Ancient Magician (Severus x Reader)

Chapter 50: Where The Quiet Lives

By Severus Snape

There's a peculiar kind of quiet that comes after chaos.

Not the kind that rings hollow and empty, like the dead air of an abandoned corridor or a dungeon long forgotten—but a different quiet. Something fuller. A quiet that breathes. That hums faintly with the leftover sounds of laughter, of movement. Of life. One that still carries the faint scent of tea and toast, that wraps around your ribs like a blanket you didn't know you needed until it was there. That's what it felt like now.

The room was dim, save for the flickering glow from the fireplace. Her slippers were still by the foot of the armchair. Half a biscuit sat forgotten on the side table. And she—she was curled beside me, asleep. Or at least pretending to be. She had this habit, you see, of quieting her breath just enough to fool someone not paying attention. But I knew her well enough to feel the slight tension still strung through her fingers where they rested—loosely but insistently—tangled with mine under the blanket.

And Merlin help me, I needed this. I needed her.

More than I'd ever dare admit aloud.

I turned my head, pressing my temple gently into the pillow, eyes drifting upward toward the ceiling that had become something of a confessional over the years. I often stared at it when I didn't want to think. But my thoughts were traitorous things, stubborn and well-practiced in their rebellion. They always wandered back to her.

They always had.

I remember the first time I saw her. Really saw her.

It was a rare sunny day in Spinner's End, the kind of afternoon that looked out of place amidst the usual gloom. I was sitting on the curb outside my house, hunched over a dog-eared, torn-up copy of Magical Drafts and Potions I'd managed to rescue from a junk shop. My shirt hung off my shoulders, sleeves falling over my knuckles. I was thirteen but looked younger, thin as anything, my knees scraped from climbing the factory wall earlier that week.

She was across the street.

Chasing a golden paper butterfly. The wings flitted and shimmered in the sunlight, enchanted just enough to stay slightly out of reach. She was laughing. Proper, full-chested laughter that echoed off the bricks and windows like a song you didn't know you'd missed until you heard it again.

I'd seen her around before, of course. She and her father, Aberforth, lived a few streets over—odd in their own right, what with the goats and the wild stories and the stubborn way they never seemed to fit in with the rest of the world. She wasn't like the other kids. There was a softness to her that felt dangerous, too unguarded for a place like ours. People like us weren't gentle by choice—we learned to be hard or be broken.

So when she came bounding over and knelt beside me like we weren't strangers, I stiffened.

"Want to catch it with me?" she asked, brushing a bit of dirt from her knee, still grinning.

I frowned, suspicious. "Why?"

She shrugged, as if the answer was obvious. "You looked like you needed something to smile about."

And just like that—without hesitation—she caught the butterfly in her small hands and placed it in mine. As if it wasn't precious. As if I was.

"I'm Y/n," she added, like it was an afterthought. "My daddy says I make too much noise for a Dumbledore, but I think he secretly likes it."

I didn't say anything. Not really. Just stared. She didn't seem to mind.

She grinned wider, her front teeth slightly crooked, her braids messy from running. "You don't talk much, do you?"

I shook my head.