It wasn't supposed to be like this. The final battle between him and Voldemort should've been an overcast and stormy day, or dark and moonless night, surrounded by the war of Light and Dark as the Dark Lord challenged him to another (seriously one-sided) duel. Instead, they stood alone in the large, empty dining hall of Riddle Manor, the winter sun shining brightly through the windows. No war, no duel, just one wizard, wandless and horribly outmatched. All it had taken to get here was the betrayal of his closest friend, and he'd been lain at the feet of the greatest monster the Wizarding World had known in over a century.
Voldemort now stood a little more than twenty feet away, cackling and ranting about something Harry didn't care enough to listen to. He searched frantically for an escape, but the only door stood behind him and his early attempt had proven it to be not only locked, but heavily warded (evidenced when he was thrown back several feet for simply touching the knob), and the windows were too high. Already once, the Dark Lord had tried to order the room's only other occupant to attack him, hold him for death, but Nagini had angrily refused to sacrifice the only other speaker she'd ever met. This had led to their current situation of Voldemort spewing vitriol and Harry doing his best to take advantage of the monster's lapse in attention.
Realizing he was trapped, Harry began desperately trying to gather the energy required to cast wandless magic. Snape had spent hours each week for the last several months trying to drill it into his head that he would need it someday. He wished desperately now that he'd paid more attention to the actual process rather than concentrating on the theory…he'd been foolish and assumed he had more time. Voldemort seemed to realize what he was doing.
"Enough!" The wizard hissed, his red eyes flashing angrily. "Today you die!"
Harry watched in horror as the white-handled wand rose slowly into the air, waiting for the flash of green that would seal his fate, and that of the Wizarding World; but just as the Dark Lord uttered the first syllable of the most forbidden of spells, the doors behind Harry burst open and he found himself pushed to the dusty floor by a heavy weight. He looked over his shoulder as the jet of green passed over his head, and saw Snape getting to his feet.
"Get up, Potter, draw your wand!" The Potions Master yelled as the Dark Lord stood stunned.
"I don't have it," Harry murmured, getting to his hands and knees slowly. He had a moment to sympathize with Snape as the man's face went white with total dread before Voldemort seemed to recover himself.
"You dare to betray me, Severus?!" The snake-like wizard shouted, his voice echoing in the barren room. Harry felt an entirely new kind of terror fill him as he stared between the rising wand and his professor.
"No!" Harry screamed as a second jet of green light left the tip of Voldemort's wand, streaking with the force of lightning towards its target: Snape's heart. This couldn't happen, he was supposed to die, not anyone else. He felt a sudden rush of raw power in his hands and pushed it out without concentrating, only wanting Snape safe and the war over. If he could have seen himself, he'd have known that in that very moment his eyes glowed a green so bright and angry that it was as if they contained the power of the killing curse he'd survived sixteen years ago.
The deadly spell rebounded as it hit the wall of raw magic, Harry's intent channeling the rebound directly back at the Dark Lord at twice the power, even as the spell shattered his shield. The backlash of the magical force blasted Snape back, through the open doors and into the stairwell banister, shattering the wood on impact. He fell to the ground in a heap on his side, unmoving, and Harry ignored the slowly burning corpse of his enemy as he rushed to the Potion Master's side.
"Don't be dead, please, don't be dead," Harry cried frantically as he pushed aside the splintered wood and rolled Snape over. He tried to recall everything he'd learned from the first aid classes Dudley had forced him to attend on his behalf and felt for a pulse at the throat, and then the wrist. It seemed to him that it was sluggish, but strong, and he breathed a little more easily. He hadn't been sure he could have caught his breath long enough to perform CPR if the man had been dead. A sudden cough from the still body startled his heart rate back through the roof, before he leaned over the man's face, searching for signs of consciousness.
"Snape? Can you hear me?" The pale eyelids fluttered, but did no more. "C'mon, Severus, don't pull this shit, I need to know if help is coming!" He shouted in frustration. After a few breathless moments, the eyelids fluttered again and the man released a groan, grimacing. Finally, black depths met watery green. "Oh, thank every deity in the known world, I didn't kill you," Harry breathed.
"Potter," A rasping, fluid-filled cough, "The next time you blast me against a wall, I'm declaring open season on your scrawny, unfocused ass."
Harry grinned. "You got it, Professor."
