lift's metal bar and his whole frame lurched inelegantly behind Potter's.

He was embarrassed at the indignity of the situation. At the utter humiliation of finding himself thus: tethered to the man who'd so cruelly slaved him, like a dog on a leash...

The moment they stepped out of the lift it's metal doors closed and a long corridor, bathed in the soft, amber-colored light that was coming from those odd little bulbs that the muggles had developed, extended before them in both directions. There were doors here and there, breaking the bland monotony of the horribly beige walls. The carpet under his feet was thick enough to bury half the sole of his odd shoes, but it was as horribly soulless as the rest of the strange hall. It was a soft cream-like color that allowed the eye to drift, offering no focus and no challenge to it.

There was nothing on the walls either, be it painting or hanging of any kind, and the curtains that so elegantly covered the distant windows at the end of the passage were a plain, uninspiring white.

Potter moved to the right and he just... followed, elbow burning under the touch of foreign fingers. They shuffled slowly forwards until his companion halted before a door that in no way looked different from any other: -68B- it read in curling, metallic numbers and he assumed that these golden plates were the only identifying detail that separated one ghastly, insipid doorway from the next.

Potter's hand slid away from him as the creature searched, in one of the multiple pockets of his odd attire, for a short and flat looking key. A moment later the door swung open to reveal the utter emptiness of a foyer that held... not a thing. Not even a coat peg...

The auror entered the house, motioning him forward, and he swallowed his dismay as he followed that directive. The plain colored wood swung closed behind him with the soft swish of devotedly oiled hinges and they crossed the small hallway towards what might had been, in any other place, the main living area...

He came to an abrupt halt and stood there as if rooted to the spot. Anxious tension rose steadily within him when his widened gaze settled on the sparsely decorated space. He was dismayed beyond words by the sudden and shocked flash of total comprehension that fleeted through his mind.

He'd once seen a place just like this one. The moment, buried under the weight of a million and one more important memories, had remained mainly forgotten all these years, but it re-surfaced now to offer him unnerving comprehension of what he saw:

Under the bright morning light coming in from the wide windows he could see that the whole room was mostly empty with the exception of a wide couch. The supple leather upholstery was dark in color. It looked soft and yielding. Obviously selected for the clear air of indulgent comfort that it projected...

A fireplace that was unlit, but already prepared to hold a warm blaze, occupied a good portion of the wall opposite the sofa. The thick rug that covered the expanse of gleaming floor, between the hearth and the couch, looked deep enough to bury a body in it... A square table, small and carefully set by the right arm of the seat, held every kind of alcoholic bottle he'd ever seen and, disturbingly, about a dozen more that he hadn't...

It was no effort whatsoever for him to imagine the scene as it unfolded just, like the one he'd been so naively trusted into on that distant June evening, almost a lifetime ago... Back when Regulus Black had managed to get a mixed bunch of his sixth and fifth year slytherin class-mates, past the formidable wards of Hogwarts and into his elder brother's little place near Hogsmeade. They had all laughed so hard at Sirius Black's one-track mind, which had been so very clearly revealed by the obvious nature of the furniture that he'd chosen to decorate his bird's nest... For a fleeting moment Severus had allowed himself to relax. To enjoy the novelty of ridiculing his enemy among friends and smile widely. But the moment had been fleeting, bitter-sweet...

It'd been Aloysius Knot the one to start it, suggesting that they besmirch the Gryffindor's whore love-nest with some loving of their own... He'd been shocked when his classmates fell one upon another like beasts more fit for the forests than the civility of walls and ceiling. Clothes had already begun to be discarded by the time he'd shot to his feet, as if poked with a rod, and stepped backwards. Barely avoiding becoming embroiled in the disgusting embrace of a three-men lust-knot... He'd stood there: widened black eyes aghast, uncertain, as the bodies of his classmates were revealed to his utterly revolted gaze. Naked limbs slowly entwining with one another, in frenzied sharing of what should never be given to another without love...

