AN: Thank you for all the reviews. I'm entering high school next week- in my country, first semester starts in March- and it's a dormitory. I expect to be extremely busy for the next... well, three years. I'm expected to take nine or so APs in my time there. Continuation depends on whether or not my parents buy me a laptop- I can hardly see how I could update otherwise. So, well. Just a heads up.

The Raiment of Lean Winter: Chapter 2

Some days, when he woke up, he felt his body as if it were a heavy pile of slush and sharp bones, and his mind was a tired sluggish thing residing in the cavities nature had carved out for it. He sometimes wanted to lie there until he starved to death- he didn't think it would take long- but he'd remember reality, hard and sharp-cornered and uncompromising, and he'd stagger up (a bag of bones) and take care of his potions, the damn things he'd gotten so sick of in the last three years.

He had it better than some, he knew. His 'contract' (as if it were legal, or fair, or clean-cut) left him an opportunity to have a life- one that anyone else would have exploited. But Severus Snape had no life- his sole wish had been to die in peace, and somewhere in all that chaos he'd lost that chance, too. And he was too pathetic to be selfish enough to die now, so he went on.

Well. He'd filled his wallowing quota for the day.

He avoided his eyes in the mirror as he washed his face, and after he turned off the water he let the water drip off his chin and down his wrist, gathering momentum and deeper shades of pink as it did so. Blood welled around the sharp black edges of his Dark Mark. Somehow he had imagined it would fade... but it hadn't. Or perhaps being reused as a tool for control had set it off again. At least it didn't twinge, just bled.

He spent almost fifteen minutes hunched over the sink, staring at the drying streaks of diluted blood on his arm as if the gleam of the bathroom lights reflected in them would give him any answers. Of course they didn't. And this was getting pathetic. He straightened up, wincing at the pain in his back. He wrapped his arm in a few rolls of tissue, taped the edges to make sure they wouldn't trail, and got on with his job.

It was noon when he received the letter- he was outside, gathering cinquefoil, which the blasted owl made him scatter to the ground when it barreled at him. It was that or get mauled. It was a Malfoy owl, of course- typical. He stared at the seal like it was something disgusting that had crawled out of Longbottom's cauldron, and snarled at the owl when it tried to hover. It hovered somewhere else. It had to be enough for now.

Eventually, he opened it- he knew there would be consequences if he ignored correspondence from any of the pureblood families- Selwyn had reminded him time after time that he answered to all of them. Him most of all, but all of them anyway. Never mind that Malfoy had once been his student, one he had spoiled beyond reason. Well, his father had done most of it, but he hadn't helped. He'd tried, but he hadn't- but there really wasn't anything to regret, was there? Draco was living. He was married, had a child...

He pushed away all the thoughts that would follow that one and unfolded the letter, squinting- the light was too bright, and the ink was silver. An invitation- to a party- oh yes, he'd heard of the acquittal, he subscribed to the Veritaserum, the cheapest paper available that coincidentally also did a good job on the articles- one he'd ignored until several months ago, when it had suddenly flowered from obscurity into a possible challenger for the Prophet's top position. Apparently they'd received some good funding.

Of course he wasn't going. He couldn't. He had a dozen projects to take care of, three that were extremely demanding and ate up his time and patience like nothing else, and pushed him towards a brink of frustration that he had not even known had existed until he had been pushed so far. At least the Dark Lord had valued him enough not to kill him over his projects- to Selwyn and the rest, he was his projects. One that they held a very tidy threat over.

His left arm pounded, and the tissue he'd wrapped around the thing was suddenly drenched. There wasn't much pain, although the sensation was hardly pleasant and his head pounded briefly with the sudden loss.

The surface of the invitation was uneven. As if someone had written on the back with a pen, without taking care to press lightly.

He turned the invitation around.

Severus

Better come.

-Telfair-

The bastard, the bastard, the bastard. One fourth of his potions were the type that reacted unpredictably with stasis solutions, and only one of those wouldn't take close monitoring. Two extremely difficult and time-consuming, expensive potions ruined. If they wanted him to brew these things that fast and well, what was the point of wasting his precious time- and then they'd blame him for not completing them on time, too. He threw on a spare pair of robes and walked down to the village.

Once, he would have Apparated.

