Princess

Severus's feet heavily landed at the top stone step in front of the ramshackle doors of his, and before he could jerk them open and hide inside an earpiercing screech tore the otherly calm night in Cokeworth.

The tiny bundle in Severus' arms screamed bloody murder, but to his ears it was an euphony; the baby screamed, thus was still alive.

"Hey, it's all right little one" He murmured as he shut the doors behind them, ignited candelabrum with snap of his fingers and imedilately started to strenghten his already rigorous wards.

"It's okay, you're fine" He mumbled away while making the final touch of their protection, but when he turned to the struggling baby all thoughts of being fine died away.

The complete terror etched upon her face was very well predictable, inevitable even, taking in account what had happened in the last couple of hours, but for what Severus was not ready were the girls' eyes; wide and terrifed of course, but the whites of the eyes, well, what was supposed to be white was instead crimson with blood, as the tiny vessels apparently could not handle the brutal force of apparating.

His heart dropped and he swiftly moved in to the living room where he ploped the girl unceremoniously down the worn out carpet, as she was putting on such fight that Severus was not so sure whether he might be able to retain her for much longer. He imedilately knelt down next to her "hey, it's alright" he said yet again - quite unnecessarily, as the situation was anything but alright - his voice trembling and breaking "it's alright..."

In the following couple of minutes Severus performed every and all diagnostic spell he knew, shone his wand in to the struggling babys' eyes, and contray to the obvious carnage they were in, it seemed that everything was more or less really alright. The baby appeared healthy, but despite the reassuring establishments Severus' panic was rising high beyond the marks. 

Minutes dragged by and the child would not stop screaming, albeit understandably Severus knew. Her face progressively changed colour; from white to red and then steadily turning in to deep purple, as with all that crying there was not enough time for getting oxygen. And what was worst, there was nothing Severus could do about it. At least anything he knew of. He was not big in comforting people in general, and counting the fact that it was him who took down the wards protecting her home, any condolence would be probably acutely undue, even if the baby could not really appreciate the irony.

"I'm sorry, I really am" Severus breathed and diped his head, few tears escaping down his cheek. He did not even noticed that he'd started crying, but it didn't mattered, really; everybody in here was crying now, and frankly, the situation called for it.

The baby obviously paid no mind to Severus' admission, rolling on the floor, breaking decibels and bulging the bloody eyes in some sort of panic attack.

Appaling, unwelcomed thought crossed Severus's mind as he watched the scene; wouldn't it be better if Lucius reached that room first? He shook his head furiously, disgusted by himself even more than before - an accomplishment he thought not possible.

With new resolve fueled by guilt he frantically cooed at the baby, even tried to craddle her (and hell, did she hated that) but everything he did seemed to make the matters only worse, until suddenly - silence.

Mid-scream the girl took in a shrudded breath and her plaintive eyes fluttered shut, the tiny body spasmed some more and then she went limp, the silence nearly as deafening as her screaming. 

Severus's trachea constricted "No" he picked the baby up, his shaking fingers searching for puls once more. He inhaled deeply with relief as it was there, frantic and iregular, as a humming bird trapped in a mason jar.

Could that thing really fell asleep again? Crying herself senseless probably worked wonders, Severus supposed.

He carried her to his bed and arranged all the pillows and blanket around her in a kind of a make-shift nest, to protect her from falling down, and then just idly watched for couple of minutes as the small body tried to regain right oxygen supply with apnoeic gasps. The dark brown curls were plastered to girls' clammy face, which was slowly getting back to its normal colour, apart from few resisting red patches, and for a moment Severus had to fight back a sudden urge to reach out and bursh the hair away.

Oh hell, was he scared. Scared because he let the girl live and even more scared that she could die now. He still couldn't fully wrap his head around the fact that he had disobeyed the Dark Lord and tricked his comrades. It was bad, like really really bad. 

He needed to get the girl to safety, thus as far away from himself as possible.

Decided, Severus fastly got in to work, willing to manage all necessities while the baby was off.

