Albus Dumbledore's mood changed like the tide. He could be a battle-hardened war captain one minute, and a doddering old fool the next. It was no surprise to anyone except the first years, then, when their beloved Professor Dumbledore went from smiling and casting color-change charms on the Halloween bats to looking very grave and serious in less time than it took to blink.

The cause of the headmaster's change in mood, the children saw, was Professor Snape. No one really liked him, except the Slytherins. That was probably because Professor Snape didn't really like anybody...except the Slytherins. The older students, the ones who remembered him as a student, liked to complain loudly about how Professor Slughorn had been a much better teacher and to call him 'Snivelus' behind his back.

The younger students didn't dare.

Regardless, there were several worried glances towards the head table. Professor Snape had collapsed forwards into his supper (or lack thereof; he didn't eat much, even at the big school feasts) and was convulsing, clutching his left arm like a drowning man clings to a bit of driftwood.

No one spoke. No one moved. After a moment of stunned silence, Professor Dumbledore nodded to Madam Pomfrey, who left her own dinner and went to help the Potions Master. She practically carried him out of the Great Hall, leaving a large group of students trying to determine whether cheering was entirely appropriate under the circumstances.

It wasn't until the next morning that the news broke: He Who Must Not Be Named was dead! The entire school was given a week off of classes, and special arrangements were made for students to visit family. In the confusion, no one thought to look for Professor Snape until he didn't show up for his first class on Monday morning the following week.

As it happened, Professor Snape had been given an extra week of sabbatical for dubious reasons delivered by an overly cheerful Professor Dumbledore on Tuesday. After breakfast, Professor Dumbledore himself disappeared for several hours.

Only Poppy Pomfrey knew that both men were holed up, first in the Hospital Wing (while Snape recovered from magical backlash) and then in the Headmaster's office (while Snape recovered from a broken heart).

Poppy knew part of Snape's story, which was more than most and certainly more than Snape himself would approve of. She that he had been friends with Lily Evans from childhood, and that friendship on his part had grown into unrequited love. She knew what had happened in his fifth year, and partially blamed him for it. She knew that Dumbledore trusted him, and that he had still been in contact with He Who Must Not Be Named. And she knew that he was nearly broken by the death of Lily Potter.

When Snape emerged the following Monday, he was a different man; a harder man. It wasn't until years later, when Lily Potter's son started Hogwarts, that Poppy realized what it was.

Severus Snape had given up long ago. His sole purpose in life was to protect the legacy of the woman he could not save: a child he despised perhaps even more than he loved.


Heterotelic: having the purpose of its existence or occurence apart from itself

'Cause Snape has a very odd view of Harry, being at the same time the son of his childhood tormentor (James Potter) and the only child of the woman he loved (Lily Evans nee Potter). And I hold that school nurses are like bartenders: they know more than you'd think, but they keep quiet unless asked.