And Counting || Silvanna Snape

Chapter Twenty-Three

  It was raining in London, which looked just like it always had. A bit dirty, like New York, and lacking the green appeal of the countryside. It reminded her a little of Spinner's End but bigger and noisier.

 Silvanna had left her things in the muggle hotel she was staying at, The Langham, and had apparated from a seedy side-street directly to number twelve, Grimmauld Place.

 The view made acid rise up her throat, but she shook herself off and climbed the steps, letting herself in. She needn't use the knocker - there was no one left there after Walburga had died a few years after the war.

 It was dirtier than she remembered, and darker. The knarled umbrella stand remained next to the door, so she dropped hers inside and hung up her cloak. Kreacher was nowhere to be seen -in fact no one was.

 She walked through to the kitchen where she planned to get herself a cup of tea, but was stopped short in her tracks. Harry Potter looked just like his father. It was as if James had materialised in front of her, but with Lily's bright eyes. He stared at her, scowling a little like his mother had.

 "Harry," she said softly. She gathered herself and looked around the room at Remus and Sirius. And then, for the first time in a very long time, Silvanna Snape smiled.

 Harry was still looking at her.

 "I'm sorry, how silly of me - my name's Silvanna. I was a friend of your parents."

 "Really?" He continued to scowl.

 "You sound like you don't believe me," she chuckled. She tried to maintain her smile, but felt it slipping away once more.

 "There's a portrait of you outside my bedroom, upstairs," he told her. "Seems like you were pretty pally with the people that killed them."

 Oh dear.

 "I wrote to you-" She fished in her handbag, and withdrew a thick bundle of cards. Fourteen exactly, the most recent of which was only a few weeks old. "Every birthday. Look -" She held them out and noticed her hand was shaking, but that didn't matter because he tentatively took the pile from her. One at a time he flicked through them, his face softening with every number or racing car that appeared. He read every message carefully, lapping up every word she'd ever written to him.

"Thank you," was all he said, but he sounded relieved, lighter even. "Thank you so much Silvanna."

 And there was her smile again. It felt wonderful on her face.

 But then: "Why didn't you ever visit?"

 "Oh I - I didn't think it was appropriate." How could she go into detail about the vicious custody battle that she lost against his current headmaster, no doubt a man he looked up to greatly.

 Harry nodded, still looking at his cards. He gently gathered them up, taking great care with each one, before rising to his feet and making to leave.

 "Oh - wait!" She rummaged through her handbag again, before pulling out her business card. "If you or your friends are ever in New York, give me a call."

 He added that to his pile and smiled at her. "It was nice to meet you. See you around." The door closed with a soft click, and Silvanna realised she was crying. And her tummy was knotted tightly, constricting within her. Why was she crying?

Oh yes. She turned to Remus, filled with fury, seething with anger. "Where the fuck where you?" she asked him coldly.

 Remus had been smiling, but this quickly dropped away. "What do you mean?"

"I mean - on the worst day of my life, the day I lost custody of Lily and James's son - you weren't fucking there!" She was yelling now, hot in the face, and she slammed her handbag on the table.

 "Silvanna - I-"

"Fuck you Remus! I lost everyone! Fuck you!" Everything felt fresh, it all came rushing back to her. Sitting on the floor of Cheshire Way all alone once again. It felt like Mulberry House after Regulus had died. This house full of ghosts had been a mistake.

 And then a pair of arms wrapped around her, small but strong, and she realised Sirius was hugging her. She shrugged him off. "And what have you been playing at? You mean to tell me after all this time you're bloody innocent? Why hasn't it been in the Prophet?"

 He laughed at her. Bloody Sirius always laughing at her. "All that Pureblood training and you still can't shift that Nottingham twang."

 She tried to hide her smile, "Shut up."

"Er-" Remus was hesitant to interject, so she raised an eyebrow at him. "I'm sorry Silvanna, really. I never thought about what it would mean for you and I should've. I'm so sorry. I couldn't stay there."

 "Me too."

 "What?"

 "I couldn't stay there either. It was hell. That's how I ended up in New York."

 The three of them sat down, and they talked. Sirius told them everything, about the guilt he felt not being the Secret Keeper, about the escape and how Harry and Remus had found him in the Shrieking Shack while he'd been teaching there. And Silvanna told them all about that fateful custody battle, and how she'd left the Wizarding World for good.

 "But - I don't understand - if you weren't the Secret Keeper then who was?" she asked, puzzled.

 Sirius shrugged. "That's the thing isn't it - no one knows. James never told me, it could've been anyone in the Order. They could be dead now. The only thing that proved me innocent was this." He pulled a letter from his jacket pocket and handed it to her. It was old and frail, so she held it carefully. "I found it in Godric's Hollow, when I went to get Harry. Only they arrested me."

The first page in the envelope was a scrawl. It was a single line of warning that read:

You must leave.

Confused, she turned to the second page.

 It is with a heavy heart I can inform you of the Potter's whereabouts. You will find them in the cottage on Church Lane in Godric's Hollow. I know what you will do with this information, but know that it may well be your end.

It wasn't signed. Silently, she tucked it back into the envelope and gave it back to Sirius.

 "Don't suppose you recognise the writing?" Remus asked, biting his lip.

 She shook her head, "We changed our handwriting as part of the Order didn't we? That could be anyone." They looked dismayed. "And I'm sorry to say it, but that first note - the warning - that was written by-"

 The fireplace roared and Silvanna jumped - she'd been caught unawares, and had assumed it was blocked off from the floo. But there stood her brother, tall and slimy as ever, next to none other than Dumbledore himself. Arseholes, both of them.

"Severus."

"Silvanna."

Sirius mimed a shiver, but Dumbledore's greeting did nothing to lighten the mood. "I'm sure, Mrs Black, that you have established the reason I've asked you here?"

 She cast a wary glance at Remus, who only shrugged. She had been under the impression that her main reason for visiting was to see her old friends.

 But then she looked around. Grimmauld Place was one of the most secure houses among the aristocracy, and the wards had been maintained to the greatest standard for hundreds of years. She was in a house so secure it was a prison, with an inncoent fugitive and The Boy Who Lived.

 The wanted her to join the Order again.

 She shook her head, and rose to her feet. "Fuck you for even asking." And she slammed the door firmly behind her.