Another worrying cough. "And don't ever call me by my given name again without my express permission."
"Sorry, sir…but it got your attention."
Snape hummed before grimacing again. "True…just don't do it around your peers, I would never live it down."
Harry chuckled breathlessly. "Understood. Are there others coming?"
"When I left, the Headmaster was organizing his troops, as it were, so they should be here momentarily," Snape murmured huskily. "I decided not to wait around for their foolishness…I will not, however, admit to being grateful for the one time I rushed in like a Gryffindor."
Harry chuckled again. "I think that counts, considering you are a Slytherin."
The Potions Master cleared his throat. "Yes, well, at least my momentary lapse into the idiocy of Gryffindor didn't end any more catastrophically than my having a concussion." He grimaced again just before another cough wracked his body, blood spattering violently as he fell unconscious. That was when Harry noticed the large splinter, as thick as the young wizard's wrist, lodged deep in the soft flesh of Snape's stomach. When the Order arrived, Harry had passed out as well from the exhaustive amount of power he had expended.
~SSHP~
Harry woke groggily to a softly spoken conversation. He made no sign of his waking, hoping to learn if Snape had survived.
"We won't know for a few days, at least, if Severus will pull through. The magical backlash…it made his magical core unstable, and his body is warring with his magic. I can't heal him without risking putting his body into shock from the magical overload. We have to hope that Muggle means will keep him alive until his core restabilizes."
"Do we know yet who betrayed Potter?" Asked a second voice.
"Not yet, but I have a meeting with one of his friends in a few minutes that will hopefully lead us to the culprit. Apparently, he was meeting with someone when he disappeared," Said a third voice that Harry recognized as Dumbledore. "However, I have some ideas. I never would have thought it possible, but…well, we shall see."
"What do you mean, Albus?" That was the second voice, and Harry now recognized it as McGonagall. He tried to shift, or even speak, and found he couldn't move.
"I dare not make any accusations, or put ideas into your heads without proof. I must take my leave, inform me if there is any change in either of my boys."
Harry heard the retreating footsteps and sighed, or tried to, at being unable to tell him who had betrayed him, betrayed them all. For several minutes, Harry struggled to move in the silence, almost forgetting that McGonagall and Pomfrey were still there. He managed to make a sound, a soft grunt, but no more.
"How quickly will Potter recover?" Asked Harry's Head of House.
"Hard to say, he didn't only use raw magic; from what Albus could get out of Severus when he was in and out consciousness, the boy shielded against the Killing Curse. With that much power, it's amazing he is not dead, and suggests his core is stronger than any wizard I've ever known, maybe even more than Merlin himself…"Pomfrey whispered, smoothing Harry's fringe.
"He has had a hard life, Poppy, and your core is partly dependent on your will…Was he truly so desperate to save Severus, do you think?"
"I have seen this boy in here many times, and almost always due to his foolish desire to help," Pomfrey whispered fondly. "I believe, of everything Severus told us, that Potter would have given his life for the man."
"And instead he almost killed him," McGonagall admonished softly. "Don't mistake me, I am grateful for what Potter has done for our world, but I have watched him seven years and he has a horrible habit of getting people into trouble."
"Minerva, he's-"
"I know, Poppy, he was trying to help. But he is not a child, he is an adult, and a loose cannon! We all assume that Potter was taken against his will, but how do we know? What if the boy went along willingly, thinking he was strong enough on his own to defeat You-Know-Who? It would not be unlike him, he has always been a selfish, thoughtless, headstrong child, ever since he came here," The Gryffindor Head of House murmured angrily.
There was silence for a few moments, and when the hospital Matron spoke, there was barely concealed anger in her tone. "Potter is one of the most selfless boys I have ever known, Minerva McGonagall, and if he is headstrong then it is because he could not trust the adults around him! How can you speak so cruelly about a boy who has suffered so much, had so much put upon his shoulders by a world he hardly knows?!"
"He almost killed someone!" McGonagall argued. "This is not the first time that Severus' life has been jeopardized by Potter's foolish actions, and I dare say that, if Severus survives, it won't be the last. Of the people whose lives Potter has unknowingly risked with his careless behavior, Severus has had the worst. I truly believe that his life might have been better if he had never known Potter."
