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Broken by the Dark Lord	By : Kanashii Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female Views: 6067 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 16
- 17
- 18
I have stood here
before inside the pouring rain

With the world turning circles running 'round my brain

I guess I'm always hoping that you'll end this reign

But it's my destiny to be the king of pain� (King of Pain. The Police/Synchronicity)

�� Severus Snape used his wand to stoke the fire
in the main fireplace and then began to pace once again. His mind was traveling
down so many paths now even he wondered how he kept track of them all. �So Voldemort wants to see her in two weeks�
his mind twisted around the thought. He would have to prepare her well, Snape
was certain the Master�s tests of her would be harsh. Snape glanced to the
ceiling as he could almost envision his student bathing and putting more of the
healing ointment on the fresh scars on her face where Lucius had struck her.
Thankfully because of Snape�s quick healing intervention those scars would not
be permanent. But he could sense that Lucius Malfoy was walking a thin wire,
his mind and nerves on a razors edge. �This
assignment bugs him and has him worried. He will be far too confident and
careless in this mission I just know it.� Snape pondered again. What had
truly caught Snape unaware was his recent legilimens information from both
Draco and Miranda.

�� Draco Malfoy was
slowly breaking under strain of his home life, his constant sniping with his
father and his father�s anger at his upcoming mission was causing Draco�s
schoolwork to suffer and to cause him to be even more of a bully at Hogwarts. Snape
could sympathize with Draco, after all Snape had been in the same shoes once
upon a time. Draco truly craved a friend he could trust, but yet he knew
everyone in Slytherin house expected him to act a certain way, he could never
let his guard down, and worse, he was being slowly forced down the same Death
Eater path as his father. Whether Draco wished to go down that path or not.

�� During the few times Snape had discreetly
read Miranda�s mind he had heard the conversations Draco had spoken with her,
and his growing stress with school, his father and the constant death eaters.
Like Miranda, Snape could sense Draco was afraid of what would be in store for
him when he was of age to become yet another follower of Lord Voldemort. �It was only the constant expectations placed
on him from the time Draco had been a child to follow his father�s footsteps
and his sense of duty to father and family that had kept Draco as hard and dark
as he was. But even now that was beginning to show as Draco hit his own
adolescent turmoil.

�� And Miranda, she
had found perhaps the only shadow of solace in this whole terrible predicament
in Draco Malfoy, a fellow student who trusted her and seemed to show the only
kindness she had seen since being kidnapped and forced into this. Snape knew
deep in his heart and mind that Miranda Vitale could never be what Voldemort
wanted her to be, a true Death eater, her heart and soul were not in it no
matter what. While she could have a temper, and even cold anger in her heart;
for her to do what Voldemort had planned for her to do (Kill her blood family
and serve Voldemort as fully as any death eater) would break her so completely
as to drive her mad or worse. Snape knew Miranda could be kowtowed, even
broken, but she would never truly be as fanatical as Bellatrix or Dolohov or
the others.

��However
the shadow of a brilliant plan was beginning to take the most basic of shapes
in Severus Snape�s mind. He sighed a moment and then resumed his relentless
pacing once again. �Who is really being
broken by the Dark Lord?� he wondered. �Perhaps
all of us; or perhaps I am so shattered already that it matters not to me.�
This time it was his own voice and not the taunting voice of his father who
spoke clearly in his mind.

�� He walked over to
his bookshelves and began to pull out a few dusty tomes that held the magical
knowledge he knew he would need. Recipes for potions so archaic and dark that
even Snape almost reverently handled them. The slightest tremor ran through him
that no one, not even Albus Dumbledore would have ever seen. He had been correct
in what he had said to Lucius Malfoy, �Darkness
is something I know far more intimately than you Lucius, I do not fear what is
required to be done, and know this. I have done such dark things for our Master
you can not even begin to imagine��
Severus Snape took the books and apparated down into his laboratory. Yes
the darkness he had done would haunt him more than anyone could have ever
imagined, had cost him the one and only chance to perhaps every truly allow his
life to be happy, but what was done was now done, only ghosts haunted his
dreams and he was very good at being the king of pain. ��

�� The next week
Severus worked even harder with his student, pulling back even more and driving
her even more relentlessly in occulmency and magical lessons.

Honing the charms and simple curses he was sure Voldemort
would be testing her on. Severus dare not say why he was teaching her the
Occlumency but had Miranda work even harder on putting up a blank wall, knowing
how good his Master was at looking deep into a soul. It also gave Snape a
chance to look into her own mind, to replay the parts of her and Draco. Her
total trust and friendship of Draco was implicit if his plan was to ever work
in the future. At night he worked long hours down in his lab going through the
archaic tomes and experimenting with dark potions. Between his work for
Voldemort, his teaching at Hogwarts and his work for the Order he was getting
barely an hour or two of sleep a night, using potions himself to keep his mind
sharp and his body running on pure adrenaline.

