Obviously, I own none of the original character; they all belong to JK. This applies for the entire story.

Not entirely half blood prince, deathly hallows compliant**

Chapter One: The Beginning.

Snape dragged Hermione towards the fireplace in the derelict house; he had his arm tightly around her waist pulling her limp, unconscious body closer towards the fireplace. He kneeled down slowly, resting Hermione in his arms. Snape's usual impenetrable heart was momentarily stopped by the sight of this broken woman's face. He looked down at her; she had deep gashes and bruises on her face, neck and arms. He removed a single golden curl from a cut on her right cheek; he couldn't heal her now, there was no time. The dark professor traced her innocent face admiring where the long lashes of her closed eyes touched the tops of her cheeks and how her pink lips gently parted. Everything went silent, to him; it was like there was nothing else surrounding them. Through the wounds even he could see that since she had left Hogwarts she had grown into a beautiful woman.

He shook his head, he could hear Harry firing stunning spells in the next room to hold off the death eaters in pursuit of them; when loudly; he heard Lucius' deafening voice, scream the 'Avada Kadarva' curse followed by the smash of a window. Snape's chest tightened, he snapped his head towards the other room; had Lucius hit Harry? A couple seconds silence and then he heard Harry's voice calling to him. Snape breathed, Potter was still alive. Confident the two death eaters had been taken out by Harry; Snape called him into the next room whilst throwing the magical powder into the fire place, starting the emerald flames. Harry ran into the fire; blood, deep wounds and lacerations covering his face. Snape carefully shifted Hermione into Harry's arms;

"Go home, now. I'll think of something" Snape growled, his stare intense as the young wizard nodded.

"12 Grimmauld Place" Harry whispered, his gaze moving from Snape's dark eyes back to the emerald fire, before disappearing.

Severus waited for the flames to die down then pointed his wand at his face and muttered a spell which immediately made his face to look like he had been in a heavy bar fight. It felt like it too. He cringed in silent pain as the spell sunk in; Snape looked up at his face in the cracked, rusted mirror above the fireplace; he was covered in blood and bruises, with tears to his robes across his chest. He nodded, pain shooting down his neck; this was the desired effect. He staggered back into the room where Harry had fought the death eaters, only to be met by two unconscious, bloody messes on the floor. Snape scowled at them and their pathetic attempt at attacking; they were adults after all. He had, however, been lucky that neither of them had seen him dragging Hermione to the fireplace otherwise he would have been as good as dead. Severus had always been good at thinking on his feet, he knew how to protect himself – he had been doing this since Harry had been born, 19 years ago. So, he put on his most disdainful face, cringing in pain and revived Lucius and his wife Narcissa with a simple spell.

"Having a nap, are we?" Snape spat as he grabbed Lucius by his collar, dragging him up, internally all of Snape's arm muscles screamed at him to stop. Lucius whelped and held his ribs; Potter had clearly broken a few of them. He was thankful, for once that Potter (he admitted reluctantly to himself), was a good wizard, able to do this kind of damage having just seen what Lucius had done to Hermione. He shivered internally.

Narcissa tried to stand, leaning against the wall;

"Severus I-" But she was cut off by the snarling potions master,

"You're both pathetic. You let two inexperienced aurors get away." Slowly, a wide smirk spread across Severus' face, "The dark lord wouldn't like to hear this, will he?" He let this smoothly roll out of his mouth, threateningly. Snape's eyes sparkled and turned to leave the room; he knew he had the Malfoy's at his bidding.

Seconds later, Harry tumbled out of the fire place into the library at Grimmauld Place, surrounded by Order members. Harry looked around but couldn't see through the blood dripping down his face and knew he was about to faint. He held on until he recognised Hermione's hand in his and so he let himself drift away, knowing he had brought her home safely.