[Chapter Size: 2100 Words.]
Third Person POV
Ministry of Magic.
...
...
With no other choice, the crowd began to leave the Wizengamot chamber when they heard Lady Vincent's pause. Severus said nothing and began to turn without allowing anyone to say a word, heading for the entrance of the place, still under everyone's gaze.
Rosária and Bellatrix ran between the stairs to reach him, as did all the Aurors who had to keep an eye on him. They made an effort to keep their distance, but they didn't lose sight of him either. Everyone knew he was back with his wand, but no one questioned taking it from him.
Meanwhile, the reporters kept scribbling quickly, making calls through mirrors. Some ran straight outside to start editing the newspaper. It didn't take long for the first headlines to appear an hour later. The entire wizarding world had its eyes on this trial.
They had already released the papers earlier because of Severus's peculiar entrance. While the first newspapers were negative, the photos of Severus entering through the crowd drew the public's attention. There were also front pages showing him glaring at the journalists after getting irritated, with bright, threatening eyes. Most reports spoke of it negatively, saying he had threatened the reporters using only his dark aura.
And now, new newspapers began circulating throughout the wizarding world. Newsstands received them by owl, and they were quickly flooded by people eager to buy them.
It was noon at Hogwarts when the new wave of newspapers began. Papers of all kinds arrived at the school, filling the common hall with owls and other birds delivering them.
People had already been whispering nonstop about the first reports, and now they updated themselves with Severus's unbelievable confessions at the Wizengamot. Everyone was mainly staring at Pandora and Clarisse. While Pandora didn't seem shaken, Clarisse struggled to ignore it.
At the Slytherin table.
As soon as the newspaper fell into her hands, she ignored everything around her, quickly starting to read with dazed eyes. Severus had confirmed every one of the events there, as the reporters had made sure to include them all and his other confessions, as well as the total number of deaths he had caused, portraying him as a cold-blooded murderer. But that was the simplest part of one of the newspapers.
At the Ravenclaw table.
One of them, which Pandora had taken, said on the front page something like: "The one who possesses the most wicked magic: necromancy. Severus, the necromancer who turned a Dark Lord into his servant."
"Pandora, don't tell me you're going to marry a necromancer?" someone from Ravenclaw pointed out to Pandora, who was sitting. She stared back.
"Severus is a good person. He has never hurt anyone innocent, and I believe in him. I want to marry him," she said, as people looked at her with a certain horror.
Since classes had started that morning, everyone had been keeping quite a distance from her. Not that this was really unusual, since even though she was one of the most beautiful among the students, she had always had the reputation of a girl lost in thought and even half crazy.
Even the boys who had tried to get close to her before she met Severus had never held her interest. Now that she was officially the fiancée of the man everyone was talking about, they all stayed even further away from her.
At the Gryffindor table.
"Peter, why are you trembling? Are you afraid of him?" shouted Potter, while Peter seemed to be having a nervous breakdown right there.
"What if he wants revenge on us? What if he turns us into those dark servants!? I don't want to be those things!" cried Peter, terrified, shaking.
"Do you really think he's going to get away with this? That's dark magic, Peter! Severus is a monster, an evil guy, surrounded by powerful wizards. He could be imprisoned at any moment!" Black replied, irritated.
"I don't think it's that simple," murmured Lupin, looking at one of the newspapers in his hand.
"What are you saying, Lupi? He uses dark magic, he's evil! He's going to end up in Azkaban and get the dementor's kiss!" Potter retorted.
"But here it emphasizes that everyone is tense. It says he made the entire room shake in a moment of fury. And here it says no one can stop him if he wants to be the enemy. And now they're talking about this business with portraits... he even showed me a memory according to this excerpt, and there are some photos..." Lupin finished, while his eyes ignored his enraged companions. They wanted Severus to pay for everything he had done.
Lupin's eyes turned toward the side where the girls from their year were sitting on the other end, more specifically toward Lily, wondering what she knew.
They knew Severus and she had broken their friendship, and that she had even tried to restore it. He had saved her too. She had told Lupin about Severus's visit during the holidays, but also about his wish not to rekindle the friendship they once had. She had said that Severus was no longer the boy she had met at nine years old, but she couldn't say more, for she cried for some reason.
Now Lupin could understand a little. After all, the newspaper described exactly something about someone from outside this world, who had died and come back to life in the body of a young man who had taken his own life — Severus Snape.
Everything he read was unbelievable. Some parts said Severus was insane, that he was making everything up — a dangerous delusion for society, according to comments from some people, mostly anonymous, who didn't want to identify themselves for fear of retaliation from Severus himself.
Lupin didn't know what to think, and Lily, who was also reading one of the newspapers, was even more lost. She ignored all the eyes on her. Everyone was watching her with questioning looks, wondering what she knew, if it was true.
Some seemed afraid of her, others disgusted. People judged easily.
