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northangel27) wrote2008-06-17 07:20 pm
The Alchemist - Chapter 72
Chapter 72
The black shadows and sinister whispers of Knockturn Alley called to him but he chose to ignore their siren’s call for the moment, and instead strolled up Diagon Alley, and turned into the apothecary. Row after row of tinted glass jars containing potions, herbs and tinctures rose up to greet him and he let his mind begin to naturally categorize and inventory each one in relation to his own stores. It soothed him. It cleared his head and helped him think.
He had managed to work his way nearly half-way through the west wall by the time a smiling, rosy cheeked young man made his way from behind the counter and headed in his direction. He could see him approaching out of the corner of his eye, and decided to head him off before he had a chance to start into a sales pitch.
“No,” he said, just as the young man reached him.
He looked at him quizzically. “Sir?”
“You were going to ask me if I need any assistance. The answer is no. What I need is to be left alone.”
The smile faded. “Oh…Yes…yes, of course. Just let me know if I can be of any assistance.”
He said nothing, and the young man wisely retreated back to his place behind the long counter at the other end of the shop.
Why had he come here? Why Diagon Alley? Or had he really meant it to be Knockturn? The truth was he didn’t know where he rightly belonged anymore. For a few blissful months it had all seemed only too clear, but he owed Alice Longbottom a huge debt of gratitude. She had, with a single look reminded him of exactly who he was – what he was. He was a wraith, a mere specter walking a tenuous line between the world of light and shadow.
He purchased a packet of dried mullein and a small vial of extract of woad and then walked back out into the early evening sunlight. The rain hadn’t lasted long, and had already begun to dissipate by the time had stepped from the cab in front of the Leaky Cauldron an hour prior. Now the puddles that had gathered between the cobbles gleamed pink and gold reflecting the beauty of the fading summer light.
He glanced back down the alley toward Knockturn, but turned away again and headed in the opposite direction. Not yet. Soon enough that would be his world, but not yet. The shops around him began to close up, one by one, and soon he knew that he would have no choice but to leave or head down the dark throat of Knockturn toward the clubs and gambling houses that greedily welcomed the denizens of the night.
There was a rare and rather costly book on Practical Alchemy that Lily had been interested in when they had visited the Alley a few months prior, and he wondered if the old bookseller at the Gringotts end might still have it. If he hurried he might be able to catch him before he closed. He would be separated from her soon enough. It might be nice for her to have something to remember him by, or at the very least something of value she might trade for galleons if the need should so arise. Merlin only knew what might happen to her when… But no, he wouldn’t think of that. Not yet. One thing at a time.
The door was locked and the shop dark when he finally reached it, and he growled with frustration. The idiot had obviously closed up early.
“He’s not been about for several weeks now, my boy. They say he’s been taken. Dark times on the horizon, and all that, you know…” He spun around at the familiar voice only to see Ollivander locking the door to his own shop on the opposite side of the alley. Pocketing the key, the old man made his way carefully across the damp cobbles, and stopped only a foot or two away, looking into his eyes as though trying to determine something.
He quickly lifted his mental guards and stared back, but there was really no need. The wandmaker didn’t seem to ‘read’ in that way. “I suppose I will be next, hmm…” He paused and stared first down the one end of the alley toward Gringotts and then down the other toward Knockturn, before returning his knowing eyes to his. “I wondered how long it would be before I would see you at my door.”
“Me?”
“Yes. Would you like to come in for tea? There’s no reason why we can’t still observe the social niceties. We’re free men yet, lad. Come. Let’s have tea. I should be able to conjure up some pudding too, I suspect. You like pudding, don’t you?”
He only nodded, a strange knot beginning to twist in the pit of his stomach. He didn’t feel hungry, but he couldn’t say no. Following the old man around the back of the shop and up the rickety staircase to the flat above, he found himself scanning his surroundings cautiously. If they were truly alone, if no one had seen him accompany him, then…
No. Not yet. It didn’t have to be now. The old fool was offering him tea and pudding, for Merlin’s sake, naively inviting him into his own home. It would be an absolute betrayal of trust.
The look of terror and disbelief in Alice Longbottom’s eyes flashed momentarily in his minds eye, and he laughed bitterly under his breath. Betrayal of trust? As if any of it mattered now. As though a few more days or weeks would make any difference at all.
“Something amusing?”
