"Everyone here?" Hermione breathed out, choking with horror.
"Fortunately not," Harry hissed from beneath her, feeling the pain in his scar sharply ebbing away. "The Lord stayed behind."
"He can follow us," Ron moaned, lulling his scorched hand.
"He can't," Hermione cut him short. "Fiendfyre burns out any trail of apparition."
"Nice spell," Harry approved respectfully. "Could you two get off me now? Or the sword will pierce me right through. And let's all get off the professor. I think he's still alive."
His words seemed to break a dam in Hermione that separated stupor from vigour. In the next instant the boys were thrown from Snape by centrifugal force. Who would have thought that such a potential was hidden in their delicate friend. While Ron was examining his burn, Harry frowned, staring at Hermione's pale fingers squeezing the handle of Snape's wand. Bending over the motionless man, she was casting one diagnostic spell after another, making unknown-to-Harry passes with her trembling hand.
"Hermione?" he called his friend, kneeling next to her.
She turned her head towards him – her eyes, wide with horror, were full of tears; her teeth were biting mercilessly into her lower lip.
"I don't feel anything, Harry. I don't feel anything!"
"Hermione, look, it's blood. He's bleeding again… Do you hear me? What potion did you give him? Did he swallow it?"
But the girl only shook her matted hair. Such sharp movement made the tears pour out of her eyes and stream down her face, leaving twisted paths through the ash and dust smearing her cheeks.
"Dunno…"
"What potion, Hermione?"
"I don't know!"
Harry cast a desperate glance at the inert Snape. A thick, echoing emptiness was throbbing in the boy's temples. Hermione turned back to the injured wizard and muttered – at first, softly; then louder; then almost shouting:
"Episkey! Episkey! Episkey! Don't die, please don't die!"
But the bleeding did not stop, despite the spells and pleas.
"Why can't I do it, Harry?" her fingers dashed to Snape's throat in an awkward, unsuccessful attempt to apply pressure to the wounds; but the blood, as if bewitched, kept flowing between them, writhing like a ball of snakes.
The despair in his friend's voice brought Harry out of his stupor. He and Ron had grown too accustomed to counting on Hermione's composure, and now her weakness left them vulnerable – as though they were unable to conjure a simple Protego.
"Episkey! Harry, my hands are shaking… Maybe because of this?"
Her voice broke into a hoarse whisper. The feeling of Snape's warm blood on her fingers was pushing Hermione closer and closer to the edge of serious hysteria. Was it the end? She jerked away her soiled palms as if suddenly burnt and looked at Harry with unseeing eyes.
"Please…"
Then addressed the still bleeding professor:
"Please!"
Putting his hands on Hermione shoulders, Harry jolted her, attracting her attention.
"Hermione, where are the potions? Hermione!"
The girl shook her head towards her pockets.
His hands disappeared for a moment, fumbling through her clothes, then, clinking with the vials, returned to her shoulders.
"Hermione, step aside. I'll do it myself. Ron!"
The red-haired Gryffindorian appeared with lightning speed.
"Take her away."
Harry did not have to explain anything to him. More precisely, Ron wouldn't mind receiving an explanation for Hermione's strange behaviour, but one glance at her was enough to postpone any questions. He grabbed her under her arms, lifting her to an upright position.
"No!" she wriggled free from his hands like the nimble otter that served as her Patronus and darted back to the wounded professor.
"Hermione! Listen to me," Harry's voice was full of patience, but the short glances he threw at the bleeding wizard eloquently indicated that he was pretty worried about the loss of time. "You can't do magic now. You've spent far too much energy on Fiendfyre and apparition. That's why you can't perform diagnostic spells. I'll do everything myself."
"But –"
"Hermione, I remember what to do: first, stop the bleeding – Episkey; second, heal the wounds – Vulnera Sanentur; then give the potions – Blood-Replenishing, Restoration, Skele-Gro. Ron!"
This time Ron's grip was so strong that it was impossible to break free.
"Come on, Hermione, let's go… Drink some Restoration Potion too…"
Harry took a few more seconds to make sure that their exhausted friend had obeyed. Ron sat her down on a boulder thirty feet away and loomed over her, muttering something consoling and prudently (or accidentally) blocking Potter and Snape from her view.
