Author's Note:

This is a pre-chapter to Out of Control. It's about Severus' father, Tobias Snape and how he met Eileen Prince, his mother. *Spoilers!* This is my version of the story, any errors are my own. If you have questions about how I came up with this stuff and why—just ask me nicely ;-) Enjoy!

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He had never been a heavy drinker until lately. He was taught that drinking was a sin, however, in this case, it would have to be an exception.

Tobias Snape had always been a strict and stubborn man, but how else would he be with the parents he had? They were known throughout the small provincial town as the most devout, if not the most severe, Protestants. Their ancestry (they claimed) went back to Oliver Cromwell and the Puritan movement. Though the family was not rich they were well off and lived in the proper lifestyle of a proper Protestant family.

Tobias led a decent life, as decent as one could expect, as was laid out for him. He went to school and was going to take over his father's place as a teacher and become an official member of their church. But against his father's wishes, he had married a woman, who was not from their village, and that fateful day had marred any chance of him having a normal life.

Though he would never admit this to any one else, he had been madly in love with her. For what reason that was, he never could quite remember, only that he knew he had to have her and no one else. Others had said she wasn't attractive but sallow and that she looked a bit dingy. He paid them no mind and went after her until she agreed to marry him. It all happened so fast.

"Too fast…" he had said to himself later and to the agreement of his father who said, "Those who marry in haste, make up for it in their misery later in life." If he had only listened.

She had seemed to him at first to be the most beautiful, charming and even elegant woman ever to come to the provincial town (where the women were mostly old spinsters). Her name was Eileen Prince and she said she came from royalty. Or something of that nature, he had thought.

Tobias never had a qualm until after their wedding night. Up until then, it went rather nicely. Eileen met his mother (she didn't approve of the girl) and she was introduced to his father (who also didn't approve) and they had gotten married in a small ceremony on the outskirts of town.

Only three other people came to the wedding, Eileen's mother, Evelyn Prince, a man who was not Eileen's father but was dressed in a long strange cloak and a woman with a shocking hairstyle to match her shocking clothes which were not at all suitable for the church they were in.

After the wedding it was arranged that Tobias' new wife would come and live with his family, in their home and in their town, which was just fine for him. He never thought about the new adjustment his wife would have to make or how much trouble it would be for her to move her things and forget about the life she lived before. Tobias hadn't known much about Eileen and really didn't want to, he never asked after all, and so he took it for granted that she would fit right in with his family, and their strict ways, in the small town where hardly any outsiders came by.

The problems began when Eileen Prince, now Eileen Snape came to live with her husband and his family.

Her mother had warned her about muggles and how ignorant they were but she never guessed just how cruel they could be. Eileen's mother-in-law, Martha Snape, was as nosy and unyielding as she was stern and unsmiling. Eileen had barely talked to the father, Walter Snape, who acted as if she wasn't there at all and would actually talk through Tobias when talking to her.

"Is your wife finished with the sewing yet, Tobias? I have things that need mending." He never even glanced at her as he had said this.

Her first task as the new wife was to do all the housework as a maid might do, as well as the cooking, which as Martha Snape said, "A woman is only as good as she can cook and clean." Another one of Martha's favorite sayings was, "A woman should not complain or chatter about all day in gossip or idleness." There were a lot of shoulds and should nots in the Snape household as Eileen learned.

However, since it was beyond the knowledge of the religious and narrow-minded Snape family to know of magic, no one said Eileen shouldn't use magic—but she did so in secret. Her household chores were of no bother to her with the careful use of her wand and cooking was no problem as she brought a book of Malfalda's Magic Success for Cookery with her. The thing that had really depressed Eileen was the fact that her new family-in laws didn't much care for her. But what was worse was that Tobias Snape, who had been madly in love with her, seemed to be having doubts not only about their marriage but about Eileen as well.

"Do you really love me, Tobias?" she had asked him one night, after he was seated by the fire and she had brought his slippers to him.

"Don't ask such a ridiculous question." he had shortly replied and returned to reading the paper.

Eileen had been used to his shortness and his unloving ways to her, she was after all, a Prince and her father wasn't exactly kind to her even when she was a child but she was used to this treatment and had love for her husband. It was for him that she left her family, a pure-blood wizard family that had gone back generations, supposedly related to the royal family of Mordred and LeFay. It was only for Tobias that she was cut off from the only wizard life she had known and thrown into a muggle world without magic and an even duller existence. It was all for love and she knew she had made the right decision—even though every part of her wizard life went against it.

Eileen knew when she first saw Tobias that he was the one for her. She had seen him walking past when she and her mother were on their way to see a distant cousin. It was love at first sight, even though Tobias never acknowledged her or had seen her at first. She had gotten away at every moment she could, just to see him walking past.

