Well well, I'm dipping a toe into the Snape/Hermione infested waters. However, It's so much fun to write that I may just end up drowning myself.
No really, It's drawing me out of a bad case of writers block, which I am so so happy about.
Just so you all know, this story follows the books right up until the epilogue.
And to clear up the confusion before it starts, this story starts with a nightmare of Hermione's: It is not how the death of Snape actually went. Like I said, It's DH compliant, mostly.
Enjoy : D
Hermione was running as fast as she could, her ever-thinking mind entertaining the cold hard fact that it wouldn't be fast enough to get away from the monster that chased her down. Her awareness of her surroundings extended only to how much of the ground ahead of her she could put behind her, how the bright sunlight blinded her and how the damp, green grass beneath her feet was slippery enough to hinder her movements as she bolted towards her destination.
Now that she thought of it though, Hermione actually had no destination. Not knowing where she was didn't help and she had no time to turn her head to assess her location. As Hermione strained forward, trying to gain more ground she became aware of two figures running behind her, shadows on the edge of her vision.
"Hermione!" The shadow to her left called her name and Hermione immediately knew who it was that had joined her in her attempt to escape from the huge slithering snake that followed her every turn.
"Harry, Ron…" she muttered under her breath. The knowledge of her two best friends joining her brought no comfort.
"Harry!" she screamed, out of breath, "Get Voldemort!" After all, what was Harry doing, joining her in her almost-certain demise when he had a bigger monster to kill?
The shadow that was Harry did not falter at her words, giving no indication that he had heard her at all.
"Ron," she moaned desperately, "Make him go…"
From somewhere on her right she thought she heard him say "Sorry 'Mione," before the wind took the words and whipped them away.
The serpent bore down on them now, snapping at their heels. Hermione's usual logic was failing her; surely the snake could move much faster than they could run, so why was it merely chasing? As though the snake could sense her thoughts it fell behind.
Finally, up ahead, there was a landmark that Hermione could recognise and she tore towards it, throwing herself at the base of the familiar tree and touching the knot to still its movement. She'd flown under so fast that the Whomping Willow had no time to grab her or the shadows that materialized into Harry and Ron beside her.
The tunnel was small enough now that they had to crawl and the small space was suffocating. Nevertheless, Hermione frantically fought her way through, followed by the others. Reaching the end of the tunnel however, Hermione stopped when she saw the figure in front of her.
"Hermione!" Harry hissed, "Nagini's coming!"
His voice startled her into moving again; it was a choice between Nagini and Snape and Hermione knew which one she preferred to be killed by. She threw herself into the room ahead of her and felt the others behind her do the same.
Snape's black, glittering eyes met hers for a moment then, and she felt her own widen. The eyes she was seeing now were not the eyes she had associated with Severus Snape; full of pain, suffering and regret. He had never looked more human, had never shown this amount of emotion before now in her presence.
As she stared into his dark eyes, transfixed, she forgot all about Nagini until Snape's eyes moved from her own and fixed themselves on some point behind her. Whatever he saw caused the pain and fear in his eyes to increase tenfold, but Hermione could not tear her eyes from his. Her gaze was unwavering, even as Nagini moved from behind her with terrifying speed, slithering towards Snape, who didn't even draw his wand. She watched in horror as the snake lunged at Snape, latching onto him at the neck. Snape posed no threat to the giant serpent and crumpled to the ground, writhing in agony and running with his own blood.
There was a hiss as Snape's head hit the floor, his eyes in clear view of Hermione as she leapt forward, wand outstretched. The look in his eyes changed to something unreadable before the light went out of them and he lay and unseeing.
"Hermione!" It was Ron and Harry calling her now and she tore her eyes from Snape's empty ones to see Nagini lunging at her, teeth showing and she screamed, her death inevitable now.
"Hermione!"
Hermione sat bolt upright as she heard her name spoken by a familiar voice, too startled to notice the concern the deep tones held as the speaker called to her from across the classroom. She had been dreaming, again, or having a nightmare, depending on which way she looked at it. It wasn't the first time she'd had this dream. It wasn't exactly the way the scene had played out in actuality but this wouldn't be there first time that her dreams had manifested themselves to play on her own emotions. Maybe it was the guilt, the loss to the wizarding world or that she'd never been able to thank him but no matter which it was, Hermione Granger was her own worst enemy.
