The History of Severus Snape

Disclaimer: Thx to the most excellent JKR who, through her creation of these characters, has allowed for nerds out there like me to enjoy Severus Snape and other characters to their full potential. Important! This story contains non-consensual sex, and depicts rape in later chapters. If this ain\'t your style, turn away.
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Chapter One

At first he had not understood. She would be there, she had always been there for him and this time would be no different. True, over he last few months his mother had been confined to her bedroom, but he just knew if he went up the stairs, and into his mother’s bedroom she would be there.

It took days, weeks even for Severus Snape to comprehend the death of his mother. He was only a small boy of six years old, and many other concepts were already within his grasp, but he could not believe that she was gone. She was who could trust, and whom he could count on and she had abandoned him with his stupid father. Though he was truly too young to understand how he felt, Severus became angry with his father. He hated his arrogant domineering ways and he knew that neither he nor his mother had ever been good enough for his father.

He had to learn to be a man and grow up. Then he could hate his father and everything about him, and stand up to his cold influence. Severus also had much to live up to he needed to be the perfect pureblooded son, and uphold his family tradition. In more ways then he knew; he matured very quickly. He became aware of everything around him, sharp and observant with excellent reflexes, he was ready for anything.

That was probably what encouraged his deep interest in the dark arts. There were no short supply of books in his father’s study – and what a better subject to read up on than giving oneself a good defence – or offence. Not only was Severus convinced that he needed this knowledge to stand against his father, but he knew that starting school in a few months would pose a new and more difficult challenge. He and his father rarely talked during their brief moments together, but with only one month before school began he called the ten year old boy into his study.
Severus had no idea what this could be about, on his own he had collected his items for starting school which all had been listed in the letter he had received from Hogwarts, and living in London he could easily get to the train too. So he entered his father’s study warily, ready for whatever might be thrown at him.

“Boy, you are going to be married, and don’t twist your gob at me, I don’t mean today. When you’re out of school, you’ll have a proper bride, with good blood, from a good family, and we’ll pick her for you. Today we’re going to see Mrs. Smith, she arranges all the pureblood marriages.”

He had no idea what to say there were not words for what he felt. All the burning anger he harboured towards his father seemed to intensify. In his opinion he had never done a good thing for him or his mother, but now, the sadistic old bastard was letting someone decide his own son’s fate. He hated him.

He was far too young to aparate, so the journey to Mrs Smith’s was made on foot. With every begrudging step another curse was added to the list of those that he would have loved to use against his father. He would cause him pain for all the memories he had of him shouting at his mother, how he ignored him, and of course, for this.

When they finally arrived at Mrs Smith’s posh little flat Severus thought it odd that they had not used floo powder, but the thought was ejected from his mind as the door opened.

If he thought the whole idea was a joke, she herself proved it. Mrs Smith, as she introduced herself was a plump woman with a broad patronising smile. She surveyed Severus’ lanky, pallid form before beckoning them into her flat, and leading them to the kitchen. Seating them at the lace-clothed kitchen table Mrs Smith went to retrieve the kettle that was whistling above a fire. Instead of returning with a teapot or cups, she had poured some steaming water into a large glass orb, which was placed in the centre of the table.

The water in the orb started spinning, until out of her pocket she produced a tea bag and dropped it in. With her wand she stirred the water, causing colour to seep from the little sack. By the time she was satisfied the water was a deep green colour, and she removed the teabag.

“That, is you” She explained, indicating the water.

How a glass sphere of water could be ‘him’, let alone how it could determine the woman he was going to marry baffled him, but he said nothing, waiting for her to continue. Mrs Smith did so by placing another tea bag in the green liquid. The water turned a horribly bright yellow, and caused her to scowl at the glass. Tapping the glass with her wand, the teabag vanished and the water returned to the deep green colour. She did this many times, and each different tea bag turned the water a different colour. Though she continued with the process none of the colours seemed to satisfy her.

The final teabag however caused the water to take a murky appearance becoming transparent and then finally clear. Severus could see faint pictures moving in the liquid, and watched as Mrs Smith smiled to herself.

“Is that her?” His father asked impatiently.

“Very good, Mr Snape, she is indeed it.” Mrs Smith replied rising from the table. “If
you’ll follow me, we can see to the paperwork.”

Severus stayed seated as the two adults left the room, and as soon as they had gone he leant over the table to peer into the water. It was not at all exciting. He saw himself, as he was now, but not a reflection, a view from somewhere else in the same room. This wasn’t impressive; this wasn’t even fortune telling, what did this woman think she was playing at?

He was determined to go into the next room and tell her that he knew she was an old fraud when the picture began to change. It showed a girl, a little younger than him with long brown hair and grey eyes. Was she the one he was to be married to? Merlin, he thought, this could get no worse, and she wasn’t even pretty. Now, he did not as much want to expose this woman as a fraud, but he wanted to tell her exactly what he thought of her choice for him, dreadful.

But something was happening, the girl was growing older, instead of playing with a set of dolls on a dusty wooden floor, she had aged about five years. The fourteen-year-old version of his betrothed was cornered in a darkened cobble street, he watched her scream as the green light hit her, and she fell to the ground. She was unmistakably dead. How could Mrs Smith betroth him a girl who would die in a few years anyway? This was madness, but still, he wanted to see more.

The next picture however was quite different. It was one that surprisingly enough, pleased him greatly. It was Severus again, but older, about ten years older in fact and he was with a young woman. Not just any plain sort of woman, and she was nothing like the girl of the pictures before. In this vision the woman he held in his arms was vibrant and beautiful. She had long auburn curls and captivating liquid brown eyes, and she was his. He could not stop staring at her picture, and he was startled when he heard laughter behind him.

Mrs Smith had returned. Severus stood, feigning innocence. When he saw that he was not in trouble for what he had done, he ventured a question.

“Is she..?” He began.

“Yes, she will be yours, one day.”

Now he knew, and he would never forget her face.
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AN: I know, I know, book 6 completely hashes my story because HbP proves that Sev isn\'t a pureblooded wizard, but this was written long before HbP came out. So, stick with it anyway, in some time I might look into changing the structure of the plot so that it works with all the new informatiion from HbP, but until then R and R.
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