Marked

The Brothers

Chapter 10: The Brothers

"You're doing better," Snape said in a tone that he must have meant to be encouraging, though the effort at positivity was visibly straining him.

Theo grumbled irritably. "I think I've found the secret to occlumency," he said with a grunt. "Just don't care about anything. At all. Ever."

Snape looked unimpressed. "I can see that you're joking," he commented flatly. "But truly, that is the secret."

Theo leaned forward, burying his face in his hands. "Brilliant," he said wearily. "I'm fucking brilliant. A thousand points to Slytherin."

"Theo, the less you have to lose, the better off you are," Snape told him, his voice ringing with a sense of finality. "Believe me. Use it to your advantage instead of letting it defeat you."

"You think I'm defeated?"

"I think you think you're defeated."

"You say that like there's a difference," Theo said with a grimace. He sighed dramatically. "What a great time to be alive."

"I take it things aren't going well at the Manor?" Snape broached delicately.

"He's not happy," Theo remarked grimly. "I'd stay away from him, if you can help it. The Carrows were supposed to move the vanishing cabinet somewhere more accessible but shit-for-brains Amycus broke it." He shivered. "The imbecile's lucky he got to keep his fucking head."

Snape blinked in surprise. "The Dark Lord did not punish him for it?"

"He has something else on his mind these days," Theo said with a frown. "He's got me running around after some other project of his. Besides," he added, "with you in charge, it's not like he needs a vanishing cabinet to get into the castle. He can get there any way he pleases."

"He didn't find it odd that Amycus would be fool enough to break such a valuable connection?" Snape asked, leaning forward. "You don't find it odd?"

Theo shrugged. "Why should I care? Amycus is a third rate wizard at best, and you know as well as I do that those cabinets were hardly reliable to begin with."

"True," Snape said, though his furrowed brow seemed to indicate an entirely different set of emotions. "I suppose it also helps that the cabinet is no longer a necessity."

"Not that I care," Theo said with a smirk, "but I suppose it makes sense to limit access to the castle. Best that only the Death Eaters who used it that night know that it exists, don't you think?"

"You know it exists," Snape noted quietly, his dark eyes calculating. "I take it the Dark Lord has seen fit to trust you, then."

"With little things, here and there," Theo admitted. "Not nearly as much as I'd like, but with Amycus essentially demoted - "

"This is something you want?" Snape asked, cutting him off. "You wish to be close to the Dark Lord?"

Theo tossed him a dismissive eye roll. "Of course," he said with a lazy wave of his hand. "That was always the purpose to this. I'm not here to be one of his minions, I need to get close. I need to know what's happening." He paused, biting his lip. "I need to know what happened," he added, his voice low.

Snape raised one carefully arched brow. "You think he is hiding something from you?"

"The whole thing is like a puzzle where the pieces just don't fit," Theo said with a scowl. "Whether he's hiding something from me or not, I want to know everything he knows."