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Title: Promises
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Highlander: the series, Harry Potter (circa Order of the Phoenix)
Characters/Pairings: Methos/Adam Pierson, Severus Snape, Irma Pince, cameo by one of the Weasleys. Methos/Severus.
Summary: Reputations, deceptions and promises. A wartime romance, and two men who delight in confounding expectations. Even each other's
Wordcount: 2322
Disclaimer: I own nothing, not even the boys, which is a pity because I would have liked to treat them a bit better than they were
Notes: for the prompt "Snape has a lover? That's Snape's lover???"
Promises
"Snape has a lover?" The red-haired child couldn't have sounded more stunned if he tried. "That's Snape's lover?"
It was a sentiment apparently echoed by half the school. More than half, really. In the two days since he'd arrived, Methos had heard just about every possible variation on the theme. It seemed as far as these people were concerned, the only possible reaction to the prospect was rampant disbelief.
Not that he could blame them, precisely. Severus had crafted his persona so very well, had honed and shaped his bitterness and sarcasm to simply stunning effect, and to see Methos' own persona against that, the young, fresh-faced Adam Pierson ... well, he could hardly begrudge the children a little cognitive dissonance at the effect. It was so wonderfully warped, after all. Perfectly appalling. The shy, gentle researcher, chained to that horrible ogre of a Potions Master.
He snickered softly, flashing a smile and an apologetic shrug to Madame Pince for the noise, waving a hand in askance at the students for making such a ruckus in the Library. The old battleaxe smiled back, sympathetically. A kindred soul, that woman. There were books in this library that all but leapt to her touch, knowing genuine caring when they felt it. Methos did love those with a proper appreciation for the written word, and Irma ... well. Lets just say that if the Great Library at Alexandria had known her touch, it would never have been lost, and Methos was not shy about his appreciation for the fact.
Unfortunately, battleaxe though she may be, sanctity of the Library notwithstanding, not even Irma Pince could stem the mutterings that surrounded him, the ripple of shock and confusion and pity. And, amusing though it may be, Methos was beginning to find it annoying. Severus deserved better than this, from people he worked so hard to protect ...
As if summoned by the thought, the Library doors slammed open, and the man himself strode into the hall, cutting off the murmurs as if they'd never been. Pausing for a moment to rake the room with a quelling sneer, ignoring Irma's glare, ignoring the stunned, guilty expressions of the students, Severus Snape stalked towards Methos, his already grim features twisted into a scowl of truly epic proportions. Methos stared, swallowing, very carefully allowing only Adam's apprehension, his concern, and maybe a glimmer of shy appreciation, and ruthlessly shoving down his own flash of sheer hunger. Oh, but Severus did know how to put on a show, didn't he?
"Mister Pierson." Snape's lip curled into a contemptuous little sneer, dark eyes flashing dangerously as he shoved his hands down on the desk between them, on either side of Methos', leaning in until his prominent nose rested an inch from Methos' own. The Immortal hurriedly swallowed the urge to laugh, and pulled up every scrap of meek confusion Adam Pierson possessed.
"Severus. Can ... can I help you?" A little bit of a quaver, there, an acknowledgement of how truly intimidating Severus Snape could contrive to be. For a second, a smirk flickered over his lover's face.
"I would like a word with you, darling, if you don't mind," Severus purred smoothly, rich threat in his voice, anger and hunger and note-perfect demand. Oh, but these fools hadn't a clue what they held, did they? The perfect spy, the perfect double agent, deception given voice in their midst. Such a gem, and not a one of them appreciated it.
"Of course, Severus," he smiled, disarmingly, coming to his feet with a sheepish glance at Madame Pince, the very picture of shamed innocence in the face of his lover's wrath. Behind Severus, he caught more than one student glaring daggers at the Potions Master's back on his behalf, and hid a grin. Oh, children. You've not the first clue who you're dealing with, do you? If only you knew. It's Severus that needs protecting, little ones. So very much. But they didn't know, and it wasn't his place to tell them, even if Severus had wanted it. Which he didn't.
"Any day now, Adam," the taller man bit out, standing back, pale face smoothed into a ruthlessly controlled sneer, black eyes glittering in challenge and annoyance. Methos hid the hungry twitch of his hands with the clumsy gathering of his books, and moved into Severus' shadow with cowed eagerness. The Potions Master laid a firm hand in the small of his back, as if to propel him out of the room, and Methos pressed back into it a little, just a faint reminder, a secret delight, as he gifted Irma back her treasures and allowed himself to be swept away.
