A/N: Sorry about that cliffhanger! ;)
Since I still can't find a way to reply to reviews (me and technology lol), a few things I wanted to say! (If you didn't leave a review just scroll down to the story ;P )
Ginnychou, I haven't read anything by Loten, but you made me curious, now I'll definitely check it out! ;) Thank you for the recommendation, and thank you so so much for all your insight on the characters, I'm really glad you like them and the story. I'm writing some chapters ahead of what I post, but I still don't know how long it will be... I'll try to keep it interesting! :)
HarryPGinnyW4eva thanks for the review on the mermaid part! I figured they would be cautious but trusting if she's smart enough to do things the right way ;)
Hurtinginlife, welcome aboard! Thank you for all the reviews on different chapters, I'm so glad you're enjoying the story and the small details you mentioned... it is really nice to see what bits of it different people like :) I hope that it lives up to your expectations from now on as well!
And to Lucyole, PsychoPanda777, and A5mia thank you so much for sticking around! Seeing you're still there after each chapter always brings a smile to my face ;)
I think that's all, but in case I'm forgetting anyone, thank you all so much for the reviews, they encourage me to keep writing this story! Take care! :)
Severus was feeling strangely determined.
After wallowing in self-loathing for a long while following Miss Granger's visit, he had severely scolded himself on his indulgence and decided that enough was enough.
There was clearly a silver lining to realizing that who he had believed to be someone caring for him was actually nothing more than another person trying to take advantage of his skills. Now, he could finally stop thinking about the damn girl and her moving speeches and focus his entire attention on himself again.
And the first step, before even trying to figure out what was going on with his neck wound and the rest of his weakening body, was to get rid of the alcohol. He had thought that smashing the previous bottle into the fireplace would do the trick, but he hadn't counted on his own resourcefulness and how easy it was to summon a house elf and force it to fulfill his request. He would have to set a safety clause against his own self-destructing traps. So he called the elf again, which apparated into his office with a loud crack.
"Master Snape called, Sir?" the elf asked in a high pitched voice.
"I did. I changed my mind. You can take this back to the kitchen." Snape informed, handling the bottle to the small creature, who grabbed it with both hands due to its size and weight. "And don't bring it back. Not even if I ask you to." he warned the elf.
Its big rounded eyes looked at him with terror. "Master Snape wants Fink to disobey Master Snape's orders?" it asked, as if its mind was about to explode.
"Exactly. And not only Fink. You must extend this command to every house elf in the castle. Understood?" Snape added with a menacing look.
"But… if Master Snape later asks Fink to disobey this order, what shall Fink do?" the house elf's eyes were rapidly filling with anguish tears.
"Oh, for Merlin's sake, just take it!" Severus snapped with a loud grunt of exasperation.
The elf didn't need to hear it twice, relieved to be released of such impossible conundrum.
It turned out he would have to rely on his own self control. Which shouldn't be a problem, right? Hadn't he been, after all, the ultimate master of self control? It had only been after that annoying young woman began interfering with his life that he had become lost and bewitched by his own rebellious emotions. But fortunately that was over.
However, he figured that he would do well in keeping himself busy to avoid the temptation. How about finally heading up to the library to do some research on unknown healing spells? By the urgency in Hermione's request, he was positive that the girl would be at the lake by now, so the library was a safe space until she got back later.
After a two hour long, thorough exploration on all the books he could find on the subject, Severus rubbed his dry eyes, exhausted. He hadn't found anything useful, but at least, he had fulfilled his purpose of keeping himself busy. Though he was feeling moody, he decided it would be best to have dinner at the Great Hall with Minerva and the other teachers, so their company would keep him distracted until he was too tired to crave anything other than the comfort of his bed.
He listened to their chitchat absently. They were listing all the improvements that they had achieved with the castle restoration, and how everything was almost as good as new, a month away from the beginning of the next school year. The grounds still had some burnt areas that would take a while to grow back, but all that relied on magical reparations was practically finished. Snape ate with his eyes on his plate, only humming or nodding in response to some questions, until Minerva addressed him directly. "What about you, Severus?"
