Disclaimer: I own nothing of the Hogwarts universe, I earn nothing. I am just playing - with a loving heart and neverending joy.
Please note that there is a new chapter 31 that I put in on May 23rd because idiot-me somehow managed to go from chapter 30 to 32 in translation.
The part of Harry meeting Severus and getting the memories has been missing. It is - for obvious reasons - very different from the movie or books.
I am sorry that you have to reread from there if you want to follow all plots of the story...
I noticed it because there is a reference to the happenings of that chapter in this chapter.
Chapter 36:
As Hermione walked to the Great Hall, the noise of fighting around her suddenly stopped.
She stepped inside and took a deep breath when she realized that the rows of people lying down on the floor were not injured, as she had thought in the first moment. The familiar faces looked estranged, the souls had left them and it was hard for her to look at them. There was an almost palpable accusation in those blind eyes - how on earth did it come to this?
Hermione's throat tightened when she saw Arthur crying uncontrollably over his son's corpse while Molly held him at his shoulders. Ron stood next to Ginny, who was hugging George; they all had scars from the battle and seemed to have aged since Hermione had seen them just over an hour ago.
From the smaller hall next door she heard voices, orders and questions that Hermione recognized as medical treatment and she followed these voices out of the Great Hall again.
There was nothing she could do here.
In the other hall Poppy ordered volunteers around to treat the casualties lying side by side, and Hermione asked if she could help.
"Oh love, I have enough hands to help, but I'm running out of potions. You can't help with that either."
"I know that there are supplies in the dungeon and I think the room is unsecured, I saw that before the fighting started. Should I have a look if they are still there?"
Poppy looked at Hermione baffled and just nodded. Hermione ran off, glad of having a task, and found the dungeon actually intact. It was a strange feeling to enter these rooms, his rooms, without him being there and she almost expected to feel his wand on her neck at any moment.
What an idiotic thought.
She'd have to do that herself, she remembered. His wand was in her hand.
Shaking her head, she quickly gathered up all the labeled vials, jars and tubes that had been prepared and placed them in a box. Because of the debris lying around in the semi-darkness she let the box float in front of her as a precaution. Back in the hall she gave the box to a very relieved Poppy and thought about what to do next.
When she considered looking for Harry now, she suddenly felt a hand on her arm and turned around.
It was Ron.
Pale and with tearful eyes he stood in front of her and struggled to appear strong, he was so brave that Hermione just hugged him so that he didn't have to watch her cry. They stood there for a while until Ron asked hoarsely, "Have you seen Harry?"
Hermione took a deep breath and pulled away from him.
"No, I thought you were together."
"We were, until ... until I got the message ..." He swallowed hard.
"He had looked at that memory from Snape and he was really weird after that, Mione. He said that it was all Dumbledore's plan, that Snape should kill him and Snape didn't want that, but he had to so that we could find the Horcruxes. And that there was another fucking Horcrux, one that Voldemort had inadvertently created when he killed Harry's parents and I asked him if he knew what it was and he said he had a clue, but first we had to find you and Nagini and then all of a sudden this message came from Pa and I ran back to the Great Hall and then he was suddenly gone somehow ... "
Ron's flow of speech dried up, he looked at her helplessly while she tried to follow what he had said.
Another horcrux.
What the fuck. Why did they only find out now? What was this miserable secrecy about?
And this time, for the very first - and probably last - time it was Ron, who figured it out first.
His eyes suddenly widened, his face became even paler and his hand clenched on Hermione's shoulder so tightly that she almost dropped to her knees.
"Ouch, Ron, that hurts..." She complained, but Ron ignored her whining, instead looking directly at her face with a strange expression.
"Harry," he whispered.
Hermione frowned and looked at him questioningly.
"'Inadvertently created when struck by his own curse', Hermione! It was just Harry who was there, damn it, that's why he always has his voice in his head, that's why he has this connection - he's the Horcrux! It is him, and now he wants to destroy it, he ... "
Ron's voice broke and he and Hermione stared at each other.
Hermione's heart painfully sank in her chest and in the back of her head her merciless mini-me reminded her of a memory:
'You don't have much time left.'
The bitterness in Snape's words when he spoke to Harry at the whomping willow.
"Where is he?" Hermione whispered just like Ron did before.
