I must be crazy. Starting two new fics, on the same day, and waaay before I'm finished with Lioness? SMH, yes, I'm crazy. This new fic is a gift to the lovely Perry Downing, who has reviewed just about every HP fic I've written and nearly every chapter therein as well! I am constantly astounded by your kindness, Perry! Much love to you, and I hope you enjoy this, but it will not be over quickly ;)

Chapter 1

"Good afternoon, Mister Snape, how are we today?"

Severus grunted in answer, moodily watching the obnoxiously chipper attendant sweep through his recovery suite at St. Mungo's and rake open the curtains for his obligatory 'view'. Sneering back down to his crossword puzzle from yesterday's Prophet, he rather thought he could do without a grand picture window overlooking a white brick wall five feet out, but it reflected sunshine, and that's what 'Sandra-Dee' repeatedly ordered.

She came around the side of his bed and pulled the crossword out of his hands in order to gain his full attention. He gave her an offended look and went to reach after it. It was his, for Pete's Sake! Sodding nurses and their thinking that they could do whatever they wanted...it was enough to drive him well again.

'Sandra-Dee', whose real name Severus couldn't be bothered with remembering, tucked the paper into a drawer on his bedside nightstand and smiled, "Same as usual, then? All right. How about I bring you something to read later?"

He flared his nostrils and glared at the drawer that was too far to reach in that direction without severe discomfort. Narrowing his eyes at the saccharine witch, he inhaled shakily and ground out, "If you must subject me to this (wheeze) boredom (wheeze-cough) then why break it at all?"

Her watery blue eyes snapped to his in concern as she fluttered forth with a conjured glass of water. "You know you're not supposed to talk until your throat heals up. Now, before you get all worked up, you've got a visitor, which is why I'm not bringing you something to read right now."

He gratefully sipped the cool liquid, but grimaced when she said he had a visitor. Probably Potter again, the sycophantic arse.

"That Mister Potter sat here for a full hour while you ignored him for yesterday's paper. Which I know for a fact you'd read cover to cover only an hour before!"

He snorted in response, cutting another glare at the nurse, which rewarded him with her continued yammering, "So I'm not bringing you anything to read until Professor McGonagall has gone.

Blood leached from his face as he heard the impossible words falling out of Sandra-Dee's mouth, inhaled too sharply and started coughing again. It would be a fine, crisp day in hell before he'd want to spend time battling recriminations from that harpy. The silly baggage before him thought it was a Nice Thing, so he needed to set her straight. Taking a slow, steady-ish breath, he crossed his arms over his chest and said, "You can send that (wheeze) hellcat back to Scotland."

The nurse conjured and handed him a handkerchief to cough into, which he snatched out of her hands with a silent snarl. He tried to count how many glares he could throw at her before she started in with how good visitors were for his recovery.

He got to three before she said her favorite line, "Now, Mister Snape. It's clinically proven that visitors help speed up recovery time. Don't you want to get out of here?"

He glared again when she pulled the water from his hand and vanished the glass. Did the woman come with a script? That was nearly verbatim her line from yesterday before she let Potter in. He coughed again into the square of cloth and thought that perhaps the objection to visitors they didn't want was the real motive behind increased patient recovery rates.

She took his pensive gaze as acquiescence and started for the door. "So, I'll just go let her in and you be nice or I'll have to bring you ice instead of ice cream later."

The witch had to be nineteen or twenty. Where in Hades did she get off shaking her finger at him like he was some recalcitrant child being bribed with ice cream? His black eyes narrowed again and he slowly enunciated, "I see I'm exchanging one harridan for a (cough) nother. Fine. Let the witch in."

At least with Minerva, he wouldn't be subjected to constant saccharine, sunshine and daisies. It was enough to turn a man's stomach.

Sandra-Dee gave him a chastising look and popped her head out the solid walnut door. "You can see him now, but don't stay too long, he's in a good mood." Severus' eyebrow arched up at her tonal indication that 'good' meant 'not'.

He had to strain to hear Minerva's response from the hallway, "That's all right, Verna; I know what he's like."

Verna, yes, that was her name. Ah well, he'd probably forget it in a few minutes. It wasn't like it mattered, he'd be leaving here in a few weeks as soon as he was cleared from treatment, anyway.

Many different things ran, bounced and played havoc in his head as he watched the newly-named Headmistress of Hogwarts walk sedately into the room. As she moved closer, he saw a heavy gravitas in her posture that seemed to weigh down on her sharp shoulders. A bright streak of silver shot through her hair from each temple, something he'd watch encroach on her iron black tresses over the past year or so.

