Penny Potter may be the twin of Harry Potter but she does not share his proclivity for a hatred of the Potions Master, Severus Snape. Likewise, Snape finds, despite his better efforts that Penny has become dangerously intertwined in his life. Given...
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"I curse you, Potter, for binding me to this half life!"
The cold hands on Penny's face shook slightly as he said the words as though he were trying to imbue them with the force of the feelings he associated with them.
Brain somewhat sluggish, Penny merely stared at him, the moonlight hardening all the lines on one half his face and softening the other. It was a reflection of the contradiction in him, the one that he refused to see and Penny refused to tolerate.
"Well I curse you for selecting this moment—when I'm confused as hell how I ended up in the Hospital Wing—to feel so inclined to finally express your love for me, but only as a reason you are angry. Because Merlin-forbid you ever just say, I love you, Penny, without some caveat."
The grip on her face slackened, his hands dropping away and the features that were so full of emotion seconds prior, now stony.
"Could you expect me to rejoice in the admission of such a thing —to congratulate myself for taking every wretched thing I have accomplished with these loathsome hands and tossing them at your feet like the reality of the life I chose does not tarnish everything I touch!" he spat, getting to his feet so abruptly the chair behind him clattered to the floor, making Fleamont hiss loudly.
Anger welled in the pit of Penny's empty stomach. On their own, his words were sincere, full of a kind of love Penny barely comprehended, but Snape had them so tightly intertwined with his anger that they slashed at her heart, making her feel like he was trying to push her away yet again.
Did he have such little regard for what her heart had been dragged through the last several months? Was ensuring his control more important to him than Penny?
"How long will you insist on perpetuating your own purgatory? Make me understand why you have taken such pains to construct your own hell and then locked yourself inside! I promise you the gate is wide and open, you can be free whenever you choose!" Penny insisted, tossing her feet over the side of the bed making to follow him to her feet, but a well placed hand to her chest forced her back down.
"And how long will you delude yourself into selecting those pieces of me which suit the fantasy you have constructed! If I were a free man, I would not return to the darkness as often as I am beckoned! You have only ever known me within these walls, but you know little of what I am outside of them—"
"You're a bloody spy! All I need to know is that everything you do is at great personal risk to yourself. Even you can't turn such courage into a vice, no matter how much you despise the traits of my house!"
"Mine is not a role one simply picks up and puts down at their leisure, Potter! Not if I wish to continue living. Nor is it a skill learned through study. Has it not occurred to you that I am so good at what I do, because there is no hesitation when I blacken my soul with the deeds the Dark Lord commands!" His voice told her he was angry, but his eyes were wary, afraid almost. He was not as resolved as he normally would be if he was truly set on pushing her away. Reluctance was her ally.