"Wow, a friend of a necromancer... who knows, maybe she's already been contaminated too?"
"Friend of a murderer... who can guarantee she wasn't involved too?"
"Friend of a Dark Lord... can anyone say she isn't also a Lady of Darkness?"
"Friend of a madman, saying there are portraits with portals and other worlds..."
People whispered all the time. Even her friends, Mary and Marlene, tried to talk to her, but Lily could feel their fear. It was strange, because until not long ago everyone had been worried about her. Severus hadn't spoken to her since their last conversation, saying that the Severus she knew had died — and that she had been a terrible friend.
She had realized that in the days that followed, trying to understand why she had drifted away from him. Remembering and seeing things she hadn't noticed before made her cry even more — not only because of that Severus's words, but because she reflected on how truly awful a friend she had been. She had laughed along with the others when he was hung upside down by Potter.
It was strange how Lupin looked at her with a cautious gaze and still spoke to her. He was the least judgmental, perhaps because of his own condition, and because she had accepted that he was a werewolf. Maybe that was why he could more easily accept the fact that she had once been friends with Severus Snape — or rather now, Severus Prince.
Peter Pettigrew had approached her that morning before classes and knelt before her, begging her to ask Severus not to take revenge on them, saying he hadn't wanted to do any of those things back in school.
She didn't know what to answer. Severus didn't seem like someone seeking revenge, because if he had wanted it, he would have done it long ago. She only said he didn't need to worry about that, that Severus wouldn't act that way.
Even if he was no longer the Severus she had known, there was still something of him inside that body, somewhere. Unfortunately, perhaps she no longer deserved his attention.
Her gaze fell on the other tables. She didn't fail to notice the Ravenclaw one, and also the Slytherin one. Pandora, once again isolated, didn't seem to care. In Slytherin, people stared at Clarisse while whispering. Clarisse kept her face lowered over the newspapers, searching for any information with her sharp eyes.
Lily noticed that, among all the gazes, some were directed at her. Strangely, at that moment, Clarisse turned toward her, using both green eyes to stare and raising an eyebrow. "What are you looking at?" — it was a silent question, exchanged only through their eyes. It seemed Lily's gaze was more disturbing than anyone else's in the entire school.
She didn't know what to say. Clarisse had become quite close to Severus, closer than Lily had ever been since their fight two years ago — she was nearer to the new Severus than Lily was.
And she had gotten close to him thanks to Dumbledore, with his schemes of giving her love potions. Every time, he would call her to his office, showing her a picture of Severus so that the effect would last indefinitely, while also placing the formula into the lemon drops. He had confessed that he had even used a few vials of the Elixir of Life mixed in to create a formula far more powerful than usual — something Dumbledore had obtained from Flamel.
Lily quickly averted her gaze and returned to the newspaper.
"Are you all right?" asked Mary McDonald.
"I am... I'm just a little surprised," Lily replied, trying to hide it.
"So...," began Mary, with a hesitant look, glancing between the newspaper and her friend, "is it true that he's no longer just Severus Snape or Prince...? It says here that he's someone called... Morou? A person from another world? What order would that be? Do you know anything? You... were quite close to him last year, weren't you?" murmured Mary carefully.
"I know as much as you do... and no, we weren't that close." What Lily had done was almost entirely because of the love potion. She wouldn't have gotten that close to him otherwise.
Even Severus had acknowledged that it was an artificial feeling and hadn't wanted her closeness... It wasn't real. That made her wonder — if she had tried to approach him again without the potion, would she have felt the effects of an attraction that could have existed genuinely? — or at least not in that abnormal way.
If she had seen how bad a friend she had been, she might have tried for the kind of friendship he had with Pandora, Clarisse, even Bellatrix and a professor... maybe Severus would have reconsidered their friendship.
He had kissed her in a way she hadn't even known someone could. He had done it only to give her the potion through his mouth so she could rid herself of the foolishness of an artificial love she had for him.
She wondered if that kiss had meant nothing to him, because for her, the feeling hadn't gone away. Did he think the same of her? She secretly wished she had never taken that potion that cured her of the love potion. She even wondered if it had really worked, because she felt there were still feelings within her heart.
Tired of the stares, she rose from the table and began gathering the newspapers to read them somewhere else. She left the common hall without much appetite, still feeling the gazes coming from all the tables.
"The friend of Severus..."
Or, as many had seen at Slughorn's Club, "one of his girlfriends, the only one he didn't make his fiancée," since Severus seemed to have several, even relationships with one of the professors. They looked at her the same way they looked at Pandora and Clarisse. Even James looked at her strangely, as if she had betrayed something — which made no sense.
In any case, she left the common hall carrying a pile of newspapers, all with different opinions about Severus. There was every possible piece of information there, and she couldn't help but think that perhaps she should talk to him once more. She wanted to understand better everything that was happening. Apologizing would be a good start.
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