Chapter 42: The Clash of The Damned

Unknown Location, Wizarding World...

Severus Snape had taken off after Rodolphus LeStrange. The deranged wizard had a broad smile on his face as both he and Snape stood on a hill over looking the minor battle below. Rabastan had been giving Lucius Malfoy a run for his money. Greyback had been most beneficial where Lupin had been concerned. The winds blew as if outwardly showing a shift in the winds that seemed to be occurring internally.

Snape's shoulder length raven hair had been swaying with the wind along with his ebony frock coat. His obsidian eyes held only immense hatred as they met the equally hate filled eyes of Rodolphus LeStrange.

"How does it feel, Severus?" taunted LeStrange. "How does it feel to have your very heart ripped from your chest?"

Snape smirked at the deranged wizard.

"Like coming home." he replied in an icy tone.

The deranged wizard arched an eyebrow at this.

"You've got to be in agony Half-blood." he said still taunting.

Snape wore the same smirk and remained largely unaffected.

"I'm use to it." he replied evenly.

The deranged wizard growled in frustration.

"I will make you pay for your cheek Half-blood." he declared. "I don't see what the dark lord deemed so special about someone so treacherous as you."

"Funny, I thought that was a prerequisite for joining his cause." replied Snape. "He certainly seemed fond enough of Bellatrix."

"SHUT UP!" yelled LeStrange enraged at the mention of his late wife. "DON'T YOU DARE SPEAK HER NAME!"

Snape only chuckled at this.

"Do you remember how I use to make her scream at the dark lord's command." he said icily. "She would go on for...hours."

The deranged wizard tightened his grip on his wand.

"What's the matter Rodolphus?" asked Snape. "Did I strike a nerve?"

"GO TO HELL SNAPE!" shouted LeStrange.

"After you." replied Snape in mock civility.

Rodolphus pulled his wand.

"It's time to put you in your place once and for all insolent half-blood!" he said allowing his rage to get the better of him.

"And it's time for you to join your beloved Rodolphus." replied Snape with a wicked smirk. "Given the circumstances I feel I should be honest with you, I kind of miss having your wife at the end of my wand."

Having had enough of Snape's jeering, Rodolphus cast the first hex.

"Ventus vitreum!" shouted the irate LeStrange.

Snape blocked it as if it had been nothing.

"Is that the best you can come up with?" he asked icily. "It'll take more than a little glass wind to stop me."

Rodolphus glared at Snape and cast another incantation.

"Fluvius dolor!" he shouted.

Again Snape blocked him with ease.

"What's a little pain between enemies?" asked Snape in a bored tone. "Don't you have anything original?"

"Manu tenebrarum!" shouted LeStrange.

In an instant, a large shadow stretched before the dueling wizards and rose high above them. It's five fingers and enormous palm stretched out before Snape and it started coming down at an alarming rate.

Snape flicked his wand with intent.

"Pugno lucis!" he countered.

An enormous fist slammed down on Rodolphus at about the same time the hand forced him to the ground. Both wizards had been knocked off their feet. Snape held his wand tightly as he struggled to get his bearings. Rodolphus picked-up his wand and let loose a desperate spell in an bit do keep Snape from returning to his feet.

"Sphaera dolor!" shouted the deranged wizard.

A black ball of light hit Snape in the chest sending him back to the ground as he reacted to whatever the ball had done to his chest. He glared at Rodolphus and scrambled to his feet with all the agility of a humanoid house cat.

"Pugionibus peti veritatis!" shouted Snape.

All at once daggers had come flying from the end of his wand at alarming speed slashing at Rodolphus as he tried to bat them a way. He had only half succeeded as he was nicked and cut across his chest and his tattered attire grew more ragged.

"Pila venenatorum aranearum!" shouted Rodolphus flicking his wand at Snape.

The Potions Professor threw up a wandless shield as what seemed like thousands of venomous spiders came flying at him. Snape moved across the battlefield his pace quick and precise.

"Serpentes tenebrarum!" he shouted.

Snakes shouted in darkness appeared and attacked Rodolphus LeStrange all at once. He narrowly avoided their lethal bites.

"Vites viva radice!" shouted the deranged wizard aiming his wand at the dark snakes.

"Levicorpus!" Shouted Snape suspending LeStrange in mid-air.

Snape glared at him as the wizard gripped his wand tightly still attempting to stay in this bout. Then the potions professor released the spell and LeStrange fell to the ground landing on his back hard. The deranged wizard still managed to keep his wand as he looked up into the cold obsidian eyes of Severus Snape.

The dour wizard seemed to take no pleasure in this as he would have if he had not been cursed.

"It seems you were always a heartless bastard, Snape." said LeStrange.

Snape simply glared at him and lifted his wand.

"Sectumsempra!" he shouted.

In a matter of moments Rodolphus was about to share the fate of his little brother Rabastan. Blood pooled around him in rapid succession. Snape watched as LeStrange screamed in agony too weak to even lift his wand to counter. The extended and well fought bout looked as if it had been over, but LeStrange had one last ace in the hole.

"Spiritus tenebrarum I. accersire te." he said nearing his end.

