Change
It was nearly time. The moon had reached its peak. And Severus Snape was scared out of his mind.
Of the moon.
Severus let out a snort of laughter, and then immediately sobered at the agony in his ribs. He was probably slowly going insane.
Severus had always knew that he was going to die a horrible death, although the thought of dying as the sacrifice for the second Dark Lord was such an absurd thought.
Even though it must have only been three hours or so, Severus felt like it was an eternity. He'd been crucioed at least fifty times. He'd been kicked and punched even more. At least it was nearly over. Severus's heart ached however. It ached for Dahlia.
They only got to spend around a week together. A week reunited. And now Severus was about to die. There was no way in hell that they could save him now.
He was exhausted. The flames on his right side and ribs had spread, and now his whole body burned in agony. Severus could barely even open his eyes. His throat was hoarse after the screaming and his neck was split open and bleeding again. So much for healing.
"Poor little Sevvie." Bellatrix grinned at her prey, plopping down to sit next to him. "Aw, lovey, if I actually cared for you, I would feel sorry. But..."
She sighed dramatically and groaned loudly.
"The moon cannot possibly right fast enough!"
"Bellatrix."
His low, wheezy voice startled her.
"So you can talk, can you? I suppose we should add a little more pain, then? To shut you up?"
"Isn't it betraying the Dark Lord's name- Tom Riddle's name if you submit yourself to Macmillan? There can only be one Dark Lord, after all. Remember when we promised that he was our one and only master?"
Severus cut off, coughing, his lungs heaving for precious air. He lay convulsing on the ground for a few moments, and then stilled.
"What would he say now, if he saw his faithful servant?"
"You betrayed him too." Bellatrix stared at him with genuine interest.
"Indeed. But at least I betrayed him for someone who didn't control my every move." Severus knew he was lying. When he left Lord Voldemort, he'd flown from one evil master to another manipulative one.
"Genie doesn't," Bella breathed, her eyes going misty.
"Gross. So you're doing it for love, then?"
"Not love," she sneered. "For redemption. For a cause."
"I think I understand," whispered Severus, lying on the ground next to her. It was odd, how he was talking to her, out of all people, when he was waiting for his death.
"I felt it too," he continued. "A soldier without a purpose, hm?"
Bellatrix stared at Severus Snape, her heart thudding loudly.
"But really, Severus," she said moments later, when he had passed out, "if I weren't under orders to kill you, and you weren't a traitor, I think that I would like you very much. I suppose...I suppose you're not so bad, when you're unconscious. I've learned that the past three years."
And then she smiled in her satisfied way, stood up, brushed dirt off of her cobweb filled robes, and stalked away.
Perhaps it was fate, perhaps it was luck, or bad luck, in Severus's opinion, but it was a cloudy night, and the full moon could not be seen.
Agitated, Eugene Macmillan simply sat there and chomped loudly on a piece of gum, each bite threatening to break his jaw. And on the dirty floor, guarded by Bellatrix, who was humming and sharpening a knife on a random stone, Severus lay there, only half awake.
At around twelve, Severus was woken when something bit him on the head. Hard. Like a piece of rock. Severus lifted himself up weakly and peered into the forest. Bellatrix didn't notice.
Severus stared into the woods and found two amber eyes staring back. He just managed to stifle a gasp. He wasn't afraid of the creature, no, but what his faitgued head could not fathom was that he had seen those eyes before.
He gazed at it for a little while longer before it clicked.
Remus Lupin.
The werewolf was here. Ah, it was full moon. Severus should've known.
He blinked wearily at the wolf. It blinked back. And then Severus, delirious with pain, lifted a hand as a wave and beamed towards the shadows. Seconds later, his companion left.
Disappointed, with fresh tears stinging his eyes, Severus laid back and tried to convince himself that he'd imagined the wolf. It was just like how it was when he was in Azkaban, constantly forcing himself that good things were not real, and that he didn't deserve to hope.
Severus stared numbly out at Macmillan, who was now spitting out the gum and shoving another one in.
"That can't be healthy," Severus slurred, his gaze blurring. Macmillan turned towards him.
"I cannot see why you care, traitor."
"Traitor?" Severus mused, humming to himself. "Really?"
"Delirious, no doubt. That's why you've got that rash courage to speak up. Ah, well, you won't live through this anyways, so I hardly see why it matters." Macmillan turned his back from Severus and continued to watch the sky.
"See what?"
Macmillan snorted, turned to face him, and stalked forward.
"Tell me, Snape, what do you think of my plan?"
"Your plan?" Severus asked dumbly.
"Compared to Tom Riddle, of course. Tell me what you genuinely think- you were his most trusted servant, after all."
Macmillan chose to ignore Bellatrix's sudden screech at the thought of Severus being the Dark Lord's most liked slave.
"You move too quickly," Severus said bluntly. "You're smart, I can hand you that, but you act too fast. I did not know who you were. Lord Voldemort-" Bellatrix and Macmillan gasped there, but Severus chose to act deaf- "Lord Voldemort made sure that everyone knew who he was before he started killing. You won't last long, Macmillan, because you lack the control he had. You aren't...scary enough. Simple kicks and taunts won't do. You have to threaten me, you know? Actually threaten, before you-"
"Shut up," Macmillan growled. "Shut up. I will not listen to any more of this. I am clever, you know? I found a way to return those six's wands without getting caught! The masks? Those are so ugly, so boring, so I made them change colors and sprout horns and wings and whatnot. Because it symbolizes me, you see? As a Metamorphmagus!"
"Yes," Severus said wearily, "but what's the point of doing that if no one knows that you even are one in the first place?"
His question was met by silence; Macmillan gave him a glare that could kill and stalked away, bristling like a porcupine.