He remembered to this day the nausea that had risen in his throat. Recalled the sickening hammering of his own pulse beating wildly inside his chest as his eyes lifted. It had been then that he'd crossed the last genuine look he'd ever share with Regulus Black. His host had been staring straight at him from the other side of the sofa. A desperate, strangely feverish look darkened those enormous blue eyes and, although he'd never managed to understand the significance of that look, the truth was that he'd never managed to forget it, either. There had been something akin to sorrow in Black's eyes, something that had looked so much like desperate despair that he'd been haunted by that look for a long time...

"Severus, are you all right?. You look a bit... pale"

The sound, hesitant as it was, pulled his mind away from those... best forgotten... memories and he returned to the present room that was so similar, in many ways, to the one of the past... His whole body stiffened as that comparison finally took root in his mind and he understood that Potter's much-talked-about muggle apartment was, in fact, the man's little den of... sexual indulgence... and, just like so long ago, he shuddered with distaste.

"I can't possibly stay here!" His voice exploded with the force of a thunderclap in the echoing emptiness of the place and his companion, who'd seemed so far content enough with staring at him gormlessly, while following his every move with his hands buried in the pockets of those awful muggle jeans that he was wearing, shot him a clearly affronted look before demanding:

"Why not?"

Horrified black eyes surveyed the room once more, hopelessly attempting to convince their owner that he could be quite wrong about the place. But he saw nothing to dissuade him from the idea that he was, in fact, probably standing on the very same spot where all the tarts his companion had cared to bed over the years had once stood. The notion sickened him to his very depths and his brow furrowed in thunderous displeasure.

"This is your...." His voice halted as his throat closed on the words. His thin face flushed in embarrassment as he warred with the awful feeling of being... totally filthy, that was turning his skin clammy with sweat. He could not say the words aloud... He. Would. Not. Say. Them!.

If that was Potter's intention then he feared that he'd failed the bloody man miserably at the very first hurdle. He could take many forms of humiliation, but to be forced to acknowledge any kind of... depravity of the flesh... was simply too much to bear. He could not cope with such a thing. Not from Lily's son, at least!. Not from anyone, really, for that matter.

Potter's eyes turned almost feral as the silence stretched and the jerk didn't even bother to control the obvious rage that tainted his voice when he demanded brutally:

"You are to answer my every question, Severus Snape!. Wizard's Vow and all that... Don't you remember?. And you better do so as truthfully as you can!"

He felt like dying with abject humiliation at the barked reminder. Awful weakness slowly spread through his shivering, cold limbs as his tongue froze.

"Well? "

The furious Head Auror confronted him harshly. His very posture a mirror of seething fury about to be unleashed over Severus' own head with the little bastard's very next breath.

Midnight-black eyes fixed on the dark couch as he forced his rigid throat to gasp out his response haltingly:

"This seems to be a very... private... dwelling. It has... indulgence... written all over it. This is not the kind of place a man should share with his worst enemy"

A startled bark of bitter laughter followed his embarrassed explanation. He refused to look up when he felt the abrasive look from those emerald eyes burn the side of his face.

"You are offended because I shag here?" The brutality of that question sent him reeling and his eyes widened impossibly, rising to stare with appalled horror at the man across from him. That Potter lacked the kind of decorum that would render such a topic unsuitable to be spoken of in any kind of polite company surprised him so much that he just... gaped. The auror's amusement seemed to increase ten-fold in the face of his own flushed discomfort.

"I am not in the habit of being confronted with anyone's private affairs, Auror Potter" He snapped defensively and was totally disconcerted by the abrupt softening in the other man's demeanor.

"That I can imagine, Severus. I have never, in all my years, encountered a man as... reluctant... to engage in any kind of intimacy as you are"

His throat dried even as he flushed with discomfited embarrassment. He didn't know how to take that observation, couldn't respond to it in any other way than attempting to ignore it had ever been made and, therefore, found himself in the uncomfortable position of being the first to avert his gaze. The action felt like a concession that he had not wanted to make, like a defeat of some sort. Like humiliation...

Silence grew. It stretched between them like a cold shadow. He did not know how to break it... so he stood there, rooted to the spot, as his legs slowly weakened. His back hurt with the strain of rigidly maintaining the illusion of dignified strength that he was so adamant to project.