“What?”
“You laughed.”
“Oh…did I? No…no it’s nothing…”
“Ahhh…”
The heavy curtains were drawn across the windows, no doubt to keep the sun’s rays from heating the flat during the day, and the room was stuffy and dark. He would open them, open the windows wide to let in the cooling evening air, and then there would be no way he could do it. Once the lamps were lit, anyone passing by outside might see them. It would not be tonight. He would have to wait.
But to his surprise the old man lit a lamp and then moved into the next room without touching the curtains. He could hear the clinking of tea cups. “You don’t mind if I don’t light a fire, do you Boy? It’s a tad warm for it.”
“No…no, of course not.”
“Sit down, make yourself comfortable. Niceties, my boy, niceties. There will come a time when you will wish for them back again. Let us pretend, just for this evening that there is nothing brewing on the horizons, that you and I are just colleagues, or better yet friends - two men sitting down for a nice cup of tea together.”
The clattering in the kitchen stopped and the old man appeared in the doorway a tea service and small pudding in his hands.
“Sir?”
“Ah Lad, you and I both know that you are here because you have to be. I’ll not make it more difficult than it needs to be, but let’s do have tea first, shall we. I am rather hungry.”
How? How could he…? ”I…I’m sorry. I’m not sure I know what you…”
Ollivander set the tea service down on the table between them and lifted a hand to stop him. “No need for that. Tea’s the thing at the moment. Tea first – responsibilities later.” He sliced into the pudding, and drizzled some sauce over top before handing it over to him. “Pudding?”
He took it without question and then just proceeded to stare down at it, watching the caramel run in tiny rivers between the soft hills of warm pudding, his mind racing, the knot in his stomach growing tighter and tighter until it felt as though he would vomit, as though the pressure had reached his heart, was constricting it so intensely that it was being forced into his throat.
Sinking his fork into the warm dessert his lifted a small amount to his lips and swallowed hard, attempting to force it down. It was a good pudding, the sort he had loved as a child, but only ever had on Christmas Eve – sweet, sticky, moist… It was a pity he couldn’t enjoy it now.
Ollivander dug into his own serving with relish. “My wife used to make a brilliant plum pudding for Yule. Delicious. You remember Agnes, don’t you boy. She used to work in the shop. I think she was the one who boxed up your wand and Lily’s too, all those years ago. She used to like to tie bright ribbons about the boxes. She would always choose the color for the house she guessed the child would be sorted into. I don’t know if anyone ever caught on, but…”
“But the ribbon on my box was white. Lily’s too.”
The old man smiled at him. “Yes, I would imagine that it would have been.” He went back to eating his pudding without further explanation. After a moment or so he poured out the tea and handed a cup to him. “So where’s Lily gotten herself off to this evening? I’ve seen the two of you about the Alley together quite often the last few months…”
“She had other responsibilities to attend to. I was in town and decided to come by to get a few supplies.” He continued to stare into the warm soft mounds of pudding in the dish in his lap, but he could feel the old man’s eyes on him, boring into him.
“You’ve experienced conjunction - that is clear. I’ve seen it for some time between you, but there is something else…Something has happened, something profound…” The man’s voice was gentle, inquiring but not probing. Still, it irked him. He did not wish to be confiding in him now, sharing this sort of information, these sorts of details. The less the old fool knew the better. Merlin knew what Riddle would do to him to get what he needed, and he had no desire for all these riddles and mysteries to come spilling forth at the first round of Crucio.
“Nothing’s happened.”
“Fermentation, I should suspect….or at least the first stages of it. Putrefaction I would wager.”
“Forgive me Sir, I’ve not really the energy to follow this line of thinking at the moment…”
“No, I would imagine not. There is much weighing you down. Putrefaction is never easy. You are teetering on the brink of death, death of body, death of soul, death of spirit. The Dark Night of the Soul the Old Ones used to call it. But you must walk through it, and you mustn’t fear that the dawn will not come. It will come, my boy. It always comes. One must die, so that one can be reborn. It is the natural and magical order of things.”
“Die to be reborn…? I don’t…?” He was curious now in spite of himself. There was something important in what the old man was saying. The turmoil brewing within him told him that much, but what?
“Yes, the cycle of life, of magical evolution. Die to be reborn to new life. There is great power in the cycle.”
