A/N: Going out on a few limbs here. Come with me?

"Good Morning," he said when he saw her eyes open. He stood on the threshold to the balcony with a cup of tea.

Her arms thrown wide, her body mimicked her mood – relaxed, sated. "Is there tea for me?" she called out.

"Other people just say 'Good Morning,' Minerva," he teased as he walked over to the side table to get her tea.

"Really, Severus. We're lucky I can form words at all this morning." Sitting up, she took the cup from him with both hands. "Ah, my hands work. We are in luck."

"Indeed?" he smiled from behind his tea cup.

"Come talk to me," she told him, patting the spot beside her on the bed. "Tell me about the potions work you want to do." He brought over a tray of croissants and she nibbled while they spoke. "Is this about your condition, Severus. Something for those recovering from overdoses of venom?"

"That is what started this line of thinking... But I became interested in finding a better way to treat nerve damage in people who were struck by curses." She looked at him questioningly. "When I spent the two weeks at the clinic, I learned that there are four people who have nearly identical symptoms."

"Which ones, Severus?"

"The Lipcots, James and Shelly. And then Frank Waldron and Michael Grossman. I believe they were all attacked by Antonin Dolohov. Niall is checking into some background information for me. I would not be surprised if Dolohov had a vendetta against James Lipcot and Frank Waldron. I believe Lipcot was a guard at Azkaban when Dolohov was there and, it was Waldron's father who turned in Dolohov years ago."

"But Antonin Dolohov's Curse would leave them dead or with internal injuries not ..."

"From what I learned from Death Eaters in those final months, Dolohov was working on subjecting people to a curse that would be a living death. Nerve paralysis. He viewed this as an improvement on his original curse. He would have used it for the first time only after he escaped from Azkaban in the final weeks. He wanted his victims alive so that they would be a reminder to the rest of us of his power."

Standing, he began to pace as he talked. The excitement of discovery was in his voice as he told her, "I have been talking with Asha and Niall about this. The nerve tonic is not as effective as it should be. It isn't targeted. But they think that working together we can develop something that will work on the nerves. It will involve their healing knowledge, some charms work, and the development of new potions. I don't know how many cases there are. But this is I want to do, Minerva."

"I'm glad you've found something, Severus. Some reason to move forward."

"There is a catch." His words had a firmness to them she did not like. "If I am to get access to the materials I require I need to use my credentials, and if any findings are going to carry any weight... I am going to have to resume being a Potions Master."

She nodded while she took in the importance of what he was revealing. "I think what you are saying, Severus, is that you want back into the world. You want to let the Ministry know you are alive."

"I am hesitant, Minerva. I want nothing to do with 99 percent of the world, wizarding or Muggle," he said frustratedly. "I will never be a popular person. Being associated with me will be more than unpleasant... you will be subjected to vitriol and condemnation."

"But the truth..."

He cut her off, "Entirely too many people care nothing for the truth. Too many people will not want to judge me on the balance of my actions, just the ones that affect them. Even if in the end accounting I was of value to the Order..."

"'Of value?'" she said incredulously. "You are a hero, Severus. No one risked more than you."

"But, no one did more to betray those loyal to Voldemort. And I am not innocent in the eyes of those who will always hate Death Eaters. You want to see what is good and what is right, Minerva. I know. But you have to expect the worst... the worst sort of reaction to my being alive. I don't want to do this to you." He was agitated, his fingers flexed repeatedly in nervous fashion.

"I have said I am up for this Severus." She gave him a firm look. "You need to go to the Ministry, let them know you are alive."

"There is another problem, Minerva. Someone will want to see you prosecuted. When I resurface, you will be left open to charges from the Ministry for faking my death," he said.

"I don't care. I stand by what I did. It was wrong, but I did it."

"We should get married then. You'll marry me?" He stood over her now and his words were quiet.

She ignored his discomfort other than to reach out to squeeze his hand. "I'm not against the idea, but you don't need to marry me as part of revealing yourself to the Wizarding community, surely.

"Once the Ministry acknowledges that I am alive, you will be asked to account for what you did in hiding me and faking my death. I want to be with you when that happens. As your husband." He looked a little sheepish. This was pretty heady talk for Severus Snape.

"So, if we do get married... How do we do it? I would need to marry a dead man."

"We could have a muggle wedding. When we present the paper work to the Ministry for them to validate, then they can decide what will happen about me being alive."

As the thoughts fell into line for her, her eyes grew wide and her voice took on its old confident cadence. "I know an old vicar in Aberdeen. Retired fellow. It would be nice if he could marry us. Maybe we can do this," she said with a smile. "We'll need to get all our paperwork together and then visit him... when we get back."

"Where are we going next?"

"Oberammagau, Germany," she told him happily. "After that, its your choice."

"I'm taking you to Lamu."

"Lamu? Kenya? I'll need a swim suit."

"Not necessarily. The beaches are often quite deserted," he said as evenly as he could manage.