"Hermione." The voice sounded again, this time calmer, as Neville Longbottom strode towards where she was seated at her desk, papers spread out in front of her.
Hermione let her eyes focus on him as he came to a halt before her desk.
"Falling asleep on the job again Professor Granger?" Neville teased, handing her a cup of something steamy that turned out to be hot chocolate.
Hermione smiled weakly as she reached for the hot drink. "Something like that," she told him, before gesturing with the hand that held her cup and adding gratefully, "Thanks for the hot chocolate.
Neville grinned at her. "That's fine 'Mione," he assured her as he took a seat, the sound of the chair scraping on the stone floor cutting through the relative silence.
They were silent for a moment as Neville took in the sight of Hermione. She looked more and more stressed with every day that passed and he found himself wondering yet again, just why she wouldn't give up on Professor Snape; everybody else had. As much as Hermione tried to hide this from him, she couldn't quite succeed. Having known her now for twelve years and seeing as the two were among the youngest professors teaching at Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry, with a large age gap between most of the other professors, the two were bound together out of loneliness and familiarity and often spent their time together as a result.
After the final battle and the defeat of Voldemort, Hermione, Neville, Luna, Ginny, Harry and Ron had come back to Hogwarts for their final year of schooling. After completing their NEWTs, Harry and Ron continued on to become Aurors, Luna was studying in charms and running The Quibbler in her free time, Ginny had gone on to study in healing while playing quidditch on the side and Hermione and Neville had taken positions at Hogwarts as the Muggle Studies and Herbology professors.
Most people were able to move on after the final battle. All over the country witches and wizards were picking up the pieces of their broken lives and learning to move on. Everyone, that was, except Hermione.
Neville cast a critical look over Hermione; something in her had broken during the final battle and no-one had been able to guess why. Neville knew, and not because she told him herself; no, it had taken years of watching Hermione work herself into the ground, becoming more and more socially secluded before he had figured out the source of her problems.
Neville had had to work hard to put it all together. He had heard about Severus Snape dying in the Shrieking shack, in front of the Golden Trio - they had told him of course - and it was from this information that he drew the basis of his suspicions. It seemed to him that Hermione felt guilty for not trying harder to save Snape as she watched him die before her and he knew it haunted her every dream and hovered over her waking thoughts. But there was more to it than that: Hermione thought that Snape was still alive somewhere and the only evidence that she had was that no-one had been able to find his body after the battle. The thought that Severus Snape could be alive somewhere, and the fact that she hadn't tried to save him, caused her more guilt than she could handle.
Neville didn't blame her for leaving Snape: After all, it had seemed that Snape had taken his dying breath before the Golden trio, not to mention that, at the time, no-one had known of his innocence and loyalty to their side. He sighed; Hermione was obsessed with finding Snape. For years and years, it was all she had tried to do. Shortly after the battle there was a short search for Snape, but everyone had given up; everyone but Hermione, who protested that it was unfair to someone who had put so much on the line for their cause. However, her protests and pleads fell on deaf ears and she had decided to take matters into her own hands.
When, only a year ago, Neville had finally figured all this out, Hermione had told him of her plans to find him, but she was attempting the impossible and they both knew it.
"How is the spell coming along 'Mione?" he asked her. Hermione was attempting to create a spell that would give her the location of any particular person the caster wished to find, no matter where they were or what spells they were using to hide themselves. Wizards and witches had tried before in vain to create such a spell, or ones lesser than the one she was attempting, with no success. The closest anyone had ever come to creating it was in spells such as The Trace, used to track the use of magic on underage wizards, or tracking spells that could be placed on witches and wizards. Neither of these were any help at all to Hermione.
Hermione didn't meet his eyes as she sighed. "It's not really," she told him, "Look."
Neville watched as she waved her wand and a ball of blue light appeared between them both. It appeared to be made out of thin wispy strands of hazy light, all intertwining to create one ball. The light was so bright that Neville had to squint to see the details, noticing as his eyes became more focused that the light was not only made up of blue strands but of silver and white strands as well.