"Minerva, I have not always agreed with you, but I have never hated you until today," Poppy whispered, her voice choked. "You dare to accuse Potter so monstrously? That boy has done more for this world in his short 17 years than you can even imagine, and you call him careless, accuse him of going willingly without even his wand to aid in his defense? If you had ever done anything to help him, or even spoken to him, in the last seven years, you would hate yourself for even suggesting it."
There was a sniff of indignance. "I stand by what I said, Poppy, it would have been better if those two had never met. And you mark me, Severus would agree."
Harry felt a lone tear slip from the corner of his eye and over his temple into his hair. It was hard to imagine that McGonagall, who, while never being a particularly supportive or friendly professor, could have been hiding such a harsh opinion of him. He heard footsteps receding from the room, and then a weight settled on the edge of his bed. A cool, motherly hand ran over his hair.
"I'm sorry, Harry, for the horrors that you have been faced with, the many things over the years that have left you in my care. If there is any good in this world, once you've recovered from this coma your magic has forced you into, perhaps you will awake to a happier, more carefree life than before. I can only hope that your strength will hold out against those who you'll find were rats disguising themselves as allies and friends. It seems the fighting is never done, but now it will be a war of words, and I pray that you can be strong enough to stand against it," Pomfrey whispered lightly, her fingers running continuously through his hair. Harry wished he could move, or speak, but could only lie still until the woman had gone. Finally, he fell back into the dark, open arms of a dreamless sleep.
It was several days before Harry woke, and when he did his first response was to ask after the man who'd risked his life to give him a chance. The news was grim. They had managed to remove the stake from Snape's abdomen, but it had sent his body into shock, and he was still too weak to be healed magically. In the end, they had been forced to patch him the Muggle way, or risk an infection settling in the wound.
"He wakes briefly, for a few minutes, on occasion," Pomfrey told him gently, "And each time he asks after your condition before his own. It would seem that you have, when no one was looking, made a friend of our resident lonesome Potions Master. When you are more recovered, you may see him, but for now I will insist that you do your observations from your own bed, Mister Potter."
Harry scowled at being bedridden still, as he had 'woken' several times during his strange magical coma and was tired of being trapped in the bed. However, when the hospital matron threatened to strap him down, he agreed readily, deciding he would settle for sneaking out of bed during the night as he had done in the past.
His chance came just a few nights later, when he was lying awake and watching the moonlight play with the shadow's on the vaulted ceiling. He'd heard his professor begin shifting on the bed beside his, and sat up in time to see black eyes open groggily. The pale, moonlit throat worked silently for several seconds before the Potions Master managed to croak a single word.
"Potter."
Harry got up immediately and went to the man's bedside. He helped the man to sip some of the water from a waiting glass, and then sat on the edge of his professor's bed, setting the glass aside. "How are you feeling?" He asked carefully.
Snape smirked at him. "As if I've been lying in this bed for far too long. Why haven't I been healed yet?"
Harry looked away in shame. "Pomfrey said that my blast of magic unsettled your core, and that all they can do is wait until it's resettled itself before you can be healed properly," He gave a dry sob as a pale hand slid shakily into his field of vision to grip his hand gently. "This never should have happened, Sev'rus. McGonagall was right, things would've been better if we had never met."
"No," The Potions Master replied shortly, his voice firm despite his body's weakness. "You listen to me, Potter. If it hadn't been for you, I'd have been dead years ago, with nothing to fight for. I have survived this long because of you."
Harry shook his head, tears brimming. "That's not true. I've only ever gotten you into trouble. I'm not even your student anymore, and again you were hurt trying to protect me. If you'd never known me, you wouldn't have even been there for me to hurt you."
Snape pushed himself into a sitting position, grimacing at the pain in his abdomen. "Potter, look at me." Harry did, staring blearily into the deep black pools. "You may not be my student, but as a student at this school, it is still my duty to protect you." Harry started to look away again, but a cool hand on his cheek stopped him. "And even if it weren't, I would have been there to defend you anyway. Believe me when I tell you that, if I never knew you, I would be dead, with no inkling of how precious life could be."
Harry closed his eyes against his own tears as they began to fall. "But I could have killed you. I was so reckless. By trying to save your life, I put it at greater risk." He froze when cold lips touched his gently. After a moment, he melted slightly into the chaste kiss. Finally, he opened his eyes when Snape pulled away.