He was unprepared for the joy he would see in her in Oberammagau. Her smile was full, her energy, unstoppable. The second morning there he had come out of the bathroom to see her dressed in pants. He tried not to act surprised.

"Mmmm, you've gone native. Lederhosen?" he said.

"Nein. Bundhosen. Knickers. Short pants."

Her words fell away and her eyes moved to his now much-shorter hair. But she would refrain from saying what she was thinking, he knew. She, like him, would enjoy, but not voice the memories and the sensations her gaze provoked.

She had talked him into the hair cut on their last night in France. It had been a silent and strangely intimate act, heavy with the joint awareness that it, like so much else they did, was an exploration of the extents of the relationship. She snipped the front of his hair where the grey was coming in. Rubbed at his brow, blew the trimmings softly away. He let her take her time, lost to the fingers in his hair and the silent smile above him. Cautiously, he ran a hand up her side to hold her about the ribs, his hand framing her breast. "Severus," she warned, the only words spoken in twenty minutes. The scissors up now, pointed away. Her eyebrows were a question to him. What will you do? His hand trailed safely down, he sighed, his eyes drifted shut and he pulled in the smell of her. His hand to her back, he eased her to him. The softness of her breasts nudged at his cheek as she took a step in, settled her weight, stooped her chin to the top of his head. Arousal pulsed in him and he knew he would bed her before he even brushed away the stray hairs at the back of his neck. And he knew after weeks of being with her, knowing her breathing, the things her fingertips told him, that she shared his anticipation. She pushed against him with her hips and her hands as she levered herself upright. "Almost done," she told him with effort.

After breakfast in town, they walked to the outskirts of Oberammagau. Severus had thought the wanderings were aimless that brought them to the edge of a farmer's field. Looking up to the top of a rocky peak across from them, he was non-plussed, she radiant.

"It's not a bad little walk to the top, Severus," she told him reassuringly. "I came here years ago with my cousins. We could see the way to the trail," she said pointing to the gap in the trees, "but I didn't want to walk around this field. I was always looking for the short cut." She started laughing. "So, I jumped the fence. Landed right on my backside in the mud. Over there stood the very amused cows. And there," she said indicating the railing Severus leaned on, "the very amused cousins. I hit so hard that day I feel like there should still be an imprint in the mud 50 years later," she said peering over the fence.

Severus turned and started walking around the paddock. When he looked back he saw Minerva was now sitting on the fence.

"Today I am going to be more careful," she announced through gritted teeth.

"Oh, Minerva. No," he said resignedly. She landed unsteadily, putting a hand down to catch herself. With quiet pride she raised her hand to show him the scant mud on her palm.

"Not bad," she said smiling.

There was little choice but to follow her. Grumbling, he climbed half way up the fence and then kicked his long legs over. He trotted the few yards to come along side her. Severus was sure there would be a confrontation as they crossed the enclosed space – either with an irate farmer or a displeased cow - but they made it to the far side, muddy but unharmed.

They took up a slow, deliberate pace on the trail that snaked through the forest. On the crest of the hill's shoulder there was a fork in the trail. A sign with an arrow pointed off to the left. "Nur für geübte?" Severus read haltingly.

"That means we're not going that way. 'Only for the experienced,'" she translated. "Still, it's a bit of a climb our way."

The final bit of their ascent was accomplished with the help of the steel cable that someone helpful had bolted into the rock. Minerva went first and Severus took great pleasure in getting to push her bum up the last bit. He was rewarded with the sound of her giggle. He shook his head in cheerful disbelief. A giggle? From Minerva McGonagall. And then she flopped over and sat on the rock at the top. He scrambled up over her and stretched out next to her.

It was early still and there was a mist and a biting breeze at the top. The wind prompted him to sit behind her and to wrap his arms and legs around her. They sat in silence and looked at the town and green fields below. Off to their right was the final summit, just a simple 20 foot climb to an iron cross that was no doubt the reason many climbed here. Severus lowered his head to Minerva's shoulder and tried very, very hard to cement every recent wondrous feeling over the evil that lay below in his memory.

When they were ready to descend they stood and stretched. Minerva caught his hand and asked him, "How do you feel about God?" Her words startled him, although they were softly spoken.

"What sort of question is that, Minerva?" he accused.

"When we get to Aberdeen, my friend Gil, the rector, will ask you." She sounded apologetic. "If we are to be married in the church, he'll want to know... if you believe."

"I've spent a very long time not believing in anything. Not even in the possibility of a future."

"I understand that. But what about now?"

He looked at her askance, as if there should be no difference. He quickly eyed the iron cross on the craggy outcropping beside them and then turned his back to it. "Minerva?" he said, pained as if he had been betrayed.

"No, Severus," she told him gently. "I am not asking you to adopt anything. It's not a test. It was just a question. Let it be. I won't ask again."