Severus' restraint, incredible as it was, lasted about five seconds once they were out of sight of prying eyes, and Methos found himself caught up in large, stained hands, pinned against a wall with brutal efficiency, and then Severus' eyes were an inch from his own, some laughing, desperate thing shining out at him from their depths, and Severus' voice was a silken purr in his ear.
"You!" the spy breathed, narrow body pressing Methos into the wall. "Do you have any idea what you've done to my reputation, Methos? Do you have any idea?"
"Something good, I hope," he murmured back, shimmying a bit, grinning at the little gasp that Severus mastered with vicious control. "That was why I came, after all." He grinned hopefully. Severus had asked for his help, and he'd hate to think he'd disappointed ... But the expression on his lover's face as he pulled back, just a touch, to stare down at Methos, the dark, hesitant emotion, rich and stormy and pained ... that silenced him, suddenly. Methos stared, mute, at the leashed desperation in those eyes, at the hope and hunger and resignation.
"He called me last night, Methos," Severus whispered, his hands curling a little where they pressed against Methos' stomach, tension singing in their strong grasp. "Letters from Slytherins, home to their parents. He thinks you're some Muggle slave I've smuggled past the Headmaster under the guise of a lover. He took the time to actually congratulate me on my ingenuity, in between punishing me for risking my position as a spy." A harsh laugh. "Half my House apparently thinks the same. Quite possibly half the school, and the other half ... Dumbledore thinks you're my last grasp at something happy, you know. The old bastard even gave me his blessing, despite thinking I should maybe not be so harsh on you in public. He thinks you're my last attempt at happiness given ... given what's coming." A bitter quirk of those lips. "Amusing, don't you think?"
Methos shook his head, reaching out to wrap his arms around the younger man's waist, tugging him gently forward into an embrace. "They don't understand, Severus. We never expected them to. In fact, we very deliberately set out to make sure they didn't understand, remember?"
A snort of rough laughter, and Severus tucked his head into the side of Methos' neck, chuckling darkly. "I remember. I just ... didn't expect it to work quite so well, perhaps." Softer, tired. "It never stops amazing me, just how much they're willing to believe, and just how little of the truth they're willing to see." A sad smile. "Just how little of me. Anything that might contradict the picture of me they have in their heads, they ignore, or bend to fit. If it weren't so likely to get me killed, I'd be almost tempted to laugh at them." He raised his head a bit, a flicker of a smile, a faint hint of teasing. "Are all of us poor mortals so easy to fool, oh Ancient One?" Methos bit his lip.
"No," he said, shaking his head. "Not really. Not ones like you, certainly. But those two ... they're paranoid, Severus, and caught up in a war, a vendetta, that neither of them are willing to let go. They're desperate to see anything that might indicate their own superiority, anything that might hint at future victory. And you ... you, my love, are a linchpin held between them, and as long as both can let themselves believe they hold your loyalty, they can let themselves believe in that victory. And they want to believe in it, Severus. So very desperately."
Severus looked at him for a long minute, so young and yet so old, aged long, long before his time, by hate, by suspicion, by a life lived caught at the cutting edges of two very desperate powers. Mortal he may be, young he may be, but Severus Snape had lost what innocence he'd had a long time ago, and hope not long after. But war did that to people, didn't it? No-one knew that better than Methos.
"Yes," said the spy. "They want to believe it. And when the time comes, when I finally prove one way or another which side I'm on ... That betrayal will kill me, won't it." Not even a question, not anymore. "It doesn't even matter who wins. Whichever side falls in the end ... I'm going to fall with it."
Methos lowered his head, face twisting, hands knotting into fists at Severus' back, and for once, there was nothing, nothing at all, of Adam Pierson in his demeanor. This was pure Methos, old and sad and tired in so many ways, and fiercely, desperately determined despite it. He couldn't lie. Not to this boy, not to this man who'd never been offered honest comfort in his life, but he couldn't confirm what they both knew, either. He couldn't open his mouth and blithely agree to Severus' death. He couldn't.
Severus was silent too, for a minute. Watching him, studying him, studying the bitter knowledge in his face, the defiant caring despite it. Looking for a lie, in this face that had lied to the world since the day it was born, looking for a deception in the oldest deceiver in existence. Looking for it, and failing to find it. It wasn't much to offer, never enough to offer, but it was all Methos had, and in many ways more than anyone else had ever given.
