Severus fusses over the pillows, and the sheets, and the quilt. He trims the wick in the oil lamp, and refills the water glass from the pitcher on the nightstand. He stands on his tiptoes to straighten the painting of a sunny meadow that hangs over the bed.
"Don't," Albus protests feebly, an all-purpose complaint that never refers to anything in particular anymore.
The children are playing outside today, and the sound of their laughter drifts up to the eye of the tower, slipping in between the bars on the window. Severus shudders at the sound of their voices in this place, and tips the painting askew again.
Albus is propped up with pillows against the headboard, looking sallow. He is breathing poorly today, and Severus is under orders from Poppy to come do whatever it is he does to perk Albus up.
"Do you remember," he says, pulling up his chair beside Albus's bed, "oh, this would be nearly four years ago, when you finally took me to Venice?"
For a moment, Albus's lips move silently, and then the rust clears from his throat. "Don't remember it," he croaks. "Don't believe I've ever been."
Severus rolls his eyes.
"Of course you have," he admonishes. "You always said we'd go, after--after it was all over. We took the train from Paris, remember? One of those awful silver ones, where they expect you to eat with all the other idiots and make small talk. You lured me into the Pullman car for a liaison--am I to believe you don't remember that?"
"Not just now," Albus says absently.
"Well, you did. We did. We took the train all the way to Venice."
"What train? I don't remember a train. What was its name?"
Severus leans back in his chair and stares up at the ceiling, folding his hands over his stomach. Why does Albus always insist on names? He hasn't the mind for names.
"The name of the train was...The Zephyr, not very original, I know. I was seasick the first night--or trainsick, I suppose. They played the victrola at dinner, and you tried to make me dance the fox-trot. When I wouldn't, you flirted with that woman whose cabin was down the hall from ours. You were quite shameless about it."
The outline of a smile appears on Albus's face. "Who?"
Severus catches the smile and is pleased. "I don't recall." He shrugs. "Why should I remember her name? She was only a silly old witch with vulgar robes slit down to her breakfast."
"What was her name?"
"I told you, I don't remember."
"Please," Albus says. He is breathing through his mouth. His dull eyes almost seem to flicker. After four years, the red in them is finally beginning to fade but, as Poppy has told them time and time again, that is all the improvement to be expected.
"All right," Severus says. "Her name was Margaret." It's his mother's name, but he doesn't expect Albus will remember that.
"Margaret," Albus says, sighing briefly.
"Yes, Margaret," Severus says. "And you made an ass of yourself around her, but I think she liked you. I remember I once caught you two at the window together, gazing out at the stars."
"Was I terrible?"
"No more than I was. I was still rather trainsick, and doing my best to ruin our holiday. You bought her drinks, though. Every night."
"What did she drink?"
"Margaritas," Severus says and, hearing the note of sarcasm in his own voice, reels himself back in. It doesn't do to get sloppy. "What I minded was that she'd leave the door to her cabin open when you were around. You would look in, and there she was."
"Yes," Albus says. "There she was."
"There she was," Severus continues, "in her dressing gown, or worse. In her white dressing gown, and there you were, standing in the hallway, staring at her."
"You caught me."
"Yes, I did, and I was a pain about it. Women liked you."
"Did they?"
"Yes, they did. You were very...dapper in those days, and nearly as witty as you thought you were. And when you sat down at the piano in the conservatory car, it was hard for those old biddies to resist."
"Could I play the piano?" Albus is definitely smiling now, perhaps thinking of the train, or of Margaret.
"I've heard worse. You could play and sing. You sang to me. You'd sing to anyone."
"To Margaret?"
"To anyone," Severus says. When he sees Albus' smile fade, he quickly adds, "And to her, too. I daresay she liked it. Who knows what trouble you two got into--but you certainly had enough energy for me when you'd come back to our room at night."
He picks up the glass of water and puts it to Albus's lips, tilting it until Albus swallows. A trickle of water slides down his chin--how strange, even after all this time, to see it clean-shaven, but it's easier to keep him clean this way. He wipes Albus's mouth with his own sleeve, and then takes a sip himself.
"In Venice..." he says, "...we stayed at...some hotel, the Palazzo something."
Although Severus has indeed been on a continental train before, he has never been to Venice, and finds himself speaking more slowly now as he tries to picture the scene. "It was on the sea, some famous beach. And the sands were white, as white as alabaster. I sunburned."
