Princess

The old man gave brief nod to his brother and proceeded to Severus' table. Severus rose to his feet and automaticly bowed his head. "Headmaster" He said, forcing himself to look in to those blue, piercing eyes. He normaly had no problem to keep his composure, but now, most likely due to the violent stress of last hours, it took a tremendous effort of him not to shudder under the old mans' cold, calculating look.

"What message does Lord Voldemort have for me, Severus?" He asked.

Severus could not hold back flinch, as the Dark Mark painfully flared up by the sound of Dark Lord's name.

"No message sir, no message from him. I came on my own" Severus nodded towards a chair hopefully, and when Dumbledore complied, he too settled back down the rough bench.

Dumbledore stared at him mutely, so Severus took a deep breath and commenced, going straight to the point. "A battle occured today and..."

"You mean you murdered someone, I pressume" Dumbledore interjected icily and Severus cringed inwardly. Yes, right, taking down two unarmed people in their kitchen could be hardly referend to as a battle.

He swallowed and proceeded with the narrative, hoping to not be pressed to elaborate too much. "I was tasked to search the house afterwards and I found a baby, a girl probably year and half old" He chanced a glance at Dumbledore, but now when Severus nearly wished him to do so, the old man showed no inclination to interrupt.

"I need you to take her sir, I hid her in my house, but it's not safe" By the time he was done speaking the tone of his voice was downright pathetic, but he also realised that he hardly cared; the only thing he cared about was Dumbledore ridding him of the child and ensuring her security. 

But the old man did not seemed inclined to be doing such a thing. Those briliant blue eyes shone with contempt and when he finally spoke it was to say "So, let me make this clear; today you broke in those childs' home, murdered her parents, then kidnaped her and now you expect me to take care of the consequences?"

Severus swallowed on empty again. Well, yes, that pinpointed the gist of it quite right, but he knew better than to agree out loud.

And Dumbledore was still not quite finished speaking anyway. "I would hate if you went to sleep tonight with a feeling that anything you did was any heroic. You did not saved the girls' life, you had destroyed it, if you want her to be safe than make sure of it"

Severus' jaw dropped, the anxious guilt giving way to some exasperation. "Well yes, that's why I came to you" He pointed out the very obvious.

"I don't have a place for a toddler at school" Dumbledore said evenly. Severus had to bit the inside of his cheek to keep his temper under control. Oh, he nearly forgot the stupid kind of games Dumbledore liked to play with other humans' lifes.

"But you have quite some people at your comand, have you not?" Severus breathed through his nose,  restraining himself from growling, aware that he was not in a position to get too perty.

"And you ask me to endanger any of those people and their families because of the reprehensible deed you had commited?" Dumbledore cocked his eyebrow belligerently and Severus could again feel the panic engulfing him; the old man had no intention to help him.

"Dumbledore, I cannot keep her; I am a Death Eater for heavens sake" Severus desperately emphasised on the fact he'd normaly wouldn't like to mention at all.

The old mans' eyes hardened. "I am well aware of that, and anyone who knows me also know that I do not make any kind of deals with Death Eaters. On the contray, I am known for fighting them. As today you sough me out with probably good intentions - however misguided - I am going to let you walk out of here as a free man, but make no mistake; shall we meet again you won't get out of it as easily"

Severus just stared, feeling as if everything was crumbling down around him. There were some universall truths in this world, an unshakable facts one could count on, so as that the Dark Lord was evil, that he Severus - most regretably - was faulty too, but Dumbledore; Dumbledore was supposed to be good, wasn't he? The savior of the innocuous and weak, the fighter for the human rights, the greatest wizard of all time, wasn't he? 

"So, are you not going to help her?" He could not hold the panic and disbelief out of his voice.

"I think we had estabilished that it is not me who should perform the said help. And were you the Death Eater you claim to be, the girl would be already dead and we wouldn't have to lead this conversation"

"So that's it?!" Severus bellowed and jumped to his feet "are you trying to appeal to my better nature? I don't have any, Dumbledore! This is not a game, the child is in mortal peril"

Oh, Severus was loosing it, he knew, as every word he got out of himself was still more close to mindless shouting in lieu of the rational calm he was aiming for. And what was worse, he could feel the prickling of irrational tears behind his eyes. He shall be damned had he start to cry in front of Albus Dumbledore.

The barkeeper stopped to polish his glasses and followed the exchange with seemingly indeferent look, but carefully prickled ears, while his older brother apeared absolutely unfased by Severus's little display. "It was you to put her in the peril" he pointed out gravely.

Severus scrunched his face. As if he didn't know that. And the fact that he hadn't killed anyone today ( at least so far) was nigh to no consolation. With what he did he was as good as a murderer. He fastly wiped his cheeks and mindlessly caressed his bracelet; still pulsing. 