"Severus?"

Potter's voice reached him suddenly. A gentle uttering of his own name that, for some reason, made him feel lonely. He missed Albus and Luc. He missed Draco... Surely even he, himself, deserved the company of a friendly face while recovering from grievous injury. While lacking the comforting pulse of his own magic. While mourning for the things gone out of reach, maybe forever...

"Severus? "

The tone became even softer and he swallowed the lump that had lodged in his throat, thoroughly appalled at his utterly maudlin reaction to that soothing, but fake, gentleness...

"I do not require false care, Mr. Potter!" He gritted out at last. Onyx gaze pinning the bastard to the spot with such a hatred-filled look that the man's approach simply faltered.

For a second they both looked at one another with the same intense dislike that had, so long ago, defined their relationship as tutor and student. As Slytherin and Gryffindor. As never-truly-trusted-spy and precious Saviour of the World... Then Potter's brilliant green gaze darkened under the weight of unfathomable emotions and he coked his head slightly, like a jungle predator lazily appraising the merits of abandoning it's rest in order to pursue unexpectedly spotted prey.

"Whoever said my care is false, Professor?. I'd have to be pretty cold-blooded to feel any kind of indifference for the man who risked so much of his soul, of himself, to keep me alive and whole for seven years!"

His breath hitched as the man neared him. A hand dared to close around his elbow again, in a grip that proved to be as firm as a brick, and simply... pulled. His traitorous legs went ahead and followed. Stumbled really, as he was so disrespectfully dragged towards the couch.

"You look about ready to collapse, you foolish man!. Haven't got the good sense of letting go, just... sit, all right?. I promise you that we'll fight over anything you want the moment you feel better.."

"What on Earth do you think you are doing?" He spluttered with incensed indignation when he felt himself being unceremoniously pushed down into the seat.

Potter shrugged as he stood there: towering over him and looking... lost.

"I want you to get better. I need you to!. I've waited far too long for you to just... wake up, Severus. Seeing you so weak, and so reluctant to ask for help, is truly hard!. Too hard... I... I just... I don't want to play this stupid game of ours any more. I want to... er... call for a truce"

Severus blinked with astonishment as the most awful confusion clouded his every thought. He could not possibly fathom the man's plan, but then again Gryffindors were notoriously tricky to understand. He'd never truly managed to do so and that had been the root of much of the misery that he'd been forced to endure as a naive teenager. He was naive no longer, though. Hadn't been for quite some time and he'd be dammed before he allowed another petty Potter to mess with him again!.

"I am afraid that any sort of peace between us is quite unachievable, Auror Potter. Even if I were remotely inclined to try my hand at such a thing: Which. I. Am. Not, we shouldn't forget that you actually detest me!. I am here because your hatred of me is so poisonous that you've decided to circumvent the justice of the Wizarding World itself in order to impose your own over my person. Do not forget that you have used the potion of choice of every swindler, thief and charlatan there is to trick me maliciously into slavery!. You are my enemy, Mr. Potter. My most despised foe. The dark and awful creature that has dared threaten Draco... and I. Shall. Not. Ever. Willingly. Offer. You. Peace!"

Potter sucked in a breath and flailed like a landed fish. He seemed sickened beyond endurance. Utterly aghast by the perfect truth of his bold statement and Severus thought, with no small amount of satisfaction, that the ridiculous jerk had never truly understood the most important thing about slytherins: none of them truly feared confrontation. None of them could be called simply a coward and then be as easily forgotten as yesterday's trash. To do so could bring disaster upon those who were stupid enough to even try it.

A slytherin's first weapon of choice would always be diplomacy, of course. It made perfect sense to every single one of them, after all. They didn't just want to win, no. They wanted to do so forging new friendships, new acquaintances, new contacts. They wanted the kind of power that no man would ever offer to their enemy. Sometimes, though, diplomacy would go... nowhere. It could achieve no benefit and only serve to muddle the otherwise clearly-drawn lines of battle. When that happened there was no one that they would shy away from confronting, as viciously as they possibly could, in order to protect themselves and their loved ones from harm.