"When they come for me," Severus said at last, quietly, almost gently. "Whichever of them it is ... when the war spills out, Methos ... you can't be here. You can't be near me. Neither of them would hesitate to use you against me, against each other, and if either of them ever found out what you are ..." They both shuddered instinctively at that thought. "You can't be here. I'm sorry, Methos. You've done all you can."
"I know," Methos whispered, harshly. "I know, Severus." A bitter laugh, but there was a certain dark humour to the situation, despite it all. If only in the nature of their mutual deceptions. "And heaven forfend that the oldest, most self-absorbed survivor in existence should risk himself now! Think of the damage it would do to my reputation!" And that got him a smile, a bitter little twist of one thin lip, but there was something light in black eyes despite it all.
"No," Severus murmured, reaching up to trace Methos' mouth with stained, scarred fingers, a master's touch. "We can't have that, can we? Reputation, after all, is everything." Yes. Reputations that kept them alive, reputations that every day threatened to get them killed, reputations that simultaneously belied and uplifted the truth of who they were. Reputations they swapped between them with equal deception and equal truth. The innocent and the monster. The spy and the scholar. The survivor and the sacrifice. The youth and the ancient. The living man and the walking corpse. And oh, if only Severus knew. If only he dared tell him ...
Methos strangled a cry, and reached up to tangle a hand in Severus' lank hair, tugging his lover's head down with a ruthlessness no-one would ever suspect in Adam Pierson, and a youthful desperation no-one would ever suspect in the oldest of the old. "Promise me," he hissed, fiercely, watching the mortal eyes an inch from his own. "Promise me, Severus. When this is over. When your part in this is done. Promise me you'll find me again. If luck is with you, if you manage ... Promise me. Promise me!"
Severus stared at him, nonplussed, with eyes full of age and sad knowledge and almost tender pity. "I promise," he said, softly, and never in all his years of deception had the lie been so obvious in his voice. "I promise, Methos. I promise I'll come." And he leaned in that last inch, and kissed Methos, something bloody and bitter and impossibly sweet, the seal on one last lie, the promise of one last moment before death. Methos clung to him, and tried desperately not to laugh, tried harder not to cry.
"I'll show you the world," he promised, a promise he'd made before, and as earnestly. "I'll show you all the world, Severus, when you come back to me. Show you how to run, how to hide, how to get lost in the freedom and beauty of it all. I'll show you that."
"I know you will," Severus said, biting Methos' lip gently, tasting the age of him, the spark of magic that gave life to death, tasting the magic he knew he'd never have. "I know that."
And Methos smiled Adam Pierson's smile, and pulled what comfort he could from the fact that, though Severus would have to die, and they both knew it, between two of the best deceivers the world had ever seen, between two promises equally and obviously false ... the only one of them was actually a lie. And that, only because the liar knew no better.
*Severus, beloved child ... do you think I'll let you go so easily as that? Cunning serpent, you don't know half of what you think you do! And love, remember, I promised I'd never lie to you.
I do always try to keep my promises, Severus.*
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It always surprised me that there wasn't more Methos/Severus stories out there, considering all the potential of the pairing which this story so lovely demonstrated.
:)
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Thank you!
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Oh, and thank you, by the way!
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But, JKR forgot something when she painted those broad strokes of Snape's character. For all that Snape supposedly loved Lily so much that he became a spy, he was happy to see James and Harry dead, if it meant he could have Lily. For me, my issues with Snape stem from Book 5. Until then, I could buy that he has to act like he does towards Harry because he has a position to maintain. I cannot, however, buy that that gives him leave to mind rape Harry in "occlumency" lessons. That on top of his continued derision towards Harry makes it very difficult for me to buy his character as being someone who is trying to redeem himself for being responsible for his love's death. In Book 7, we are made to believe that everything he did was for Lily, and yet he treated Harry terribly. At the same time, JKR did her best to tarnish James, Sirius and Remus for Harry while not allowing them any type of redemption.
This is a similar complaint I have about Dumbledore. The view of the kindly headmaster falls to pieces once we find out that he suspected Harry was a Horcrux and let him be live with the Dursley's as he did. Whatever else you might want to argue, it is impossible to say that the Dursley's didn't abuse Harry. Maybe not hitting him or beating him up, but forcing a child to live in a cupboard is abuse, or at the least neglect. And Dumbledore forces Harry to live there, dictates the way Harry lives and yet Harry is okay with that. It... bothers me, if you can't tell.
