Chapter Text
Severus Snape had not been expecting a owl that day especially from a owl he didn't know, to the address he didn't share, during a time he is notoriously at Hogwarts. It stood perched in front of him, on his windowsill, watching with deep fathomless eyes. Tied to its foot was a small rolled piece of parchment, coiled in green string. Severus Snape placed his book down, and stepped forward, reaching a cautious hand towards the bird, who raised its leg obediently, untying the paper, he unfurled it.
Inside, in tight neat handwriting written in black ink, was a short note. A letter more like. Severus took in the words, the warning bare as a babe in birth; horcruxes.
It wasn't the first time he'd heard the word or even the first time he'd been told that the Dark Lord had them. But this was first time an anonymous person decided he was worth telling.
'An old friend' was frustratingly vague, a brutally common moniker, one plucked from fantastical stories. Severus pursed his lips, looking emptily around his home as if the worn novels, potions and dark green carpet could give him an inkling to anyone who would consider him a friend.
He placed the letter down, atop the mantlepiece in his living room, before turning back to the window. The owl was still there, watching. Perhaps it was waiting for a response, an answer, an acknowledgment, and what was Severus to do but to give the pitch black bird it's request.
His quill hovered over the paper, hesitation clenching at his throat,
Confirmed.
description?
6 galleons
He wanted to ask more, more specific, but such specifics would get him and his mystery pen pal killed.
An old friend before the war would have only been a deatheater, and considering the letter was most definitely treason, they were also most definitely a defector. And defector or not, they'd know the code words, everyone knew the code words.
Severus fucking hoped they knew the code words.
Rolling the piece of parchment into a small tube, wrapping the same string around it, he gestured towards the bird, who rose its foot again. Tying it securely, he muttered, "take it home"
The owl gave a small hoot, and its large wings began to flap and it pushed itself off and into the sky. Going home, he thought. Falling back into his warm armchair, his head leant back against the soft shawl half-hazardly thrown over the back. His book from before abandoned on his coffee table, the page he was on long gone, the 'Lost Properties of Valerian Root' will have to wait for another day.
He knew he should be telling Dumbledore, as per their agreement, and he reasoned with himself that he probably would've, had his legs not turn to stone and his head not ached with a soft pain. So despite the voice in his head telling him not too, Severus Snape fell into a sleep on his armchair, a rare peace in the potion master's life.
Severus Snape wanted to punch someone. Or curse them. Either worked, he supposed, he wasn't picky. Sitting quietly in Malfoy Manor, he watched with a bored gaze as Lucius preened under the false praises from the Dark Lord. As if the two were actors in a play with the same scene every week. Snape watched as the Dark Lord pulled the metaphorical rug out of from under Malfoy's feet with a scathing and vilifying remark about some failure or another.
Death Eater meetings were dull when both sides of this stupid war were at a stalemate. In fact, the meetings were about as mind numbing as sitting shoved in a thin kitchen with a bunch impulsive, murderous lions.
"Severus."
The Dark Lord's voice in legend was smooth, silky, like freshly conditioned hair. In reality it was high pitched and hard to properly decipher, Snape suppose the lack of lips contributed to the jumble of noises the Dark Lord passed off as words.
"Yes, My Lord?"
"Tell me about what Dumbledore is doing."
Severus held back a sigh, "He plans to collect the boy soon, likely bringing him to wherever he has Black holed up."
There was very little point in lying, after all the easiest method of misdirection is simply using the truth.
"And the prophecy?"
"Round the clock rotations, My Lord." Severus drawled. The Dark Lord hummed, reaching up to pet Nagini as she slithered up into his lap.
Severus hated that snake.
"Does that include you, Severus?" The Dark Lord hissed,
"No, My Lord. The Headmaster has me brewing majority of the time."
Brewing for Poppy, but Severus was fine letting the Dark Lord think he was brewing for the order.
The Dark Lord stopped his questioning of the potions master after that, returning to verbally and sometimes physically ripping into his other followers. The meeting rolled on for another hour, as dull as Severus expected, just threats, ill made plans, semi-concerning promises for violence, and various death eaters looking like the dark lord has offered them a lordship whenever he gives the barest whisper of praise.
Then came the torturing, it was slightly less dull, but the screams for mercy weren't pleasant on the eardrums. Severus was blessed with being ignored by the tip of the Dark Lord's wand. And after so long, he was allowed to stroll out of Malfoy Manor, cursing the fact that he did not get to go home and instead had to apparate all the way to London just to say the same shit all over again to people who liked him even less.
Grimmauld Place was a miserable home. It was disgusting and unkempt. Severus pushed open the door,
And it was hell of a lot more disgusting and unkempt than last time he was there.
He took a step over the knocked over umbrella stand, toeing a peeled off bit of wallpaper out of his way. Severus glanced curiously at the cracks that ran up the walls like lightning, cracks that shouldn't of existed considering decades of magical power went into the upkeep of the damn place.
Muffled murmurs floated out of the closed kitchen door, and he barely spared a glance at the gaggle of teenagers huddled at the top of the stairs. All looked vaguely offended that he got to enter the super secret kitchen and they did not.
Severus almost rolled his eyes when the chatter silenced as he stepped over the threshold. You sign up to be a terrorist when you're seventeen and suddenly you no one likes you. He ignored the wary glances from the random assortment of majority Weasley's and focused on the man who had scored second place on Severus' list of 'people who annoyed the fuck out of him'. It was a rather long list.