He felt sick as he took Muggle transportation- not from disgust at an inferior culture or anything Telfair or Malfoy (Lucius, not Draco- the boy had more sense than his father) would have cited- but because of what it symbolized, his taking a busto Wiltshire. He ignored the odd looks he got for his robes with cold prim dignity, feeling like wearing them was hanging on to a world that he no longer had a claim to anymore. Shackled. Left with only enough to brew and stir- wasn't that all he was good for-

Again, the self pity. It took almost two hours to Wiltshire. And it would take another two hours back, since Telfair would hardly bother to Side-Along him to his cottage just to oblige. Whatever trite thing he wanted would waste four hours of his life and two or three extremely expensive potions. Concentration on the rage, not the bitterness, nor the fear- yes, he feared, there was no shame in that, but it would be detrimental to keep on feeling. So, rage. Rage could be quelled easier than other emotions.

The result was when he finally reached the Muggle village Malfoy Manor was closest to, he was in a black temper.

He arrived a quarter after five, and the celebration was gaining momentum. He edged towards the wall, feeding his foul temper with the unease he felt at being surrounded by so many wizards- he hadn't been to a gathering of magic users this great since- well, Hogwarts, really, those adolescent fizzlings conglomerating into a seething mass of unpredictable energy- and also envy and inferiority.

He looked for Telfair. He wasn't hard to find. He was talking with Malfoy and a dark-haired man whose face he couldn't see, from this angle, seeming quite engaged. Snape refused to seek him out, venture into the center of the marbled hall and be made a spectacle of by Telfair and his cronies- no doubt they would- Snape, the fallen dog, the fallen spy, the slave, ourslave, the traitor. He'd rather catch Telfair's eye and talk to him in a secluded place where Telfair would not be able to humiliate him publicly.

Telfair did see him, but did not seem to be inclined to leave his fascinating conversation to speak with him- Snape ground his teeth and made himself comfortable against the wall. Several slender witches gave him brief looks as they passed. Recognition sparked on the dull faces of some of them, but they turned away hurriedly.

Malfoy left the conversation, looking vaguely pained- Telfair tended to do that. He had not heard the declaration Telfair had made to his audience, but it only served to reinforce his grim determination that he would not let Telfair do that to him.

The man continued to speak to the dark-haired man, flirting outrageously with him. Telfair did that. If he went off to fuck him without ever telling Snape what he'd wanted from him, what the purpose of summoning him all the way to this opulent manse to waste his time had been, Snape would...

He would...

Do nothing, that's what. After all this, he couldn't do anything. Telfair could summon him, waste is time, leave him hanging, and live with no consequences. He ground his teeth and watched Telfair chat with the man for- how many minutes passed? Roughly fifteen, until Telfair's companion made a complicated gesture with his hands and shoulders and went off to the nearest drink table, speaking briefly with Malfoy. The brief glimpse he caught of the man's face gave him an odd start- for some reason, he reminded him of someone- but Telfair was moving towards him like a brutish handsome iceberg, destructive and deceptive, with his hands in his pockets and a smile on his face, and dread replaced the rage in his chest.

"Hallo, Severus." Telfair said cheerily, as if he had not ruined two potions that had taken Snape a fifteen days and a month, respectively, to bring to the state they were in. "Enjoying yourself?"

He clearly was not. Snape was in no mood to be mocked. "What was your purpose in calling me here?" he said as an answer, determined to make this as quick as possible, yet keeping the vicious sarcasm from his voice. Sarcasm got him nowhere, neither in the Ministry nor among Selwyn and Telfair and the rest of them.

Telfair raised his eyebrows like it should have been obvious to him. "Well- to loosen up a bit, of course!" he walked closer and spun around, so they both had their back to the wall, their eyes to the celebration. "I know you must be having a terribly dreary time in that old cottage of yours in the middle of nowhere. Thought you deserved a break from all that. It's Scorpius's Naming, too."

Snape hoped he could escape before then. Namings were viciously boring, and leaving in the middle of one would be rude- Selwyn wouldn't leave him alone for that. "Well, congratulations." he said coldly. "I am having the time of my life."

Telfair's expression darkened, and his mind went blank with fear. "Albeit a vicarious one," he hastened to add, wondering when such obsequiousness had become part of his repertoire- Severus Snape, capable of brewing complicated potions, murder, perfidy, spite, and sucking up to people. "I can hardly join in, after all- this is not my world anymore."

