Finding Severus

3. Treason

It was well into the next night before Severus Snape opened his eyes. They shot open and his whole body tightened. Wherever he was, it was dark. He wondered for a moment if it was the afterlife. He had been gravely injured, after all, and there was no one there to...

No. Wait a minute. There was someone there, he told himself. A woman who claimed she would help him.

Severus tried to sit up. He felt heavier than he remembered. Or was he so weak that it just seemed that way? He raised his hand to his temples and rubbed them gently. Everything was a little fuzzy. He recalled running from the Ministry, from Harry Potter and the Weasley boy, and anyone else who might have been after him. He remembered that he was in the Forbidden Forest...near the end. A frown creased his forehead. But where was he now?

He looked around. There wasn't much he could see in the dark. Then it occured to him. He felt around with his hands. Whatever he had been sleeping on was soft. He discovered the quilt over top of him and the blanket. No wonder he had felt heavier when he woke up. The covers alone weighed a ton. If there were covers, then he was probably in a bed. As if to confirm this theory, he moved his legs out from under them and swung them over to the side. His bare feet touched the floor. It was hardwood or some other smooth surface because it was cold to the touch. Maybe it was stone. The temperature of the floor shocked him. Hadn't he been wearing shoes?

Severus was beginning to get nervous. Had that woman left him in the forest to die? Then he had a terrible thought. The cells in Azkaban had cold stone floors. A shiver ran down his spine. He had to find out where he was.

Slowly, he rose to his feet. He reached into his robes for his wand, but it was gone just like his shoes. He took a deep breath and tried to calm the rising anxiety within him. He started to feel his way around in the pitch black surrounding him. He felt the edge of a table and some sort of structure with drawers, probably a wardrobe of some kind. That's when his mind started to ease a little bit. A prison cell wouldn't have a wardrobe would it?

He felt along the structure until it ended. Then there was some other kind of shelf. Finally, after several minutes, he found a light switch. He squinted to prepare his eyes and then flipped it on. The room around him flooded with light. He could see where he was now. He was in someone's bedroom. The room was nice. He was starting to feel a lot better...until his eyes rested on the bedside table. Sitting there, was an empty vial and a syringe. Frantically, he rolled up both of his sleeves. Sure enough, there was a mark on his left arm, just above the Dark Mark. Someone had been giving him something.

Severus picked up the syringe and examined it. It was hard to tell what it was through the casing, but he didn't like the looks of it. He put it back down in a hurry. He looked around the room a little bit more. There were several shelves of books, mostly on the other side of the room, a wardrobe, the bedside table, the bed, and a lamp. The door to the room was just a foot away from him. It was quiet too. He couldn't hear a sound coming from the other side.

Maybe it was the woman he had met in the woods that had taken him in. Maybe this was her bedroom in her house. She said she wanted to help him, though he couldn't understand why. At the time, he was willing to let her because he knew he would die if he didn't. If this was hers, he hoped she wasn't home. Then he would be free to find his shoes and his wand and then leave quietly. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate her helping him, it was just that he didn't trust her not to turn him in. He didn't trust anyone at this point. The only person he had ever trusted, even a little bit, was Dumbledore.

Severus opened the door as quietly as possible and tiptoed out of the bedroom. He found himself in a semi-narrow hallway. On one end was a dead end and on the other it opened up into more of the house. He could see a refrigerator and stove from where he was standing. He walked cautiously toward it. When he reached the entryway to the hall, he could see the living room, and more importantly, the front door. Now all he had to do was find his wand and he could conjure shoes if it came down to it. He would be free.