Life in an Alien Land 2: The Werewolf Chronicles

Thanks for the kind comments.

This chapter was beta'ed by Jilliane. I think I changed all the commas and such, but if I didn't, it's not her fault.



Chapter 6: The Day After

I woke with an unmoving kind of agony in my chest and extremities, with blurred vision and a pounding head. Miss Weasley was dutifully sponging the night's effluvia from me. I thought I heard crying, and would have sneered but I was afraid it was issuing from my own raw throat. I slept again, if one can call slumber being swallowed by blackness so profound no conscious thought could batter through it.

When I woke again, I was situated on my pallet in my cell at the inn. I was not in as much agony as before and I noted the presence of not only Miss Weasley, but also Miss Clearwater. I suppressed a shudder, knowing that I had one more night of Greyback's attentions before I could be properly healed and almost completely free of pain. I shoved at the invasive hands of the two women, cursing softly through sore lips and an aching jaw. Miss Weasley leaned over me, her face smooth and without the damning pity I would expect from her leonine breed, no matter how kittenish her appearance. "Professor, we need to heal you. You've got some very serious injuries."

I bit out through clenched teeth, "Leave me. Let me die."

"No," she replied evenly and with some of the same crystalline, Weasley obduracy I had so hated when the breed was under my tutelage. "Now, shut it and put your hands down."

Molly Weasley might have been proud of the managing tone her daughter took with me but it just got my back up. I made a rude gesture in response. The young ginger giggled, the noise at odds with her haggard features. "Glad to see you're feeling better."

"Shove off, Weasley." I croaked and rolled over, only realising as I did that I had exposed myself to Clearwater. She said nothing as she probed the torn flesh of my anus and waved her wand over my the painful ribs. I remember being knocked about last evening, but only bits and pieces of my torture were coherent. My concept of time and events was becoming increasingly disjointed as I came closer to the infective dose that would allow me to Turn fully.

Once done with her prodding, Miss Clearwater said in the soft tones one uses with the gravely ill and the mad, "The Alpha will be recruiting tonight, you will not be needed."

I felt the tears, ever-present during this time of my cycle, spill from my closed eyes. Neither Miss Clearwater nor Miss Weasley passed a comment on the break in my acid demeanour. Gods, I hated showing my weakness.

An image flashed through my mind from the morning, the light spilling through the window as Greyback took me, almost gently. I curled around my gut, which roiled in disgust at the thought that I had asked him, pleaded with him, to fuck me. I wonder if that incident would be in Miss Weasley's report to the pack. I hoped not. I could stand the bestial rapes; I bore them as any good martyr would. I could not stand that he finally twisted me to his will, and by morning I had begged for his gentler touch. Greyback was still repugnant, but his magnanimous solicitude filled a need I barely acknowledged when not under the influence of the curse. I longed for gentle touches and warmth, though I would never let anyone know. Longing and need were dangerous to a person in my position. I must remember to steel myself against them.

Miss Weasley tended me the rest of the day, only leaving my company to fetch broth for lunch and later, a nearly raw steak for dinner. I ate them wolfishly, nearly snarling as she set them before me. Finally at dusk, Borowiec came to chain me to the ring set up for such a situation, and to bid me good night. Before doing either, he ushered Miss Weasley from my tainted presence.

Borowiec returned to lock me in. He considered my fevered state for a moment before snapping a length of chain through the eye hook placed in the floor. I lolled indolently on the pallet, woozy from the Muggle painkillers Clearwater had forced on me. Borowiec stooped before me, his legs splayed wide in the attitude of a Russian dancer, his feet flat on the floor. He took my chin between his fingers. "You look like shit."

"Thank you for noticing," I snapped. "Perhaps you would like a round of rough sex with your leader to see how good you would look."

"I've had it. How do you think he turned me?" Borowiec answered mildly, no self-pity or revulsion colouring his tone. I had nothing to say to a fellow survivor of Greyback's attentions, but of course, I hadn't survived yet. The man stood, holding his hand out. "My mate says you'll need help to the loo and then I'll need to secure you."

I batted his help away and then teetered to my hands and knees. "I don't need your pity, Borowiec."

"Just as well you don't have it then." Borowiec stooped in a graceful motion and pulled me up by my arm. I bit my tongue to prevent the scream from escaping my lips at the jarring of my mostly mended ribs. "Sorry, we need to make this quick though. I have to go with him tonight."

Borowiec seated me on the toilet and waited for me to call him. I did not. I crawled to the sink, ever fastidious after observing my lout of a father shit and then eat a full meal without the benefit of a wash. Borowiec returned to the washroom and gave a tick of his tongue. "Would it kill you to accept help, Snape?"

"From your kind? Yes," I said with a rueful sneer, Borowiec laughed and clapped me lightly on the shoulder.