Severus was just about to give Dumbledore his piece of mind on that statement - all selfcontrol forgotten by now - when a flash of a silver light iluminated the dreary tavern. "Oh hell" he choked out. That was the Patronus' warning; the baby was waking up (or something worse, Severus shuddered.)

He had to go back home, like right now, so in the last desperate attempt he turned to Dumbledore and lift his chin. "I'm going to leave the baby at the Lime Street station then. By tommorow morning, right at down. I will drop her by the safety deposit boxes, across from the caffé. Someone will find her and take care of her" With the threat which he fully intended to fulfill Severus ran out of the inn, praying that Dumbledore eventually gets soft in the end and will be willing to take that obvious bite.

.

With heart rising to his throat Severus bursted in to his bedroom, but he could have saved the headless run; the baby girl was still snoozing in the blanket fort, albeit now she laid now in a different position, apearently tossing in her sleep.

Severus curled his lip in wry smirk. It seemed that his Patronus was just as unsure about watching the babies as he was, rising an alarm at her first movement.

He allowed himself a while to catch his breath, gingerly perching at the foot of the bed, but the fleeting relief got splintered by a shorebreak of consternation and hate.

Right now there was no one in a whole wide world Severus hated more than the old half-moon-bespectacled bastard (not even the Dark Lord himself. Severus shuddered at that unexpected and dangerous thought.)

No matter how compunction-filled Severus was, he felt absolutely hard done by. He was trying to do the right thing, wasn't he? Well, taking in account every and all events of last three years, he really wasn't. Of course he wasn't, but he had really tried today! Yes, he was faulty of accepting the Dark Mark, but he never anticipated that that also ment signing up for murdering babies!

Oh heavens, he hardly thought about what he's signing himself in to when he was seventeen.

Severus ran his hand through his lanky hair and craddled the pounding head. He was right neck deep in shits at the moment.

Baby in the bed behind him tossed some more. Severus' pulse imedilately rose, because he was not ready at all to have another round with the conscious girl.

A sudden thought popped up in his mind; he was still clad in his black service robes obviously, thus still looked just like the person who marched in to girl's home and brought a complete pandemonium upon her life. Maybe he should try to change that, have he wished for more peaceful awakening this time.

Severus did not needed to check his wardrobe to know that there were no colours going on, but he striped down from the heavy cloak and robe, leaving only the white shirt beneath. He too owned one pair of dark grey slacks, so he exchanged them for the black ones he wore, though he highly doubted that the baby would appreciate such detail. 

When changed, he proceeded in to the bathroom to use the facilities and refresh himself a bit. Oh, how could he use a shower right now; he reeked of sweat and fear, but he knew that that treat will have to wait until he gets rid of the baby. Instead, he splashed his face with ice-cold water, to get rid of the fatigue and the clammy coating that sticked to his skin.

Looking in to the mirror made him actually shudder. He had a good reason to avoid doing so most of the time, as his reflexion was something hardly encouraging.

In all honesty, were he the baby and saw this, he would be crying too, he thought dryly and tentatively reached up to put the long hair out of his face, holding them in a make-shift ponytail. Well... he was defenetly not any more handsome, but he did looked a bit different; maybe a little bit less like a huge bird of prey, so he sighed, summoned some questionable ribbon that apparently layed somewhere around and tied his long hair at the nape of his neck.

Well, now was Severus at least looking a little less gloomy, though the new visage did not matched his feelings at all. The baby was still asleep and he frankly had no idea of what to do. He awkwardly stood in the middle of his bedroom for couple of minutes, then get himself a glass of water and settled down to floor by the bed, leaning his back against the wall. He did not bothered to bring a book, as he was in no way fit enough to focuse on to anything. Instead he contemplated the last resort plan he had threw at Dumbledore before his dramatic leave. 

He did not liked the plan much, but it wasn't like He had much other options anyway, and at least this one seemed feasible somehow. If the railway schedules did not changed since the last time Severus had checked ( well, it had been quite some time already) then there were at least two night trains which could take them in to Liverpool before dawn.

Severus shifted uneasily with the idea of leaving that bundle of a toddler somewhere on a dirty bench in an awakening railway station, all alone and unprotected. Some muggles would find her, yes, but shall the Dark Lord - or anyone really - learn about her very existence... oh that prospect was rather nauseating.

But that was never Severus' real intention anyway. The idea was, that no matter what the old obnoxious man said, Dumbledore would come in there and eventually save the baby. He would do that in the end, wouldn't he? Wouldn't he? When Severus rose the threat in Hogs Head he was quite certain of it, but now he was no longer feeling so sure.

Whatever the right outcome of that question was however, Severus had no more time to ponder about it, as in that moment the wards of his house were interupted.