A slytherin with not-a-thing-to-lose was nothing less than a very cunning Gryffindor gone wild. A pissed off Ravenclaw standing just outside a burned library. A cornered Hufflepuff determined to stand, until the very end of time, between his weakened family and his blood-thirsty enemies.

They did have some things that were only theirs, though. Things that no other house at Hogwarts had ever truly appreciated: they knew loyalty to one another. They knew how to lay in wait for the most auspicious time to strike and, when they finally did so, it was always with deathly intent, because they also understood that there's nothing in the world more dangerous than a wounded enemy left alive to seek revenge. But, even more crucially, they understood the importance of unbreakable commitment while fighting. Once a Slytherin decided to engage in battle they might not to participate in every skirmish, not bother retaliating every humiliating attempt to strike them down. They might even lose more battles than they won, but... They all understood that a war is a thing that takes years. And strength. And stubbornness. And that, when your enemy has grown weary of all the fight or he's squandered his resources and has no more of... anything... to use against you then, if you have either the fortitude or the strength to raise back up. If you make sure to be the one man left still standing at the very end of it all, then you have every right in the world to claim fair victory. Regardless of how much actual damage you've caused in either, blood or tears, to your enemy...

He'd fought Black and he'd fought the aurors. He'd fought Death Eaters. And his father. And Lily... He'd fought Voldermort himself from his own hidden position, among shadows... Harry Potter was, maybe, his weakest enemy. For he was easily riled. He was impatient and capricious. He had no real staying power, at least not in battle. He liked to give up, unless he found himself truly corralled and he could be very easily manipulated into guilt, if one was careful enough. Severus knew without a shadow of doubt that he would find freedom from this awful situation one of these days. He had only to remain firm, wait the brat out while giving away nothing of himself. Nothing that he didn't had to offer under the letter of their vow, that is.

"I don't think it's very wise of you to lock horns with me over this issue, Professor. The way I see it, if I want to have a truce then I get to have it. Don't I?. Don't forget the terms of our oath: I am the one calling all the shots here and you are... You. Are... Not!"

Although the words were firm and challenging, in and of themselves, the tone the boy had used was quite weak. There was a bruised quality to his emerald gaze that made him look pained. He was pale and trembling. He was breathing harshly, like a child about to explode into a storm of crying. Severus did not bother to respond to that utterly unimpressive bravado in any shape or form, he had promised the menace his respect, after all. A deep sigh broke from his chest and his head turned. Cold, black eyes raked the room in the growing silence.

Potter stiffened as the moment stretched. Taught frame rigid with obvious affront and ever-growing frustration. Severus waited, perversely entertained, for the fireworks that could so easily be caused by that hair-triggered temper to start in earnest. The brat's leg jiggled in place, weight was shifted from left to right in a strange dance that revealed a deep well of untold anxious energy. Then he wrecked havoc in that horrid mop of his when he tangled restless fingers through his short, ink colored locks.

"I don't want to fight with you, Severus" The boy finally released that statement in a short, savage whisper. Angry green eyes flashed darkly as they settled over his own seated form in a storm of fierce frustration.

"As you wish, Auror Potter" His own offering was neutrally voiced. Respectfully given. A work of art in restrained emotion and utter, absolute indifference. He was counting on it to rile the little ignorant to the point of storming off.

The boy's features became mulish. Obstinate determination flashed verdant-tipped daggers from those eyes, a snort exploded from angrily widened nostrils and the dark head shock once. Twice.

"Are you hungry?. You didn't touch your lunch at all, I was watching..."

The abrupt change in mood and topic threw him and he blinked in absolute bewilderment before the meaning of the words truly sank in. Then he frowned his derision and a single black eyebrow rose incredulously:

"Are you attempting to convince me that there is food here?"

The boy flushed and his stubborn emerald gaze lowered self-consciously towards the floor for a brief second. A shoe rubbed onto the side of it's twin, in a strangely coy motion.

"We could always go out, you know? There's a small Indian place down the corner, I think. Do you even like Indian food?"

The idea of walking, dressed in these... dreadfully thin muggle garments... wobbling down the road like some kind of aged, drunken pet, thoughtlessly tethered to the miscreant before him made him shiver.