Though Eileen wasn't pretty there was a certain austere beauty about her that she shared with her mother and she didn't think herself ugly. She put on her best dress robe and ventured out past the rock wall that protected the small cottage of her witch cousin and went up to him.

"Hello, are you from around here? I've seen you walk by here often." This was what Eileen had wanted to say. What had come out instead was, "Excuse me…I mean…I'm sorry…uh…" Before she could say another word Tobias turned on the spot and stared at her.

"What on earth are you wearing?" That was the very first thing he said to her. He was still staring at her when Eileen's mother had called to her. In a fright of being seen, she had mumbled an excuse and ran back to the enchanted cottage.

Eventually she had mustered up the courage to make an excuse to her mother and cousin and finally managed to have a decent conversation with the man who had caught her eye whose name was Tobias.

"My father is a very important man around here," he had boasted and went on, "Our family is very much respected in these parts. Which family are you from? I've never seen you before in my life. I would know immediately if you were from here because I know everyone in this town, everybody knows everybody, you see. No, I don't think you're from around here at all, in fact, you must be from out of town—maybe you're not from here at all. No, I didn't think so." Tobias had switched his load of books from one arm to the other and very brazenly opened a silver pocket watch to check the time.

"That's a very fine watch, Tobias." She had smiled at him after letting him talk for a time.

"Yes," he looked from the watch to her for a moment, "That was very forward of you!" He looked at her sternly.

"I'm sorry?" she clasped her hands nervously.

"You called me by my first name. You shouldn't do that without a proper introduction, since we haven't been properly introduced."

"My name is Eileen Prince, my cousin lives up there yonder." She held out her hand for him to shake or possibly kiss but he only stood there and looked beyond the hills.

"I don't see anything and I would know if someone lived over there. There's nothing there but grazing grounds for cattle and a fallen rock wall."

Eileen had forgotten that only wizards and witches could see the cottage and so desperately tried to make an excuse but he was already leaving.

"Would it please you then to go for a stroll? We could walk by the creek over there." She had caught up to him but he only rebuffed her.

"It wouldn't be proper for us to be seen together in such a manner. People would talk." Tobias checked his silver watch again as if in a hurry and it was then that Eileen did something she would later regret doing.

Though she was not good at charms she managed to do a spell, a minor one she thought, that would make him stay for a bit and talk. She wanted him to be interested in her as she was in him. She had meant to do a cheering charm but something had gone wrong. Instead of brightening, Tobias' face had grown darker and he looked at her with something close to loathing.

"What have you done to me?" He never saw her wand under her cloak and he staggered a bit before he fell to the ground while his books tumbled around him in a heap. "I feel light-headed and ill, my heart is pounding and I can't catch my breath."

She bent down to him and said softly, "I'm so sorry Tobias, I didn't mean to hurt you. I don't know what went wrong with the spell—"

"The what?" he answered before his head fell back into her lap. "You really shouldn't call me by my first…" His eyes closed and he fainted.

Eileen held him, scared but bursting with happiness, as she waited for him to gain consciousness. She could have used magic but didn't want him to wake up in a hurry because he might leave her then. Instead she made up a story about coming to his rescue as he fainted, maybe from the heat of the long walk, as she did what any good-hearted maiden would do and stayed by his side.

When he woke up he was not pleased. He had quickly gotten up before staggering a bit and then gathered his books. It wasn't until she reached for his hand that he finally looked at her and yanked his hand away. There was a strange look in his eyes that she had never seen before and it made her scared. His face was flushed and he was breathing hard. He stared at her for a while before he walked off, leaving Eileen Prince in tears.

It wasn't until a few weeks later that she had seen him again and quite often. He seemed to be in constant pursuit of her after that strange encounter. She had finally run out of excuses for visiting her cousin in the country (who she didn't like) and at last said to her mother that she was in love and that she had fallen in love with a muggle.

Her mother's only reply was, "Your father will not be pleased."

It was a grave understatement. Eileen had been disowned and her name burned from the Famyly Lyne of Prynce Book. Her mother had to risk her father's wrath just to go to the wedding and needless to say, she did not approve of Tobias Snape or his family at all.

Eileen's mother, her distant relative from her mother's side (she never knew his name but her mother told her to call him Uncle) and a woman from the Daily Prophet were the only witnesses at the wedding from the wizard world.

It had been an absolute scandal when the piece about her marriage to a muggle (tiny as it was) had been announced in the wizard paper, the Daily Prophet, and it was the final slap in the face Eileen had received when all of her old friends had stopped contacting her as they claimed they never even knew her. Almost all of her old friends were from Slytherin House (as she had been) and they were anti-muggle with a vengeance.