�� That Saturday
Miranda trudged morosely down the stairs prepared for her weekly session at the
Malfoy manor.

� �No,� Snape looked
up at her over his morning juice. �Your lessons with Lucius are put on hold for
now. The Master will want to be seeing you in person next week to test you
himself on what you have learned.�

�� Miranda sank down
onto the chair her body trembling slightly. This Snape noticed immediately.

� �Fear the Master�s
power but do you not ever DARE show
it!� he abruptly stood up, �Have you lost your fool mind girl?� he demanded.
�You swore an oath of loyalty and service to him!�

�� Miranda just shook
her head slightly and worked her hardest to throw up strength of will. However
her appetite was now officially killed, right now all she wanted to do was
disappear. Because it had been nearly two months she since she had personally
seen the Master and pledged service, she had been able to move Voldemort to the
furthest corners of her mind, unless her dark mark tingled. Even Lucius Malfoy
seemed preferable to the totally dark and cruel power of the Dark Lord.

�� Miranda saw even less of her Professor
during the day now except for intensive lessons at night. During the day she
read and practiced her lessons solo, twice she had even tested the boundaries
of Snape�s enchantments on his home and tried to escape his home forgetting
what Snape had said to her that first night. She tried the door but it would
not open for her, nor would any of the windows. Professor Snape�s home was an
effective cage and she was going no where. That night he came home and was in a
contemptuous mood indeed.

�� I thought I told you that trying to leave my
home was impossible.� He stared darkly at her.

�� What if there isa fire, eh?� she had tried to
ask politely, �What if I have to leave then, eh, Sir?�

�� An icy cold glare came from Snape then and
an almost a cruel curl to his lip. �Oh, if there was a fire at my residence I
would know. I would come and take you out. But there had better not be any
fires in my residence, do we understand one another?�

�� She had merely nodded her understanding and
the next day had even allowed herself to break down
totally in the privacy of his home. Her eyes once again filled with tears of
not only despair but utter fear. She had been working on her potions lesson and
at one point picked up the shiny silver dagger used to cut and crush the
ingredients and with tears streaming down her face, her body wracked in such
despair had held the dagger to her own throat praying and hoping for the
strength to drive it deep into the carotid arteries. But she could not. She was
too cowardly, too afraid of even that escape. With a howl of rage and
hollowness she threw the silver dagger across the room and spent the next hour
curled in a ball on the couch sobbing nearly uncontrollably. She never
remembered herself falling asleep in exhaustion from her depths of despair
until she felt the warm wash of gentle heat coursing over her.

� �Wake up� professor Snape�s voice was
calm and almost soothing within her mind.

Her eyes flickered open to a darkened room, she felt guilty
for not stoking up the fires or the candles. �Drink this.� Snape said in his
detached voice and handed her a bright blue potion. Obediently she did as he
ordered, within a few moments the black cloud of total despair seemed to lift. She
was worried that he would be angry at her for falling asleep, for not doing the
required number of hours of practice. Instead he merely walked across the room
and picked up the fallen dagger near the far wall. He turned once and glanced
at her, and she briefly felt the room waver as his eyes seemed to bore into
her. The image of her putting that dagger to her throat and then not being able
to finish the job swam lazily in her forethoughts.� The link ended and she truly did expect him
to be enraged then, to lecture her darkly on there being �no escape� from Lord
Voldemort, but he simply fingered the dagger glanced once at her with an almost
slightly amused gleam in his eye and then silently walked away with no mention
of anything.

�� Miranda had counted with rising dread in her
mind the days until the visit with the Dark Lord. Had it not been for Snape
feeding her draughts of dreamless sleep she would have been pacing as
sleeplessly and relentlessly as her teacher. Even his teaching methods had
switched to being more direct, he seemed to push occlumency above all else the
last several days, ripping at her mind until she was sure there was nothing in
her heart or soul that Snape had not intruded on or seen with his mind�s eye.

�� Two days before the dreaded visit to her
Master�s home, Snape had mainly concentrated on tutoring almost as some dark
finishing school professor. �Remember to always bow when you first see the
Master,� he idly said. �Remember his first lesson to you. Refer to him as
Master, and always be respectful but yet strong. Do not DARE open your mouth
and ask him anything unless he asks you first.�

� She had just sat
numbly on the couch, her hands almost unconsciously twisting in her lap. �You
need to cease that fear Miranda.� Snape eyed her sharply, �what the bloody hell
have you been learning occlumency with me for if you cannot even put a cap on
your most basic fear?�

�� But it was so hard, her mind screamed, so
very damned hard. Just the thought of that tall thin wizard with his cruel red
eyes and the way his voice so casually uttered �crucio!� filled her with such
dread. In fact the more she learned in magic the more powerful she realized
Lord Voldemort was.

