Author's Note: Major thanks to Emmeebee for short-notice betaing and making suggestions, and generally being awesome! :)
Written for…
Quidditch League Fanfiction Challenges. Team/Position: Montrose Magpies, Chaser 1 Task: Write about love without using the word love. Prompts: "Demons" by Imagine Dragons, no dialogue, dawn
Open Category Competition 3. Category: cross-gen
Don't Get Too Close
The notice came at breakfast. Severus tensed at the sign of the Ministry seal; there were only a handful of reasons they would be contacting him, and none of them sat well with him. He shielded the letter from the view of the colleagues on either side of him as he tore the envelope open. The contents had him knocking over his chair in the rush to get to his office.
The letter hadn't specified who had been released from prison the previous day, only that they were a former supporter of You-Know-Who. That might not have narrowed down the list very much but it was enough to make Severus worried.
Turning the corner into the dungeons, he shoved a student out of his way. Nobody else was stupid enough to block the path after that. Moments after his office was unlocked, he was at the fireplace, flooing to his house.
The silence shouldn't have meant anything – it was late enough for her to be at work, after all. But, somehow, he knew that wasn't the case. Severus had never been one to trust a gut feeling, but now it was all he had. Wand gripped tight, he stalked through the den and dining room, searching behind doors and furniture, until he reached the kitchen.
She was there, lying on the floor. A small pool of blood surrounded her arm, welling up from the long gash across it. Her face was badly bruised and cut. He pushed back strands of brown hair to cup her face, checking for a pulse at the same time. It was there but barely. His stomach in his throat, he easily lifted her and disapparated.
:-:
The silence was unbearable. Severus normally reveled in the quiet, but tonight it held none of the serenity he usually found in it. He had long become accustomed to the sounds of another's breathing and movement close by, but those comforting notes were noticeably absent.
He was sure Hermione would have had something to say about his anxious foot-tapping or the fact that he couldn't sit still for more than a few minutes. As it was, she wasn't in a position to say much of anything.
The room was dark in a way that should have been sinister, but it was his saving grace. Huddled in his chair in the corner, unable to see anything but the outline of the moonlit window, Severus could pretend that he was enduring another sleepless night at home, with Hermione's sleeping form mere inches away from him.
He tried to sleep in the chair but kept waking gasping, reaching for his wand as visions of his wife's broken and bruised body flooded his mind. Her cold and still form on the bed next to his chair did little to reassure him that the reality was any better.
It had been twenty hours and forty-three minutes since he'd found her lying on their floor. Checking the time, he felt, was the only thing he could do now. The healers were confident in a recovery, so long as she woke up by the morning. An entire world of magic and the best advice they could offer him was to wait.
Three thoughts fluttered in and out of his mind with some regularity over the night: First, that he should have better warded the house. Second, that he would kill whoever it was that decided it was a good idea to make an attempt on Hermione's life. And third, that this was all Severus' fault.
The guilt was overwhelming, and it soon outweighed his desire for revenge. For a long while Severus had been foolish enough to believe that he was through ruining everything he touched. Hermione had given him a second chance the night she saved him; a new life the day she became his wife. And he had helped her too, holding and comforting her when the memories caught up to her. Never in a thousand years would he have willingly thrown away all she had given to him, but the past was not so easily tamed.
Not for the first time Severus realized how dangerous it was for her to be with him. He had tried to warn her but Hermione was as stubborn as she was beautiful. She'd had so much faith in him and he'd let her down again. Were it not for his selfish need to see if she survived the attack, he would have left the hospital long ago.
The lights flickered to life as the door opened and a nurse attempted to enter. Severus roughly shut the door in the man's face and extinguished the lights once more.
He stalked to the window, familiar enough now with the room to avoid stubbing his toe in the darkness. He opened the curtains, keeping the window closed. Hermione liked the bedroom warm, and he'd hate for her first words after waking to be yelling at him.
Scratch that. He would welcome any sign of life from her at all, even if she was furious and never wanted to see him again. He would gladly leave her alone if it meant she'd finally be safe.
It was nearly dawn. He could see the sky lightening over the buildings. His breath caught. Morning. If she didn't wake soon, the healers would return and probably tell him it was too late. He wouldn't believe them; he would keep trying. He'd do anything…
There was a creak. He turned, expecting the door to be open again. He squinted in the darkness, trying to make out the shape of the nurse. There was a rustling sound now, and he hastily lit his wand and looked to the bed.
Hermione was on her side with one hand up to shield her eyes from the light. She was groaning loudly.
Severus didn't think he'd ever heard a more beautiful sound.