𝐒𝐀𝐂𝐑𝐈𝐅𝐈𝐂𝐄 || Severus Snape x OC ||

34. OF SERPENTS & CINDER

"This potion"— he had nodded with his eyes — "will give a fair representation of what happens to those who suffer, for instance, the Cruciatus Curse" — Alice had read of the curse, and it made her lips part in the thought of the agony — "feel the Dementor's Kiss" — he had continued — "or provoke the aggression of the Inferius."

"Isn't this dangerous, sir?" Obsidian pools had looked deep into hers.

"The Dark Lord had used them all in the past. It'd be ill-advised to assume he won't use them again."

There was no play in his eyes. No sparkle, and no sneer. His once sarcastic expressions had been reduced to a reserved coldness foreign to what Alice knew of him. A coldness was rooted within him by the seeds of secrets she dared not ask him of. The ominous finality in his gaze was a grim petrichor signaling the arrival of a storm. A storm that something within Alice told her he'd venture to fight on his own.

But she followed him, nevertheless, watching him as he walked ahead of her, his dark robes billowing behind him.

How is it that our roles have reversed, and the secrets I kept are now spilled before you, whilst yours remain sealed?

She watched him take flight, dark mist and smoke and fabric; a sight that not so long ago had saved her life. And there she was, alone it seemed.

The enchanted forest beckoned her into its pulsing heart. The deep, haunting ballad of its ancient song called out to her once the master of Dark Arts had vanished. As old as time, the forest was still steeped in plushness and opulence.

With a cautious heart, she plunged into the over-arching vault of leaf and limb. Deeper than ever before. Coils of vaporous mist enwrapped the shaggy heads of the oak trees. They writhed around them like a conjuror's milky smoke, sensuous and illusory. Sieves of mist caressed the lichen-encrusted bark. Adding its phantasmal gas to the damp breath of the forest, it glided with deadly intent. It deadened sound, haunted glades and poured into empty spaces. A sepulchral silence overhung the hallowed ground where the trees dared not grow. And for a moment, nothing stirred, nothing shone, nothing sang. A hollow echoing, like the hushed tones of a great, slabbed cathedral, entombed the wood.

The raven-haired witch curled her fingers around her wand. She kicked off her shoes and breathed slowly. Eyes closed. Controlling her mind, disciplining her emotions. The soil welcomed her skin with its primitive touch. In this forest, she was with her tribe of wood and leaf, among the giants whose roots hug the earth. Her savage nature within entwining with this place of ancient souls, of the creatures who dwell with the sounds of moving water and the songs of seasons. Somehow this was more home than any home she knew, and barefoot as she stood, her veins, her heart, and mind summoned the life of the Forest and its ancient tongue to speak to her. She had heard the voice of the Forest once before, chased when she was by the Death Eaters. Like a nymph of the woods, the Forest had whispered to her, called upon her senses, upon her primitive instincts. And she felt the Forest respond, the breath of the woods enveloping her, its ancient energy flowing through the ground into her skin.

When her eyes opened again, the veela in her wand's core vibrated with the witch's energy, responding to the clench of Alice's long fingers around the hazelwood. And the wilding delved deeper into the woods, as if she were a part of them. Ethereal and primitive, her pagan nature awaking with each step, with each breath. Her awareness expanding like the wings of the raven, her eyes keen piercing through the wands and snake-like branches of the woods.

Then a finger of supernal light poked through the misty mesh. It was followed by a whole loom of light, filtering down in seams of gold. Like the luminal glow of the gods, it chased the shadows, banished the gloom, and spilled into spaces where the mist once stalked. But the source was neither the sun nor a creature magical and unknown. Instead, the light turned into a beam powerful, and striking, that sought to find Alice.