The Seven Deadly Sins

Author: Libertyelyot aka Shez ;)
Pairing: Sinistra and Snape
Warnings: Angst


How many years has it been? Let me count backwards…

He is headmaster now, but his tenure as the Potions Master was long, beginning when I was still a student. I remember the young man with his crow-black hair and skinny pointy fingers, using the power of his stare to wither the class clowns where they sat. He was no more than twenty one or two, but after the inevitable testing period, even the most hardened recidivists settled down and accepted his authority.

He ruled by fear, of course, and when I joined the staff – seven years ago now – I had resolved to be as little like him as possible. I wanted to be warm without Trelawney’s flakiness; firm without McGonagall’s ascerbic quality; as fascinating as Flitwick but not as whimsical.

My resolution lasted roughly half a lesson. Dismayingly, teaching was more difficult than I had bargained for. Oh, I had no problem with the planning or the delivery of the information, or the marking of papers. But establishing a well-disciplined learning environment was tougher than I had been led to believe. The older pupils saw me as a contemporary of theirs rather than an authority figure and were inclined to slack off as much as they could get away with, while the youngsters merely saw their opportunity to run rings around an inexperienced staff member. It was exhausting and dispiriting.

My least favourite combination was Gryffindor with Slytherin. I knew I could rely on a Ravenclaw’s innate love of knowledge, and the Hufflepuffs were born teacher-pleasers, but these other two Houses were thorns in my flesh. The Slytherins excelled in sly and underhanded mischief, while the Gryffindors were tempestuous and cheeky. I did my best to rein these tendencies in, but my initial Wednesday night lesson with the first year Gryffindors and Slytherins soon descended into a shambles.

The one saving grace of this year group was that so far they knew little magic, but the antipathy between them was extreme. Already Harry Potter seemed to have made enemies in the form of young Draco Malfoy and his pugnacious little friends, and the sniping between them was near constant.

“Observe the patterns,” I urged them. “Can you identify any of the stellar groupings we looked at on the charts?”

“Draco!” whooped Malfoy. “I bet none of you has their own constellation.” He looked around the platform, puffing his small chest up with pride. “Except Potter – he’s got the lesser dog.”

“Give it a rest, Malfoy,” chipped in a red-haired boy; a Weasley, I believe.

I sighed and returned to the one child who appeared to be making an effort, a wild-haired girl called Hermione. I turned a weary blind eye to the slanging match that was taking place around me and discussed the configurations that we could see in the inky sky instead. I called for quiet three times, but was roundly ignored. The class was moving towards a more general level of disruption now, some pushing and shoving and a great deal of shouting and name-calling.

“I will speak to your Heads of House,” I threatened, but I am an unconvincing threatener; far too mild-mannered and reasonable. There was a scream as one of Malfoy’s friends – Crabbe? – swung on the telescope, kicking his legs out towards a gaggle of Gryffindors on the other side. I rushed forward with the intention of sending him out of the room, but before I could reach him an intense sort of silence blanketed the Tower and I became conscious of the stiff looks on the children’s faces as they all faced the door, limbs frozen in place.

“What is the meaning of this?”

Professor Snape stood in the doorway, arms folded, robes flapping from his shoulders in that trademark way of his. I am ashamed to say that I was probably no less terrified to see him than the children were.

“Crabbe, take yourself downstairs and wait for me outside my office. Professor Sinistra, a word please. And as for the rest of you, don’t think for one instant that if you put a foot out of place I won’t know about it. I will.”

Feeling like an errant student, and then feeling hot and angry at feeling that way, I stepped outside the door with my nemesis. We stood silently, waiting for Crabbe to make his doleful way down the spiral and out of earshot, then I turned to Snape, my lips pursed, on the defensive.

“You didn’t need to do that. It was under control.”

He raised an incredulous eyebrow. “Clearly it was not, Professor, or I would not have felt the necessity to intervene. That baying mob could be heard from the dungeons.”

“Oh, of course they couldn’t,” I said crossly.

“Only a slight exaggeration,” he replied, unyielding. “I was patrolling the library corridor, which is some way away, when I first became aware that something was amiss up here.”

I was mortified but I really did not want his help or his patronising advice. Unfortunately the only way I could think of to express this was by pouting and tapping my foot on the floor. Hardly the actions of a confident colleague.

