Hello again. I'm very sorry for the delay in uploading this chapter. Over the past week there's been a lot of stress with writing essays about things I really don't care too much about but luckily they're all finished now. Tomorrow I get one back which I wrote before Christmas and I'm very nervous about it. Oh well I digress. I probably should let you all know that this is AU if you hadn't already guessed. It takes place in the Summer before Harry's 5th year and shortly before the dementor incident. After I'd finished writing this chapter I remembered the Weasleys. I'm not entirely sure when they canonically started living at Grimmauld Place in that summer so in this it's going to be really not long before Harry.
Thank you to the wonderful people who reviewed this and followed and favourited it. It made me smile sort of goofily and it was very nice :)
Disclaimer: If I wrote Harry Potter I would not be sitting here smoking Pall Malls and sleeping with cheap arse pillows that are basically no thicker than cardboard. So yeah, I don't own Harry Potter or any of it's affiliations.
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"Why have you brought a profusely bleeding Snape into my mother's house, Remus?" He asked calmly.
"Severus here had a bit of an accident while we were watching over Harry's house." Remus replied with the same amount of casualness in his words, "I'm sure he'd appreciate it as much as I would, if you'd put aside your grievances and help him to recover, wouldn't you Severus"
"I'd be forever… indebted to you, Black" Severus agreed with a slurred, mocking enthusiasm, and after which Remus couldn't quite work out whether he was bowing to Sirius or doubling over in pain. Either way Sirius' expression of confusion did not abate, and he slowly walked up to the two men, bent down, gently pulled the bundled cloak from Remus' grip and regarded the bloody rip beneath it for a second.
"That's quite an accident, Snape" he said, replacing the cloak and Remus' hand to the wound "We had better get you to the kitchen. I doubt you can climb the stairs and I'm sure the table in there is just as fine as any feather stuffed bed at St. Mungo's." He fastened up his dressing gown and led them past the still screeching portrait of Mrs Black and through the kitchen door. Upon arrival Sirius started to clear the kitchen table as quickly as he could. It would have appeared that his house elf had left it to neglect in both Sirius' absence and presence at number 12 and therefore the kitchen was in a rather unsightly state. Remus leaned Severus against the kitchen door holding him up with one hand and tried to strip him of his robes with the other. He seemed to have drifted off into a world of his own again and when his eyes weren't drowsily shut, they were glassy and distant. He attempted to aid Remus who was frantically pawing over the many golden buttons adorning Severus' robe, and raised shaky hands to each one in turn.
"Merlin, Severus why do you need so many buttons?" Remus asked, exasperated as his hands fumbled over them. Severus closed his eyes and breathed in slowly, "For moments just like this." he replied after a minute and Remus stifled a laugh, instead sighing with relief as they finally managed to undo the robe, taking it off and throwing it to the side quite unceremoniously. Now Severus stood there in a – what had been white – shirt, tucked into some stained black trousers. He was getting quite breathless and sweat was still pouring off his forehead while the rest of his body still shivered with cold. Remus politely tried to ignore the large red stain and tear which had decorated the front of Severus' shirt, taking out his wand and casting a heating spell on him, before forsaking the new set of buttons and ripping the shirt open with his bare hands. Severus' breathing hitched several times as bits of the shirt which must have clung to his sticky wound were mercilessly torn away from it.
"I'll be expecting a new… shirt from you, Lupin" he said breathlessly, and so quietly Remus almost didn't hear him, "That one was in very good condition..."
Remus stared at the wound that was now visible on Severus' stomach. It wasn't just a stab wound it was an angry red hole, like someone had twisted a knife inside of him. It oozed blood like a tap. Sirius, who had finished sanitising the kitchen, had come to stand next to him in front of the sweating, shivering man leaning against the door.
"Merlin's shit, who did that?" he said without preamble. Severus, who had had his eyes drowsily closed, opened them and followed their gazes to his stomach. His eyes widened and he lifted his head back up, letting it thump against the door, before sliding slowly down to the floor. Remus and Sirius both moved quickly, grabbing an arm each and pulling him back to standing position, but it was no use. Severus' legs could no longer hold his weight and they simply buckled beneath him as soon as he tried to use them. Seeing no other option, Sirius moved to hold Severus' legs and Remus, understanding his friend's intention shuffled awkwardly round to hold his torso and together they lifted the semi-conscious man and managed to lay him flat on the kitchen table.
"I'm going to have to fire-call Dumbledore," Remus said to nobody in particular, "he'll need to know what's happened." He walked briskly to the fireplace on the other side of the room, threw in some fire powder and called for Dumbledore. After a few moments, the face of the man in question appeared before him in the flames, looking up at him expectantly.
"Remus," he said, "Is everything alright? You know how I like you to keep in touch, but half past three in the morning is a little extreme."
"Not really, Albus. Severus has been attacked. It's quite serious." Remus relayed his story to the headmaster of how he had found Severus after he'd said the emergency word and how they were now both in Sirius Black's kitchen. After Remus had finished, Dumbledore paused in thought for a few seconds, his brow furrowed in concern.