He sighed internally, wondering how many of those silver strands were from dealing with him. Eying her again, he thought that perhaps she looked a bit more stooped than he remembered.

Stress apparently did not sit well on Minerva's shoulders.

The nurse closed the solid door behind her and Minerva was left standing at the foot of his hospital bed, looking as if she'd much rather be anywhere else but in a room with him. Not that he could really blame her, but like hell he'd look away from that stony-eyed stare she was subjecting him to at the moment. He silently counted to thirty-three before she finally broke with a stammering blush, "Well, the least you could do is nod or something. I didn't come all the way down here just to stare at you."

There must be something seriously wrong for her to get so defensive so quickly. There was no love lost between them—Albus had made sure of that—but he at least expected general pleasantry before the snarling began. Externally, all he did was continue staring back at her, waiting with a raised eyebrow for her to deign he was worthy of whatever she had to say to him this day.

Her upper lip pursed out a slight bit, something he was very interested to remember was usually a tell for her hiding humor at something. After another moment of her glaring between his eyes and his eyebrows, she finally relented with a huff, "At least that still works. Merlin knows, the earth would shift off its axis if Severus Snape couldn't glare with his eyebrows."

Was that supposed to be an insult? He scowled at her to try and get her to the point before her Gryffindor colors ran maudlin.

Apparently the scowl was what she'd been waiting for. With a wry smile, she acknowledged it, "Ah, that's more familiar." His scowl deepened as he watched her look around for seating. Finding none—he'd vanished more chairs than the nurses could successfully conjure and the resultant compromise was for any visitors to bring their own—Minerva conjured a soft leather armchair and shifted it with her foot hooked around the leg to face Severus more clearly. The leather groaned as she sat on its tufted surface and once she settled in, they recommenced staring quietly at each other.

Well, he certainly wasn't going to make it easy on her, so she'd have to eventually tell him whatever it was that was important enough to beard him in his den, so to speak. A contemplative gleam hit her glittering eyes and she finally decided to talk, "You know, you could have told us you were on our side."

His eyes flew open in surprise. That certainly wasn't what he'd expected. He snorted his disbelief and gave her a look that spoke volumes about his concern for her sanity.

As that hadn't been an unusual expression from him, she continued on an apparent rant, "You and that secretive old bastard. I can't believe you two! We tried to kill you several times, you know!"

He was surprised she admitted as such, but alas, yes, he'd been fully aware. How else was he still around to hear of it? With a level stare that was much more subdued than he really wanted—borderline sentimental, really—he nodded once or twice and sighed, looking down at his hands folded in his lap atop the counterpane.

"Severus," She hesitantly began, "I don't understand why you or Albus couldn't have at least told me. I'm really quite confused about all this."

He shook his head in further disbelief. Did she honestly think it would have been any less confusing had she known? He took a steadying breath but coughed. Damned snakebite was still affecting his respiratory system and he fought to regain control of the wheezing response. He'd heard Minerva stand up out of her chair, but was surprised when he felt a cold glass push into his hands. He'd gotten so used to the nurses doing this, he automatically took a sip to calm the cough, but once it was under control, he saw Minerva and her pitying, fretting fuss standing over him. He glared at her, then the glass, then vanished it with a thought. She blinked at his abrupt removal of her simple application of help, and moved to sit back down.

He waited until she was settled again before rasping out a sentence, which started out as 'it's my life, not yours' but ended up simply, "My life."

Her narrowed gaze told him she'd caught on to his meaning. "Is this some tripe about you leading your life as you please?"

With a quick shrug and a flippant hand gesture, he conveyed for her to think what she wanted.

She gave back an equally perturbed and mulish expression, then pressed onwards, "Potter showed everyone your memories when he thought you were...dead."

He glared at her as if she'd really lost her mind. What kind of segue was that? He knew very well that the sanctimonious prat paraded around his very personal memories for the general public's pleasure. It was all the papers would talk about for weeks, exploring such subjects as speculating on Potter's true parentage and what his Amortentia smelled like. The only part that mattered was that he'd been exonerated from any criminal activity; and fat lot of good that would do if every time he'd been reminded of his so-called heroism, he wanted to strangle anyone that mentioned it.

Looking over at Minerva's pitying expression, he rather thought 'case in point'.

She looked positively motherly when she followed up with, "You've really quite vindicated yourself, you know."

He snorted, rolled his eyes and took another steadying breath, "What (cough) why are you here?" He hoped he could convey his intended implication of telling her to hurry up and get on with it.

Her smile vanished—thank Merlin—and she straightened in her seat. "Ah. Well, I'm sure you're aware that we're getting on with repairing the school."

He looked up to the ceiling, inhaled and looked back down at her, gesturing for her to get on with it.