“But to die is…”
“Final?” The old man smiled. “Nothing is ever final. There is always an afterward, the great wheel of time and eternity turns on its axis and we simply move on to something else.”
“Yes, yes, to the afterlife, to…to…to Heaven or Hell, but not…”
“Heaven or Hell? My, that is a muggle concept. I’ve not heard that come up in conversation in some time. Raised Christian, were you boy?”
“No. Tobi…my father was a Catholic. My mother was a witch and raised me in the magical tradition.”
“But still, to you death is an end - something final.”
“It is the end of this…” He swept his hand about the room as though to indicate it all, all of the petty, wearying trappings of life, all the things that didn’t matter, that had never mattered. “It is a rest - the end of …of...”
“Is life so wearying that you hope so to escape it? I had thought that perhaps you might have found something worth staying here for; worth coming back for…She is of great value to you. You cannot deny it. I have seen you together.”
“I don’t want to talk of her!” He snapped. “I’ve not come here to speak of her.”
Ollivander smiled sadly. “No, you have not…” Leaning forward he reached over and lay a hand briefly on his knee. “You most certainly have not…” He suddenly sounded weary, older than he had ever heard him. Sitting up again suddenly, he took a careful sip of tea, and then set the cup down on the table beside him, and leaned back in his chair, fingers tented beneath his chin, as he found his gaze and held it. “So then…why exactly are you here, Severus?”
The pressure in his chest began to grow in intensity again, and he felt as though he were suffocating, drowning. He couldn’t know. He didn’t know. “I did not intend to come. You were the one who invited me, if you will recall.”
“Ah yes, you are right, of course. You will forgive an old man his memory.” He tapped the side of his skull lightly. “Not what it used to be, eh… The man’s eyes drifted down to the bowl of now cold pudding in his lap. He nodded toward it. “Was it not to your liking?”
He shook his head. “It was fine. I was simply not as hungry as I thought.”
“Ahhh…well perhaps you would prefer some port then, my boy. There is a nice bottle in the pantry, if you’d like to fetch it. I would get it myself, but these old bones…once they settle they aren’t quick to move again. I’m sure you understand.”
“Yes. I’ll fetch it.” He wondered why the old man didn’t just summon it, but he said nothing. He welcomed the opportunity to get out of his presence and think.
The kitchen was dimly lit with the light of a single flickering candle on the table, and the strange indigo haze of dusk seeping from behind the pale poplin curtains over the window nearby. They were alone. No one had seen them go in together. The curtains were drawn. The windows were closed. He should do it. He might not get another opportunity such as this.
The bottle was easy enough to find. He perused the cupboard until he managed to find two glasses and then stopped himself, wondering just what exactly he thought he was about. What would he do, let the old man drink a toast to his own impending death before subduing him and delivering him as promised? He set the bottle and glasses back on the table and raked a hand through his hair, with a deep and conflicted sigh.
“Everything alright, my boy?”
“Yes Sir. Just fetching glasses.”
Silence again from the parlor, as though he knew, as though he were only waiting for it be done. Let it be done then. Let it all be done.
The old man didn’t even flinch as he pressed the tip of his wand to his temple. He simply set down his cup of tea and sighed softly. “Time to go, then is it. I hoped you’d do it tonight, not put it off; much easier on my old nerves.”
“Don’t make this anymore difficult than it needs to be.”
“I have no intention of doing so.”
“You will come quietly then.”
“Of course, Severus.”
And he could not help but wonder why the sound of his name on the old man’s lips brought a sudden and strange bite to his eyes.
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I was going through Severus withdrawals too. As painful as this was to write, it felt good to get back inside his head again. I missed him horribly ;-)
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Poor Sev. All the crazy shit happening before hand, and now he's gotta throw Ollivander to the dogs. Did I mention before that I love your Ollivander? I still do, although I wonder if maybe he's being a little too strong about the situation.
Oy...I hope Sev and Lily have some time together before the big thing with DD. These past few chapters have been so heartbreaking. -_-
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I think I'm just going to focus on the pudding.
You don't mind if I have it, Severus? Only it didn't seem to agree with you much, you see...
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I really thought that after a long break, the story may not have the same impact on me, but I was definitly wrong, the magic is still there operating all the more, since reading this chapter was the best break I had in weeks! thanks!!! Of course I'll always be checking, it's a real pleasure!