He secured me and cast a strong Silencing Charm, the one the English brotherhood had learned from fellow Death Eaters of Dusun's alma mater. I leaned back on my pallet, dreading a new sexual attack from yet another werewolf. Borowiec strode to me and asked, "Can you be trusted?"

It was my turn to give voice to a laugh, as mirthless as the sound was. "As far as one can trust a turn-coat who killed the puppet-master to which he ran after he defected. No matter that it was required of me by both puppeteers."

"I suppose we shall see then." Borowiec merely smiled through wolfishly bared teeth. When he left I pondered his comment until the pull of the moon brought my agony upon me once more, and I was lost to the caged canid in my body, which gnawed to be released from the thin tether of humanity that held it back.

I had only been allowed one full moon night away from Greyback before, and that had been for another recruitment drive. I felt for the hapless victims that would face him. Since I had been under his less than kind auspices, he had taken a modified version of the Wolfsbane Potion, one that allowed him to keep his human sense of reason but still allowed him seek the bestial pleasure that he might take. I suspected that tonight he would bring back several likely boys for his pleasure. He did so like them before they sprouted hair in unsightly places. It was the reason I was shaved during my first few months in the Colony.

Once again I vowed vengeance, and as I retreated into the wolf's mind, I visualised my retribution in full gory technicolour, as the Muggle films used to say. Tomorrow would bring another day and another chance to kill him. I hadn't done well at the plot so far.

~(@)~

I was in a little better shape the next morning as Miss Weasley returned for her duties as my nursemaid and main irritant. I ignored her offer of help as I crawled to the toilet after she released my bonds. She remained behind, stripping my pallet of the soiled and plasma-stained linens. When I returned, she had the thin coverlet hanging out the window and was bustling about like a good little housewife, straightening and fussing, and making me feel alternately fatigued and irritated by her industry. I was able to seat myself at the cabinet after moments of painful positioning. I glared at Miss Weasley, who had stopped her fussing in mid-stride, her wide, brown eyes fixed on my labours.

She strode to me and poked me in the chest with her thin, pointy index finger. It felt like a steel shaft had pierced my skin. I winced as she said, "Stop acting like a prick and ask for help, you daft sod."

I couldn't help myself, I laughed. The kitten was poking the enraged werewolf in the chest, telling it to behave. The sound of my laughter startled her and she retreated a step. I suppose the students had not heard my laughter often, as I had always been too busy worrying about saving their blundering arses from the dire consequences of their idiocy. The thought that my laughter would startle Miss Weasley to a full on retreat when nothing else had, caused me to laugh harder. I could hear the hysteria in the noise, but could no more stop it from flowing from my mouth than I could bring back the dead.

As I continued, my sides aching, I was startled to hear a higher note join me, and then I felt Miss Weasley stumble into me. She was clutching her sidesm mouthing for me to stop, the only sound escaping from her lips a flowing ululation of mirth. Her hand clutched my shoulder as she moved out of my line of sight. That sobered me as none of her protestations had. Had the girl responded with scorn, I would have been able to cut her to size. But somehow, her touch, such a common thing amongst her tribe, made the hysteria flee. I sat back on my perch, slowing regaining the ability to control my faculties, a chuckle escaping only occasionally.

Miss Weasley began wiping her face with her hand, now rough from the weeks of labour she had been forced to do. "Thanks, Professor, I really needed that. You were so... funny."

She tittered again. "I would have never thought you were one for a good belly laugh."

Her hand fluttered against my shoulder as she stood more fully. I felt her heat and smelled the clean, outdoor scent of her. I watched her face as her cheeks gradually lost their rosy hue. I noticed that I was also under scrutiny. She withdrew from me, straightening her tunic self-consciously. I said, as I turned to my meagre breakfast, "I shall need your help in the coming week. Please inform the kitchen matron."

I turned from her in dismissal, wishing she would touch me once again, knowing I was flirting with danger. She withdrew and left me to my own devices.

Borowiec entered my cell in the afternoon, his body clearly showing signs of distress. He moved slowly and favoured one arm as he gesticulated in his very gauche Eastern European manner while he spoke. "You will have a roommate for a while. The Weasley you treated has not recovered properly from his beating. My mate has done all she is able to do without attracting unwanted attention."

"What is this?" I sneered, willing the Beta to react. "Am I to become keeper of all the Weasley spawn you come across?"

Borowiec sighed. "I wish I were at liberty to tell you, but I have not... I do not have that freedom. Prove yourself with the boy, and I shall... get approval."

"From Greyback." The words were not a question. I hated my enforced enslavement. I needed to know what was going on if I were to survive this ordeal, if I so chose.

Borowiec gave me that toothy smile once more. "If you think that is so, then it must be. I shall direct his brother to bring him to you this evening. Expect the mother and sister to visit after dinner is served."

~(@)~

Ronald Weasley was in a bad way when Fred escorted him into the room. He sagged against his brother, his pale skin yellow-tinged and his breathing laboured. The surviving Weasley twin placed him gently on the pallet. "Professor."