He ripped a loose thread from the blanket and transfigurated it in to long red yarn and split it in two. One half he carefully fixed around girls' tiny wrist and the other around his own. He spelled the babys' bracelet and conjuncted it with his. The spell was complicated and obviously, he never tried it before for such particular reason, but it worked; the girls' yarn recorded her pulse and mirrored it in to Severus', so he was able to monitore her vital signs even while being away. 

Before leaving Severus casted one more diagnostic, just for a good measure, and when satisfied he conjured his Patronus, ordering it to look after the sleeping baby.

The silver doe blinked her huge eyes and dipped the pretty head in understanding.

"Sleep tight" Severus whispered towards the girl and set off of the house to disapparate.

With an inapproprietly loud crack Severus materialised in the centre of Hogsmeade, a very inconvenient place for a Death Eater to be; the fact that he came in here was just a testament to how dire the present situation was.

He fastly ducked out of the main street and at run set off towards Hogs Head, a dingy tavern by the dead end of the village.

With the hood up he entered the pub and was relieved to see that apart from the barkeeper the place was empty.

"Good evening" Severus mumbled and decidedly pulled his hood down. The tall man behind the bar slightly narrowed his blue eyes, but did not said anything.

Severus was aware that Aberfort knew who he was, or at least what he was, and also that he knew that he did not came in for a pint, but obviously, the man did not intended to make it any easier. Well, why should he, right?

"Sir, I need to speak with your brother, it's really urgent, could you please..." The sentence disspersed in to void, and Severus was at once sure that Aberfort Dumbledore despised to be treated as his older brothers' monkey boy.

"Ah, urgent is it?" Bartender huffed without an ounce of interest and turned his back on Severus, presumably to clean an incredibly dirty glass. Severus mindlessly ran his thumb over the string of yarn on his left wrist; it pulsed, too fast but consistently.

He needed to speak with Dumbledore, the headmaster one, and he needed to do it very fast.

With the taste of panic in the back of his throat Severus did something very rare for him; he pleaded, albeit he tried not to sound too ruefully. "Please sir, couldn't you send for him? It's very important"

Barkeeper turned to him, mild contempt residing in his eyes. "Oh why, the likes of you can't produce a proper Patronus, can they?" He sniffed and picked another glass.

Severus felt himself flush slightly, but he let the man think that yes, he could not send a message with a Patronus because yes, he was a stinking vile Death Eater. There would be very little point in explaining the matter. "Please" he repeated instead, and then with a sigh he decided to volunteer some more information, information he did not intended to reveal to anyone but Albus Dumbledore, adjudging that it would be worth it, shall the barkeeper decide to be more accommodating. "A life of a child is at stake, I need help. Please" He whispered, using more 'pleases' in the single conversation than he did in last couple of years all together.

It worked, Severus could tell, by the way the barkeepers' eyes went suddenly bright. Without a word the man retrieved wand from the pocket of his cloak and send a silver, horned animal towards the back doors of the inn. "I send him a word, don't know whether he's in the castle though"

"Thank you" Severus breathed and dipped his head. He sat down to a barstool and tried to keep himself from craddling his pounding skull and cerebrum in his hands. Just little bit longer, little bit longer and everything will be alright, he told himself over and over, not believing it even little bit. 

"What will you drink?" Aberfort asked harshly, the sudden sound making Severus jump.

"Anything" he waved his hand, willing to pay as much for the succor as the man pleased. Aberfort nodded once and seconds later an exceptionally filthy tumbler of whisky landed in front of Severus. He grunted his thanks, put one galeon on to countertop and retreated to the corner of the pub, nursing the drink in his hands.

All in all he could not be waiting more than fifteen minutes, but for Severus it felt like eternity. He kept rocking his tumbler to and fro, keeping the repulsive liquid in even more repulsive container far from his mouth, and mindlessly counted the franatic beats of his bracelet; it comforted him and made him sick to his stomach at the same time.

And then, at long last, the door sqeaked open and Albus Dumbledore in all his majesty walked in.