"I remember that," Albus says.
Severus smiles faintly to himself. "Good. We walked around the city and found a little cove on the beach where nobody had been for years. You convinced me to swim naked. We saw an albatross flying overhead and you said it was a sign."
"A sign of what?"
"Good luck. Happiness."
"Were we happy?"
"Yes," Severus says, closing his eyes. "We were."
"Always?"
"We were then. Anyway, on another day we took a gondola to the wizarding markets, and you bought me twenty drops of hyrda's blood. I still have the phial. It was beautifully made."
Albus looks over at him, searching Severus's face and hands and chest.
"I don't have it with me," Severus says. "I'll bring it tomorrow," he promises, knowing that Albus will have forgotten by then.
The sound of Albus's laboured breathing is beginning to fatigue him. He will not be able to continue this much longer; it's combat of a subtle kind. He hurries on.
"You were always picking flowers, and every evening when we sat out for dinner by the water, you put a flower in that ridiculous straw hat of yours. You put a small one in my hair once, and it stayed there nearly all day before I noticed it. We ate seafood every night, and you made me try a bite of every dessert you ordered, and at moonrise the sea breeze came in through the window of our room. You had the room service bring us champagne and you read Yeats to me."
"Yes," Albus whispers. "What did you look like?"
He digs his nails into his palms. "Like I always do. You said I looked like a patrician. We...we pretended that I was. We wore the bed sheets like togas."
"The sound," Albus says suddenly.
"What sound?"
"There was a sound."
"I don't remember a sound."
"There was one," Albus insists.
"Where?"
"In the room."
"Yes?"
"It came in through the window," Albus whispers.
"From where?"
"From the sea. Do you hear it?"
"No."
"Listen."
He sits listening. The children are still chattering away outside, but below their din, he can almost hear it: a low, distant hum.
"Do you hear it?"
"Yes," Severus says faintly, frowning.
"I heard it first there--in Venice."
"So did I."
"I feel a little better," Albus says. "I could sleep."
"Then go to sleep," Severus says. "Get your rest." And as always, part of him hopes that this time, finally, Albus will not wake up.
"You'll be back?" Albus asks.
"Yes, tomorrow."
"Where else did we go?"
"We went," he sighs, "to Egypt, where you dragged me through the pyramids. We went through the fjords in Norway. We saw wonders. We saw...many wonders."
"Tell me tomorrow."
"I will." He kisses Albus on the forehead, stands up, and walks to the doorway.
He glances back before he leaves; Albus seems about to fall asleep, his head cocked to one side, listening to the sound. Severus stares at him for a moment, and then goes down the corridor, passing Minerva, who watches him carefully. He shakes his head at her unasked question. No, there is no change. He knows she is no longer asking whether there is an improvement, but if the old man will die soon.
He makes his way down to the dungeons, past the Great Hall where Albus once held court, past the hidden staircase to what was once their bedroom, past the statue of Harry Potter, the conquering hero.
There was a time when Severus believed he couldn't possibly hate the boy more than he did. Before the Final Battle. Before Potter saved Albus's life. Before the wizarding world's saviour walked away from Hogwarts forever, consigning all who remained to the hell of caring for whatever was left in Albus's body after three days in the Dark Lord's tender care.
Severus pauses, and spits on Potter's marble feet.
He begins shivering as he descends into the lower levels of the castle, into his office where the walls are lined with a thousand stoppered phials, the merciful deaths that he brews but can never quite bring himself to put in Albus's water. No one would blame him; Minerva has said as much in quiet, frank tones before bursting into tears.
But no--no, when the end comes, he must be guiltless, or it will never truly be over. More than anything, Severus thinks, this needs to be over.
He sits down at his desk and pulls out a sheaf of quizzes to mark. The words blur and run together, twisting across the pages like the Venice canals. He rubs his eyes, but they refuse to clear. He'll just rest them for a moment, he thinks, and lays his head down on the cool desktop. His thoughts are of hot places a thousand miles away from this Scottish winter. He imagines burning sands, and cool, sweet shade, and the sound of the ocean, which is the sound of blood rushing in one's ears, the sound of Cruciatus.
Severus sleeps, and dreams of tomorrow's story.