"What about me?" he repeated, lazily raising his eyes to the woman.
"Well, I was hoping the success of your reversal potion may have ignited a spark of interest in staying as Hogwart's Potion master again..." she said tentatively.
"I haven't decided anything yet." Snape murmured, uncomfortable. She was right. The rush he had felt while working on such challenge and watching it succeed had made him wonder if there might be more to his dull life at the castle that what he had allowed himself to believe over the years. But again… now he wasn't sure of how much of that had been influenced by his feelings towards the manipulative girl. It was too painful to consider at the moment.
"Of course, take your time, for sure…" Minerva reassured him. "However, I would appreciate if you have any recommendations for a substitute, should you decide to leave us in the end. This year's seventh class will be unusually crowded and they will need a good teacher to help them prepare their N.E. . I want Hogwarts to start its new era with the best results." She said, raising her chin in a prideful gesture.
"What do you mean, unusually crowded, Minerva?" Professor Sprout asked, intrigued.
"Well, it appears our seventh-years from last year weren't entirely… certain about the… adequacy of the school's curriculum." Minerva said, carefully pondering her words not to offend last year's Headmaster sitting by her side.
"Our Headmistress means that our students would like to learn some actual Defense Against the Dark Arts, Pomona." Snape pointed out sarcastically.
McGonagall pressed her lips together in a tense gesture, uncomfortable. "Anyway, a not so small amount of them have decided to retake the year with their fellow younger students." she continued to explain.
"Is Potter coming back too?" the Herbology Professor asked with curiosity.
"He hasn't enrolled yet, but according to Molly Weasley's letters, him and her youngest intend to do so, yes." Minerva confirmed.
Snape almost chocked on his food. Well, that settled it. There was no amount of galleons or exciting new potions that would make up for having to spend a whole other year seeing Potter's face every day again, not after he knew… However, he figured that telling Minerva right away would be too obvious, and the witch would accuse him of childish immature behavior, so he decided he would spare himself the humiliation, notifying her at any other time as if it had been a carefully pondered decision.
Shaking his head and taking a sip of water to clear his throat, Snape wondered why Miss Granger, in her continuous attempts to earn his trust, hadn't warned him of her friend's decision. If she had been sharp-witted enough to understand that he wouldn't like to run into Potter during his previous visit, how come she had missed mentioning a possible whole year of the golden boy's presence around the castle? His eyes wandered unconsciously towards her spot in Gryffindor's table, but it was empty. He looked around, searching for her among the Ravenclaws, where she sometimes sit to discuss more intellectual matters. But she wasn't at their table either. He would have merely assumed she had again lost track of time working in the library, except he knew for a fact that she hadn't been there this evening.
"Poppy." he called the mediwitch, leaning forward so he could look at her better across the table. "Is Miss Granger upstairs at the infirmary with Miss Silvermoon?" he asked, figuring it would make sense that she would have chosen to visit her, see how the potion was working.
"No, she's not. Miss Silvermoon has been sleeping almost without an interruption ever since you reduced her pain." Madame Pomfrey responded with a grateful smile.
Against his better judgment telling him to stop caring about the conniving girl, Severus began getting restless. He had this stinging feeling that something was wrong.
He tried to think rationally. If Hermione had been swimming at the lake for two hours, as the amount of requested gillyweed suggested, she must have come back exhausted and cold. She had probably taken a hot shower and gone straight to bed, maybe just grabbing a quick bite at the Gryffindor tower instead of coming to the Great Hall for a proper dinner. Snape realized his hypothesis could be easily confirmed by someone eating in front of him… as much as he dreaded having to resort to this person for help. He got up slowly, bidding the teachers goodnight, and walked towards the Gryffindor table against his better instincts.
"Mr Longbottom" he greeted the oblivious boy, who almost dropped his fork with surprise when Snape approached him silently.