The storm receded, and Telfair smiled once more, and clapped his back. "Hope you really don't feel that way, Severus- we all know your true place is here- you proved it all to us when you were just sixteen."

He kept his face bland. Telfair had not been a Death Eater, he'd been very conveniently sent on a mission to the Amazon during the majority of the Dark Lord's rise- and his fall. Telfair did not tail after the strongest player, he circled around the other circlers, and reaped small and steady benefits. He would not have taken Snape's betrayal personally, but he followed those who did, and those words were very clearly meant sarcastically, although he could detect no trace of it on Telfair's face.

"During these last years," Snape said slowly, "I have grown to prefer solitude and quiet. Also, and I mean no offense in these words, but by summoning me here you have disrupted several important projects that were commissions for Jasper Selwyn. So I wonder what was truly on your mind that was more important than his convenience- and I'm sure there are many, but so far I have not seen a sign of them."

"Well then. Frankly, I have a favor to ask of you."

The honesty was not unexpected, but he was astonished that it had come so quickly. "Yes?" he sighed wearily.

"Perhaps we should talk elsewhere."

He frowned, torn- elsewhere meant that Telfair would not be able to viciously humiliate him in front of everyone if Snape did not acquiesce to his- 'favor'- but it also meant that should Telfair ever decide to torture him to make him agree, he might not receive any help. Without knowing more, it would be foolish to risk either. "And perhaps you could give me a hint about what this is all about."

"Hmm..." Telfair said, his eyes- no, not twinkling, what a horrible thought- glinting. He did love games. "An old student."

"Yours or mine?" he asked warily. He knew that Telfair had once taught at Durmstrang as a substitute- it seemed unlikely that he would be referring to one of his own, but it would be like Telfair to do that and make him think it was about one of his.

He caught a glimpse of the dark-haired man Telfair had been talking to earlier, staring at both of them with open surprise. He was holding two glasses of wine in his hands. He was too far away for Snape to see his face clearly, but that odd feeling swamped him once more- like he was seeing someone familiar. Ridiculous, of course, he had a good memory for faces and if someone looked familiar, he always knew who they were. Perhaps it was a sibling of one of his students, he seemed to be the right age for that.

"Yours." Telfair was answering. He was grinning. He expected another question.

"House?" Snape said- indulge him, that was the key.

"Del leon." the answer came, joking.

Gryffindors, important enough to garner Telfair's attention, had something to do with him? Snape searched himself and drew only blanks. It seemed harmless enough, though, and he let himself be led into a corridor, down a hallway which- he realized with a pang of unease- had no portraits. No witnesses.

As he exited the hall, he saw a flicker of movement nearby, and turned his head to see- but there was nothing. Telfair closed the door behind him.

There was very little light as they moved on, treading on soft carpet. "This used to be Narcissa's wing, you know." Telfair said conversationally. "Her own suite. There's quite a nice collection of astrolabes upstairs. She also had a garden and a laboratory. Grew her own plants. Hardly cost a thing to her, and she was good at Herbology and Potions, too. Do you want to see her lab?"

He blinked, feeling a bit dazed. "No," he started to say, but Telfair clasped his hand (like a friend- his nerves seemed to writhe away from the warm dry touch) and led him down the stairs, and Snape had a mad thought that he would never come out again.

A pair of doors swung open at their coming.

It was a good laboratory. He couldn't deny he felt a pang at it- he hadn't had something like this even at Hogwarts. There was everything, organized neatly. He recognized Narcissa's touch in the arrangement of spare phials at the first shelf, those hexagonal containers no one used anymore. There was the tang of dried ingredients, no doubt originating from the storage room at the end of the room- some of them would need ventilation, and it was those he was smelling now.

Graters, knives, mortars, pestles, pipettes, strikers, watch glasses, crucibles, tongs, stirring rods, filter funnels, stoppers, cauldrons of all shapes and sizes, and one antique silver octagonal, the kind no one used anymore. There was a muggle timer at the top of one shelf, of pale blue plastic. It must be a recent addition- Snape had no idea why it was there.

"Pretty complete, eh?" Telfair said cheerily. In his examination, Snape had already forgotten that he was there. Foolish of him. He tore his gaze away.

"You've made your point." he said in his driest voice. "What do you want from me?"

Telfair did not lose his smile. "You have a rather interesting history with powerful wizards," he said, spreading his hands. "Sworn to the Dark Lord- served him, murdered for him, spied for him... betrayed him. Joined Dumbledore- did much the same for him."

