.Morning came. They spent all day in each other's arms, knowing their time was short. He showed her another fun spell he'd invented.

Then another morning came. It was time for Lily to go home. Fog hung over everything and the violet hues of early dawn still colored the sky.

Severus was still sleeping. She brushed his black locks away from his face and kissed him, a tear running down her cheek. She grabbed a vial and caught it, then capped it and left it on his table.

"Goodbye, Severus", she whispered. It had been an amazing two days in his arms. But it was time to return to reality. Time to return to James.

A short time later, he woke up alone. He'd reached out to her, but she was gone. Her side of the bed was cold. His heart sank. He'd hoped maybe she'd change her mind about returning to James.

As he sat up, something caught his eye. A vial sat on his table. A tiny amount of clear liquid lay in the bottom. She'd left him a tear. A memory.

He viewed it. He watched their first time together in the darkest corner of the restricted section of the library. He'd approached her and as they looked at books they weren't supposed to touch, he'd told her she was beautiful. Then he'd asked if he could kiss her and they ended up giving each other everything.

He watched himself creating a spell that made Lily very happy indeed. He watched himself quietly murmuring it into her ear in the astronomy tower as she came undone and then came undone again.

He watched every time they'd snuck around to be together. The astronomy tower again, while everyone else was at a Quidditch game. The Forbidden Forest.

Dumbledore's office while he was away. The mandrake nursery.

Severus shook his head and chuckled at their brazenness. Of course, nothing topped having a married woman in his bed for 2 days while her husband was away at the Quidditch World Cup.

He eyed the empty potion vials on the counter in his lab. He'd made her very happy with them.

My favorite dreams of you

still wash ashore

Scraping through my head

'til I don't want to sleep anymore.

I just want something

I can never have.*

Many moons later, they both stood in Sirius Black's kitchen as she burped and rocked her newborn son and tried to calm him. There were no raised eyebrows, no stolen kisses. She'd excused herself from the Order of the Phoenix meeting when Harry had started fussing and Severus had followed her a few minutes later.

He stood quietly as he watched her with her son and noted his black hair and dark eyes. The timeline would be just about right.

"Lily."

She looked up at him, tears in her eyes, knowing what he was going to ask.

"Is he…?"

"Yes, I think so. I was so caught up in the moment with you, I forgot to cast the maternus preventus spell." It was a birth control spell she'd learned from Madame Pomfrey after their first secret rendezvous. She'd been so stressed about possibly becoming pregnant that she'd accidentally set the Gryffindor common room on fire.

Headmistress Mcgonagall had brought her to the infirmary because she couldn't calm down and wouldn't say what was wrong. She finally told the medic that she was afraid of becoming pregnant, but wouldn't tell who she had been with. Madame Pomfrey had told her of the spell. She also examined her to make sure she was not already with child, which she was not.

He reached out and touched the boy's cheek.

"No one can ever know, Severus."

"No one will."

As he ran his hand over the boy's thick, dark hair, he repeated his promise.

"I won't tell anyone."

"Promise me, if anything ever happens to me, that you'll protect him."

"I promise. I'll protect him."

The two shared one final kiss and as Snape pulled away, Harry grabbed a lock of his hair that had landed on his tiny fist. With a sad smile, he loosened it.

"Goodbye, Severus."

"Goodbye, Lily."

Just after they'd broken apart, James walked into the kitchen looking for Lily. He stared at Severus and then at Harry and back at Severus. Then he walked back out of the kitchen wordlessly.

"Does he know?" The potions master had expected a fight. The silence puzzled him. It was more ominous.

"He hasn't said anything, but I think he does."

"Are the two of you safe? Will he hurt you?"

"No, he's never hit me, Severus. He'll just give me the silent treatment for days."

That night, when the Potters flooed through Sirius' chimney back home, James stalked immediately to his office. Lily tried to follow him, the baby still in her arms. Before she could register what was happening, he turned and punched her in the face hard, knocking her down and causing her to drop Harry.

"I knew you had a thing going with him at Hogwarts while we were dating, but I never thought in a million years you would still keep it going after we were married. How dare you? You filthy mudblood whore!" Then he kicked her in the abdomen, grabbed her by the hair and punched her face again and again.

Lily crawled over to where Harry lay on the floor screaming, and picked him up. She leaned against the wall and cried as she rocked her son.

The next day, James didn't leave his office at all. He'd slept in there the night before, on the couch. Lily finally looked in the mirror. Her face was swollen and bruised almost beyond recognition.

The following day, James beat her again after Harry had been crying inconsolably for hours. He only stopped because there was a knock on the door. He quickly put a glamour charm on her and opened it. It was Sirius and Remus, inviting him out for drinks. He grabbed his coat and left without a word.

As soon as he was gone, Lily grabbed some supplies for Harry, some clothes for herself and strapped Harry to her chest. Then she flooed the two of them to Spinner's End.

Severus had been in his home lab for hours, focusing on potions. It somewhat kept his mind off Lily and baby Harry. Something in James' demeanor and ominous silence was setting off warning bells. It wasn't like him, he was usually more likely to lash out when he was angry.

Suddenly he heard someone come through the chimney and then heard a baby's cry.

He hurried to his fireplace in time to see a blood soaked Lily stumble in with Harry.

She could barely stand and was in obvious pain, so he quickly took the baby and helped her to the couch. She laid down, then undid the glamour spell James had put on her.

Severus gasped as he saw the bruises all over the woman he loved. Her face was swollen, purple and covered with blood. His gut feeling had been correct. He grabbed his wand and performed a diagnostic spell. A broken nose, six broken ribs, a broken wrist, concussion, abdominal bleeding, fractured vertebrae.

He spent the next hour healing her injuries and giving her potions, while Harry slept on his shoulder. The baby had gone to sleep the moment Severus had picked him up. Twice he'd tried to put him down, but he woke up and cried and Lily got upset and tried to get up. So on his father's shoulder he stayed.

When Lily could sit up without pain and feed Harry, he made her and himself a cup of tea. Then he sat down.

"Can you tell me what happened?"

"After we arrived home from the meeting, I tried to follow him into his office. That's when he punched me, causing me to drop Harry. Then he called me a filthy mudblood whore, kicked me and punched me repeatedly. Then today, I couldn't get Harry to stop crying. James couldn't stand it anymore, and started beating me. He only stopped because Remus and Sirius arrived at the door to go out for drinks. He put the glamour spell on me so they wouldn't see what he did. After he left with them, I came here."

Severus sat silently, getting his anger under control. It wouldn't help Lily for him to lose control of his temper.

"You know you both can stay here as long as you need to."

"Thank you!"

They fashioned a small bed for Harry by emptying a drawer and topping it with blankets. They set it next to the bed, then laid down. Lily snuggled into Severus' chest and he wrapped his arms around her. Soon he could feel her even breathing and knew she had fallen asleep. For him, sleep never came. He thought of a thousand ways to deal with James for beating Lily. He could sneak a potion into his food, trick the Death Eaters into targeting him, put any number of unpleasant curses on him….

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*Nine Inch Nails, Something I Can Never Have