Hermione flicked her wand again and started to speak. "The blue is the general location spell that I have managed to create." As she spoke, the blue strands separated from the rest. "A imperator locus," she said softly, and as a result, the blue formed a tighter ball.
"So this will locate the person?" Neville asked in awe.
Hermione sighed and flicked her wand again, this time drawing out the white strands to glow separate to the rest. "Yes, but it would only reveal the country of the person and without a recognition charm, it would not recognise a spoken name and attribute it to a person. That's what the white is: It blends with the general location spell so that if I speak a name, it will recognise who that is and therefore be able to find them. Agnitio Nomen." She gave her wand a final flick and the small wisps of silver were brought to Neville's attention.
"This is what I have been working on at the moment," Hermione told him. "I need a component that will transfer the magical wavelength of the results into comprehensible information. I have succeeded in the spell forming words, but the words are jumbled and not understandable. Veneficus ut lacuna."
Neville was in complete awe of Hermione's spell work. What he was seeing before him was nothing less than absolutely amazing.
Hermione took a deep breath and began to move her wand in complicated movements. "A imperator locus agnitio nomen veneficus ut lacuna Neville Longbottom," she said, and as soon as she stopped, the ball of three colours formed into letters.
CT S LN OD A
Neville frowned. "What does that mean?" he asked her.
Hermione smiled softly. "According to our current location, I assume that it is meant to read…" Hermione guided the magical letter with her wand and rearranged them.
SCOTLAND
While Neville attempted to wrap his head around this, Hermione kept speaking. "So I need to improve the translation. I also need to add at least three more components to the spell. I need to add a specific locator so that I can find out more than just the general location. I also need to add a non-detection charm so that the person I am trying to find does not know I am trying to find them. Lastly, I need to add a spell or series of spells to undo protective charms, spells or wards."
Another wave of Hermione's wand vanished the ball of light, leaving both Hermione and Neville to their own thoughts.
"That really is incredible Hermione," Neville told her after a few moments of silence.
Hermione shook her head, the weariness showing itself in her features, eminent in the lines that marked her forehead almost constantly these days. She sighed tiredly and pushed an errant lock of curly brown hair behind her ear before replying. "I still have so far to go," she muttered. "He's out there somewhere and I know it."
Neville sighed. This was the part where he would try and convince her to end her mad search for Snape but would fail spectacularly in the face of her vehement protests; it always went the same, but he couldn't help hoping that Hermione would stop neglecting herself for the sake of a man who had always seemed to hate her.
"'Mione, maybe…"
"No Neville," Hermione said, more forcefully than she would have liked. "He deserves better than this. How can you give up on him so easily? He saved us all. And, not only did he save us all, numerous times, I might add, but he risked his life to do it, each and every day for so long. Everybody is still so ready to believe the worst of him, like they always have. Maybe it's because he's a Slytherin, maybe it's because he never had anyone to trust and no-one to trust him, maybe it's because we drove him to the darkness in the first place and when he wanted to come back, we never made it easy for him. Neville, don't you understand?"
And Neville did understand. The professor may have terrified him as a student, but war had matured him, had changed him. The year of Severus' reign as headmaster had been tough on Neville and the others, but Neville knew enough now to know that without Snape in charge, it could have and would have been a lot worse. Snape had victimized Neville in his classes - the main reason that Neville had been terrified of him - but Neville could now see that he had been a major risk in the potions classroom; that his abysmal potions skills, or lack thereof, had been a constant danger to all involved.
Now, Neville could bring himself to feel ashamed of himself for giving up on Snape so easily. One thing that Neville had been quick to learn about death eaters was that they loved to use his parents against him, to upset him, something Snape had never done. This realisation had bolstered Neville's confidence in Snape almost more than anything else. So he hung his head in shame upon hearing Hermione's words, the sheer truth of them hitting home.
"Ok 'Mione," he said slowly, "I know, and you have my support…. Just- I don't know…. Look after yourself better, or something."
Hermione nodded as Neville stood to leave, both of them knowing that she wouldn't really look after herself better, that she would work herself just as hard until she tracked Snape down and that the conversation was over for now. Neville gave her a small smile as he took their empty cups and bade her goodnight.
Hermione returned his wishes for her to sleep well but she hardly saw him leave through the voice in her head that constantly chanted just one question: Where the hell was Severus Snape?
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