They both knew the answer and although they both started running at the same time, crossing through the Great Hall, searching, calling, so that all living souls there jumped to their feet - they knew it. He was gone.
Hermione looked breathlessly at Ginny, who was standing next to her parents, and over the grief she felt the horror of the suspicion that everything was even worse, much worse.
"Ginny ..." Hermione just said helplessly in a small voice and it didn't need anything more. The understanding and horror on Ginny's face when she understood that they had lost Harry almost broke Hermione's heart again.
The horrified scream of the guard at the front gate echoed in the hall and Hermione didn't even have to look at Ron. They both knew immediately why Riddle was suddenly marching into the castle in triumph.
When she saw Harry's lifeless body in Hagrid's arms, Hermione almost went numb; her thoughts seemed to stand still as Ginny collapsed beside her and Draco fled to his family. It was Neville who awakened her and the others out of their lethargy with a great speech of rage - and then suddenly everything went haywire.
The last thing Hermione saw in the yard after Harry had ruined Voldemort's grand entrance by being very alive, was Draco and his parents, escaping the chaos as quietly as a Malfoy can. That was probably the smartest thing this family has ever done, thought Hermione, and ran back into the castle with the others so that they did not have to face the Death Eaters and their companions in the open space.
Ron couldn't believe his eyes when he tried to rush to her side to protect her - and then saw her fighting. One opponent after the other fell under her curses, only half of which he even rudimentarily recognized and which obviously also surprised well trained Death Eaters. And what the hell was that wand she was using? Before Ron could get any closer, however, he heard screams behind him and felt a jolt in his back that spun him around.
Nagini.
The huge snake had slipped past him at lightning speed, past him as well as the others, it had even literally rammed him, but obviously only knew one target.
"Mione!" yelled Ron and Hermione spun around.
With a tremendous stupor, she fended off the first attack of the creature, turned around and started running. Ron tried to get between her and the snake, which still didn't seem to notice him at all.
'That bitch is taking that kick in the ass in the Shrieking Shack very personally now,' thought Hermione and actually found a free brain cell to think about whether snakes have anything like an ass at all. It did not need any closer knowledge of Parseltongue to understand that the hissed monologue of the angry worm behind her was not suitable for young people and that Hermione's entire ancestry was included as well as her theoretical descendants, whose existence the reptile now intended to prevent once and for all.
Nagini was fast, just too fast for her, and in a defensive movement backwards, Hermione fell over the rubble lying around, together with Ron. She fell on her back and said goodbye to her life when she saw the figment of Riddle's Hell approaching with its mouth wide open. She closed her eyes and saw Severus' face in front of her, felt once more the warmth and security in his arms in the Forest of Dean and ... nothing.
No bite, no pain, nothing. Just the noises around her going on.
She opened her eyes carefully - and there stood Neville Longbottom like the personified avenger of humanity. He held the blood-stained sword of Gryffindor in his hand, and in front of him the rest of what had once been Nagini and a part of Voldemorts' soul rose as dark smoke into nothingness.
Stunned, Hermione and Ron looked at their schoolmate, who raised the sword and looked at it with a satisfied 'Ha!'. This was exactly the moment when Hannah Abbott, who stormed in from the hallway, fell in love with him - but Neville would only find out about this much later and this is a completely different story.
The brutal clash of pure streams of magic in front of the castle electrified the air and the din of the fighting broke off. As if there had been a silent command, Voldemort's followers withdrew in a panic and with the others Hermione and Ron rushed into the courtyard - just in time to see Riddle falling down on his knees. Harry stood in front of him, injured, breathing heavily, but upright - and in his raised hand was the Elder Wand, which he had taken from the now rather dissoluted self-appointed Lord.
'No world domination for you today, asshole.' thought Hermione.
She couldn't swear it, but she had the feeling that Riddle had given her one of his last glances as they rushed out, all united and ready to finish him. She hoped so. She hoped Riddle had been hit with the full extent of his loneliness in this defeat before he was blown away by the gentle breeze of spring.
It was over.
Obviously, afterlife smelled like meat pie.
Confusing.
It was even more confusing that every single damn muscle was aching, as if he had been massaged by a mountain troll who in the meantime accidentally had mistaken him for a schnitzel that had to be prepared in the kitchen.
Groaning, Severus Snape opened his eyes; even that was an effort.
