closed (Lezard and Snape): defense against the dark arts

[arrogantmage]

If there was one mortal he'd met whose pride could equal his own, that mortal was Snape. For the past few months Lezard had made himself scarce, having good and less-than-good reasons of his own. The rapid departure of Hermione and sudden ascension of Ofdensen could not be allowed to pass without some token of condolence to Snape, however.

Comments

[arrogantmage]

Lezard glanced toward Narcissa Malfoy, then returned his gaze to the more familiar face of Snape -- that long, dour face, fraught with concern. Few people had felt concern for Lezard; few, anyhow, had shown it.

"What could have harmed me? A rhetorical question, perhaps; a riddle, as it stands now. Nothing should harm me. With the powers I have gathered unto myself and knit inseparably into my being, nothing should harm me with such a lasting effect. No god is truly immune from all ills, and it is a truth that gods can be killed, but something so trivial as a curse should not trouble me for long."

He was not speaking for Narcissa's benefit. He expected she would have no idea what he meant, with this talk of gods. Figurative language, perhaps. It was to Snape he was speaking. As for Narcissa, it could do no harm to discuss in her presence such matters, when she could not understand them, and would have in any case no interest in working against Lezard.

"It's connected with the curse I cannot remove from the lady Mio, which has marked her indelibly. I wonder: if her soul were transferred into a homunculus, would that homunculus develop the same crimson butterfly mark at the throat, and the different signs that are like mine? But I have neither the energy to create a new vessel for her, nor the interest to coax her into accepting such an experiment. She is a dull and passive creature, pretty to look at, and one would think such a thing harmless. It would be better to think of her as an artifact than as a mortal being." He spoke of her with a curious mixture of affection and contempt.

Narcissa's presence checked his tongue not at all -- as if Narcissa too were an artifact rather than a person.

"The sleeping-curse -- perhaps a dream-curse, better termed, since sleep in itself is a natural occurrence for mortals -- is different than, but connected to, the demonic mark of the crimson butterfly. The latter is not contagious, as it is produced by the act of fratricide committed by a single victim. The sleeping-curse does seem to be contagious, but a contagion of the spirit, of the psyche, and it's this which I have contracted ..." He tapped the edge of his teacup in an irregular pattern. Snape's healing spell had revivified him somewhat, and he felt suffused with nervous energy.

"Though I have no memory of the girl who was killed, who started it all, since I have never met her. The lady's sister, whom the lady killed, and who haunts her dreams. Now, of course, Mio includes me in the dreams. Whether she dreamed of me first, and this caused me to be afflicted, or whether she only dreams of me because I am now afflicted as she is afflicted, I cannot say," this a tangential point, something said with the intent to forestall a line of inquiry Lezard thought fruitless. Back to the main thread: "The sister's ghost is not itself present at Hogwarts. It is not the cause of the affliction. As far as I can tell, it is only a dream-image -- a memory, a fragment of memory."

[not_so_stellar]

Narcissa has no special interest in improving this young man's prospects. He looks uncomfortably like the Potter boy, and though this does not cause her to dislike him, there is likely some subconscious distaste that can fade only with time and lengthened acquaintance. Moreover, his manner with Severus is overly familiar for a student, and she is surprised to see it tolerated. Is Severus smitten? He has always been very correct, and Narcissa has never wished to look closely into his private life, but her cousins used to say things about men as solitary as Severus, and then there is the question of Lucius' father. That, too, Narcissa has never wished to investigate.

As Lezard Valeth talks at length about some girl he knows and the disease the girl has given him, Narcissa is listening, mainly because she likes to be informed, but her attention is divided. She is woolgathering.

Is the school really so full of Muggles now? In our day, the lot of them would have been Obliviated for so much as stumbling onto the grounds. She realizes she had just been thinking in our day, and suddenly feels old. Aging gracefully is one thing, feeling old is another thing.

Lezard Valeth is talking now about memory, memory, the word surfacing again. Narcissa's attention is renewed with this conversational turn.

What she says is what she has been thinking, mostly, but she feels it is apropos.

"In our day, people like that would have been Obliviated."

[methleigh]

Severus has been listening carefully. "So. Mio killed her sister and is now haunted by her memory. That memory returns in dreams and has the effect of a curse. It is insidious and destructive. It is contagious in that when she dreams of others, the curse is transmitted to them, even to the extent of inflicting nightmare upon those who have no need to sleep."

He turns to Narcissa, as an aside. "Lezard really is a god. he has, with his already remarkable powers, taken over the soul of the god Odin. He has died and does not need sleep or food. This affliction is thus unheard-of."

He brightens. "But perhaps Narcissa has an idea for this curse. What if Mio were to be obliviated? Suppose she forgot her sister and suppose her subconscious were erased of the source of these nightmares. If she ceased to dream, would she cease to dream of you, and would you thus be relieved as well?" This pleases him. He would gladly forget on more muggle in what had once been a distinguished school - his home. He would gladly obliviate Mio in the old way even for self-satisfaction. She should be far from here, and she should know nothing of wizards or of Hogwarts. But there was no hope really. There were so many of them. He worried for Narcissa's disgust when she experienced the extent of the travesty. She should never be disgusted. It wa wrong.

[arrogantmage]

Lezard found no fault with Snape's summary of the description Lezard had given. He nodded here and there, to show his assent to its accuracy. When Snape gave Narcissa that parenthetical explanation of Lezard's godhood, though, the mage looked sharply toward the pale woman, to see what she would make of it.

He caught no sign of skepticism -- nor of belief. Her face seemed to him smoothly indifferent.

Snape's idea took him a bit aback, only because Lezard habitually relied upon his own extensive knowledge, and seldom thought of Hogwarts magic as a serious option for anything. He would amuse himself with Hogwarts tricks and cantrips from time to time, usually in Sortings, but the mainstay of his magic was very much outworld in origin. Obliviation? He had never used it. His obsession was with making people remember him, not forget him.

"If she were to be Obliviated --" He spoke slowly; he was thinking. "What could it hurt?"

It might hurt Mio, but it ought not to harm Lezard, and his real concern was his own safety. He had not come this far to be felled by something so stupid as a curse not even targeted at himself.

[not_so_stellar]

"We wizards use Memory Charms as a matter of policy." Narcissa is not interested in the fate of a Muggle girl. As to the godhood of this young man, she wonders: has Severus found a master to replace Voldemort? Or is this an overly rosy and credulous assessment on her friend's part, and when he tires of the boy, he will see him in a light less divine?

"It ought to be perfectly safe, if the caster knows his business."