'I did not betray Dumbledore.', he wanted to say. He did not. Telfair was not a man he needed to defend himself to. "Both are dead." was what he did say, laconically and coldly.

Telfair's face froze at his words- perhaps I was wrong, Snape thought with deepening trepidation, perhaps he did have true loyalty to Voldemort, despite all his rumored dealings with Muggles, perhaps he intended to make him suffer for his betrayal. "I'm surprised you haven't caught on yet, Severus." he said softly, and the room felt very cold. "Do me a favor and think."

Snape thought, hating himself for having to be reminded. Gryffindor. A student of his. Powerful wizards?... what-

Potter?

What did he have to do with him? Potter was gone. He hadn't been seen for five years, since his defeat of the Dark Lord. Searching spells had been diverted to Antarctica, Polynesia, Korea, California, and one, humorously, to the moon. Another to the backside of the centaur statue at the Ministry. Potter had chosen an odd time to develop a sense of humor. His Gringotts trust fund had been emptied, the Potter vault left alone- a few times it had been accessed (each time it was reported, as if it was some great mystery, a man who wished to be left alone drawing money from his family account) from an ATM machine in Hong Kong, the New York branch, RSA... no one had managed to find him.

He had no significant relationship with the brat, other than owing his father a life debt and being hated by him.

"I can't think of any connection between us that you may imagine to exploit." he said.

Telfair rolled his eyes. "They all said you were intelligent."

Snape breathed.

"He was eleven. The Quidditch match. You saved his life."

A silence.

"That- is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard." Snape said, his snort genuine. "You think you can exploit a- a life debt of the weakest sort- I didn't even save his life, someone else would have done it anyway! And I didn't even finish the incantation- there was no acknowledgement of the bond-"

"You fought alongside with him afterwards- there are accounts- you shielded him at several points-"

"Scores of people fought with him and protected him, it means very little- there was no meaningful sacrifice-"

"Meaningful- magic doesn't work that way, you know it- all it matters is that there is a bond, and it can be used, Snape, used- we just need him to tug at it, and he'll come- do you know what we could do with him?"

"He won't come, the bond isn't deep enough to summon him like that."

"If you ask, he'll know, and he'll be curious or concerned enough to come. He's like that, everyone knows that."

"Excuse me- have you even met the child? He's selfish, thoughtless, self-absorbed, and his famed empathy extends only to those close to him, I thought it would be obvious."

A beat.

"Do you have any idea-" Telfair sounded a little breathless now, a little excited, the flare of fire in his eyes much like lust, ragged with frustration. "-what we could do with him if we got him? The power he has? What we would have at our disposal if he were ours? And most of all, the favor you'd receive for having participated in his capture? Selwyn would let you go, Severus, he'd free you from his hold! And you could have this- anything like this-" he swept his hand at the laboratory, dead Narcissa's laboratory, its pristine completion. "-with what we would reward you with-"

Snape barely knew what to say. "First of all, Telfair," he managed at last, when the other man's sputtering excitement had faded into hungry expectation. "As I said, there's no guarantee he'll heed my call, or even recognize it for what it is- the boy was always oblivious to the finer nuances of magic. Second, what makes you think you could exploit him? As you say- as it is undeniably so, the boy has power- what makes you think you could overwhelm him? Third- how can I trust you to keep your end of the bargain, that the end result of my cooperation will be my manumission from Selwyn's control?"

Telfair strode to a nearby table to sit on it, legs crossed. As he did, there was a small slapping sound, like something light hitting the ground. Snape looked around, but there was nothing to create such a noise. Telfair seemed not to hear. "You have a fair point. It's a big gamble, really, but there's no harm in trying it, for one thing- and for your second point- well, it's easy, we have his friends. Or friend."

He meant Weasley, Snape realized, and the realization jarred him like ice water. Potter's brain-damaged sidekick. "You kidnapped him from St. Mungo's?"

"We will, if we succeed." Telfair said sedately. "If he comes, you'll approach him, talk to him, put him off his guard. We'll Stun him from behind, or something, and then show him his friend- I thought about using Polyjuice, but frankly I think having the real article would be better- we don't really have anyone who could imitate a lunatic like that. We'll threaten to kill him if he doesn't cooperate."

"What about Imperius?" Snape said.