A small, completely unknown room with a low ceiling. No windows. Where the hell was he?
He tried sitting up and immediately regretted this high settled goal. Sighing, he fell back again.
Only the real world could feel that shitty, he analyzed resignedly.
He had survived.
But how? And why was he so terribly weak? How long has he been here? What about Potter - and Voldemort? A vague but alarming memory of Hermione in the Shrieking Shack flashed through his mind. Did she make it out of there?
His head slowly returned to operating speed, bombarding him with questions he couldn't answer. At the same time, his stomach demanded vigorously to get to the bottom of the meat pie mystery, and he obediently slowly turned his head in the direction of the tempting smell.
Indeed - next to his bed there was a well-filled plate on a wobbly stool and a butterbeer that was already slightly stale.
That was tempting enough to take on the torture of sitting up again.
Severus managed to drop his legs out of bed and get himself into a sitting position on the edge of the bed, which he then had to discuss with his circulatory system for a few long moments. Merlin, he was so weak.
With great difficulty he began to eat. What a treat! He felt the energy flow back into his body, soon he could be so cocky and try to straighten his back a little.
Footsteps approached, but Severus wasn't bothered. What else should he have to expect now; nothing to get excited about. According to the noise, it was also just a single person who, with a slight shuffling step, didn't seem to be in combat mode either.
There was a knock on the door. So this was definitely not Azkaban, he thought with relief.
"Come in," he croaked, whereupon the door creaked open and, to Snape's surprise, the owner of the Hog's Head pub entered, so he apparently seemed to be in Hogsmeade.
Severus needed a second to remember:
Albus' brother.
Now he suddenly would have prefered Azkaban after all.
At Hogwarts, the arrival of Kingsley Shacklebolt's trustworthy Ministry staff was a clear sign that the state of emergency was over.
The dead were brought to the biggest barn of Hogsmeade and laid out there in a dignified manner. The seriously injured were transferred to the Mungos and only the students of the last two years remained.
Minerva McGonagall asked them to go to their rooms, as most of those were still usable, and to wait there until the search of the castle for the last scattered supporters of Voldemort and everything else that did not belong at Hogwarts was completed.
Harry, Ginny, Ron and Hermione threw themselves on the bed and the armchair in Ginny's room and enjoyed the silence that surrounded them. Finally the nerve-wracking tension that had accompanied them for the whole last year started to lose its iron grip.
Ron and Harry were almost dozing off after all the shocks when Hermione took a deep breath and began to speak into the silence.
"I have to tell you something."
At the same time, at Hogsmeade, Severus Snape didn't know what to do with himself for the first time in a long while. Aberforth had told him what had happened - he was well informed after Flitwick had entered the pub completely exhausted half an hour ago and since then clung to one Butterbeer after the next, while he explained to the amazed audience how the Chosen One had turned Voldemort into dust, after Neville Longbottom - of all people! - had become a shining hero through the beheading of Nagini.
Aberforth had then tactfully left him alone with his thoughts. Standing in the doorway, however, he turned back to Snape once more.
"It's actually not my business and I don't really know what happened between you and my brother. But Severus, please forgive him and yourself. He shouldn't have asked for that."
Severus hadn't replied to that, but Aberforth apparently hadn't expected an answer either.
It was all so unreal. He was free - at least by his own personal standard; the judiciary in his world would look at this quite differently, he had no illusions about that.
But for now: no Voldemort, no Albus - and Lily's son had achieved the impossible, as had his little warrior: They had both survived.
'An amazing young lady' Aberforth had said and Severus had allowed himself a raised eyebrow and a grim smile at the remark.
'An amazing young lady who should prepare for death' he had thought.
The only flaw in it all was that he was still there. This wasn't meant to be, and it was her fault. Apart from strangling Miss I-Care-For-Everybody-Who-Does-Not-Want-That, there was nothing, absolutely nothing, that was left for him to do now ...
Wait a minute.
Snape frowned.
Damn it, there was something left. The memories he'd given to Potter. He had to prevent the world saviour from speaking about this in public or, worse, someone else getting his hands on them.
Snape snorted in anger. Sure as hell, Potter would have left it in the pensieve and anyone who came into the unsecured headmaster's office could simply take it.
That wasn't acceptable. Not acceptable at all.