At that, her gaze faltered and she looked down at her hands, fussing in her lap. "I've been-ahem-I've been named to take over as Headmistress."

She peeked up at him over her spectacles and he glared at her, nodding impatiently. He knew all this, it'd been in the papers as well.

"Right, well." She took a breath to shore up for her next words, "There is a slight issue, with that."

He patiently waited through an awkward pause but after a moment, cut his eyes at her in disdain. Whatever it was, she could bloody well spit it out.

She glared back at him and spat it out, "I don't suppose you could give me the password to the headmaster's office?"

He blinked at her, completely confused. Out of all the things that he could have expected, this was not it. The password? But—

She continued, interrupting his thoughts, "After the battle, it seems to have locked itself down, much like when that horrid Umbridge had taken over."

There was nothing to do but plainly stare at Minerva. The password?

She kept talking, taking his confusion as not understanding her meaning, "The gargoyle won't step aside for any of the administrative overrides and merely states that he is guarding the post for the headmaster. We thought perhaps he meant Albus, but of course that was wrong since Hogwarts knows when a head passes."

Shock. He must surely be in shock. Why else could he just sit there, dumbfounded, and just wait for her to come up with the answer that was so obvious in his brain. He was partly gratified that Hogwarts kept faith with him as chief protector of the castle, but surely the old girl could move on to a more appropriate Head, now?

She interrupted his thoughts again with a summative, "So."

Shaking his head in disbelief, he inhaled, coughed, swallowed, glared, then spoke, "I broke the passwords (cough) when I left that night (cough cough)."

"But-"

"There is no password."

Her head tilted to the left and her eyebrows met tightly above her pinched nose. She was obviously confounded, but what was he supposed to do about that? She couldn't get in the office, and he didn't want to get in the office. She'd been apparently thinking along the same lines, for she fumbled out her next words, "Then you'll have to give up the position to me?"

Glad she'd said it before he had to, he breathed out, "Consider it done, I don't want it."

Oddly enough, he'd rather expected a bit of magic after passing the headmastery to her, but...there was nothing. He shook his head to dispel any sense of obligation. It wasn't his problem anymore.

She seemed pleased, but then tilted her head at him in speculation, "I don't understand. You really don't want it?"

Now that he'd done his part, why wasn't she going? He glowered at her and sucked in a breath in agitation, "You got what you-cough cough cough" His words devolved into a coughing fit and once he realized he couldn't speak past it, he just pointed to the door with an angry glare. Just for good measure, he started tapping the button to call the nurse back in for help.

Minerva looked appropriately panicked, but refused to leave until the nurse arrived, which thankfully was only a moment. Sandra-Dee must have been listening in.

The nurse trotted over to him with a glass of water, which he took and sucked down greedily. She turned to Minerva and gave her an apologetic look, "Oh dear, you've got him coughing. I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

Minerva looked uncomfortable, but muttered a quick goodbye and slipped out the door.

/

After recovering from his coughing fit, Severus sat back on his convalescent bed, thinking through all the ramifications of Hogwarts refusing entry to anyone but him. It was heartening, to know that at least the castle knew and trusted him during his reign of terror.

He thought through the ridiculous amount of people that heralded him as a hero. He'd much rather have people still hate him. Hate was an honest emotion, at least. Take Potter's wife. She couldn't stand Severus, regardless of Potter's protestations and delusions of decency. At least the former Miss Weasley was honest in her emotions. Potter, on the other hand, seemed about to wee himself whenever he was in the same room as Severus, hanging on to every stilted and wheezed word that might work its way out of his mouth.

It was disgusting and a complete turnabout from their mutual hatred from before.

He set back against the mountain of pillows against the headboard and sighed. Why couldn't Potter have left well enough alone? Severus was supposed to be dead, but that idiot Gryffindor told St. Mungo's where to find him and those canny bastards revived him with his own potions.

It wasn't enough that he'd been saved from the eternal peace he'd been expecting. Now he had to suffer the consequences of being revealed a hero. He was supposed to be left alone now, but apparently Hogwarts thought otherwise. On a whim, he searched within himself for the castle's wards and sighed in resignation when he felt Minerva try to enter the Headmaster's office again...and fail.

It had been several weeks, and only lack of proximity and consciousness had prevented him from knowing what the castle maintained: Severus was still the Headmaster of Hogwarts.

Part of him was terrified of the constant villainy he'd be subjected to by returning to the school in any capacity, but another part of him was intrigued by the idea of going back and correcting his wrongs. He certainly didn't want to go back under Minerva.

So. Perhaps he would do this...the only question that remained was how long could he hold out before telling them?

A/N: So? What do you think? :D