Chapter Twenty-two: The Library Again

Winter, 1980

"Poor Severus," said Voldemort. "But what else could I have done? I would have had to kill him if he had refused to take the Mark. Obliviation would never have worked."

"N--no. But he didn't refuse." Obvious, but Lucius couldn't think of anything more intelligent to say. He was too shaken by what he had just seen.

"I didn't realise his Light magic would be that inconvenient." Voldemort looked thoughtful for a moment, then added, "You're sure your house-elf can take care of him?"

"Dobby is my most capable elf," said Lucius. And more importantly, his most trustworthy. What had happened to Severus Snape in Lucius's library must never leave it. Voldemort would insist upon it, whether he said so in so many words or not.

"Good," said Voldemort. "He must recover as soon as possible, so that I can put him to work."

"I thought he would die!" Lucius's astonishment burst out of him.

"But he did not," said Voldemort softly. "Just as I hoped. Just as I gambled."

Lucius smiled in spite of himself. It must have been the relief. "At least, now that he is ours, you can tell Bella why she had to help snare him. She never trusted Severus, you know. She still doesn't."

Voldemort laughed. "Poor Bella! She found it most distasteful to befriend Tobias Snape; she made no secret of that! But how else could we hope to get him into Linden Lane, with the Muggle-Repelling Enchantment that Watkins woman had woven with her tenants' magic?"

"I was hoping Eileen Snape would let her husband in," said Lucius.

"Yes, who knew she would finally learn strength? Surprising, isn't she? Rather like her son."

"Fortunately, Bella's connection with Tobias was enough," said Lucius, though he still felt rather doubtful.

"It's like being a Mudblood, isn't it?" Voldemort laughed coldly. "How do the Muggle-born's parents get into Diagon Alley to help him with his school shopping? How do they get to Hogwarts for the conference with the Headmaster when their precious darling has done something horribly wrong? How do they get so far as Platform Nine-and-Three-Quarters to see their child onto the Hogwarts Express? Their wizard child is the Muggles' passport into the wizarding world.

"So it is with a Muggle husband and a witch wife, like Tobias and Eileen Snape. Because of their conjugal connection, the witch Eileen could let the Muggle Tobias into the magical Linden Lane, even against the wishes of her landlady and the other tenants.

"And so it might be," said Voldemort, "with a Muggle lover and his witch mistress."

Lucius stared.

"Bella could get into Linden Lane. She had accompanied Narcissa on visits to Eileen Snape in Linden Lane several times. It remains only to ask how close a relationship a Muggle needs to have with a witch for her to get him past Mrs Watkins's Muggle-Repelling Enchantment."

Lucius continued to stare.

"We shan't ask Bella that," said Voldemort. "Suffice it to say that she has always done whatever I needed her to do. All she volunteered to tell me was that she Obliviated Tobias Snape." He chuckled. "Perhaps she wishes she could Obliviate herself."

Lucius had to get himself through several moments of shock before he could say, "At least now Tobias Snape is dead."

"Yes. He's dead. And I saw to it the last month's rent was paid on his room in Grimmauld Place. Severus won't have that debt to worry about."

And Bella, Lucius imagined, would no longer have to worry about attending Tobias there. Or perhaps he didn't want to imagine that. "How did you steer him to Grimmauld Place?"

"Will Paxton. Via Rabastan Lestrange. They both took rooms in the same boarding house. Will thought he'd look for work while Tobias looked for his wife, since there was nothing for him back home. I hope that made it easier for you?"

Much easier for keeping Tobias under his eye, since Lucius had been with Narcissa at Number Twelve frequently in the past year, comforting poor Aunt Walburga after Regulus had disappeared and Orion had died. They'd met Bella and Rodolphus there often enough. So that had probably made it easier for Bella too.

"She will come to feel that her sacrifice was worth it, I am sure," said Voldemort. "For now Eileen Snape is secure. Now Severus Snape is free."

"Of all the rest of Tobias's debt too," said Lucius, eager to move on from the subject of Bella and Tobias. "Tobias Snape owed enough money to ruin Severus. But Father's solicitors paid it all. At the request of a client, according to Wandless senior."

Voldemort smiled. "I persuaded the firm to contribute to a good cause."

Lucius looked at him in surprise. To kill Tobias Snape was one thing. But to coerce the ancient firm of Wandless and Wandless? "Why have you done so much for Severus Snape, my lord?"

"The very question he asked me. But you ought to know the answer, Lucius. You are the one who proposed I take on the wizard who could invent Sectumsempra and conjure a Patronus."

"You have not found the latter a stumbling-block, my lord," Lucius ventured.

"I doubted you, Lucius. I admit it. But you were right. He has Light in him, but darkness rules him, or he could not have taken my Mark. He is like you and me. He wants all for himself that he can get."

