Author: Ithilwen C. Malfoy

Rating: R (PG-13 for now, higher rating in later chapters)

Pairing: SS/HP

Spoilers: OotP

Warnings: Oddness, darkness, graphic slash, language.

Disclaimer: All characters and concepts belong to J.K. Rowling and various publishers including, but not exclusive to, Bloomsbury Publishing and Warner Bros. Plot, however, is mine. No financial gain is being made from this story.

Archive: Name your terms, and I shall have my legal people quibble over details. Actually, I'll probably just say yes, but I really would prefer it if you ask.

Notes: This is part I of a three-part story. Parts II and III will be coming v.soon. And I haven't abandoned 'Move Beside Me'… it's just taking a little longer to write one particular bastard of a chapter than previously expected.

~~~

Aftermath

Twilight had fallen. Vague shapes moved slowly, some stooped, some supporting or supported by others. This was the aftermath. There were no conversations, only odd murmured words, as if to speak above a whisper would shatter the silence so irrevocably that it would never return – that it would break this tenuous calm... this precarious grasp on sanity.

Severus Snape cast his hooded gaze over the scene before him. In the half-light it was impossible to make out the dark shapes which lay, seemingly scattered, across the wide clearing. But when you concentrated, stared at one particular spot for long enough, you realised that these were people… crumpled, discarded toys. Some piled, some alone, all dead. Blood on the grass, pale vomit around the lips of the dying. They were silent now, and a handful of Mediwizards walked through the bodies, their shoulders slumped, their voices flat and quiet as they murmured a short spell, and the ragged, shallow breaths of those beyond help ceased.

Slipping his hand into his pocket, Severus let his fingers run across the smooth surface of a small leather-bound book. He closed his eyes and drew a deep breath. He had seen all this before, but never quite like this… The Death Eaters had not been idly named. Severus was no stranger to corpses, to blood, to the smell that pervaded every sense and filled every pore. But never had he seen death on such a scale, so many lives, so many empty shells.

His fingers closed around the fine-grained wood of his wand. This was magic. This field full of bodies, no more than children. Children he had taught across a Potions classroom for seven years, who he had saved from Minerva's detentions, whose parents' Christmas drinks parties he had reluctantly attended. Whole families lay here, being counted, identified, recorded by scattered Ministry workers, the main body of officials not having arrived yet.

So the end had come. No more war, no more death, no more pain… No more lies. Severus was in no way naïve enough to believe that this was salvation. War, death, pain – it never ended. And yet we fight on.

He barely flinched as the wand snapped and splinters drove into his palm. More blood. Like the blood on his face – some from the gash on his left temple, and some that he knew wasn't his. Perhaps it was Lucius', or Nicholae's… Nothing but filthy  robes to wipe it off with… So he didn't.

Raising his head, Severus opened his eyes. Not that it did him much good. Darkness was falling swiftly. Soon he would have to leave – should have left hours ago. Yet it wasn't just him standing in the gloom.  

A lonely, stooped figure stood unnoticed amongst the debris. Severus mused that there was some cruel irony to it – that The Boy Who Refused To Die should be unmissed, and should manage to be inconspicuous even though he stood, head bowed, in the centre of the darkened clearing. The centre of the world's attention for 17 years, and now forgotten. That's gratitude.

Perhaps it was disappointment that it had not been their boy hero who had cast the final curse… but Severus was sure that no one had seen the struggle; the boy, under a stronger Cruciatus than Severus had seen many endure; Granger throwing one of her speciality curses, drawing attention away from the boy; the force of the Avada Kedavra knocking Voldemort away, his soul defeated, finally lifeless, and the Granger girl falling to the ground; Severus dragging the screaming boy away, letting the boy fight against him, but clasping the deceptively thin, strong arms to his own, preventing the boy from returning to the girl's crumpled form. He had let the boy fall to the ground then, defeated and weeping, and felt the world twist horribly, the mark on his arm burning away to nothing but a scar, and staggered a little way before dropping to the ground himself and letting the battle come to an end around him.

The boy was silent now, his eyes red, but his tears stopped, and was staring unseeingly at his hands, which were shaking and clasped before him. Without stopping to consider his motivation, Severus stepped forward, and walked silently towards him.

Severus stood a little behind him, and the boy neither raised his head nor spoke, but Severus knew that he was aware of his presence. Neither of them looked at the other. They stood side by side in heavy silence.

Severus saw the boy's gaze come to rest on the scene before them. A man – Severus knew him as a Ministry employee, but couldn't put a name to his face – holding his arm to his chest and limping, was stepping through the debris, checking faces, looking for someone, but praying that he didn't find them there. But he did, and now knelt, cradling his friend's broken head in his arms. It angered Severus to see a figure holding a crucifix touch the grieving man on the shoulder. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away.

"It's a bit late for that now," Harry said in a dead, flat voice which chilled Severus to the bone. "Praying for your soul when it's already gone. I pray for mine. And his." – Severus realised to his surprise that Harry meant Voldemort – "And yours. Dumbledore told me that it's necessary to fight for some things, that to kill for those things is forgivable. But just in case they're wrong, and we're all damned…" He gave a harsh, mirthless laugh, which Severus shudderingly recognised as something like his own.

Then the laughter faded and the boy said, in a small voice, "Is it over?"

Severus paused for a moment then silently placed a hand on the boy's shoulder. He felt them shake suddenly, and the boy lifted his hands to his face, and it seemed that the world had ceased to spin and understanding flowed between them for one brief moment. And then Severus stepped away and it was gone, and Harry was left alone, weeping in the darkness, and Severus tried to ignore the longing to stand beside him and weep for their souls together.