Fire & Ice: War Games

‘Ere sin could blight or sorrow fade,
Death came with friendly care;
The opening bud to Heaven conveyed,
And bade it blossom there.’

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Epitaph on an Infant




The door clicked softly behind him and Severus released his breath slowly. Emotionally and mentally exhausted, he slumped against the door let his body slide limply down. He drew his legs against his chest and tucked them beneath his chin. Wrapping his arms around his folded legs, he let the tears fall freely down his sallow cheeks. For a brief lapse in eternity, he allowed himself the luxury of crying. As the weight crushing him lightened, Severus reined in his emotions and clawed feverishly at his eyes in the vain attempt to plug the flooding waterworks again. Puffy eyed, Severus wrestled with chaotic thundering of his heart in a new futile attempt to regain his composure.

Closing his eyes, Severus felt the full weight of the emptiness that had replaced him a long time ago. If his life had been different, Severus wondered what kind of person he might have become. If a person was the defined by the scars acquired from their personal experiences, Severus theorized as he stared at the opposite wall, then perhaps he might’ve been socialable or even accepted by his peers if his past had been different. Though he loved his house and had been pleased with the Sorting Hat’s decision, Severus couldn’t help but wish that he’d been placed in another. Then at least he wouldn’t have been forced to join the Dark Lord’s minions and he wouldn’t be a constant target for certain nameless Gryffindors. As soon as the wish had been completed, Severus regretted it.

Despite the many grievances he had in regards to his life, Severus knew that he wouldn’t want to live another life. Surprising himself, Severus didn’t register any emotion as the moment of clarity settled around him. He was exhausted, tired of living as it already was. As he leaned against the door, Severus felt the last of his will dissolve as his head slumped to his chest in defeat. The ingrained primal instinct for self-preservation flickered briefly before being squelched inside of his soul. The pressures and mind games had taken their own toll on his soul and heart, Severus was slowly suffocating beneath their crushing weight as he struggled against the gulf of nothingness lying between life and death.

The brief conversation with Gryffindor House’s matron had stirred memories best left collecting dust in the farthest and deepest recesses of his mind. The seemingly prophetic dreams had only served to release the reality of his plight that was until then known only by his unconscious mind. Severus understood that for the first time, he truly had nothing left to hold onto and he was ready to take the next step. Oddly enough, Severus found himself at peace with the simple conclusion that the string of circumstances from the last couple of weeks had brought him and was grateful that it was so easy to make the decision. Severus only hoped the transition went as easily.

A glint of silver caught his eye and drew him to the small cabinet to his left. Severus was mildly surprised to find that his hand was steady as it sought the object beneath the cabinet. Dust coated cobwebs wrapped themselves around his fingers like cotton candy around a cone as his heart throbbed steadily in his ears and his hand brought the silvery object to his face. Any other day, Severus might have wondered why the Transfiguration Mistress would be in possession of a muggle’s straight blade razor. Today, however, Severus was beyond caring. The steel of the blade was colder than ice to his touch and yet it seemed to comfort him as the light reflected off it its surface. He understood then what the muggle William Shakespeare had meant when he had wrote about a man’s fate being not written in the stars. He could hear the whistle calling to him from far away and knew that he was going to ride on the long black train one more time. The difference was that he was choosing to go for the ride and not being forced too. Severus’ destination was the middle of nowhere and going there fast.

Now that he had arrived at the point of no return and had acquired a suitable instrument, Severus feimseimself waver. Severus trembled as he felt his resolve slip like quicksand from beneath him. For a brief moment, Severus unwittingly convinced himself that there were things to live for after all. A memory surfaced, one of a million that refused to be lost in vastness of his mind and quickly followed the fragile thought, recharging his resolve. Severus understood that he was the fruit born from a poisonous tree and had accepted the fact that his lot in life was simply to occupy empty space. He had hoped to at least graduate from Hogwarts, to have accomplished something before he had departed.

Empty onyx eyes closed as he brought the sharp blade of the razor to the inside of his arm. Severus mentally prepared himself to escape into the abyss as the blade cut into the sensitive flesh above the pale blue vein in his arm. He held the his breath as the blade ran the length of his throbbing vein. Curious, Severus risked a peek at his handiwork. He frowned at the grim sight that greeted him, “that’s what I get for not using a potion!” The flesh on the inside of his arm was red with irritation and a raised strip ran the length of his arm from his wrist to the inside of the elbow from where the razor had only scratched the surface of his skin.

His father’s voice whispered in his ear a familiar tirade as he stared miserably down at his arm. “You’re worthless!”

