The Dark Lord did not scream.
He sat still, fingers steepled, eyes shut. Around him, the walls of the ruined chamber dripped with unspent magic—threads Severus had unknowingly triggered, twisted, and abandoned like snapped puppet strings.
He was not angry.
He was thinking.
"I underestimated the boy," he said aloud.
Behind him, Peter Pettigrew trembled.
"Which—boy, my Lord?" he asked, voice thin.
Voldemort opened his eyes.
"Both."
Meanwhile, in Malfoy Manor—
Lucius sat in a chair that had once belonged to his father.
The fire had gone out.
He had not relit it.
His robes hung loose. His wand lay untouched on the floor. And the only sound was the soft clink of crystal—wine, unsipped, held too long.
He'd once thought he could control Snape.
Break him. Reshape him. Devour the sharpest parts and leave only the clever shell.
He hadn't realized he'd grown fond of the bitterness.
And now it was gone.
Stolen by the very boy Lucius had warned him about.
Lillian.
He whispered the name like it burned.He reached toward the fireless grate—
And found only cold.
At Hogwarts, Severus didn't sleep.
He sat in the Hospital Wing, pale, quiet, his body recovering but his mind—
His mind was somewhere else.
The pain Voldemort inflicted had been real.
But it wasn't the body that ached.
It was the voice. The lies he whispered. The truths he seeded.
"You're not an Omega," Voldemort had said softly, kneeling beside him. "You never were. You're a tool. A shell. A clever, loyal beta."
"You were designed to serve."
"And now you think you deserve to be chosen?"
He had leaned in.
"Lillian doesn't love you, Severus. He's hiding in you."
Now, Severus stared at the moonlight on the ceiling.
He wasn't afraid of Voldemort.
Not anymore.
He was afraid… the Dark Lord had been right.
Dumbledore stood in the tower, looking into the glass.
Not a mirror.
But a pensieve.
Not memories.
But plans.
He saw them all—Severus, Voldemort, Lucius, Lillian—pieces, every one.
"I did warn you, Tom," he murmured. "About love."
He turned to Fawkes, who stirred but did not sing.
"He's in love, you see," Dumbledore added. "And so is Lucius. Which makes things… wonderfully complicated."
He smiled, eyes twinkling.
"Exactly the kind of war I like best."
Elsewhere, in an abandoned greenhouse under disillusionment charms…
Lillian sat alone.
He hadn't gone to see Severus yet.
Not after the ritual. Not after the words.
"Let me braid myself into you," he had said once.
But Severus hadn't understood then.
Now?
Now Lillian was afraid he had understood too well.
What if the binding had rewritten him?
What if Severus didn't love him freely—just followed the script?
Lillian bit down hard on his knuckle, shivering.
Because somewhere in his chest, the bond ached.
Not with magic.But with doubt.
In the shadows of the Forest, a figure watched.
Lucius Malfoy.
Wandless. Maskless. Unseen.
He watched the castle.
Watched the boy in the greenhouse.
Watched the window where Severus sometimes sat, sleepless.
He had broken him once.
But now?
Now Lucius had no idea how to feel.
He hated him.
He missed him.
He wanted to hurt him again.
He wanted to protect him.
And above all—he wanted to find the string that Lillian had tied, so tightly, between them…
And cut it.