“Professor Sinistra, allow me to offer you a word of advice.” Oh gods! This was intolerable. I made an inarticulate clicking noise in my throat, but he continued regardless. “These children do not want you to be their friend. Failure to set boundaries or apply consequences for poor behaviour is confusing and indeed alarming to them. They want you to make it abundantly clear that they can go so far but no further. If you do not do this very soon, you will lose them entirely. Muggle pedagogues have a saying, I believe: ‘Don’t smile till Christmas’. It’s not a bad principle.”

I knew at heart that there was wisdom in what he said, and from any other staff member it would have been gratefully received. But oh, Hades, why did it have to be him? I could not just smile sweetly and thank him for his advice.

Bristling, I said, “Perhaps we don’t all want to follow your example and rule by fear.”

Rather than taking offence at that, the flicker of a smile twitched at his lips.

“You’ll need to rule somehow, Professor,” he noted, “or they will rule you. Ignore me if you wish, but I promise you that you will regret it. This is a big enough ship of fools as it is without another to add to the crew. Good evening.”

I took his advice without having to blend our dissonant educational philosophies too much. After all, he was trying to be helpful. But I didn’t want his help, or his pity, or his patronage.

I wanted him.


Of course, he did not know, and I could never have told him. He was so fenced-in, so closed off. For a while I wondered if he was gay and in a relationship with Dumbledore – they did seem so awfully close. But then, in my third year here, Remus Lupin told me that he had loved a girl at school, lost her, and then she died tragically. So he was at least heterosexual. The inappropriately lengthy grieving period was worrying, though. Severus Snape was clearly not a man who took life – or love – lightly. Did he feel unworthy of affection and tenderness from another human? Would he rebuff all offers of intimacy?

Probably.

So I waited. I waited for war. In times of war, the most repressed souls can suddenly burst into flower, driven outwards by the possibility of annihilation. We all knew it was coming, Snape more than most. His demeanour became, if anything, colder and more guarded than ever.

But still I waited. I knew that the moment of vulnerability would come, and when it did, I would be there. I would give him the taste of sweetness he had never had. Perhaps we would make it through, perhaps neither of us would survive – but at least we would have had that moment together.

I watched him. All through the simmering tension of the Tri-Wizard Tournament, all through the grim fiasco of Umbridge’s takeover of the school. He was like the most tightly-wound spring you had ever seen, never allowing himself the luxury of an off-guard second.

There was a night, towards the end of my sixth year, when I encountered him in the Astronomy Tower, alone, brooding and staring over the parapet of the walkway.

‘Professor Snape,’ I said timidly. Although we were colleagues, somehow I could not bring myself to call him Severus.

‘What the blazes are you doing here?’ he snapped, whirling around, angry and discomfited that I had caught him there.

‘It’s my classroom,’ I pointed out gently. ‘I thought I might prepare for my next lesson. While it’s quiet.’

He merely looked at me – or seemed to. One could never tell when those black, black eyes were on you, or looking past you.

‘Do you…are you all right?’ I ventured.

‘All right,’ he almost whispered. He swallowed and for a moment gave the impression that something momentous was about to be said.

Then he turned on his heel and swirled out of the door.

He killed Dumbledore the next night.

So my patience had come to nothing, or so I thought. The man I had invested in was a murderous Death Eating low life. I had wasted all these years.

He returned to Hogwarts in September amidst general uproar and disbelief. We all threatened to resign as a body, but were told in no uncertain terms that Azkaban awaited us if we did. Snape was to be headmaster, and we were to accept it.

Grimmer and grimmer grew the fortress. Charity Burbage never came back to take her discontinued Muggle Studies class. The Carrows appeared on the scene – coarse, brutal bullies whose treatment of the children incensed us all.

‘Severus was never a kind man, but I still find it hard to believe he’d sanction this,’ Minerva lamented one day in the staffroom. ‘I know he’s a traitor – I accept that now – but this viciousness! I wouldn’t say it was unlike him – but it’s so unrefined. And Severus was always keen on the refinement of cruelty, rather than putting the boot in.’

Yes, she was right. It didn’t ring true. Severus would never approve of the behaviour of the Carrows unless…he was being leaned on. Made to act outside his true nature. Was he, after all, some kind of…?

The more I thought about it, the more plausible it seemed. I found out his time of birth and drew up a chart. I consulted the stars and planets. They all backed me up. Severus was not what he seemed. He was destined to be misunderstood, his actions misinterpreted by all. But not by me.

I stewed and stewed until I realised that I had to force a confrontation. His time was near, and I could not afford my patience any more.