"I see," he said seriously. "And is Severus currently conscious?" Dumbledore was interrupted by the sound of Severus crying out and swearing quite loudly. Remus turned to see Sirius restraining the man with one arm, while he used his other hand to dab at Severus' wound with a damp cloth. Severus' eyes had closed in agony and he appeared to be muttering something under his breath. Insults probably. Sirius for his credit, was not returning Severus' abuses with a hex.
"Severus, my dear boy," Sirius said in mock congeniality, "It would not do, to utter such a dirty word in the presence of professor Dumbledore." Remus turned back to Dumbledore in the fireplace, smiling apologetically as he distinctly heard Severus replying,
"Go fuck yourself," before Sirius in return said,
"Oh believe me, Snivellus I do. All the time,"
Remus, paused and nodded his head silently at Dumbledore's earlier query of is Severus currently conscious, as if the previous display of his and Sirius' swearing at each other had not been enough to prove it, and Dumbledore smiled in understanding.
"I'll find you and Severus some replacements for the watch duty. I imagine Mundungus might do it, if I ask him nicely enough. Then I'll be straight over." Remus physically sagged with relief as the headmaster's head disappeared from the flames in the fireplace and he returned to the kitchen table. Sirius was now kneeling with one knee on the edge of the table and the other on Severus' chest. He was leaning forward and had his hand on Severus' shoulder while he tried to dab at the wound with the damp cloth. Severus was breathing heavily through gritted teeth – his eyes clenched shut and his brow furrowed in pain.
"Sirius, is it really necessary to restrain Severus so forcefully? He's in enough pain as it is," Remus said, forcing back a sigh.
"I needed to clean the wound and without a wand, the Muggle way had to suffice, but Writhey McWrithe here wouldn't stop writhi-"
"It may have escaped… your notice, Black, but it hurts... like Hell… when you poke… an open wound" Severus interrupted tiredly. Remus nodded in sympathy, he hadn't initially understood why Sirius was cleaning Severus' wound the Muggle way instead of a quick and painless cleaning charm, and then he'd remembered that Sirius didn't have his wand. Even so, he could have simply used Severus' or his own. He voiced his thoughts to him and Sirius grinned boyishly and replied,
"But where would be the fun in that?"
Remus loved Sirius with all of his heart, he really did. He was like a brother to him, but by God sometimes the man was really quite infuriating. He flicked his wand at the still kneeling Sirius and sent him flying back quite forcefully into a pile of chairs that had been assembled on the other side of the room. Remus ignored his annoyed complaints and concentrated on Severus instead.
"Are you alright, Severus?" he asked. Severus opened his eyes slowly and regarded him for a second or two in silence with a look on his face that seemed to ask are you a moron? Before closing them again and Remus nodded in understanding of his underlying meaning: no, not really. He once again flicked his wand and the blood was cleared away from Severus' stomach. Then he summoned a towel and pressed it firmly against it and Severus grabbed his wrist weakly, breathing heavily and arched his head back – his eyes still closed shut. With one hand still pressed to the towel, Remus patted him on the shoulder in consolation. Sirius seemed to have disappeared somewhere and Remus absently wondered where he'd gone. He hoped he wasn't sulking, it seemed like just the childish thing he normally liked to do, and Remus had hoped he'd think better of it tonight. Luckily Sirius returned a moment later with a bottle of light blue potion in one hand, a bottle of fire-whiskey in the other and a teeth baring smile upon his face.
"I was trying to find some pain relieving potion," Sirius explained, "unfortunately we seem to be all out. That's why I've brought this." He raised the arm holding the fire-whiskey. Remus doubted very much that the best alternative to a pain relieving potion was fire-whiskey, and he also doubted that it was safe for a man who seemed to have lost as much blood as Severus to be drinking anything alcoholic any time soon. Never the less he smiled and gestured to the potion in Sirius' other hand. "And what might that be?" he asked and Sirius beamed at the question as if he'd been expecting it.
"This, my friend is a blood replenishing potion. I'd almost given up – almost given up and then I saw it, staring up at me, begging to be put to use. And I simply couldn't help but marvel at the luck that had surrounded me in that moment. It was a lucky find, I tell you, Remus. A lucky find. I never would have dreamt that my mother would have such a concoction in her home, it might even be older than I am." Sirius explained happily. The pair looked to the man lying on the kitchen table. His eyes were still closed, but gentler now and Remus only now noticed that his grip on his wrist had loosened completely and Severus' hand now rested limply atop his thigh. Remus observed for perhaps the first time how young they all were. It was clear to see as Severus slept – he was only as old as Remus was: 35, Sirius too. And that was sometimes easy to forget. It was funny, actually, the man could have been dead and lying in a coffin. He certainly looked the part – with his face so pale and pallid and his eyes shut to the world. Even his chest didn't seem to be moving.
"Remus, is he breathing?" Sirius asked. Remus' eyes widened. Oh fuck.
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Cliffhanger. Yay! I'm slightly concerned that I might need to change the rating of this fic to M. There's a wee bit of swearing but I'm a bit of a swearer anyway, heck I say the F word as often as I say 'the', so obviously I don't notice it as much but yeah I'm not sure. If anyone has any thoughts about it can you please let me know? It would be a huge help!
