The Marauders: Year One | #Wattys2016

Midnight Meeting With the Dark Lord

Although Severus didn't know what Sirius Black had been up to in that Slytherin locker room, he knew one thing for certain – there'd definitely been a look of no good about him when he'd come back out. Whatever he'd been getting into, Sirius hadn't wanted Madam Hooch to know about it, which made Severus feel very, very suspicious indeed. If Sirius Black had been stepping out of line, then Severus needed to know about it so that he had something to use against Sirius next time he bullied him. So Severus decided right then, as the boys split up in the Great Hall and he watched Sirius trot away with a swagger almost as arrogant as James Potter's, that he would be watching the four Gryffindor first years very carefully. Anything and everything that he noticed about them would be used as defense against them when they tried to torture him in the future.

If it was one thing that Severus was very skilled at – it was the art of blackmail. After all, he had grown up with the two best at the craft – his mother and father. Eileen and Tobias had been very carefully blackmailing each other day in and day out for as long as Severus could remember. Neither Tobias nor Eileen had loved the other in years, but they stayed together for a spiderweb of secrets and lies that had twined itself so deeply that neither could easily separate from the other without falling apart. Severus's entire life had been like living in a house of cards.

But it had made him a master at facades, at straight faces and double meanings – it was a talent that he lauded quite proudly.

That night, Sirius laid awake in the dormitory bed, staring up at the ceiling of his four poster, listening to the sleeping sounds that surrounded him. A snuffle here, a kicked blanket there. He took a deep breath, wishing that he dared to fall asleep. The worry of having another of those crazy mixed dreams unnerved him now that he suspected they were other peoples' dreams, though, and even if he closed his eyes all he could do is lay there and worry.

Finally he decided that laying in the darkness was doing him no good, so he got up and shrugged on his pajama robe and some slippers and snuck out of the dormitory, being very careful about closing the door behind himself silently. He'd only planned to go down to the common room to read, but when he emerged onto the landing before the doors that led up to the dormitories, he halted and crouched down.

In the common room was Lucius Malfoy and a couple others, including the elder of the Mulciber brothers and Walden McNair. They were gathered together in front of the fire and in the smoldering ashes there was a face – a face unlike any that Severus had ever seen before. The features were that of a handsome man, but the details were starting to blur together until what had once probably been a good looking face was now rather like a grotesque figure. He felt his throat tighten up and he clutched the rails of the stairwell, peering down with wide eyes.

He'd seen folks communicate with the floo network before, but there was something obscene and clandestine about the scene before Severus that made him feel funny – as though he were seeing something he shouldn't.

"Master," Lucius Malfoy was saying, bowed so low on the carpet that his nose nearly touched it.

The other two bowed as well.

"Tell me Lucius," said a low, mystic sort of voice, "How did your little meeting go with the Slytherin students of Hogwarts?"

Lucius appeared to be groveling. "Very well, master, very well indeed. Nearly half the house turned out... all interested in helping you purify the wizarding race."

"I see..." the voice mused. Severus realized, the way Lucius kept saying 'master' that this weary face in the fire must have been none other than the Dark Lord himself. A sort of thrill travelled up Severus Snape's spine as he thought of how close he was to such power at that very moment... and how excited he was that he was able to sneak so close without being detected by one of the most powerful wizards that had ever lived and breathed upon the earth. "And do you think any are trustworthy, Mr. Malfoy?"