Severus remained silent, not moving a muscle after Lord Voldemort carried him to the bed.
Lord Voldemort knew that Severus could hear and understand every word he said. He could understand what was left unsaid, and he could read the meaning behind his silence.
Lord Voldemort unbuttoned the ruined, crumpled garments, stripped them off, and dressed Severus in a Hogwarts school robe instead.
"Lord..."
Severus did not know whether he should be grateful that the Dark Lord had not dressed him in the robes he wore as a professor at Hogwarts, or worried about the Dark Lord preying upon him as a student.
Oh, right—since when did the Dark Lord care about laws? It was a miracle he hadn't rewritten the legal code already.
As he was thinking this, the Dark Lord approached. With a flick of his wrist, to Severus's astonishment, the heavy iron cuffs on his wrists and ankles fell away.
"There is magic woven into these shackles, Severus," Lord Voldemort explained as he fastened a delicate, Ouroboros-shaped anklet and a mithril bracelet in their place.
Severus had no idea what to say. In his past life, he had been favored; ever since leaving school, he had spent his time brewing potions for the Deathers, rarely seeing actual combat. Later, when he joined the inner circle of the Death Eaters, he rarely spoke, constantly torn between relaying intelligence to the Order of the Phoenix and brewing potions for both sides...
"What are you thinking about?" Out of nowhere, Severus heard the Dark Lord's voice. A cold sweat broke out over him—he had actually let his guard down and zoned out with the Dark Lord right beside him!
Lord Voldemort lay down next to Severus, pulling him into his embrace. Severus could feel only a warm chest against his back, with an arm draped heavily across his abdomen. The hand was pale and strong; just judging by the muscle definition, Severus doubted he could win an arm-wrestle against the Dark Lord.
What did he... want to do...?
Severus's mind raced, his forehead throbbing with a dull ache.
In the middle of the night, Lord Voldemort opened his eyes in the silence, frowning slightly. His Potions Master... condition... seemed a bit off.
Both of them had been reborn; Ariana's price was seven resurrections, while his own price was unrequited longing. The price he shouldered for Severus was also unrequited longing. He only hoped this double dose of fate wouldn't kill his Severus—that truly would be an unrequited longing, and it would drive him mad enough to tear the world apart just to give Death a headache.
Death: *Don't call me, I'm worked to the bone and don't want to deal with you two kids!*
***
The night grew deep. Unable to sleep, Severus was suddenly struck by a thought and reached out to the bedside table for his wand.
Lord Voldemort had never confiscated his wand, but Severus knew very well that he was no match for the Dark Lord. Even with his prime combat skills from his thirties, he was simply incomparable to a Dark Lord who had also returned through rebirth.
Yet the Dark Lord was lying there, completely undefended, exposing his throat to him...
A single *Sectumsempra*. Just one *Sectumsempra*, and the wandless Dark Lord would bleed to death...
But... but...
Severus looked at the young, handsome Dark Lord. In his past life, by this point, the man had already become hideous and insane.
The present Dark Lord led the Death Eaters in conquering most of the magical ministries in Europe. Aside from Britain and France, every other ministry was already under his control. Yet there were no reports of slaughter—none at all. Within Slytherin, the Dark Lord's reputation was overwhelmingly positive....
Was this the glory of Slytherin, or the final glimmer of sanity before madness?
Severus dared not take the gamble.
However, Lord Voldemort dared.
"Sweet dreams return."
In the end, Severus cast a harmless white magic spell, hesitated, and put his wand back down.
He... he was a damned Death Eater, yet he was actually harboring romantic illusions about the Dark Lord.
No sooner had he put his wand away and lain back down than he caught sight of those deep, glowing eyes. Terrified, Severus scrambled to kneel on the bed. "Lord, I didn't..." *want to kill you—*
Lord Voldemort pulled Severus's hand into his own, squeezed it gently, and looked straight into those dark eyes. "I won the gamble, my Severus."
Severus froze, every hair on his body standing on end.
The Dark Lord hadn't been asleep at all!
Yet how had he dared...
"Alright, Severus, go to sleep."
Lord Voldemort yanked him back under the covers. In the palm of the Dark Lord's relaxed left hand, four crescent-shaped indentations were deeply pressed into the skin.
*Severus, do not betray me...*
***
"What is this?!"
With a grim expression, Severus found himself pinned down by Lord Voldemort, who forced his jaw open and shoved a piece of beef rib right into his mouth.
"Do not fight it, Severus."
How could any self-respecting man accept being treated like a helpless plaything?!
Lord Voldemort leaned in, pressing a gentle kiss to Severus's lips. Severus froze instantly. As their lips and teeth met, the Dark Lord's lips were astonishingly, impossibly soft. Warm breath washed over his face, sending a gentle wave of heat through him.
"Severus, this is not humiliation..." Lord Voldemort murmured, sliding a hand down to stroke the double agent's backside before pressing a kiss to the Potions Master's chest.
Abraxas's mocking words still echoed in his ears: *Merlin himself wouldn't believe it if you told him—a Dark Lord in his forties and still a virgin—*
Severus had given his first time to him, and he had done the same...
This was the person he treasured above all others, the person he intended to cherish for a lifetime. The idiot main soul couldn't understand love precisely because that part had been ripped away from him.
Lord Voldemort gently stroked the Dark Mark on Severus's arm, forging an even deeper connection with it so that Severus's mark would forever remain unique—the very first one he would sense if any danger ever arose.
"Lord... take that thing off, please..."
Throwing away his pride for once, Severus whispered his plea to Lord Voldemort. After a moment of silence, the Dark Lord used a vanishing spell to remove the mark entirely.
He simply couldn't say no to Severus.
***
A few days later, at the exceptionally young age of eighteen, Severus entered the inner circle of the Death Eaters.
A half-blood who had earned the title of Potions Master even before graduation—this had all the purebloods in an absolute frenzy. Especially after learning that the boy was a Slytherin, everyone became even more eager.
Unfortunately, the Dark Lord's strict rule was that no Death Eater could recruit students who hadn't graduated and weren't at least two years past the age of majority, so everyone could only look on with greedy eyes, not daring to harass him.
On the very second day after graduation, during the inner circle meeting, when the Dark Lord walked in leading the gloomy, cold little bat, everyone except Lucius, Black, and a few other insiders completely lost their minds.
*Damn it! I almost poached my own boss's prized possession!!*
"Allow me to introduce Severus Snape, the Potions Master I personally trained. Yesterday, I officially bestowed the Dark Mark upon him, welcoming him as one of us."
Sitting in his chair with his fingers intertwined, the Dark Lord stared with crimson eyes at the Death Eater elites from across Europe, smiling with unfathomable amusement.
Severus sat composedly at the Dark Lord's immediate right, with Lucius looking equally at ease right beside him.
Only when those Death Eaters frantically dug through the records three or five days later did they discover that Severus was actually Lucius's close friend!!
No wonder!!
The Malfoy family—speculative geniuses to the core!