"I serve you, my lord," Lucius murmured. "What I want, I want for you."

"Oh, stop lying," Voldemort said, laughing. "Or rather, don't. You amuse me."

Swallowing hard, Lucius hurried on. "So you have a use for Snape, my lord? You've taken such an interest in him these past few months."

"You're not jealous, are you, Lucius?"

Actually, he wasn't. He had learned better than to crave the Lord's full attention. He also knew better than to say so.

"I do have a use for him," said Voldemort. "As Severus knows now--better than any of you, I think--I have a way of barring spies from our ranks."

Lucius knew all he needed. He hadn't forgotten the Auror, a young fellow named McMahon, who'd had the life burned out of him when he'd tried to take the Dark Mark. Neither Dumbledore nor the Ministry had sent anybody since to try to infiltrate the Death Eaters.

"Dumbledore has his own way of rooting out spies," said Voldemort. "Until now, it has been foolproof. Dumbledore has devised a means of sending messages using Patronuses, but that is not why they are important to him. The ability to conjure a Patronus shows a bent toward Light magic--an inclination so strong that I have never before seen that and the capacity to take the Dark Mark--which is the willingness to submit to me--in one and the same person. I never expected to see it. And then, Lucius, you brought me Severus. With Severus, I can do to Dumbledore what he has never been able to do to me. I can place a spy within the very heart of his Order. Perhaps--" Voldemort's voice fell "--within his very heart."

Seeing the look on Voldemort's face, Lucius might have feared for Dumbledore, if he hadn't disliked the man so much. "Within his heart, my lord? How will you do that?"

Voldemort eyed him. "Did Severus ever mention to you anything about giving Dumbledore--some sort of promise?"

"Why--er, no, my lord."

"No," agreed Voldemort. "He wouldn't. And you will never mention that I spoke of it."

"Of course not, my lord."

"I know how to handle my weapon, Lucius. That is all you need to know. That is all which it is safe for you to know." Voldemort smiled. "Yes, I do worry about your safety. You will be of use to me for a while yet, I think." A distant look entered his eyes. "And Severus. He will be of use too. My weapon. My Sword of Slytherin, which I will aim straight at Dumbledore's heart. My spy, who will infiltrate the Order of the Phoenix."

Lucius looked at him in amazement, then with satisfaction. It was he who had given Severus Snape to the Dark Lord.

"And if all goes well, you will have your reward," said Voldemort. "Never fear. But on to more pressing matters. For instance, the job of a St Mungo's Apothecary. It's quite onerous, don't you think? Late nights, on-call shifts." Voldemort paused as if waiting for an answer.

"I wouldn't know, my lord."

"No. A Malfoy would never stoop to grubbing for a living."

Indeed not, thought Lucius. But the Dark Lord, smiling sardonically, did not appear to consider that much of a virtue.

"But Severus must grub away, Lucius, as you need not, and fortunately we can put that to use. His school records indicate that, although he wasn't first in his year, in a few subjects Severus was outstanding. Potions. Very helpful, if you want to be an Apothecary. Defence Against the Dark Arts. Well, that stands to reason for someone who could create countering magic to those nasty spells he thought up."

"I remember when he started Hogwarts," said Lucius. "He knew more curses than half the seventh-years."

"Well enough to teach them, as Rabastan can attest. And what do you know? Headmaster Dumbledore is looking for another Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher for Hogwarts."

"Again?"

"Yes. I understand poor Professor Carmichael was nearly eaten by an Acromantula a couple of weeks ago, on a routine foray into the Forbidden Forest. She's recuperating at home and says she won't be back to teach next year. She'd prefer, I hear, to return to her former quiet life of hunting Lethifolds in New Guinea."

"There was a new one every year I went to Hogwarts," said Lucius. "And now that I've left, Father still talks every spring about the Governors vetting the contract for the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher."

"They'll be doing it again this spring. And I was thinking: why shouldn't it be Severus's contract? Why shouldn't Dumbledore hire him?"

Lucius looked at him in wonder. He knew no one who had joined Voldemort because of his brilliance, but the wizard certainly was brilliant. "He's as qualified as any they've had. And no one is closer to Dumbledore than his teachers."

"Exactly. Dumbledore is an acute Legilimens, so Severus will need a bit of Occlumency training. But my conversations with him lead me to believe he'd be a natural. Dumbledore could decide against hiring him, of course. But something tells me...." Voldemort trailed off, looking thoughtful.

Every moment of their conversation since Dobby had carried Severus out had seemed to imply that Voldemort thought Severus was even more remarkable than Lucius had hoped he would. "Yes, my lord?" he urged.

