Chapter 1
Sometimes, Severus Tobias Snape hated his job. He was a potion master and a potion teacher - unfortunately - not a postal service, something his boss had yet to understand. When he spoke his thoughts to the man, what did he say? 'I'll give you a pack of lemon drops if you do it for me.' The audacity of that man... He had no boundaries.
Anyone who saw the old man's atrocious robes would assume it was a prank that ended up being permenant, What they didn't realise, was that the headmaster had custom designed his robes, to the displeasure of the tailors who had to make them. And his love for muggle sweets... just last week, he'd had ten - TEN!! - crates of lemon drops delivered. Snape just didn't understand the old, probably senile headmaster (not that he particularly wanted to).
So here he was, stood outside of a worn-down orphanage, that a barely legible sign proclaimed to be 'Wool's Orphanage'.
If he had known just how much he would regret entering that orphanage and acquainting Harry James Potter with the wizarding world, he would have gone home and enjoyed the company of several bottles of firewhiskey - or something stronger. Just like Dumbledore had all of those years ago, when he first met one Tom Marvolo Riddle...
But our story starts at the most confusing part, just like every other.
Never the beginning, but at the start of the end.
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"I must confess to a bit of confusion upon recieving your letter, Mr Snape. In all the year's Harry's been here, he's never once had a family visitor. Frankly, I was stunned to find someone that knew of his existance." Serevus Snape barely resisted the urge to inform her to adress him as Professor Snape.
He could hear the unasked question in her voice: 'Why are you here?'
"I am not family, but I was quite close to his mother, and his name has been known to me since his birth."
"I see..." she mutters, but he knows she doesn't. One of the many things he noticed about her, was that her eyes got a glazed, faraway look, tinged with terror, almost as if remembering something long-since past, before she shook it off, like one would shake off a fly.
"What'd you say the name of this school is again, it sounds awfully familiar? I'm sure that boy, who lived here during the Blitz, got the same letter, something about how it was family tradition. Plain name, he had, except his middle one. Marvel, or something the like...", she gained a hysterical edge the more she spoke, eventually looking unhinged, which Severus would admit disturbingly reminded him of Bellatrix at her less... enthusiastic.
"The schools name is Hogwarts, Mrs Wool, and I find it highly unlikely that the boy that you refer to went to the same school." What he didn't notice, was her hate filled glare directed at the wall, when he announced the name of his workplace. She knew it alright... That demon boy had gone there for seven years, before he vanished.
"I think I should tell you, considering your going to be looking after the lad. He's a strange one, that Harry. Odd. There have been incidents with the other children. Nasty things." Again, she gained that drited off look.
During the brief period where she didn't appear to be mentally present, Snape thought about the odd reaction Albus had had to the adress on the Potter-spawn's letter.
Mr H.Potter
Room 7
Wool's Orphanage
London
The man looked on the verge of a heart attack! What could have caused that reaction?
He snapped back to attention as she seemed to mentally shake herself. "Perhaps you could give me an example. Is he a bully to the other children?"
She paused then shook her head negative with a frown, and opened her mouth to comment - before snapping her mouth shut, and continuing to walk down the corridor. As Severus was following her, his eyes caught on a black and white - yellowing with age - framed photo of a seaside with a sharp rock outcropping and a cave. He was sure he'd heard of something very similar from Regulus before his untimely demise, after he'd caught him talking about it to that wretched elf - Kreature. Well, surely it wasn't important. Right?
When they finally reached Room 7, the resident dungeon bat knocked on the door as the short matron scurried away as fast as her brittle bones could carry her. What on earth could have caused that reaction?
After hearing a faint 'come in', he open the door and walked in, grimacing at the room. It was cloaked in shadows and grime, only another copy of the picture he had seen earlier giving any colour to the room. Setting his eyes on the bane of his very existance, he couldn't help the sharp intake of breath he took. The child, who supposedly looked like James with Li-her eyes, had short, tamed hair in a sophisticated hairstyle (and Severus would forever deny it, but he was ever so pleased that the boy had escaped the grasp of the untamable beast that was the Potter hair), an emotionless mask on his face. His eyes, devoid of any emotion, weren't her green, oh no, they were the same eeiry colour of the curse that had taken the lives of so many, yet failed to take his, and they glowed unnaturally, as if the very power of the curse resided in his eyes. It was unnerving to the potion's master who had seen that same colour firsthand so many times that he had lost count, as well as losing count of how many lives it had taken. His scar though, that was just as shocking as his eyes. Albus had briefly mentioned in the past it looked like the wand movements for the killing curse. Now it stemmed across the boy's right eyes like a spreading infection. But it was black. Not red, or pale, or even inflamed. He had a black lightning bold permanently etched into his skin.