The only reason the marriage was in the paper at all was because the woman from the Daily Prophet, Camilla Greystone, said it was a momentous occasion for the great wizard family of Prince and one of the few inter-marriages between muggles and wizards at that time (with one marriage being that of a distant relative of the Weasley's—who didn't count as being wizard at all) but it was no comfort to Eileen as she had been disowned.

The other announcement (and last) in the Daily Prophet came with the birth of their first and only son, Severus, named after her father's side as in tradition. Unfortunately, what was meant to be good news came with a shock and it was then that Eileen's life, as cheerless as it was, had gotten worse.

She had carefully kept her wizard magic a secret and no one suspected until her mother-in law, Martha, had gotten suspicious about her chores.

"How did you manage to do the dishes, the laundry, sewing and cooking before the morning was done?" She had her hands on her hips and struck a stocky pose in front of the slight and quiet Eileen.

"I started early, Ma'm." She had always called her mother-in law Ma'm ever since she made the mistake of calling her, Mother, and then, Martha.

"Don't be smart with me, girl. I know for a fact you didn't get up before eight o'clock, you lazy good-for nothing! Here it is almost noon and everything is done." She bent her ruddy face close to Eileen's. "I know there's something strange with you, girl."

Eileen denied it and made up lies, she didn't want to but she very well couldn't tell her muggle mother-in law about magic, until it finally came out at the worst possible moment.

Magic is a very powerful force and when it is bottled up too long, it can explode, much like a temper with no release—which is what precisely happened to Eileen at the worst possible time, in front of the worst possible people.

It was during dinner time when they were all seated together and after Eileen had served everyone. Before much longer, Walter Snape had spoken and started criticizing the food then Martha Snape joined in. Normally, this wouldn't have bothered Eileen because she was used to it but it was the last straw when Tobias started to criticize the food.

"I don't know where you came up with this muck but it is possibly the worst thing I have tasted." Tobias made a face and dribbled the split pea soup from the spoon.

Eileen was speechless at first, normally Tobias never criticized at all and sat there quietly while Walter and Martha chastised her. But she saw Martha giving a knowing glance to Tobias who looked down at his food.

"Haste makes waste, didn't I tell you so?" Walter took a sip of his drink.

"That's what happens when you rush things." Martha quipped.

She could have been talking about the food but Eileen had a suspicion she was talking about something else entirely, like her marriage to Tobias. Eileen was beside herself with indignation and her face was pale but she said nothing.

The table started to shake but no one paid any attention until the plates started to rattle on the table.

"What on earth?" Martha began as Walter took another sip of his drink. Tobias said nothing as the food jumped up from the serving bowl, he only stared with his mouth open.

It wasn't until the glass in Walter's hand broke into pieces that he finally roared, "ENOUGH!"

Tobias stood up and threw his napkin down on the table. Eileen looked up at him and saw the same loathing in his eyes that she had seen before he fainted when they first met.

"I knew it!" He yelled, "You're doing this aren't you? ANSWER ME!" Tobias reached over and grabbed Eileen by the wrist and pulled her up. Eileen shook her head sadly but he yelled again, "You're a WITCH! Admit it! All the things you've done, the chores, the cooking and mending in an hour's time—"

Eileen could see Martha nodding her head at her like a cruel sentence of guilt. Walter only looked at her as if he'd never seen her before.

"You BEWTICHED me didn't you? You made me fall in love with you!" He flung her wrist to the side and raised his hand, "Everyone in town knows it and have said so, you are a WITCH!"

Before he could strike her she screamed, "I'M PREGNANT!"

Tobias' hand paused in mid-air. She repeated again softly, "I'm pregnant, Tobias…"

His hand fell limply to his side as he uttered, "How?"

"How do you think you barmy boy?!" It was Martha who was now standing, pounding her fists on the table in an undignified manner. "I told you what would become of you walking in the fields with a woman like that!"

Both Tobias and Eileen were speechless, though for much different reasons. Tobias' face went red with shame but Eileen's was red because she was furious.

"And conceived before your wedding night! You know what that child will be called now, don't you?" Martha walked around to the table in front of Eileen. "Of course, a woman like yourself wouldn't care but I'll be thrown in Bedlam before my grandson is born a bast—"

Martha never had time to finish her sentence before Eileen's wand was out and pointed at her.

"Silencio!" Eileen cried out. Martha's mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water.

Tobias grabbed Eileen by the shoulders and shouted at her, "Undo it now! What did you do to my mother?"

"Something I should have done the first time I met her!" she spat out.

