The Witch\'s Hair Shirt

The fact that he had charmed his wards to allow him the satisfaction of slamming the door to his private quarters didn’t bring his usual smirk. His long strides took him to the cabinet of wizard spirits and muggle liquor; he flung open the tall doors and stared at the vast collection of liquids, each whispering a promise of respite and forgettin
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While deciding whether he wanted to temporarily empty his mind of these current thoughts or just dull the cutting edges, he brutally tore at the silvered clasp that closed his robes and they thudded to the floor, a dark pool around his feet. He leaned into the cabinet and brought out a heavy, crystal glass and his oldest bottle of talisker. As he levitated the glass and poured the whiskey, he could feel his shoulders itching to be rid of the weight of his woolen frock coat. He sneered at himself, grabbed at the half full glass of amber liquid and downed it in one gulp. A grimace of satisfied pain rode across the sharp plains of his face, the butterscotch fire roaring down his throat. He waited for the smoky aftertaste, then refilled the glass and returned the bottle to a dark corner inside the cabinet.

He would just grind off the surgical precision of the memories, then.

Dumbledore’s announcement certainly was a sign of something much bigger than a substitute instructor. It boded of things which would need to be examined and considered with some semblance of consciousness. The situation with the twin librarians was another thing altogether and required no more thought. He was to blame for not having noticed their interest before, in the same way that he was to blame for now having drawn perhaps more of their attentions. What was the saying, “Keep your friends close, your enemies closer?” Well, he had just added two to the crowd he held within his embrace…he couldn’t help but snicker at the dichotomy of it. He hadn’t held anyone in his arms since forever and now he was holding legion closer than any lover. The dragoon mating dance, he thought bitterly.

He kicked his robes against the wall, walked to the fireplace, set the glass down on the hearth and clawed at the buttons that kept the fitted coat closed around him. He shrugged out of the garment and threw the jacket into one of the armchairs. Spitting out the word “Incendio,” the resultant warmth from the blazing hearth fire confirmed that the cold on his skin was a chill seeping up out of his pores. Slowly he unbuttoned his stiffly starched dress shirt and in one fluid motion shook it from his body, balled it up and threw it with all his might into the fire. He watched it catch and marveled as a flower of regret bloomed inside his brain; the waste of fine cloth, craftsmanship and a month’s wages.

He stood, staring into the flames, observing the shirt burn and collapse into a fine grey ash. He felt better for being rid of the heavier outer garments; his tightly cut black trousers, his leather boots and the shimmering pale gold of the finely woven undershirt gave him a feeling of personal freedom he never felt in his coat and robes, although he did wish that his best shirt had not been sacrificed.

Retrieving his glass, he dropped himself into an armchair. He took a deep breath and then another and then another and wondered if perhaps he might be on the verge of tears.

Great Hecate, he thought to himself, I’m having some sort orvourvous breakdown.

‘Katla Freyan’ The sound of her name played inside his head. He remembered the other one’s name and let it fall from his lips like a reverent prayer, “Gerda Solveig.”

Yes, it was going to be tears, he realized, and with the same dread and revulsion usually reserved for vomiting, Snape squared his shoulders and willed his body not to betray him in that way. He would rather retch his emotions out than succumb to tears. He leaned forward and placed the heavy tumbler on the floor, with both hands locked behind his neck, he pulled his head down to his knees. He counted to ten in Latin, then on to twenty in French, to thirty in German, forty in Gaelic and finally, finally began to feel his eyes harden and his throat relax.

Leaning back again in the chair, he grasped two handfuls of the golden shirt that had come to define the hidden parts of him over the past nine years. He rolled the material between his thumbs and forefingers, marveling at it. His mind opened to the remembrance of her floor-length braid, the witch who sawed at its great thickness with glinting shears, the one who washed it clean of vomit and blood, the other witch who wove it while singing a wordless song of numbing loss.

He remembered the first weeks of his harrowing need to scratch it off his body and then the slow resignation to it, to its unique pain; the shirt that had been made from Gerda Solveig’s pale blonde hair.