"Harry, you're an idiot. I am grateful to you, and no matter how much pain I'm in, nor how close I was to death, I will never regret knowing you," Snape told him earnestly. The hand on Harry's cheek shifted to the back of his neck, drawing him forward for another tender kiss. This time, the kiss failed to stay chaste as Snape drew him even closer. Without thinking, Harry placed his hand on Snape's abdomen, drawing a pained hiss from the Potions Master.
Harry drew back immediately, but Snape's snake-like reflexes caught his wrist before he could draw his hand away entirely. Harry looked at his hand in confusion, only to see sparks flicking between his palm and Snape's bandages. Carefully, he lowered his hand back onto the bandage, and watched in amazement as a soft, calming blue light emanated from the spot where his hand touched the gauze wraps. After a moment, the light faded, and when Harry removed his hand he saw a hole burned through the light cloth. Underneath, instead of the gaping hole there should have been, was fresh skin, still pink from the regrowing process. He looked back up into the black eyes.
"Your magic was what unsettled my core, it only makes sense that a mingling of our magicks would be the thing to resettle it," The man explained.
Harry blushed. "Oh, so that's why you, um…because I thought- but I guess you wouldn't have unless-" His words were cut off with a squeak as Snape pulled him forward with the hand still gripping his wrist.
"Shut up, Potter," The Potions Master murmured, drawing him into a deeper kiss than before, a hand on his hip pulling him into the man's lap. He squirmed as he felt an answering hardness against his thigh, and gasped as Snape rolled them over entirely so that he was underneath the taller wizard, pinned to the mattress by deceptively strong arms.
"You should be resting, Severus," Harry murmured nervously, glancing down the Wing to be sure Pomfrey hadn't been alerted to the previously unconscious patient's sudden level of activity.
"I've had enough rest, Potter, right now what I want is you," The Potions Master whispered, trailing feather-light kisses over the tanned throat beneath him. "If you want me to stop, then say so. Otherwise, shut up and enjoy it, because after tonight we will both have to face the consequences of your victory. Do you want me to stop?"
Harry shook his head vigorously and allowed himself to be led in a dance of desire, their bodies writhing together with wild abandon, despite both men still feeling weak from the battle. They kept on for quite some time before finally succumbing to the aches and pains rife throughout their tortured bodies, falling asleep in one another's arms on the small bed.
~SSHP~
The Wizarding Savior awoke to a cold, empty bed. He sat up, suddenly alert, and looked around for his bed partner. He only saw Pomfrey coming hurriedly down the wide corridor between the rows of beds.
"Where's Severus?" He demanded frantically.
"Potter, we have to hurry. The Headmaster came early this morning and when he saw that Severus was healed, he took him to the Ministry. He's being brought up on charges for endangering your life, and betraying you to the Dark Lord," Pomfrey explained. "Albus put you in a magical sleep to, as he put it, 'prevent you from doing something foolish', but I gave you a potion to counteract the effects. You were still under for longer than I'd hoped, but if you hurry, you may be able to catch them before Severus is given the Kiss." She cast a spell, quickly dressing him in fresh robes.
Harry paled as her news sunk in, and began putting on his shoes. "Thank you, Madame Pomfrey, for your help. How did you know that Severus wasn't the one who betrayed me?"
The matron took the time to smirk at him mischievously. "I monitor all of my patients, Mister Potter, and there are only a few things in this world that two people might get up to that would send their blood-pressure skyrocketing like both of yours did last night. When I found you both in the same bed, it wasn't hard to put two and two together. Only now, I wish I hadn't moved you apart before the Headmaster had arrived."
Harry straightened with his shoes now firmly on his feet and drew the Hospital matron into a short, tight hug. "Thank you, again. You had no way of knowing. May I use your floo?" Pomfrey nodded and they hurried into her office, where she sent him through her fireplace to the Ministry.
Not bothering with the visitor's desk, Harry cast a hurried Find Me charm and took off as fast as he could through the winding Ministry halls where his wand pointed him. He dodged witches and wizard's left and right, following his wand through the maze of corridors. Finally, he reached the familiar set of black doors that held Courtroom 10. He burst through the doors in time to see two Dementors gliding into the room from the other side, towards where Severus knelt, bound, in the center. He rushed to the man's side, casting the strongest Patronus he could, based off of the memory of the night before. He slid on his knees to dodge a binding curse as the Wizengamot stood in shocked dismay around the room, and wrapped the man in a fierce embrace. Prongs stood ghostly white between him and the Dementors, pushing them back through the dark doors, and he stared defiantly up at the Head of the Wizengamot. A film of white light surrounded him and Severus, shielding them from anything the Aurors in the room tried to cast at him.
