Hell's Last Lantern | A Severus Snape x OC Romance

Chapter One

"Griggor Sharpp? You're actually considering him?"

The old man sat with a graceful combination of regality and comfort behind his desk, peering over his half-moon spectacles as he uttered an annoyingly calm reply. "I find it most intriguing that you are upset about this development, Severus. I was under the impression you did not prefer carrying the burden of teaching potions to––how did you put it? "Dunderheads"?––alone." Dumbledore's eyes twinkled but Snape's mouth twisted in a hardly-restrained sneer.

After several moments of silence that Albus seemed to be enjoying too much, he finally spoke again. "You have nothing to worry about, Severus. You of course will retain full control of your classroom. I'm merely having Sharpp assist you due to the chaos awaiting us for the school year, and with Voldemort's return to power."

Snape bristled at the use of the dark wizard's name, and he also resented the implication that he couldn't handle a class on his own; a class that he'd been perfectly capable of handling on his own for fifteen years. "That's not what concerns me," Snape replied sharply. "What concerns me is Sharpp's history. The man was a Death Eater in the first war––who knows what sympathies he still carries for their cause?"

As soon as the words left his lips, Snape regretted them, and rightfully so considering the smug grin the old bastard was now wearing. It didn't need to be said, and Albus seemed to recognize that, small comfort it was. Of course he knew how the other professors felt about him. No one trusted Severus Snape, well-known for being among the Dark Lord's ranks in the first wizarding war. Perhaps it was hypocritical of him to cast such assumptions on a man whose history was not so much different from his own. Griggor joined the Death Eater's ranks when Severus had just come to his height of veneration with the Dark Lord, so he was familiar with him, having been one of his superiors. He was a few years younger than Severus, but had managed to keep up in an impressive way. This was a threat, and perhaps a small blow to his pride, not that he'd admit it.

However, Snape had not seen Griggor at any of the Death Eater meetings that had been held over the summer at Malfoy Manor since the Dark Lord's return. He assumed he was either dead or in Azkaban, along with the other no-shows. When Dumbledore wrote to Snape last night to inform him of his decision to accept Sharpp's application, it had been the first that Snape had heard that he was still alive and well. And exactly how was he alive and well? Was he one of the members who claimed he was under the Imperious? It had worked for Lucius, though he had no doubt his affluence had something to do with it.

There was something else that bothered Snape about his new aide. He had always prided himself on his ability to read and appraise a person within only a few minutes of knowing them. Years of dealing with sycophants and liars had helped him hone this skill and on top of that, he'd become one of the best Legilimens in the magical community, granting him access to almost any mind or motive he sought to uncover.

He'd had a surprising amount of difficulty getting past Sharpp's mental shields. It was rather uncommon for a wizard to know the skill, and it was certainly uncommon to know the skill well enough to keep Snape out. It had disturbed him back then, but he wasn't able to give it much thought considering the stress and workload of serving the Dark Lord during the First Wizarding War.

"Headmaster, he is a highly skilled Occlumens. This concerns me greatly." Dumbledore's eyes continued to twinkle annoyingly and he replied, "Yes, I imagine he would be. My understanding is that his father was proficient in the art and taught all his children from a young age, bringing them up in service to Lord Voldemort." Snape had suspected as much, though hadn't had the opportunity to collect enough information to arrive at a conclusion one way or the other.

Snape had learned on his own how to occlude his mind from a young age, driven by a need to grow thick skin from the abuse his father and his bullies had doled out. His mother had taught him the reverse skill of Legilimency. Few wizards could do both, as they were opposite in nature.