In Lamu they stayed in an old white-washed guest house in the labyrinth of the old town. Their room was a mix of white stone walls and dark carved wood. The beds were old affairs: thin mattresses and creaky springs.

She slept fitfully and was awakened before the sun by the neighboring mosque's call to prayer. The tinny loudspeaker had roused Severus as well and he groaned, rolled to her and pulled her in. She did not know what to expect, and lay there in the dark pondering the otherworldly nature of the experience when another muezzin began its drone. One distant, one near, they overlapped oddly.

"What time is it?" she asked incredulously.

"Sunrise is another hour off. Go back to sleep." But she knew sleep was a hopeless task. All this travel, all these strange beds, had left her tired and disjointed. Her muscles complained as she stood and walked to the window to rest her head on the pane. The little she could see only made her sense of disconnect more complete. Lamu was like nothing else she could remember. She eased out of the room and to the communal bathroom down the hall. The faucet creaked, the water was colder than she could bear. But she rubbed at her face with it. "Oh, Severus," she complained to herself. "What are we doing?"

When she returned to the room, she found the sun had begun to fire up the sky's high clouds. The colors changed as she watched them, crimson and orange, later blistering yellows. Finally, the sunlight extended to the bed and her unlikely lover. She watched him, the only familiar thing, the only anchor for her here. And he, as a lover, was such a recent thing. Looking at him only added to the chaos in her brain.

After they had dressed and eaten, they threaded their way through the old town to the ocean beyond. It was as he had suggested. The beach was empty. With their backs to the dunes, they walked the expanse of white sand to the water. There were scattered depressions, potholes that were filled with the tide's leavings. Severus stopped and stood next to a pool of water and he said, "This is what made me think of bringing you here."

A puddle, she thought. You dragged me half way around the world because of a puddle?

He reached for the kanga he had wrapped around her shoulders that morning and then pulled at the light dress underneath. "Take off your clothes and get in with me," he whispered. They stripped down to their swim suits and stepped into the water. She groaned at the lovely warmth and the feel of the wet sand. She settled in to the water and smiled at him appreciatively. "Oh, well done Severus."

"I know how you like hot baths," he said simply.

...

In their dark room that night, she sat up wearily, hugging herself, her heart surging in her chest. It was like this too often when the demons in her memory took over her sleep.

The bedsprings creaked as he rolled over. She wanted to apologize for waking him, but did not trust her voice. "Do you want to tell me?" he asked as his hand found her back and began to trace a gentle pattern. The minutes bore her silence until she sighed.

"It's always the same. It's the children. Screaming. Colin Creavey and the younger ones. They shouldn't have been there. And lately I see Zoe there. Isn't that ridiculous? She's just standing there in all that chaos and I can't get to her." She had yet to look at him. She wouldn't, she knew. Fears and pain were hard enough to talk about without the complication of eyes betraying you. "Do you still have nightmares, Love?"

"You know the answer," he replied flatly.

"As bad as they were?"

"No. I see the same things now. But I'm not involved somehow. I seem to have just accepted the nightmares as part of me. As part of the past. And they got easier somehow."

...
She was tired and distracted all that next day. He knew she had not been sleeping well in Lamu and it weighed on him. They spent a quiet day in town and then after an early dinner he took her to the roof of the guest house. She walked out into the sunlight and looked off at the expanse of sky, roof tops and ocean.

He came up behind her and whispered, "We'll have it to ourselves tonight. I know you haven't been able to sleep in the room." She turned in surprise and looked past him. And there, under an awning, was their mattress and linens with extra pillows. Water, wine, fruit, a lantern, and a CD player stood on a low table. Two deck chairs sat in the sunshine side by side. She was stunned.

They sat in their deck chairs and read for an hour. She left him on the roof to take her shower and returned wet and happy in a gauzy nightgown. She curled up on the mattress. "Oh, this is much better Severus. No squeaky springs, a cool breeze..." she called out. He came over wordlessly and sat next to her. She reached up to touch his face and told him, "Thank you. I can't tell you how wonderful it is that you would do this. That you care enough to do this."

"I'm learning. It never made sense to me before... that it was not weakness or dominance." He shook his head as he did so many times in discussing their relationship. "That it is reciprocal. Ongoing..." He kissed her. "... pleasurable."

That night they lay in the bed together. The inky sky and its million stars felt so close, it was as if he was suspended amongst them. He had no doubt it was a spiritual sight for some. But it was the weight of this sleeping woman's head on his shoulder that provoked his thoughts. He felt something swell in him. Something full and sustaining. Something flawless and perfect grew from the juncture where he held her. This connection, this new thing created, this off-shoot, had a discernible presence. There was more here than the sum of the two people who lay together. He was an intelligent man, he thought... So, he asked himself: what made that so?

"Minerva," he said gently, waking her. "If God is love. If that is what it is. If that is what God feels like. I believe."

"Yes, love," she said, casting her arm around him. "That's what I think."