He was in the habit of walking the castle in the early hours. I knew this because it was when I did most of my teaching. While my class huddled around the telescope, I would see him cross the grounds like an elegant black spectre, going nowhere except further and further into his thoughts.

On this occasion, I dismissed my class. With my wand, I began to perform a number of charms, speedily, desperate to complete my task before he returned indoors. The air was illuminated above the walkway, small firebugs of light whizzing and spinning into the configuration I wanted. I saw him turn, frowning up at the Tower. The firebugs settled into the correct pattern and I grinned, suppressing a hysterical shiver, when he began to run towards the nearest door.

I waited for him, surveying my wandwork with satisfaction. An enormous Gryffindor lion, made of light, was rearing up into the sky. Beneath it were the words, ‘This Is a Permanent Memorial to Albus Dumbledore, Who Lost His Life Upon This Spot’.

I had no way of knowing what would happen next, but in the most elemental way, I simply did not care. He could kill me if he liked. Death could not be worse than the half-life of fear and misery we were living. But if he kissed me…that would be better.

I heard his boots on the stone spiral outside, stepping lightly but purposefully. I heard the door fly open. I heard his voice.

‘Who is up here? Longbottom? Finnegan? Miss Weasley?’

The lighted tip of his wand landed on my face. I squinted and shielded my eyes.

‘You…did you see who was here? Who did this?’ He hurried towards me, extinguishing my memorial with a few brief flicks of his wand. He glanced at me impatiently. ‘Well?’

‘I did it,’ I said quietly.

His face contorted, clearly disbelieving, then he stared at me, hard, hard enough to break all but the most desperate resolve.

‘You. You did it?’ He was giving me a chance to deny it, to let me off with a warning, I realised. I did not want to be let off with a warning.

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Why?’

He had folded his arms and was looming.

‘Because Dumbledore deserves a memorial,’ I said. ‘Don’t you agree?’

‘What do you think you are playing at? I don’t want to send you to Azkaban…’

‘So don’t.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Don’t send me to Azkaban.’

‘You are demonstrating your disloyalty to the Dark Lord; what choice do you give me?’ He was hissing now, and one of his hands was near my shoulder, as if he was poised to grab it and push me down the stairs.

‘You have choices,’ I said. ‘You don’t have to do this.’

‘Do…what?’ His whisper was knife-like; he was furious with me, but not for the reasons he wanted me to think. He was furious with me for understanding him.

‘Do whatever horrible thing you’ve been charged to do,’ I said. ‘You don’t want to do it, do you? Why are you doing it? Why? I think I know why.’ I blathered on into his incredulous, dangerous silence. ‘Because you think you’re guilty for that girl’s death. That girl that you loved, back in school. You don’t fear death, you don’t think you deserve to live, so you’re putting your life at risk to’-

‘Shut! Up!’ His sibilance overlaid my sudden sharp cry as he grabbed hold of my hair and pulled it hard. ‘One more word and I will send you the same way as Dumbledore.’

There were no more words anyway. I saw him reach for his wand and I disarmed him the only way it is possible to disarm Snape – by doing the thing he least expects.

I grabbed hold of his shirt collar, yanked his face down and crushed my lips to his. Amazingly, the wand fell from his hand – he tried to prise me off, but shock rendered his effort half-hearted. I climbed up his long torso, hanging off his shoulders, my feet swinging above the floor, intent on nothing but clinging to those lips. His arm came around the back of me, pulling me closer and he edged into a savage reciprocity.

We fell to the floor, thrashing and pulling at each other, blind fingers in hair and under robes, two disconnected souls connecting at last.

We stayed there until dawn, taking from each other, giving to each other, knowing it was hopeless but happy to have the moment.

‘I should Obliviate you,’ he said, watching the sky go from grey to red while I nestled in his torn robes, dazed and bruised.

‘There’s no need,’ I said. ‘Are you angry with me?’

He kissed the top of my head. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I am. I’m furious with you.’

‘I should have pissed you off a long time ago,’ I mused.

‘I wish you had,’ he said.

There was a hue and cry from somewhere in the castle; clouds of smoke began to billow into the sky. We leapt to our feet, alarmed.

Cries of ‘Crabbe! Crabbe!’ came from a direction we could not place.

‘I have to go,’ said Severus hurriedly, planting a quick kiss on my lips and hurrying away.

Of course, I never saw him again. But I will never regret giving him a memory to take into battle with him. I do rather regret my patience though. Some virtues are overrated.