Part Two

The fall of the Dark Lord earlier on that day had been a sweet truth, but not as inevitable as the happening that would play out afterward. The inevitable confrontation that each of them had been brooding on for the past six months, and a grudge match that each of them had been building on for the past six years.

But Severus Snape always knew he wouldn't be invincible from the Potter boy's reign of luck forever; one simple silencing spell, one invisibility cloak, and his very own dark curse screamed into the freezing December air, and he had been undone.

He had been aware of the pain for precious few moments before his adrenaline kicked in and spread the numbness. The initial horror of seeing his own blood splatter over his hands did not last long either.

Letting out a horrible groan he turned his cheek to the cold, wet pavement and barely registered the sight of the boy who had felled him. There were two figures there now, they appeared to be in a struggle, but their argument was all lost to the ringing in his ears, and the furious pound of his shocked heart. Words did not matter to him anymore, it seemed.

With a shuddering breath Snape rolled onto his back and stared up at the sky with a distant expression. The edges of his vision were beginning to darken now, the sounds beginning to echo and fade, the rain falling steadily down, but not seeming to touch his cheeks. Everything had become dreamlike, detached, unimportant.

Perhaps it was a dream.

But it was unlike the usual ones he had. It was good, and peaceful, without any of the usual fear, or doubt, or hatred that normally haunted him. It was night time and he was quite alone, sat beneath a tree on a hilltop, looking calmly down at a pool of lights he recognised as his town of birth. As the leaves hissed gently the sound of someone singing was carried to him in the breeze. Whispering the same words, over and over, and over again in a soft, but urgent voice.

The song intrigued him, for a short while. But everything was becoming fainter, even the voice, and finally he lost interest altogether.

Beat by beat of his slowing heart, the numbness gradually claimed him.

Her kiss for the man she had secretly admired for so long was in vain; Hermione felt she now knew what was worse than living with the secret; living on after the secret did no longer matter. Her energy entirely exhausted, Hermione huddled up to Snape's body and lay her head on his motionless chest. She began to weep silently; her tears mixing with the raindrops and rolling freely down her cheek.

And Harry was suddenly exhausted too. His previous belligerence and fiery rage had all been doused out with the single sharp shock of seeing his friend embrace his fallen enemy. He stood over them both now like a silent, morose shadow, shoulders hunched, brow creased in bitter confusion, and dug his hands deep into his pockets.

And that was when he touched the smooth surface of a small glass bottle.

Felix Felicis.

Fingers closing slowly, Harry drew the bottle out and gazed at it. It was almost empty save for perhaps three or four drops of liquid.

He looked back down at the form of his friend lying crumpled and bedraggled on the pavement, her body heaving with silent sobs, and made a sudden, crazy decision.

A decision he would regret for his own sake, of course.

But this was not for his own sake, this was for his friend.

Unseen and unnoticed by Hermione, Harry knelt down on the pavement, quietly removed the stopper from the bottle and dripped the remains of the potion into the Ex-Potion Master's frozen mouth.

That done, Harry shakingly stood up, turned and walked away as swiftly as he could, a distinctly steely expression on his face. If the potion wasn't too late to bring luck to the man, then he didn't want to be around to give the bastard an opportunity to fire any "lucky" curses back in his direction.