"That Severus would be far less incompetent than some of the people Dumbledore has hired to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts." Smiling, Voldemort rose. "So take good care of him, would you? That way, we could see to it that the children of Hogwarts get at least one year of decent instruction in the subject." He swept to the centre of the room with a swirl of robes and, with an eerily graceful half-turn, Disapparated.

****

Lucius stood watching the spot where Voldemort had stood. Severus was lucky to be alive. And he was lucky that Severus was alive. When, after a minute in Voldemort's grip, Severus had collapsed at his feet, Lucius had feared that Severus was dead, leaving himself no higher, to say the least, in the Dark Lord's esteem.

Instead, it had all turned out better than he had hoped. He had wondered whether he could persuade Severus to meet the Dark Lord. He had succeeded. He had wondered whether he could find Severus and his mother again after their eviction from their tidy mansion block. Through the good offices of an Imperiused St Mungo's personnel records clerk, he had succeeded. It hadn't hurt that, as the son of a hospital trustee, he had more freedom of the hospital office corridors than most. No one would remark upon the appearance of young Mr Malfoy in one or another of the St Mungo's administrative offices. He'd been popping in for lunch with his father before a Board meeting or dinner afterward for the past couple of years.

And he hadn't even had to work out how to get Tobias Snape past old woman Watkins's Muggle-Repelling Charm. The Dark Lord had been enthusiastic enough about Severus after meeting him for the first time to think of his own solution to the problem. And, truth to tell, Lucius doubted he could have been quite so--imaginative. It wouldn't be easy for some time to come to look Bellatrix Black Lestrange in the eye. He only hoped Rodolphus never found out.

The rest was easy, after Watkins had chucked Severus and his mother out of Linden Lane. Simply take Severus and Eileen in at Malfoy Manor. Simply prove that the scions of Slytherin House, the Malfoys and Blacks to whom a faintly sinister reputation still clung, would offer them succour as the wizarding government authorities, like the wizarding school authorities before them, would not. And let the Dark Lord do the work which no one else could do better.

So Tobias Snape was dead, killed in a pub brawl while Severus and Eileen slept snug in their beds at Malfoy Manor. Even Rufus Scrimgeour, the Auror who had haunted Severus's footsteps after Severus had healed his partner (such was the wretch's gratitude!), suspected nothing.

Severus was free, and under such circumstances as were bound to steer him toward the Death Eaters. So much Lucius had hoped for. What he hadn't hoped for was the blossoming of Eileen Snape. The comfort his mother's happiness gave Severus was every bit as important as his relief at finding his father had died without debt. And if the Dark Lord had forced Wandless and Wandless to secretly make good on Tobias Snape's debt--well, Lucius couldn't exactly sympathise. The hours old Wandless had billed Father for over the past twenty-five years would more than cover the firm's loss.

Lucius sighed happily, not only at the success of the Dark Lord's plan, but at its beauty. It had even been worth suffering Severus's Sectumsempra Curse, since Severus's healing had left him without scars. After all, it was that night of Sectumsempra, in this very library, which had convinced the Dark Lord to select Severus as the weapon with which he would strike at Albus Dumbledore's heart.

No one, thought Lucius, no one has offered Lord Voldemort a greater prize than Severus Snape.

Better see to it that the prize remained unspoiled. Lucius pointed his wand at the bell rope in the corner. In a few seconds, Dobby responded, Apparating into the library with a crack! He bowed until his nose scraped the rug. "Yes, Lucius Malfoy, sir?"

"How is Snape?"

"Severus Snape is sleeping, Lucius Malfoy, sir."

"No tossing and turning? No muttering, no crying out? No nightmares?"

Trembling so hard that the hem of his tea towel shook, Dobby peered into the dark corners of the library.

"Yes, you know who was here," said Lucius. "But he's gone for now. So just answer the question."

Dobby fixed his eyes on Lucius. "Severus Snape sleeps. With no mutterings, no cryings-out, no nightmares. Peacefully, he sleeps."

"Good. Go back to him, then. When he wakens, call me at once."

"Yes, Lucius Malfoy, sir." Dobby bowed, then Disapparated.

"Yes, Lucius Malfoy, sir." Lucius mimicked the elf softly, gazing into the empty space which had held him a moment before. "Yes. Guard Severus Snape carefully, Dobby. He is, for the moment, valuable to Lord Voldemort. So he is--for the moment--valuable to me."

End of Part One

****

I'm going to refurbish Part One by editing in a more DH-compliant Lily/Snape relationship, although I'm going to leave my chronology of Snape's Worst Memory and the Prank intact. The current chronology works for my story, and besides, for reasons which have been amply discussed elsewhere, I can't quite wrap my mind around having the Worst Memory occur after the Werewolf Prank.

After that, on to Part Two.

Many, many thanks to Anne, Lyras and Panamdea, my patient, observant, meticulous and generally brilliant beta readers. I couldn't have done it without you.