"What the hell are you doing, Dumbledore?!" He demanded.
"Step aside, Harry."
"I won't!" Harry screamed. The hall rumbled threateningly as he tried to restrain his magic. "You've got the wrong man!"
A witch near Dumbledore spoke up, and he recognized her as Madame Bones, Susan's aunt. "There is ample evidence against him, Mister Potter, and we were told you weren't well enough to give testimony about what exactly passed in that hour where He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named fell."
"Then you were lied to," Harry cried hotly. "Severus has never done anything but try and protect me. The one who betrayed me is none other my supposed best friend, and the boy who led you to wrongfully accuse this man: Ronald Weasley!"
The very red-head stood indignantly from the Witnesses box. "That's outrageous, Harry you're my best friend, I would never do anything to hurt you! Snape's got you under a spell or something!"
Harry let a tendril of his magic lash out at the traitor, binding his former friend tightly with magical ropes. "You betrayed me, and gave me a port key to Voldemort designed to look like my wand."
The boy tried to shout past the ropes gagging him, but managed nothing more than muffled grunts. Dumbledore leaned over the dais he was set behind. "Harry this isn't how things are done, you can't just shout accusations at the people trying to defend you. We will stay our decision until this has been investigated more fully, but Severus has to be taken into custody! For all we know, you've been imperius'd."
Harry glared at the old wizard. "That's bullshit, Albus, you know that mind control spells don't work on me. I won't let you treat him like a criminal when he's only ever been a hero! I love him!"
A collective gasp moved through the hall, but Harry heard none louder than the one that came from the man he was huddled over. He shifted slightly so that he could look the man in the eye, and blushed a bright red.
"U-unless last night was just a one-off -I'd understand completely if you were just showing your gratitude since I'd healed you and all- I was just sort of hoping…" He trailed off nervously, forgetting for a moment about the gathered witches and wizards around them.
Snape shook his head. "No, I-" His voice was tight and strained, his body still weak. "I just never thought you would return my feelings. I thought perhaps last night was just a one-off for you, as you've any choice of wizard or witch that you want."
It was Harry's turn to shake his head. "No, I want you…I have for a while, actually." They stared into one another's eyes, both sets shining with love, before Dumbledore cleared his throat. Harry returned to glaring at the old wizard. "Severus is many things, but he is no traitor, and if you insist on pursuing this line of accusation, or try and say I've been poisoned with a love potion or some rot, I'll make sure the entire Wizarding World knows how you treat its heroes."
The aged Wizengamot turned immediately towards one another, and the hall was silent save for their hurried, whispered voices. After several long moments that seemed an eternity, they turned back to face him, and Dumbledore raised his wand. The doors the Dementors had come through closed, letting Prongs vanish, and the shackles binding Severus to the floor unclasped. With his hands free, he pulled Harry close, capturing the younger wizard's lips in a gentle, insistent kiss.
When they pulled away, Dumbledore spoke gravely. "Due to new evidence, Severus Snape is cleared of all charges, and Ronald Weasley will be taken into custody pending an investigation. This court is adjourned." He turned soft, apologetic blue eyes on the pair still kneeling in the center of the room. "I am sorry, my boys, for allowing myself to be led astray by grief at the near-death of you both. I hope someday you can forgive a foolish old man for his follies."
The courtroom began to clear, Aurors carrying the still-bound Ron away through the door the Dementors had gone through, and Harry helped Severus to stand. The Potions Master cupped his cheek tenderly.
"You see, Harry; if I never knew you, my life would be so boring," He growled playfully.
Harry chuckled breathlessly. "I'm just glad that worked, I thought for a moment I only looked foolish, kneeling there and trying to boss the Wizengamot around."
Snape chuckled as well. "You need not have worried, Harry." He placed another tender kiss on Harry's lips. "You always look foolish from where I'm standing."
The Wizarding Savior smiled despite himself and pinched the former spy gently. "Git," He murmured, drawing the man into a deep, soul-searing kiss.