This angelic demon was just that, personifying the spell that killed perfectly, a demon hidden behind masks of beauty. The boy would enthrall those of weak minds, draw them in, only to devour them whole. Merlin pity the one who stood against this boy, no, boy isn't the right word. Rakshasa, afreet, fallen angel, and so many more would fit this child. All with a common meaning; demon.
It took a few minutes for him to regain his voice, the shock had been startling. In the time it had taken him to recover, the Potter heir's eyes had never once left him, only when he was blinking, and even then it was only for a fraction of a second. Severus would never admit it, but this child scared him, he radiated magic to the point the professor could literally taste it.
Then Snape began. "M-Mr Potter, (inwardly he cursed his stutter hoping that the brat hadn't noticed. The look on Potter's face though showed that his slip hadn’t been noted.)I am Professor Snape. I work at-"
"She's trying to get you to look at me, isn't she? The matron, I mean. I bet you're from the asylum, just like the last one. I'm pretty sure he got admitted the next day to the same ward he tried to put me in. Apparently trephination's still legal. He would know. But Matron? She's scared of me, of what I can do. I know she is. I've seen the way she looks at me. I’m just like the last freak she homed I'd what she says is to be believed. Are you one of the people she's brought in to free me of my evil freakishness, release me of the Devil's hold? I can assure you, it wouldn't do much. I can do things no one else can, not even the Devil himself. She thinks it'll go away if I repent enough for my Satanic worship. She doesn't feel it scream like I do. Doesn't feel it burn like I do. She doesn’t hear it sing when someone is in pain. I do. I hear it all."
For a second, Severus considered turning tail and running, to tell Albus that the boy wasn't here and pretend this had never happened. Surely the look on the boy's - no the monster's face was justification enough. Even the Dark Lord's hungry look of sick satisfaction when he tortured those he deemed dispensable couldn't compare to the look on the thing in front of him. His eyes seemed cloaked by sudden shadows, but they were different now. That unearthly green colour was gone. They looked the same crimson as freshly spilled blood now. The darkness seemed to accentuate the unnatural colour. His expression was blank, alarmingly so. He looked like a broken porcelain doll, especially with a lighting scar travelling across his right eye.
He could do this. He could finish this explanation. Definitely. Hopefully. Praying his occlumency shield held long enough for him to get as far away from this place as possible. Keeping his face and tone neutral he spoke, let's just hope he didn't crack.
"What can you do Mr Potter? What makes you so sure that I'm not different, just like you? Oh, and please restrain from calling it 'freakishness'. It is magic, nothing more, and nothing less. That's why I'm here. You have, since birth, been on a list for one of the worlds best school's of witchcraft and wizardry, Hogwarts. Merely out of curiosity what is it you an do? Can you control it?"
Harry raised his left eyebrow, filled with skepticism, before replying. "What makes you think I'll tak your word for it? Prove it."
In response, Snape wordlessly summoned a snake, who the boy seemed to be... listening to? Just great, Potter being a parcelmouth made life so much more difficult, now more than ever."Now, can you tell me what you've done with your magic before?"
"I can make things move without touching them. I can make animals do what I want without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who are mean tome. I can make them hurt... if I want." The supposedly heartless potions professor had only ever felt this much fear in the presence of one man, a man ths child had klled as a baby. Voldemort.
Without another word he handed the Boy-Who-Lived his Hogwarts letter and made to leave. Right as he got to the door, the frightening child spoke again. "I can speak to snakes." The elder of the two froze. "They find me. Whisper things. Is that normal? For someone like me?"
He managed a strangled 'no', before he fled the building and, once in an alley around the corner, apperated(sp?) away. He needed the strongest drink he could get his hands on. The Malfoy's wouldn't mind an impromptu visit as long as he checks on his godson and his potion lessons while he's there. Honestly, anywhere was better than in the suffocating room that felt darker than when it was last inhabited, almost half a century earlier. Not that Snape would ever know.
He'd be dead before he ever would.