His mother hissed in his other ear, “to think that I labored to give life to such a creature!”

Severus whimpered into the silence of the room as the voices continued to remind him of his own worthlessness. “You’re a waste of flesh and bone, Snivellus.”

Fresh tears poured down his face as the voices continued, their voices rising to extinguish the muffling of Severus’ hands as they covered his ears. “Why don’t you just get it over with and save us the trouble of sharing the same air with you?!”

The wizened face of the headmaster appeared before his blurry eyes, “and you expect me to
waste my sympathy on a pathetic Slytherin, huh!”

“Why should I bother concerning myself with the welfare of slimy Slytherins when I’m a good, golden Gryffindor and have a hard enough time focusing on those that are worth saving?” Professor McGonagall’s apparition asked him, a stern and lecturing expression on her face as she looked down at the inch tall Slytherin boy.

Severus growled softly, his eyes fluttered closed as his head slumped forward in resignation. It seemed to him that the dark angel would continue to taunt him from close by as he desperately sought the elusive creature’s company. Frustrated, he didn’t fight the fresh flood of tears falling from his beetle-black eyes. Tucking his knees beneath his chin once more, Severus buried his face in his arms as he wrapped them around his body. Rocking back and forth, “I wish I was dead.” The razor slipped between his fingers and onto the floor, the blade’s edge was painted with bright red blood.

The cut on his palm stung through the numbness of his pain. Beetle black eyes peered over his folded hands and silently watched the blood trickle down his hand and onto his pant leg. Severus felt the last of his will dissolve as he reached for the discarded razor lying, propped against the toe of his boot. Tilting his head sideways, Severus regarded the lethal object in his hand with the warmth recently reserved only for his potions. He watched with morbid fascination as the bloodied blade cut through the tender skin along the route of the pale blue vein and the blood pulsing to the surface before spilling down both sides of his arm. Absently cradling the razor in the palm of his hand, Severus numbly watched the waterfall of blood pooling on the hard wood floor at his feet.

Shifting the razor to the opposite hand, Severus’ hand jerked as he traced a path down the opposite arm. His hand spasmodically jerked, cutting a zig-zag trail along the length of the vein. Blood splattered on the wall with each jerk as he cut with the blood caked razor. Severus’ pants eagerly soaked the spewing liquid until they dripped from the excess amount. A crimson lake slowly engulfed the floor around him as his body slowly slumped, sliding down the door until his head was awkwardly propped up.

His breathing steadily shallowed and slowed as the blood flowed freely from his self-inflicted wounds. Severus’ heart drummed frantically against his rib cage, his lungs burned from the lack of oxygen filling them. Severus’ fingers weakly curled inward towards his palms. As his life drained away, Severus understood what it felt like to be an animal waiting for the slaughter as the abyss slowly pulled him. The train whistle seemed to burn through his suffocating brain as it slowly came into view. A fearless smile graced his lips as the world around him faded to black. Severus’ eyes fluttered closed as his last shuddering breath hissed softly from his partially parted lips into the deafening white static of the small room.

The brightly burning chandelier that was hanging above him, in the center of the cell-sized room, dimmed as the shadows grew to cover the walls like the wild vines of perfumed flowers. As they grew, the shadows gradually solidified as they took form. Two great leathery black wings stepped off from the walls’ surfaces and trailed behind a pair of clawed feet. Three to each foot, the claws twisted downward in a cruel spiral. Alabaster white gradually gave way to pale yellow which in turn gave way to brown-black at the point. The claws tapped softly on the rosewood floor as the shadow creature stepped across the room towards the motionless husk of flesh and bone. The oblivious creature’s sunken eyes were haggard and cavernous as its body seemed to slice through the thick air, intent upon its quarry. A pair of skeletal hands, both seemingly had their flesh boiled from them, hovered in the empty air and proceeded the creature as it neared the crumpled form at the foot of the door.

Almost painfully, the creature extended one deathless hand for the unexpected client. The creature shrieked as the door combusted on itself and shattered into pieces as a milky white cloudy filled the room. Splinters of wood sliced through the empty air, embedding themselves in the walls and driving the shadowy creature back into the abyss as the light invaded the small room. Severus’ head rolled limply on the hardwood floor as a head peered down at him. “Mr. Snape?” She asked shaking his shoulder gently. Stepping forward, McGonagall abruptly drew backwards as her foot stepped in the pool of blood encasing his lifeless body. “Severus?!”



A/N

This chapter beta-ed by Kate.............:)