A one time thing {Severus Snape}

Chapter 52: Freak

Usual Disclaimer: I own nothing except a rabid imagination. Many thanks to Camille who has betaed this chapter for me. Any remaining mistakes are all my own creation.

A/N: 

Just a quick note to firstly: apologise for how long it has taken me to write this chapter. Real life has burst in on me in full technicolour and proceeded to make things very difficult lately.

Secondly: This may seem a little boring but it has to be here, it kinda bridges events so I'll apologise ahead of time for the fact that nothing really exciting happens here. I'm getting to it, I promise.

Thirdly: I will try to get the next chapter up sooner.

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Odile Malfoy was furious.

How dare the man she had stood beside for all those years cast her aside now?

She wasn't concerned about loosing Lucifer. How could she when she had never loved him in the beginning? No, it wasn't the fact he was divorcing her that infuriated her, it was what she stood to loose.

Respectability was everything, and she had lost it all. She was no longer in control of her own Coven. After reading the morning addition of The Daily Prophet, they had lost no time in owling her to say that "due to her present circumstances, she was needed elsewhere, and they would all understand her standing down." In all pretences, it had been done so she could spend time with Morgana, who needed her now, and for her to recover from Lucifer's "most unfortunate timing." But she knew them better than that. Back-stabbing, conniving heartless, evil bitches! It was the reason she had chosen half of them. They were evil and not without standing in society, a society that she had just been thrown out of without a backwards glance.

She had been turned on, in much the same way she'd turned on anyone who'd crossed her over the years. But now she knew what it felt like, and it annoyed her immensely that she could see no way to salvage the situation gracefully.

Lucifer had outwitted and out manoeuvred her, and she'd be damned if she'd let him get away with it.

And now, judging by the owl she'd just received from the ministry asking for her to come forthwith and "attend an interview concerning the unfortunate state of Morgana Snape," her brother had stabbed her in the back too.

She knew that he'd informed the ministry that Morgana had found that particular spell in her Book. And she wasn't fool enough to think he'd hide the fact that she gave that book to Morgana.

A frustrated howl of rage left her throat as she paced back and forth in the room she'd rented in Knockturn Alley.

It was far below her standards, and it rankled she'd been reduced to hiding here. But, until she could find a way to think through this mess, she'd have to stay out of the Ministry's sight and also Lucifer's.

She had no doubt that he had only just started with her. And she could also see a little of Lucius' strategy behind the newspaper article as well. She was well used to the games they liked to play, and she wasn't without a little knowledge of how her husband, ex-husband, worked.

If they were going to bring her down, she'd make damn sure she took them with her, them and that lousy excuse for a brother and his precious wife.

She lifted her head an evil glint tinted her eye.

She knew she couldn't move about openly. The ministry would be watching her... unless... she narrowed her eyes as a plan began to take shape in her mind. It wouldn't be fool-proof, but it might just cover her enough to keep her out of Azkaban. And, if she could do some damage to her ex-husband and brother in the meantime, who was she to grumble?