And then the silence was shattered with a shout. Antonin Dolohov and Walden Macnair raced through the bushes, their eyes wide with terror.
"Werewolf! Werewolf!"
Severus smiled happily to himself. Maybe Lupin wasn't a dream after all, and had really been real.
Rough hands grabbed him on the shoulders and shook him.
"What do you know? Tell me, what do you know?"
"I don't know anything, please!" Severus startled. "I don't know. I don't know."
"Crucio!"
Severus screamed, writhing on the ground. Every nerve was on fire. He was burning, like a pyre- no, he was on the pyre, and it was going to burn him to the ground and tear him apart. Macmillan was going to break him until he had nothing left for him to break.
"You're going to regret that!"
Severus couldn't quite register who said it. It was a woman's voice, but too kind to be Bella's, and too real to be a mere figment of his imagination, right? He sure hoped so.
When he finally stilled, Severus found the courage to open his eyes.
Lights flared from different directions. Bellatrix was dancing on top of a table, screeching and cackling, her hair wilder than ever. Macmillan had stopped his chewing and started to duel desperately, sending green sparks here and there. Walden, Antonin, Amycus, Alecto, and Augustus were fighting as well, hollering loudly for orders that did not come from their new master.
And then someone came for him.
"Professor Snape? Professor Snape, are you alright?"
"Of course he isn't, Ronald, he's just been tortured for three, four hours! Go get Dahlia."
Footsteps ran away. And then they came back with someone with gentler, kinder hands, someone who lifted him up easily, whispered words into his ear, and laid him down on what he assumed was a stretcher.
Meanwhile, Eugene Macmillan was throwing a temper tantrum.
"NO! I AM THE NEW DARK LORD! I AM EVERYTHING RIDDLE WAS NOT! I HAVE PLANNED AND STRATE-"
"Tom Riddle was smarter than you!" came the cry, which sounded awfully like Kingsley. "Yes, being a Metamorphmagus is highly beneficial- which is why we didn't think twice about you! We thought it might have been the Port Key man-"
"YOU IDIOTS! I AM THE PORT-KEY MAN!"
There was a silence.
"Ah, yes, well that explains it, doesn't it? The point is, you wonder why you got caught, and its because-"
"Voldemort always inflicted fear before he focused on one particular person!" That was Hermione Granger. "You act too fast."
"HELL- HE MOVED TOO SLOW! HE WORKED TWICE AS MUCH AS ANY NORMAL MAN TO LIVE FOREVER AND HE DIDN'T EVEN LIVE UNTIL 75!"
"I do not know why this is even a discussion- Shelley, Korman, arrest this man, and keep him in his own facility."
”Yes sir, Minister.”
There was a snicker as Korman edged forward, stunned the man, and arrested him.
Severus was dangling on the precipice of unconsciousness and reality, and was trying very hard to hang on. But he was tired, and the kind presence seemed to know it.
”Severus, go to sleep,” she chided. “Luna, give him some of that potion, will you?”
Although it turned out that he did not even need it; Severus was asleep before the potion even touched his lips.
He woke to find himself on a soft, comfortable bed, one that he was quite familiar with…in the Infirmary.
It took him a moment to remember all the events that had happened the night before. It all came surging to him like a tsunami- Macmillan, pain, and then his rescue.
He nearly slapped himself on the head. That calm figure was Dahlia.
The door creaked open, and he found himself staring at Minerva, Dahlia, and Remus, all three looking quite haggard.
”You’ve woke!” Dahlia ran to the bed and gave him a kiss on the cheek that washed all of his tiredness away.
“Oh, Severus-“
”Minerva!” He was shocked to find her up and well- hadn’t Macmillan mentioned Stunning her? “I thought you were still unconscious.” His voice was awful, hoarse and cracked and dull.
”It doesn’t take five days to recover from a Stun,” Minerva said quietly, brushing tears out of her eyes.
Five days? Five days. He had been asleep for five days.
They caught him up on what happened after Luna and Dahlia took him back up to the castle. Macmillan was arrested, which he already sort of knew, and the other Death Eaters as well. They were already in Azkaban, proven very guilty after a short trial, and Kingsley had the pictures to prove it- Macmillan in one cell, looking furious, and the others finally separated. Bellatrix, Severus noted, was still eyeing the “New Dark Lord” with particularly large, sparkling eyes.
No one was killed, thankfully. Macmillan didn’t fight as well as they thought he would, and as soon as Lupin snarled once, the Death Eaters relented. The worst injury was Severus’s, but other than that, Lupin got his paw, or foot, sprained.
Apparently, after Severus had been gone for over an hour, Dahlia sprinted to Minerva’s office to find her Stunned on the ground. And then, after asking Hagrid to ask the centaurs if they saw Severus, because a student reported that they saw the two of them walking towards the forest, she found out that Severus was captured in the middle of the forest. Dahlia sent an emergency patronus to the Order and Ronald Weasley, Hermione Granger, Luna Lovegood, and Harry Potter had shown up. The eyes had been Lupin’s after all, and Severus thanked everyone that was there a few days after.
Severus also did have time to grieve for his wand, although his new wand from Ollivander’s was as strong as his old one, and they found his cane at the edge of the forest. Apparently, Macmillan had found the cane far too extravagant to break, perhaps hoping to sell it one day. After all, it was from Lucius, and Lucius only bought the best of the best.
Severus was thankful. He was thankful that he didn’t have any lasting injuries from this, thankful for Dahlia, and also just simply thankful for the fact that he now knew that people stood up for him. That people would willingly help him.
Dahlia told him that she didn't understand why it had to take him three hours of torture to realize that.
Severus supposed that with all of these happy, kind people around him, his broken heart would slowly heal and learn to love as well.