Albus Dumbledore smiled, "ah Severus, welcome."
"Albus." Severus said shortly, ignoring the offered seat and instead electing to stand at the end of the table, with his arms crossed. Albus sat at the head of the table, looking everything the genial grandfather figure he was made out to be. The person who was talking- Moody- barely blinked and kept giving Dumbledore his information, before they moved onto Arthur Weasley, and so on.
As more people around the table gave their reports, Severus finally noticed the distinct lack of two crucial members. Lupin and Black were suspiciously missing from the dining room. Perhaps that's why the meeting was so quiet, and why Potter hadn't been brought up yet. The brat was usually all Black could talk about.
"Severus?" Severus looked to the head of the table, from where he had been staring at the wall listening to information he already knew.
"Yes?"
"Have you learnt anything new?"
"More movement towards Foreign Affairs, and talks of getting more people in the DMLE." Severus dutifully recited, "He is getting tense about the consistent auror response times."
"Amelia will need to be informed, Kingsley?" Albus turned to the tall man leaning against the back wall, his deep blue robes brushing up dust from the grotty floorboards. He nodded silently, glancing at Severus with a respectful tilt of his head.
"Anything else, Severus?" Albus questioned,
"He has plans for Bones. Nothing specific, but she's proving too difficult to work around for his plans to work."
"A pity, who does he plan to have take her place?"
Severus watched with thinly veiled disgust, as Albus nodded solemnly, as if Madam Bones's inevitable torture and death was something completely out of his hands. Fuck, he wanted to punch him.
"Most probable would be Yaxley, or Burke."
"Not Rookwood?" Albus cocked his head, Severus sighed,
"No, he's working in the Department of Mysteries, and has no talent for leadership."
Alastair Rookwood might of been a former auror but the man had the bravery and talent of a walnut. His only use was sitting in silence listening to other people too dumb to realise the idiot behind them had a recording device. Well multiple, Rookwood had the habit of losing such devices and so was ordered to carry more than one after the brutal lashing from the Dark Lord.
"I see. And you, William? How are the goblins?"
William 'Bill' Weasley leant back slightly as heads swivelled around to face him, and Severus relaxed minutely. The eldest Weasley child had his red hair tied at the nape of his neck, and a scar dipping from the left side corner of his mouth down to just below his jaw. It seemed relatively new, perhaps a couple months old.
"Still stalwart, professor." Bill responded, his words slow and practiced, and brutally neutral. It didn't take a genius to figure out that Bill wasn't terribly enthusiastic about being the ambassador to one of the most easily offended cultures on the planet.
"Didn't you offer protection?"
Severus had to hold in the condescending snort at Molly Weasley's baffled question. Bill looked pained,
"They don't need protection. They're goblins."
"But-"
Albus held up a hand, pausing Mrs Weasley's upcoming rant about ungratefulness that was no doubt going to be tinged with some sort of vague bigotry, and instead gave her a placating smile.
"At ease, Molly. We cannot force our generosity onto the unwilling. If the Goblins do not wish to side with us, that is fine, we simply must ensure they do not side with Voldemort."
Severus's left arm flared in pain as the name dropped from Albus' lips, and he clenched his jaw tightly as to not let out a swear as stinging crawled up through his elbow before landing up at his neck before dissipating. Most flinched or gasped, but Severus just sent him a glare.
"Of course, Headmaster." Mrs Weasley said, sufficiently mollified. Severus went back to staring at the wall as Albus started giving out his instructions to everyone. Some were grouped, some were individual. Severus wouldn't get one. No, The Headmaster liked to give Severus' mission in private.
"Of course when Harry is relocated here, Sirius will have a talk with him."
Severus cocked his head, again, where was the host of the house? He silently cheered when someone else voiced his question, Tonks.
"Where is Sirius for that matter? Or Remus?"
Albus looked somber, and for one blessed moment, Severus thought perhaps that Black was irreversibly injured and unable to leave the bed, and the Slytherin would never have to interact with the man ever again. But then Albus opened his mouth.
"Unfortunately, Miss Granger was found in Sirius' younger brother's room which lead to an episode from Sirius. No one was injured, and Sirius is being cared for by Mr Lupin upstairs."
An unwelcome feeling sank into Severus' stomach, he had mostly blocked out all his grief towards those he lost during the war. Refusing to properly acknowledge it until it was tearing at the seams of the tight box he had shoved them into.
Regulus Black was one such person.
The younger man, went missing all those years ago, and Severus had cried, had pleaded to some uncaring god, because fuck if Regulus Black was dead, what did that mean for the rest of them.
As the meeting came to a close, Severus swiftly departed, glancing up at the staring teenagers who were now sitting on the bottom of the stairs. Their faces all curious and stubborn. Familiar, he thought sardonically. He looked away again.
He stepped over the umbrella stand, and pushed out the door. With the breath sparsely leaving his lungs he apparated home.
His living room was a welcome sight. He tugged off his outer robe, and shucked off his shoes, before he noticed the eerie black owl sitting on his windowsill, a scroll tied to their leg with the same green string.
In two long strides, Severus took the offered scroll, and unfurled it.
Slytherin Locket.
Grimmauld Place.