"Yes, Sir…?" Neville stuttered. Though Snape hadn't been present at the courtyard battle, he had been in enough meals by now to have heard all about Longbottom's courage facing the Dark Lord even after Harry Potter's death. If just for that, and for taking out the bloody snake, he was starting to believe there could be some good potential in the clumsy student. However, the fact that this war hero was still afraid to death of him, gave Snape a secret, pleasant satisfaction.
"Did you happen to run into Miss Granger on the common room before?" Snape inquired, his black eyes piercing Neville's with unnecessary intensity just to make him nervous. Well, he was giving up Firewhiskey at the moment, was he supposed to quit all his guilty pleasures at once?
"Er… No, Sir, I didn't. I haven't seen Hermione... since lunch." Neville answered, doing his best to mentally retrace his steps that day under the pressure of Snape's towering presence.
"Have any of you?" the Professor turned his head to the other dozen Gryffindors, but they all shook their heads silently.
Snape's stomach was getting heavier by the minute. Suddenly, an idea occurred to him that offered some relief. Maybe the girl hadn't returned to the castle at all. He looked again at the faculty table, though it would have been hard to be mistaken about it, but his eyes confirmed that Hagrid wasn't having dinner there either that night. He knew, as unlikely as it seemed to him, that the brilliant know-it-all and the, let's say, not-so-sharp groundskeeper, were good friends. Maybe she had gone straight to his cabin for some hot comforting tea after her watery excursion.
He meant to settle for that perfectly valid explanation, but as he headed towards the Great Hall's doors he realized he wouldn't. Instead of turning left towards the dungeon stairs, he headed right towards the courtyard. He would approach Hagrid's cabin just enough to see through the window in the distance and then he would go to get his much needed rest without anything bothering him.
But again, his own feet determined his direction on their own when he turned towards the lake instead of the groundskeeper home.
The white light of the full moon cast long shadows from the trees and rocks, reflecting on the surface of the calm lake. Everything seemed peaceful and crickets were singing their constant, lulling song… and yet, Severus's heart was pumping hard inside his chest, though he couldn't tell why. It didn't take a genius to identify the symptoms of gillyweed wearing off, and luckily, they came much more slowly than its transformation effects, providing enough time for whoever had ingested them to head to the surface. He reminded himself that there were no dangerous creatures on the lake waters, if one excluded an angry swarm of grindylows, but Miss Granger was perfectly qualified to deal with those. Contrary to common belief, the Giant Squid had never harmed a single soul since he was spotted for the first time a couple centuries ago, in fact it had been known to push careless students to the shore, should they fall into the water involuntarily.
And Hermione wouldn't have been reckless enough to upset the mermaids… right? But what if they had taken her amulet? Would she have…?
Snape's mind froze mid-thought. His heart also froze, his whole body suddenly paralyzed. There was someone laying on the distant shore. He couldn't discern who it was, even despite the bright light of the full moon. But he didn't need his eyes to tell him, for his soul already knew.
"No. No, no. Not again." he murmured short of breath, his knees weakening.
And then he ran. He ran as if his own life depended on it, because for some absurd reason, he felt it was so. His feet slipped several times on the loose wet gravel at the edge of the water, but he continued moving forward as he regained his balance, not stopping until he reached her.
It didn't occur to him to send for help. It didn't even occur to him to take out his wand. His brain had gone into primal survival mode, only able to process whether Hermione was breathing or not. But she had to be. As his feet tripped during his frantic run, flashing images of the past two months, traces of conversations, glances and smiles, bombed his blank mind. She had to be breathing, he told himself, because even if she had been manipulating him all along, he…
Hermione was laying with her face to the ground, so he fell to his knees and grabbed her shoulders, turning her around. Her face was almost as white as the surface of the moon that night, her lips a dark shade of purple.
"Please." Severus moaned in a whisper, leaning down to place his ear to her nose. He could have screamed with relief when he realized a very subtle current of air coming out of her lungs. She was alive.
"Hermione!" he called her, softly slapping her cheek with his hand. It felt like ice under his already cold skin. His fingers slid towards her neck, searching for her pulse. It was very slow and irregular, like the last attempts of a dying bird to flap its wings. She was alive, yes, but not for long. The prolonged cold had probably prevented blood from properly flowing through her body, and her heart was doing its last efforts to keep it going. It needed help.