"You know full well he can resist it."

"What- oh." Snape said, helplessly acting to the end. Caught. He knew it even before Telfair had finished his sentence, by the way those eyes had narrowed, the shoulders tensed an inch. Telfair's intuition was excellent, and by that one harmless suggestion Telfair had somehow realized Snape's motives in this conversation- which was odd, because Snape himself didn't know what he intended to accomplish by circling around the issue. "I see. I'd forgotten." But there was no convincing him.

Telfair was examining his face, very slowly. His eyes lingered, pointedly, mockingly, on his nose. Snape ignored him, doing no such futile foolish thing as judging the distance to the door- there was no escape- Telfair had a wand.

"You don't want to?" the man asked. Anaximander Telfair, Durmstrang graduate, the jovial lascivious pureblood arriviste, was folding aside his smile, bringing out the fangs. His words were measured, quiet. "Well. I thought you'd like the idea, to be honest, Severus. I thought you hated the boy."

"I was on his side." Snape said, not knowing how this would help his situation in any way but saying it all the same.

"Doesn't mean you had to like him to do it." he remarked, leaning back, twirling his wand in one hand- when had he retrieved it? Dread welled up in his throat, choking off anything smooth he might have said. "Winning side and all. You chose well, you know, no one really blames you for it. But I thought you'd have more sense than this."

Snape said nothing.

"You know full well that if you didn't cooperate, I'd force you to anyway."

He still said nothing.

"I was hoping you wouldn't do this. I had a real charming catch upstairs- he'll be very offended after I take care of this mess, it'll take me some time to talk his temper away."

"Charming. Even with all these plots brewing, your first priority is always sex."

Telfair laughed, loudly, not bothered at all. "As if you'd know what that felt like." he got up, and walked up to Snape. They were roughly the same height, but Telfair was broader than he was, stronger. Not that it counted, when he had a wand. "Do you like him, Snape? Always knew you were a fag, but I didn't know you were a pederast, too. Couldn't paw at him under Dumbledore's nose, so you kept it quiet? Is that it? If you helped me, you know, I'd let you do whatever you wanted with him-"

Snape stood, frozen in disgust. Telfair was angry, viciously angry, and he was in very real danger. "-or was it some great romance- Severus Snape, the most heartless bastard in the world, pining after the savior-"

"Shut the hell up." Snape spat, noting in some distant part of his mind that it had been roughly a year since he had used profanity, mild as this one was. "If you're trying to goad me, I'm sure you'll have better ways to do so than revolting me with images of myself lusting after some disgusting Gryffindor idiot."

Where did you get that idea? Snape added silently, in the privacy of his mind.

How can I get out of this?

"Because, Snape, I really can't imagine why you're protecting him." Telfair said.

"He was my student." Snape answered, throwing up his Occlumency barriers as brutally as he knew how. Telfair staggered a little on his feet, a dazed look entering his eyes, then being swiftly replaced by ugly fury. "And this business has so much potential to go wrong, I'm sure you understand why it is impossible for me to acquiesce-"

Telfair drew something from his pocket- a long silver blur that buzzed as it ground across the zipper. Snape sprang away, forgetting rationality- that Telfair would catch him anyway- obeying his instincts, fleeing. Telfair lunged, a chain held in both hands-

Snape lashed out, and missed completely- although it took him a second to realize, as Telfair landed on his torso, driving the air out of his lungs, knocking his head back onto the stone floor- and he held the chain against his face- the coldness of it burned, but so startled was he at the invisible thing his foot had met- something flat and vaguely soft, like someone's stomach- that he barely noticed the sensation of whirling away as the chain took both of them- no, three of them, something warm was locking around his legs, an invisible stowaway.

He landed in a tangle of bodies and confusion- Telfair swore and leapt away, the chain clattered onto a floor. It was dark where they had arrived, but a dim light source nearby illuminated the outlines of a now-visible person- a man- who disengaged himself from Snape's limbs, where he had been hanging on. He tried to sit up, head swimming from where he had been knocked to the floor, trying to make sense of what had just happened- obviously, he'd been transported here, but someone had followed-

It was him, the man Telfair had been flirting with earlier, the one whose oddly familiar features had given him a pause. He'd had his hair tied, but it had come loose during the chaos. He stood there, looking at Telfair, who stared back, obviously shocked.

Reviews are always appreciated. And I'd kill for critique.