"I'd rather not"

The smile that came his way then was soft and gentle.

“Of course not, I bet you are tired. Why don't you lay down for a little while?. It'll do you plenty of good, you know?. Laura said you should rest as much as you could, at least for the first few days"

Determined steps brought the little menace closer before he could think of something -anything- to say that could indicate, in as respectfully a manner as he could possibly stomach, just how very disinclined he was to... obey... that particular request. His eyes widened and his breath halted when the boy knelt before him, without so much as a by-your-leave, and proceeded to seize his left foot rudely. Golden fingers curled around his thin calf and the very strange shoe that he'd been wearing was skilfully pulled off.

“Do you want to keep the socks?"

He nodded jerkily in hasty agreement, all but yanking his limb off the auror's grasp before the man could even think of removing the flimsy dark-colored covering. A sly chuckle rent the air and his every muscle stiffened with the humiliation of having become the loathsome creature's laughing stock. The fingers froze on his leg in a disconcertingly immediate reaction to his own obvious discomfort.

There was a heartbeat of silence...

Then those eyes that looked so much like Lily's lifted to clash with his own in a head-on collision.

“I don't know how to ease these misgivings of yours, Severus. I only know that I am trying not to upset you in any way, but... It's. Just. Not. Working!. You need to relax a bit, O.K?. I'll just... I'll pull off your other shoe and let you sleep"

His own features wore a mask of painful civility and his gritted tone became a fierce reflection of the absolutely livid dismay that was coursing through his every vein:

"I can remove my own footwear, thank you very much."

Potter bristled, his jaw clenched and a hand that was truly as strong as iron held his other foot aloft.

"You can barely function with that broken arm of yours. Having to force myself to stay on the other side of that hospital-bed curtain was just awful!. I had to grit my teeth and listen to you trying to dress yourself, in extremely unfamiliar clothing, I might add, when it was patently clear that you could not cope with the task. But your precious Draco wasn't there to fuss All. Over. You!, was he? And I'm not good enough a substitute for him. Not in your eyes, at least. I was dying to help you!. You stubborn, idiotic... BONEHEAD!. But, no. Oh, No!. Never let it be said that the Great-Git-Severus-Snape lowered himself to ask Harry Potter for help, not when he could force himself to struggle RIGHT INTO A BLOODY COLLAPSE!"

By the end of that absolutely thunderous diatribe Potter had been fairly screaming his guts off. Severus blinked in affronted, flustered uncertainty, but he could think of nothing to say or do other than just... blink some more!.

The boy's lips thinned with anger, emerald eyes clearly struggling with a truly impressive riot of emotions of all kinds. There was anger and there was rage. Frustration. Pity. Regret. Hurt... There was a truly distressing chaos of virtually every feeling the human heart can hold swirling within those soulful verdant pools and Severus fully understood, to his everlasting shame, that he lacked the necessary courage to delve into that miasma for more than just a second, so his own gaze simply... lowered towards the floor.

His other shoe was removed in a stony, hardened silence. His foot was cradled for a second too long within those callused wide hands, but he couldn't bring himself to raise his eyes from the suddenly enthralling sight of the black woolen cloth that covered his knees...

Potter sighed softly into the heavy silence before setting the limb free. A heartbeat turned into a few as the man remained there: kneeling patiently at his feet. Upturned face studying his own intently. Fiery green eyes attempting to clash with his... Silence stretched but time itself seemed to have come to an abrupt halt. There was nothing in the world but the awful calmness that enfolded them within the moment, like a shroud. Then the boy became bold and a hand that was gentle, but confident, settled over his skinny right knee with astonishing aplomb. It entered his line of sight and forced him to acknowledge the hand's owner.

"It will be all right, Severus. Things will settle between us, you'll see... Now you sleep and I'll go get some food for later. That'll be all we do today, OK?. Nothing less. Nothing more... At least not until you learn for yourself that life it's not so frightening when we live it just like this: taking every day only a step further, Professor. Only one, you see?. One little step at a time..."

TBC...

Ch10

Ch12