Severus placed her on the ground again, removing her arms from her chest, and he put his own hands together under her sternum, starting to pump at a constant pace, trying to provide her heart the necessary strength to do it on its own. But soon he noticed a dull, bubbling sound each time he applied pressure on her chest. He leaned forward again, hoping to hear better, and pushed again. There it was. Snape realized horrified that her lungs were full of liquid. It was a miracle that she was still breathing, and no wonder that there was only a small whisper of air coming out of her nose. She should be drowned by now!
He knew what he had to do, though he had never done it before. His methods of rescuing people were always much more carefully planned and executed, and often relied on his use of magic. But there were no spells coming to his mind at the moment, just a pressing urgency to release her lungs from the water oppressing them before she drowned on land.
So taking a strong, deep inhalation, Severus used his left hand to block Hermione's nose, he lowered her chin with his other hand, and he covered her lips with his own.
A madly absurd, completely inappropriate and out of place fleeting thought crossed his mind- this isn't how he would have wanted their first kiss to be. There were so many things wrong about it that he didn't even know where to begin. But as he blew all the air in his lungs into hers, all of them overlapped at once. "This was nothing resembling a kiss, apart from the fact that their lips were touching! How could he be thinking about that while she was in mortal danger! And even if she weren't… how could he think about that at all?" He felt the air hitting the water inside her chest, the bubbling sound increasing loudly. It required more pressure. He inhaled deeper, and repeated the process, meanwhile the back of his mind still shooting questions at him, maybe in a desperate attempt to distract itself from the paralyzing fear he was feeling. "Didn't that crazy thought gave away that he had somehow assumed that kissing her was just a matter of time? Something that would eventually arrive, only the specific circumstances left to be determined? What exactly would have been the right way of having a first kiss? Didn't the term "first" also implied that there would be others to follow? Where had all those insane assumptions come from?" There was a loud gurgling sound and suddenly Hermione's whole body spasmed. Severus reacted quickly, turning her on her side just a second before she coughed violently, vomiting all the water. The sound was horrible, and the sight disgusting, yet he could have cheered with joy. It worked!
The desperate coughing continued, but there was no bubbling sound anymore, only the hoarse noise of air opening up her airways. Her hand grabbed his wrist as he held her shoulder keeping her balanced, even if she couldn't see who it belonged to, given that she had her back turned at him. When finally her breathing became somewhat easier, and there was no more water left to throw up, she fell back, resting on the ground with her eyes closed in a painful grimace.
Snape's heart was finally stabilizing as well, once he knew the immediate danger was over. The voice in his mind had shut up completely. Now all his senses were focused on her, waiting for her to open her eyes, begging that she would be in her right state of mind and not affected by the prolonged lack of oxygen.
Hermione let out a soft moan, moving her head to the side, her fingers still wrapped around his wrist. She was shaking with cold, and Severus realized that she was wearing some kind of muggle rubbery outfit that was soaked in freezing water. In a swift movement of his free hand, he took off his own cloak and his wand, transfigurating the first into a thick wool blanket that he promptly placed over her laying figure. Hermione felt the weight of the cover and finally opened her eyes, confused.
"Sir…?" she said, her eyes struggling to focus his face against the illuminated background.
"What the hell did you do?" Snape asked her, and his tone came out surprisingly wrathful and cold, despite the sparkling relief that was filling his stomach.
"I don't… know..." Hermione closed her eyes again, frowning, trying to move without success. Her whole body was rigid and she couldn't feel her legs, just barely her arms.
"You'll figure it out at the castle." Snape decided, attempting to rise to his feet, but her grip on his wrist stopped him, causing him to fall back to his knees.
"What happened to you..." Hermione said hoarsely, her eyes opening again and looking straight into his, "has happened before!" she revealed with a great effort.
"What?" Snape asked, puzzled, but Hermione had passed out again.