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My view of Severus comes mostly from the first six books, in which he is a bitter, flawed man who made a very bad mistake, and then made any number of other ones trying to make up for it. He is not, by any stretch of the imagination, a nice man. He might just, however, be a good one. He hates Harry. To be fair, he hasn't a lot of reasons to like him, all things considered, but it is the reaction of an embittered man nonetheless. But. He still saves him. He still protects him. Multiple times. And it says something that he would save someone he hates just because he knows it's what has to be done.
I don't like the Severus/Lily plot from book 7, because it cheapens all of that. It cheats out the realisation that nice does not always equal good and nasty not always evil, and instead turns the whole thing into a tawdry love story. *sighs*
On Dumbledore ... yeah. Agreed. That's a piece of the same lesson, though, maybe. Nice does not necessarily mean good.
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I love the nasty does not equal evil dynamic, and that good does not equal nice. I LOVE IT. Love it lots.
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See, I don't understand why he wouldn't like Harry. I can understand not liking him because of his father, but he grew up an orphan, not knowing his father. As I mentioned above, I can buy his initial treatment of Harry as a blind for the other DEs. And yes, he did save Harry multiple times. and Harry sometimes acted like an ass towards him, but I also think that by starting things with Harry, Harry was merely reacting.
At any rate, I think what confuses me most about the Snape/Lily thing, is that if everything he does is because of Lily, treating her son like crap isn't going to endear him to her in the afterlife. Furthermore, if as it is hinted that he would rather her live than Harry, it just makes his "love" for her seem stalkerish and creepy.
But yes, I agree with your point that nice doesn't necessarily mean good.
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But from Snape's point of view ... Harry was the son of the man who tormented him throughout his school years. Harry was the reason Lily was dead, in that she'd died to save him, and even if you don't believe in Snape/Lily, that had to have some impact. Harry's the reason Voldemort is gone, yes, but he's also the reason they think he might come back. Harry's the reason Voldemort was destroyed, and he didn't even try, he was a baby, and all Snape's sacrifice, all his spying, are made a nothing because of that. To a man of Snape's pride ... he was never going to like the brat. And then Harry came to Hogwarts, and inside a year was acting like his father, running around smashing the rules with his friends. Now, we know Harry had very, very good reasons for all that. But until after the fact, Snape didn't. Seriously. How was he supposed to react? His childhood nightmare, running around poking his adult nightmare into returning? Not to mention throwing werewolves and Sirius Black in his face in the process?
*shakes head* No. Snape and Harry were never going to like each other. But despite all that, despite taking every opportunity he could to hurt Harry the way Harry's mere presence hurt him ... Snape still looked out for him. Still protected him. Because he knew it had to be done, and he'd learned in the first war exactly how far he could take his hatred before it had real costs. Costs like Lily. Costs like a mark burnt into his arm. Costs like the list of Order dead Alastor keeps in his head.
Snape's a man fighting a war, with allies he doesn't entirely trust, and who certainly don't trust him, on behalf of a boy he doesn't even like, and a Headmaster who set him up. Whether or not his bitterness is something you can approve of, it's something you have to at least understand.
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Yes, Harry is the reason Lily is dead. BUT, SNAPE is the one that told Voldemort the prophesy. He is just as culpable for her death, if not more so. I don't think Snape knew about the horcruxes until way late in the game; everyone "knew" that Voldemort was still around though. (Fudge talks about it in book 3 plus by then we have had possessed Quirrel.) I'm not saying Snape has to like Harry. Treat him with indifference or badly b/c he is the BWL in public. Holding a grudge against a child b/c of who his father is, is just childish, no matter how awful James treated him - maybe more so because James is dead and Harry knows nothing about him.
I understand why Snape acted like he did. I understand that he will never like Harry. I even understand all the costs that Snape gave to the "cause." But I also treat him like the adult he is in his actions, whereas I will view Harry's actions as the child he is.
You've brought up a lot of good points about Snape and a lot of what you've said has highlighted all the difficulties I have with Snape. He is not a character I love and is one I have a lot of difficulty liking as a character - not as a person. I think what it comes down to for me is that for all the very valid reasons Snape might have for his actions, he is an adult and Harry is not. And for me that makes Snape just one more abusive adult in his life, even if he does help to save Harry's life many, many times.
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Harry may be a child, but he is making adult decisions, that affect adult lives. He doesn't have a choice, and it's not his fault, but the fact remains. When he runs off, he puts lives at risk. When he breaks the rules, he puts lives at risk. Snape had to walk into his oldest nightmares, at the Shack and at Voldemort's hands, repeatedly, because of what Harry chose to do. Almost always, it's Snape who's on the sharp end of those decisions.
