Anthem for Doomed Youth

June 1976

Chapter one

The top of the astronomy tower was bathed in shadows as Severus stumbled over the threshold and out into the cloudy night. He paused briefly and looked back at the stairway, listening intently. He couldn’t hear anything. Perhaps he had fooled them. He might not be able to persuade a broomstick to do so much as stay still for long enough to mount it, but he could be quite fast when the need demanded it. It would seem as though he were alone for the moment, which was at least something to be grateful for, not that it mattered much. They would catch him in the end. They always did.
Slowly he walked to the edge of the tower. This was the highest tower of Hogwarts; the grounds spread below him. The forbidden forest did not seem so vast from up here: Hagrid’s hut was a mere spec. He wondered how long it would take were he to jump. So far – and yet so near. It would all be over. Everything would be finished; he would remember nothing of his miserable existence; his whole world would be as though it had never happened.
He shuddered and wrapped his arms about his skinny chest. His face grew even paler; the unwashed hair fell forwards over his eyes as he transferred his eyes from the ground below him to the floor of the tower. He couldn’t do it. This was a place he often visited, and yet never could he summon up the courage. He sank to the floor, barely noticing the tears that were threatening to well up from the bottom of his being.
He was used to it, of course. The constant humiliations. The unceasing, merciless hexes while the entire school jeered. Even before school he had been no stranger to constant abuse. Not that this ever made it any easier to bear.
It was a cold night considering it was summer. The moon was completely hidden, but he knew from the lunar chart that the full moon was a good week away. One week, he thought miserably, and the term would be over. Time to go back to Spinners End. Three months spent with his mother and father. One week and the exams would all be over…
At the thought of the exams he began to shiver, not from the cold, but from anger. Anger frighteningly furious coursed through his entire body; his fists clenched and his nails dug hard into his palms without even realising it. The entertainment of that day’s lunchtime, provided with much relish by James Potter and Sirius Black, had meant his Defence Against the Dark Arts practical that afternoon could not have gone worse had he tried. There was no way he could concentrate on performing even the smallest counter spells and jinxes knowing that the story had probably spread all over the school by now. How could he possibly sit an exam with the certain knowledge that the smallest first years knew the story of how he had been turned upside down and had been deprived of every shred of his remaining dignity?
He was shaking even more. It didn’t bear thinking about. Even with 100% on the theory, he was now lucky, he knew, if he could scrap an Acceptable after the mess he had made on the practical. And the theory only counted for 30% of the entire mark, being the only subject in which the practical demonstration was considered to be important than the learnt theory. How had James known? How could he have known that it was the only subject which made his life at this school worth living; that now he would never be allowed to take the NEWT; that his ambition to be an Auror was subsequently demolished. How had James known that this was the most effective way in which to take away the last thing which had made his life worth living?

Oh well, he thought. What does it matter how many people are in pain, how many people feel that life would be better on the way to the ground from the highest Astronomy tower, if Sirius Black was kept amused and happy? What did it matter to people like him? Severus was quite sure that if he were to really go through with it James would never even notice.

He reached inside his robes and pulled out a crumpled piece of parchment. He lit his wand, not that he needed it. It felt as though he had read this letter fifty times. He could have recited it from memory; he could have reproduced it in full, including the three ink stains in various places in the parchment. When he had first received it he had laughed out loud, a pastime not often undertaken by him. Lucius Malfoy? Someone he hated in a way perhaps even more fiercely than James? The person who had taken from him the last remaining bit of happiness in his life? The girl who cared more about what her family thought of her than her own happiness – the girl who was more than willing to follow her heart for a while, but recognised when it came the time to forget her heart and marry the right person. The nice, respectable pureblood. Hatred surged through his heart again as he thought about his father. His weak, bullying father with not the slightest shred of power in his body, and was therefore ruining his son’s life. Severus knew that he would never love again. How could he possibly find someone else? Ever?

And yet…he knew about pain. It was his constant companion. Even in the times when he had felt happy, when he ran his hand through her soft fair hair as she kissed him in stolen moments when no-one was around, hadn’t he always known, somehow, that it would never last? Hadn’t he always been careful not to set much store by her, careful not to so much as smile at her, just in case his fears were realised? Even now, meeting her in stolen moments in the room of requirement, the boy’s dormitory, the prefect’s bathroom…wasn’t he careful to always keep an air of moody detachment, of carelessness – as though this was going to be fun for a while but he didn’t want (never mind expect) it to last beyond Hogwarts?

He hadn’t told her about the letter. She never spoke about Lucius beyond that one time when she had told him of their betrothal. He wasn’t too sure of what she would make of it. It was one thing marrying a Death Eater, since that was the only way of remaining a member of her family. He suspected she might react slightly differently should she realise that her lover was at the top of the list of the Dark Lord’s recruiting list. Narcissa, sweetheart, you sure know how to choose them, he thought bitterly. Only the previous night Lucius’ head had appeared in the Slytherin common room fire. “He’s waiting, Snape…he’s not going to wait forever…what’s it going to be? Free will or slavery? Your choice…”