𝑨 𝑻𝑶𝑼𝑪𝑯 𝑶𝑭 𝑫𝑨𝑹𝑲𝑵𝑬𝑺𝑺

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟓𝟔: 𝐍𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐍𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞

AFTER LEAVING THE Basilisk, Lilith could barely make it out of the cave herself, her weakened state finally catching up with her no matter how hard and desperately she tried to push away her pain. Severus had noticed it. Her winces. Her trembles. Her puffs of self frustration.
She rejected his efforts to help her, too stubborn with her own independence and refusal to allow how she felt to dampen no only her strength but her dignity. This wasn't who she was. She wasn't ever dainty. Frail. She didn't want Severus walking around her as though she would shatter at his mere touch. The sheer thought made her feel weaker than what she already was.

Lilith felt cruel for being so abrupt with him when all he wanted to do was help, but she hoped that her resilience showed that she did in fact have strength. That her mind was still strong even if her body refused to be strong with it. She hoped that as she struggled to hold herself up that he wouldn't see it as her struggling. She hoped he would see her still holding herself up despite her struggles. There was even greater strength in the reversal of her psychology. Influencing herself and Severus to see the strength she did have to be stronger than what it was. Overestimating herself to point it pulled her out of her lie that she desperately sought to uphold. It was easy to pretend but it was harder to maintain.

She could be strong for a minute, for the walk up the stairs in the Sleepy Hollow and to pour her own tea. But it was hard to maintain as Severus kept checking in on her almost hourly, ensuring that she wasn't overexerting herself. He probably thought he had been coy about it all but she knew him better than that. Sometimes she would throw in a hysteria of coughs, all of her own will, just to watch his face slightly pull at the sight of her distress. Other times she would purposely chatter her teeth together just to watch him not so subtly leave the room and return with more wood for her fireplace. He would stay in the room a while more watching Lilith from the corner of his eye as she would shuffle into a more comfortable position on the bed, all the while attempting to stifle a laugh at the obscurity of the potions professor.

Deep down he was soft, a solid kind of softness. A solid softness that had to be broken into, melted down. His icy exterior to him was most probably his version of a sugar coating. He believed his heart to be impure, as dark as the darkness he portrayed himself to be. But bad people don't acknowledge that they're bad, nor does the idea of them being bad ever cross their mind.

But it crossed Severus' mind in every spare moment he had.

He acted cold to uphold the coldness he believed his heart to have, to ensure to not only himself but also the world around him that he too, viewed himself as a bad person. That he would ensure he suffered for his wrongdoings.

But he was wrong. So well and truly wrong. His heart was not his past and yet he constantly allowed it to overrule his desire to move on. He couldn't leave the past behind because his heart was still tied to it. Tied to the guilt, the remorse and what he thought to be betrayal. He couldn't understand that his life had been a pawn in Voldemort's game and thus not really a life at all. Just as Lilith, he too was tired of not being able to live, but merely existing for the purpose of another. Whether he wanted it to be or not, Voldemort would always be a part of Severus' life, the part he could never escape from. The Basilisk had been lucky to be released of what he thought to be eternal damnation. Severus wanted to be released from his too.

"We should go out."

Lilith had been watching Severus, sitting in the armchair in her room, staring out of the window. His mind clearly occupied with something, he hadn't blinked in over a minute and she had to refrain from throwing her tea at his face to bring him out of his dazed state.

"What?"

"Between my self pity and your self loathing, we could make an admirable team of self destruction and go out."