Snape watched as something shrouded in utter darkness made it was toward LeStrange. He had barely blinked before he was suddenly seized by intense agony as the black veins wrapped around his pale flesh once more. He collapsed on his knees feeling every ounce of agony the creature had in store for him.

"Portal tenebrarum!" shouted LeStrange.

In a matter of seconds he forced himself to his feet despite the agony and blood in a super-human feat of sorts and grabbed the unsuspecting Severus Snape by the collar.

The pain stricken wizard had no time to react before he found himself pulled to his feet as well.

"LET GO!" demanded Snape irate at a cheap tactic being employed when he so clearly had the victory.

"I don't think so, Snape." hissed LeStrange seemingly at peace with himself. "You see old friend, you and I are going to spend eternity together."

Snape scoffed at the implication of such an annoying ordeal.

"Then it will be nothing less then what you and I deserve." he replied unimpressed.

Lucius Malfoy had arrived just in time to see Severus Snape and Rodolphus LeStrange tumble into the dark portal along with the spirit LeStrange had summoned. The Senior Malfoy had been at a loss for words as he made a mad dash toward where the two wizards had been only moments before.

"SEVERUS!" had been the last thing the Potions Master heard from the lips of his oldest and dearest friend before he involuntarily disappeared into the vast portal of darkness with LeStrange.

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ELSEWHERE...

Potions Professor Severus Snape found himself in a slow free fall in a sea of utter darkness. The images of the people in his life that had meant the most to him had been flashing as if projected all around him. He could see the headmaster with his twinkling blue eyes as clear in his mind as if he had been standing right in front of him. The familiar, but playful scowl of Minerva McGonagall as she glared at him during a Qudditch match with Slytherin vs. Gryffindor. The hopeful gray eyes of his godson Draco Malfoy that seemed to fix him into a kind of trance since the day he was born. The green eyes of Harry James Potter looking every bit like his father in features but the eyes...the soul of the boy had been better than anyone he had ever known.

Then there was HER.

Eyes of Amber filled with sadness belonging to a beautiful bushy haired Gryffindor witch that some how cemented her way into his otherwise empty heart. He had longed for the days when his memory of being her professor had not hindered him showing her just how much she meant to him.

Hermione.

Here in this dark place she had been the only light in which to gab on to.

Hermione.

Just her name alone made this place bearable.

Snape continued his rather slow decent into darkness as his mind wandered elsewere.

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Head Girl Room, Gryffindor Tower, Hogwarts...

Hermione sat on the end of her bed in her room as she and Ginny talked about how strange things had gotten as of late. Ginny had thought the whole thing turned strange when Hermione told her that she believed Professor Snape had kissed her before. The red haired witch had been utterly surprised by this new development. It had been further compounded by the fact that Hermione told her that she had actually kissed The Potions Professor when they were both in the infirmary and it was the second time it had happened.

"You did what?" asked Ginny with a wild expression on her face.

"I-I kissed Professor Snape." replied Hermione. "I-I didn't know what I was doing...I-I don't even know why I did it."

Ginny shook her head.

"What are you going to do about Sebastian?" she asked. "How do you think he will take it if he found out you kissed his father?"

Hermione thought for a moment.

She had been so confused by her feelings for Snape that she had not thought about what it would do to Sebastian. As the young witch contemplated what she was going to do she was suddenly stricken with a terrible feeling.

Ginny looked at her with concerned eyes as she watched her friend tense up.

"G-Ginny something's happened." said Hermione growing frantic.

"What do you mean?" asked Ginny. "Is it Sebastian?"

Hermione felt only pain as she tried to search for her boyfriend through their mental connection. She got could hear him calling out for her, but it was faint like...like he had been somewhere so far from her that she could hardly hear him. That had never happened before and it only served to make her even more worried.

"H-He's so far away." said Hermione concerned and rightly so.

"Mione, I think you should tell Professor Snape about this." said Ginny attempting to get her friend to see reason.

Hermione nodded and got to her feet.

Fear and panic had been running all through her as she found herself rushing through the Gryffindor common room.

{"Sebastian!"} she called frantic in her mind. {"Sebastian, please answer me!"}

The fear continued to build as she awaited the reply.

{ Insufferable Gryffindor.} came his reply.

{"Sebastian, where are you?"} she asked upset.

{I don't know.} he replied in an emotionless tone.

{"Something's wrong?...I can feel it."} she said growing even more worried.

{Forgive me.} he replied.

{"I'm going to get Professor Snape."} she said trying to reassure herself.

{He can't help you.} replied Snape as his voice faded even from her mind.

{"Why not?"} asked Hermione unsure of why her boyfriend would believe this.

There was nothing for a moment which only added to her increasing amount of distress.

{"Sebastian!?"} called Hermione frantic in her need to hear from him.

{I love you, Hermione.} he said as his voice faded out for a final time and the connection was lost.

Hermione had not known what to do. She couldn't shake the eerie feeling that something bad had happened to Sebastian.

If Professor Snape couldn't help her, she was determined to find someone who could. She set out in search of Professor Lupin. If there was something dark going on then he would know what to do to help Sebastian.