� �Listen to me well��
Snape leaned forward almost over her, making her vividly remember the very
first night she had come to his home here in Spinners End. �You will feel him
probing, but occulmency can only work if you do not give into the fear of what
your own thoughts revel.� He backed up a few paces and now there was almost a
sense of calmness to him. �If he asks you a question in your mind about
something you must vividly think about what you want him to see.� He folded his
arms over his chest drawing his black robes about him.

�� As an example,� he
began and then turned away from her. �If the Dark Lord were to ask you about
what you remembered from your trips at Lucius Malfoy�s, you should think on all
the training Lucius did upon you, allow your hate and humiliation of what
Lucius did come through but do not think of anything else, not even Draco�s
conversations with you.�� Snape heard her
give a soft nearly inaudible gasp behind him. �Do not dare lie, but merely omit
what you do not want seen. However to change the topic in your mind or to try
and lie would only alert the master and make him probe deeper. You must also
keep all emotion under control. When you are fearful, angry or any strong
emotions, it makes a Legilimens that much more able to read you.�

�� She wanted to ask
him why he was telling her all this? Never had Snape spoken like this to her
before, but she dare not open her mouth, dare not break the fragile spell of
his more quiet explanations and teachings.

�� Slowly he turned
back to her his eyes still calm but yet distant. �You have a natural gift of
occlumency Miranda, you are not a legilimens in any sense, but you seem to have
a knack with having some hidden occlumency talent. It may be the one and only
thing to make everything in your life easier, do you understand me clearly?� he
tilted his head slightly.

�� Yes sir.� She
nodded.

�� On your feet and
let�s try then.� He walked over near the fireplace. It was the strangest
occlumency lesson she had ever had with him, it was not at all like his usual
style. There was no wand drawn, no whisper of the incantation �legilimens� and no tearing into her
mind.

�� You will know when I am reading you because
you will feel warm, almost pleasant.� He briefly explained, �The room may seem
a bit blurred around the edges. I shall ask you some simple questions;
questions like what your home in Sicily looks like, or what your first lesson
with Malfoy was like. I want you to subtly change images in your mind, so that
if your bedroom at home is painted white, you will work as hard as you can as
imagining it blue instead. Are we clear?�

�� She nodded and finally dared to speak
respectfully. �Like daydreaming or creating a story ina my head, yes?�

�� Exactly like that.� Severus merely spoke
evenly. �Now,� he paused and just stood calmly looking at her. �What is your
father like? What does he look like? Picture him��

�� At first it was hard, perhaps because Snape
was being so casual about the whole thing, no wand, no demanding and no harshness,
just simple and almost non-threatening questions. Almost too late she would
realize she was envisioning exactly what he was wanting, the room feeling so
warm and comfortable and almost dream like.

� ��She half expected him to become enraged or
angry as he often did at her failures, but instead he just quirked at eyebrow
at her and silkily said �Try again.�

�� By the third time she was actually able to
make headway. He had asked her to picture the color saddle Lucius had used on
her when he rode her, and she was able to mentally picture the saddle as black
instead of brown. Abruptly the warm, penetrating feeling stopped.

�� Very good.� Snape
nodded once briefly, �Very good indeed.� There was no patronizing tone, no
coldness, just a quiet and almost gentle compliment. It was the one tiny sliver
of praise from her teacher that allowed her to focus her mind even more easily
into deflecting her own thoughts as he asked his questions of her.

� Half an hour later
she was coated in sweat and shivering in the cool air of his living room feeling
like she had just ran 10 miles. Exhausted but yet also elated that she had
finally learned the concept.

� �It improves with
time and practice.� Snape had casually said as he used his wand to conjure two
glasses of wine handing one to her. �It works the best if you merely try to
envision tiny changes. The harder you try to lie or hide in your mind the more
obvious it becomes.� He summoned a potion into his hand and handed it to her.
�Now, drink this and go to bed for the night. Work hard on clearing all thoughts
from your mind tonight as you drift off to sleep as I taught you.�

� She gingerly took
the potion and turned to walk upstairs but then paused. Slowly she turned and
faced her teacher who still stood by the fireplace as though gazing into the
flames deep in his own thoughts.

�� Professor?� she
quietly asked.

� �What?� he glanced
up a moment, the eyes briefly hard and cold as they usually were.

� �Thank you for
tonight�s lesson, eh?� she said respectfully, �You are indeed a gifted
teacher.� She meant it as a sincere compliment.

�� At first his eyes
seemed to harden even more, glinting in the firelight like two obsidian chips,
but then they softened slightly. �You are welcome,� came his typical flat
reply. �Good night Miranda.� He turned his back to her, gazing back at the fire
to end anymore conversation or eye contact.
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Broken by the Dark Lord