Tobias raised his hand again as Eileen raised her wand to him but they were both interrupted by Walter who had finally acknowledged Eileen for the first time since she came to the house.

"Put your wand down, witch." Walter got up from the table and calmly walked to where Tobias was standing but he didn't look at his son, his dark eyes were fixed on Eileen only.

"We have taken you in our house, and this is how you repay us? You bewitch my son and curse my wife?" He stepped closer to Eileen so that he was in front of the wand. "You who now have no family of your own, would you treat us so?" Although his words were sincere his tone was of malice.

Eileen lowered her wand slightly and she stared into Walter's deep dark and cold eyes as if she were under a spell.

"Don't be stupid, girl." Walter bared his yellow teeth at her. "You have nowhere to go. Soon you will be with child and a mother alone with a child—especially if she's a witch—will get no help from others."

Eileen knew he was speaking the truth, as cruel as it was, and she really did have no where else to go. She was shunned from the wizard world because she had married a muggle and the muggles now shunned her (as they always had) because she was a witch. She had no choice.

She lowered her wand as tears streamed from her eyes. She looked to Tobias but he looked away in disgust and went to his mother who pulled him to her side. Eileen stood alone against Walter and his family.

"Put away your wand, we shall see what to do with it later. You are not allowed to use any of that magic anymore in this house, do you understand?" Walter hissed.

Eileen did as she was told, as she had always done since she first came to the Snape household. She looked up at her husband and she saw no love there. Any small love he had for her was erased by hatred and disgust as his mother held him sternly.

"Clear the dinner. You will sleep downstairs near the kitchen." Walter left the room, followed by Tobias and his mother who was still silenced by the spell Eileen had put on her.

So it followed that Eileen was not allowed to do magic in the Snape household and having said she had gotten rid of her wand (when she really hadn't), Walter had arranged for her and Tobias to live in a small place, an old brick house by the river, in the poor neighborhood beyond the city.

"It will be better for you to live there," he said, talking to Tobias, "Than to live here and have people talk." He said the last word as if it were the most abominable word ever to be uttered aloud.

It was there that their son, Severus Snape, was born in the cold wet month of January. What soon followed after that event brought much trouble to Eileen and more humiliation to Tobias Snape. As was obvious from the moment he was born, Severus was destined to become a wizard because he had magic blood in him.

Eileen did her best to stifle what magic from the boy she could while the new father, Tobias, looked at the baby as if he didn't recognize him as his own son.

Once when Eileen had handed Severus to Tobias, the boy had given a raucous cry before a string of bubbles came from his mouth and flew in the air. As unaccustomed to babies as Tobias was, he certainly wasn't prepared for the wizard version of a baby's hiccups and indigestion. He nearly dropped the baby before Eileen took hold of him. Tobias never held him again.

When Tobias wasn't around, which happened quite often, Eileen would use her magic (with the hidden wand she kept) and try to show Severus how to use magic. Since he was a baby, there wasn't much for him to learn but she wanted him to be familiar with it, just in case.

She knew the time would come for him to grow up and go to Hogwarts, the school for wizards and witches. No matter what her husband Tobias had said, her son would not be denied a proper wizard's education—it was his destiny, after all.

Eileen and Tobias kept their distance from each other as much as they could and slept in separate beds. But whenever the slightest hint of magic came from Severus, Tobias would fly into a fit and Eileen would take the brunt of it. She had stopped loving her husband and only had love for her son, Severus.

She could have fought back with her wand against Tobias but she was still afraid of what would happen to them if they should be thrown out of the Snape house. It never occurred to her to force Tobias to her will with magic.

But as long as she could raise her son until school, she was happy and knew her son would be a great wizard, as he had shown almost immediately the skill and talent for great magic.

Eileen told her son everything she could about what she had learned and about the magic of the wizard world. She even brought up the courage to venture into the wizard world and buy a few spell books from the money she had secretly saved.

Things were happy at home, as long as Severus stayed out of Tobias' way when he came back late at night in a fowl mood from drinking and gambling. Severus learned to amuse himself and to the delight of his mother, he practiced magic every chance he could.

Sometimes there would be yelling (and even hitting at times) but Severus kept the knowledge of Hogwarts and the magic his mother had taught him close to hand, just in case.

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Epilogue:

A few years after Severus had went to school, Eileen had separated from Tobias Snape and had gone to live in the secret cottage her cousin willed to her because she had visited her so many times before. She remained there until her last days.

Tobias Snape had brought himself into debt by drinking and gambling on bad real estate and the stock market until his health gave away. He willed the house on Spinner's End to his son, to keep it from the debtor's and went to live with his parents.