Adult or child, pain is pain, and threat is threat. Snape might make life difficult for Harry, but Harry more than once almost gets Snape killed. Willfully. When your actions have life-and-death consequences for more than just yourself, how much of a child can you afford to be? And Snape already knows what Harry's mistakes might cost, because he made them himself, once upon a time, and because he's already paying the price for this set now. He knows where this could end, but he can't stop Harry because Harry won't listen.
Neither of them are where they want to be. Neither of them have a choice in the matter. Both of them make terrible mistakes. Both of them pay the price for it. Both of them are only human.
And in the end, only one of them is made to die for it.
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But. But what the fragging hell, he decides to send Snape? Completely aside from the fact that neither Harry nor Snape even remotely like each other, completely aside from the fact that making them barge around each others heads is going to do nothing but increase that hate, that decision made no tactical sense. Snape is his spy. On Voldemort. The guy who is apparently prone to popping by Harry's mind to check on the opposition. The guy who hates and loathes Harry with a passion, and is quite liable to kill anyone of his servants he might happen to find helping the brat. And this is not a theory. Dumbledore apparently already has enough proof that Voldie is in Harry's head to decide not to risk his own. But he sends Snape?
Yes, I think Snape had no choice but to do what he did in the lessons. Even if he'd already locked all memories of his time with the Order in the pensieve. Even if he was the best Legimens going. He couldn't take Harry's memories of the lessons, not if they were to do any good, and if the Dark Lord took a gander at those and found Snape really and truly helping Harry ... The best, the absolute best he could hope for was to barge in around, maybe rustle up some childhood pain that had absolutely no bearing on the war (hopefully), and hope that Harry picked up some tips by osmosis, if nothing else.
Seriously. I have no idea what Dumbledore hoped to achieve there. He had to know it made no sense, that as a spy, dealing with a proven compromised subject, Severus had no choice but to act as he would if Voldemort were constantly present at those lessons. He had to know that. The only thing I can think of is that he hoped, when Severus found out about Harry's childhood and vice versa, that they would begin to trust each other a little. In which case, he must have been pretty damn desperate, since appealing to Snape on emotional grounds is pretty hopeless, and Harry's disgust is based on how Snape acts to him in the present.
So. Yeah. If anything, Severus' behaviour during the Occlumency lessons is more justified than just about any other instance, because he is more vulnerable as a spy that at almost any other time. Even if you put aside the fact that Snape teaches more or less everything by crisis learning, even if you put aside the fact that that was most probably how he learned Occlumency, given the age at which he joined the Death Eaters ... with Voldemort potentially in Harry's mind, he genuinely had little other choice.
And Dumbledore should have freakin' known that, dammit!
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Your theory is interesting. I've never really thought of it that way. I just saw it as another example of Snape abusing his power as Professor over Harry, someone he loathes. But you bring up a good point and just make Dumbledore's actions seem even more abusive. One thing I've never understood is why the HEADMASTER of Harry's school had the ability to decide everything Harry did - from where he stayed during vacations to how long. It's just unbelievable that no one ever questions the man.
And one of the things I really resent is how JKR did her best to tarnish the view Harry had of his father and Sirius and Remus. I realize that James had to be humanized and taken off his pedestal, that he couldn't be perfect. But I didn't love Harry's reaction to seeing the memory. Further, JKR never really showed us how Remus and Sirius have changed since that memory. Her treatment of Remus especially was just terrible.
At any rate, Snape is one of those characters that I have a lot of difficulty with. Depending on my mood, day or fic, I will like him or hate him.
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*sighs* That memory. Sirius and Remus ... Okay. Harry had to grow up. He had to realise that ... well, he had to realise that nice does not always mean good, and good not always nice. The Marauders did what they did. They were kids. They didn't mean to almost kill Snape, but that's what almost happened. Snape was a kid. He did what he did. He didn't know when he joined what Voldemort was going to turn into, going to make him do. None of them knew, back then. If you blame any of them for their part, you have to blame all of them. If you forgive any of them for their part, you have to forgive all of them. Snape grew up, changed sides, learned how far he could push his hate. Sirius never had the chance, with Azkaban, but once he got out he did his best in the time allowed. And Remus ... Remus was always the weakest of them, but he did try.
*sigh* I shouldn't rant. But all those men and women, from the first war ... they all made their mistakes. They all lost something. And they all did their best to learn from them. Snape included. You don't have to like any of them. But for what they lived through, and for the side they came down on in the end ... I think you have to respect them. All of them.
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If I trusted JKR to do justice to it, I would love if she could write a prequel showing the affect the war had on the older generation.