The torches along the dungeon corridor sputtered, casting long shadows that danced like ghosts. The stone beneath Severus's feet felt cold, colder than the walls, colder than the silence Lillian left in his wake.
Severus hadn't moved in minutes—maybe hours. Time felt broken, slipping between his fingers like the strands of his sanity.
The ropes were gone. The bruises stayed.
So did the scent.
His own skin betrayed him—tainted with Lillian's heat, with the violation that didn't come with screaming or blood, but with a silence so absolute it made the castle seem abandoned. Hogwarts had never felt so empty. And Severus had never felt so full of something he couldn't name—shame, grief, rage, maybe all of them.
He reached for his wand.
It wasn't there.
Of course not.
Lillian had taken more than that.
From the archway behind him came the sharp click of boots. Slow. Unhurried.
Lucius.
He always knew how to make silence louder.
"Severus," Lucius drawled, his voice laced with something syrupy and dangerous. "You look... used."
Severus didn't turn around.
"Leave."
Lucius chuckled, low and cold. "Now, that's no way to greet the one person who still sees value in you."
A pause. Then a whisper, too close to Severus's ear:"Or perhaps… you're already his."
Severus spun, fists clenched, but Lucius didn't flinch. He stood tall, pale hair immaculate, robes pristine. Untouchable. Unbreakable.
Unlike Severus.
Lucius stepped closer, eyes sharp with amusement. "Did he hurt you, Sev? Or did you let him?"
"Don't," Severus hissed, his voice cracking. "Don't twist this."
Lucius's smile faded. "I'm not twisting anything. I'm watching you break, and for once, it's not me doing the damage."
A breath. A beat.
"But you'll come back to me," he whispered. "You always do. Because you have nowhere else."
That struck harder than any spell.
Because it was true.
No Potter. No Sirius. No professors who cared. No housemates who saw past the shadows under his eyes. And Lillian? Lillian had sunk his claws in, twisted everything, left a hollow space that still burned.
"Why are you here?" Severus asked, hoarse.
Lucius didn't answer. Instead, he knelt slowly—one knee on the cold stone floor—and reached out, brushing a lock of Severus's hair back with surgical tenderness.
"Because you still belong to me," Lucius murmured. "Even if you forget, your body won't."
Severus flinched, pulling back.
Lucius rose.
"I'm not going to force you," he said lightly, turning to go. "I don't need to."
And then he was gone, his footsteps swallowed by the corridor's silence.
Severus stood still for a long time. Then—
He sank to his knees.
And wept.
But only for a minute.
Then he rose, slow and trembling.
And walked—barefoot, broken, and blank-eyed—towards the Hospital Wing.
Not for healing.
For silence.
And the knowledge that the game wasn't over.
Not yet.
Because Lillian might have claimed his body…
But Severus had started sharpening something else.
His mind.