I resisted fixing the boy with a haughty glare. I did need allies, and it just was not on for me to alienate a possible friendly face. "Mr. Weasley."

The young man looked uncomfortably about the room before settling on the floor next to his youngest brother, riffling his hair in undisguised affection, before returning his attention to me. "I heard you were caught. I'm sorry, sir."

"No doubt you shall hear more during the monthly gathering," I answered acerbically. I felt the shame of my rapes heaviest when I was around my male former students. They would never understand what it was to have to acquiesce to the brutal attentions of my captor.

"I know what he's done to you, and I understand, sir," the young man's reply brought the waiting sneer to my face.

I said, in the coolest voice I could summon, "Do you?"

"Yes sir. After the Final Battle. It happened to me." Fred looked away. "No one who knows you looks down on you."

What monsters I had called comrades. I flinched as the boy stood to traverse the room and look out the window into the deepening twilight. "D'you think you can fix 'im?"

I turned my attention to the last remaining male of the Golden Trio. "Do you know why he is trying to kill himself?"

Fred gave a snort. "Cos he's smarter than the rest of us?"

It was my turn to scoff, not wanting to admit the boy was correct. I examined Weasley, palpating his gut, feeling the enlarged liver. It struck me that I had remembered him with Miss Granger during the last part of their sixth year. I suddenly needed to know about the Know-it-all's fate. "Miss Granger, did she perish?"

"Ron said..." Weasley grimaced, his hand drawing along the wood of the windowsill in a fist. "I don't want to believe it, but Ron said she's the one who told the Death Eaters about us. He said she traded her life for ours."

"No." I could only refute the statement. The Miss Granger that I knew would no more betray the Weasleys than I would willingly expose my love of Lily Potter to the world. "Impossible."

"That's what I said too, but he keeps saying it." The young man gave a half-hearted shrug, more an act of defeat than belief in his brother's unlikely statements.

I knew the younger Weasley's propensity to stretch the truth when it suited him, and regarded his sleeping form closely. Again, I sensed that all things were not as sewn up as they appeared to be in this post Apocalyptic world. I searched my memory for the threads of conversations that I might have overheard to synthesise a working hypothesis, but I could not make things coalesce as I used to. I just had too little information. I cursed my stupidity at not leaving the country while my Mark was still valid. I could have been sipping pina colada's on a beach in Mexico, I could have been shagging a bevy of Brazilian beauties, but I decided to stay in the mistaken thought that this cold, grey country was my home.

I knelt by the pallet. "Mr. Weasley, please bring the following potions to me..."

We worked in silence as I spelled healing potions and restoratives in Ronald Weasley's stomach. I removed the toxins from his body and gave him Sleeping Draught to ensure he would not wake until the morning.

The women of the family came, escorted by the female I recognised from the first day of their confinement in this madhouse. Ginevra said, "Professor Snape, you remember Cheri Olajewan."

I bowed, a slight gesture, suddenly remembering her. "You were in Ravenclaw, weren't you?"

"No sir. Hufflepuff. I was friends with Tonks though. She was Ravenclaw." Olajewan looked about the room, her eyes lighting on the sparse furnishings and the potions table. "Last night was my first Turning."

An uncomfortable pall fell on the room as Frederick turned to her. "Mine too."

The pleasantries of the damned, I thought as I felt a hysterical bubble of laughter rise in my throat. I stifled the effervescent jollility, and I greeted Molly. The woman had aged over the months making me feel suddenly felt ancient and meloncholy. She hung back against the door, her reddened, cracked hands wringing ineffectually as she looked over all three of her children. "Madam."

Fred turned to her, his face stricken, and then he rushed to her arms, wracking sobs shaking him almost painfully. I retreated to his position by the window, willing my mind not to listen to the maudlin sentiments of the reunion. I chanced a look at the Weasley on the pallet, and I noted a glistening wetness on the younger boy's cheeks. I let him have his privacy. There would be time for him to make his conscious state known to the rest of his family. More potion would be in order once they left.

I felt Miss Olajewan's presence next to me and she slipped a small note into my clenched fist. She left the room without another word to me.

I made my excuses and went to the toilet, my only place of privacy at the moment. I locked the doors, wishing again that I had my wand, and made the noises a man makes when he knows he is going to be in the W.C. a good deal of time. Once I had bashed the toilet lid up and then quietly placed it down, I opened the slip of paper. On it were five words in the familiar, tight script of Lucius Malfoy.

Do not despair, old man.

It was then that I knew Lucius had a plan, and I was to be included in it. I hoped I would be up to what he demanded. Once more I was enslaved to a schemer and bastard; this time, however, he was one I could out-manoeuvre. Lucius may be my superior in breeding, looks, and wealth, but I could always outplay him in chess.

Feeling a small amount of hope for the first time since my capture, I smiled.

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T