Harry was quite good at healing spells. Hermione had trained them well over the past six months, using the slightest opportunity – any scratch or cut. Of course, he had never healed such terrible wounds before – the professor's throat was ripped apart by huge fangs and Harry's scar began aching mercilessly from the very sight of these injuries. If anyone had told him a few hours ago that he'd be worried about how much blood their headmaster had lost, Harry wouldn't have believed them. On the contrary, he would have been happy to hear that the filthy bastard could die to everyone's joy. However, now that it turned out that Professor Snape could easily do so at any moment, Harry's thoughts were by no means cheerful. Naturally, he was far from the panic that would inevitably consume him if someone really dear to him were in Snape's place, but, pouring the tart potions between the professor's lips, he really hoped they would work. Years spent in constant loathing for the Head of Slytherin didn't mean much on the verge of the decisive battle. Meeting with Voldemort had set the priorities straight.
The terrible wounds, meanwhile, closed, leaving pale scars on the professor's skin. A moment later, his unfathomable black eyes were fixed on Harry, sending waves of relief throughout the Gryffindorian. The boy suddenly thought that he had never seen Snape at such a short distance, especially looking downwards.
"Professor!"
The second recovering consciousness with the taste of a Blood-Replenishing Potion on his lips was, perhaps, too much for one day. Ex-Headmaster Snape tried to focus his gaze as he could hardly endure two smiling Harry Potters at a time. His memory was coming back in jerks, like blood pumping from an artery. Blood. Snake. Hermione.
He tried to sit up despite the burning pain tearing him from within. It felt as though fire was running through his veins.
"Professor! Professor, this is Harry Potter. Can you hear me?"
Where is she? Surely, not dead? He remembered her cry, remembered her running to him, not paying any attention either to the Dark Lord or the inner circle of Death Eaters… She couldn't have survived in the fight with them. His girl versus Voldemort? Merlin… The buzzing in his ears was unbearable; the voices of two Potters came as if through a layer of cotton wool.
"Professor, is Nagini poisonous?"
That's what this fire consuming him meant. Ten points to Gryffindor for shrewdness. However, now Snape was worried about something different… His girl, his brave Gryffindorian… He must know what had happened to her.
"Where is she?" the professor wheezed, forcing Harry to lip-read – his vocal cords were still in the process of healing and therefore not working properly. Snape didn't hear himself, but Potter, pleased with his reaction for some reason, readily reported:
"The snake? Dead, sir."
The snake? Why, in the name of Salazar, was Potter telling him about the snake? As if the state of Voldemort's pet would actually worry anyone. Shaking his head, Snape tried to ask again, convinced that he had been misheard. Potter couldn't be so calm knowing that Hermione… Oh, yes. He might not know it yet – he hadn't been there…
The suspense would kill him faster than the poison.
"Where is she?" the second attempt cost the professor all of his remaining strength.
But the Boy-Who-Lived-To-Drive-Him-Insane didn't have time to open his mouth to, obviously, report more details of Nagini's death, because the greatest fear and the greatest happiness of Severus Snape fell onto his chest like a bomb, wet with tears and snow.
"Severus!"
What had he thought about Sectumsempra last night? Heaven accepted the fangs of Nagini as payment as well… Alive. She's alive! He needed to answer her, call her by first name, deduct points from Gryffindor, tell her that she's crazy and that he loves her, but – Merlin – pain burnt every inch of his body, not allowing him to breathe or take a better look at his sobbing Hermione. What had Potter said about poison?
He had an antidote on him, of course. However, after he had been in the grip of the serpentine rings, all the vials were undoubtedly ground into powder.
"Harry, he has a fever!"
"Must be snake venom. Sir, drink this."
Snape focused his eyes with difficulty – thick claret liquid that looked like blood… No way!
"This is Serpentum universale," Potter's voice was filled with ill-concealed triumph. If the central part of Hogwarts hadn't collapsed along with the giant hourglasses, Gryffindor would be inevitably awarded no less than fifty points. The All-Snakes Essence slid down the professor's oesophagus, spreading to his very fingertips in a cold wave.
"Your potion was the right colour," he said, "Longbottom."
With a crooked smirk, he watched as the triumph on the boy's face was replaced by bashful amazement. Harry turned to Hermione with a silent question: 'How does the damn bat know about Polyjuice Potion?!' To erase the last hope for praise from Potter's face, replacing it with mortal terror, it was necessary to add only: 'Miss Granger shared this information with me this morning… In my bedroom.' However, the willpower of a double agent managed to defeat Snape's genetic urge to sting a Potter. Besides, the boy, having recovered from shock, explained:
"I made it for a retake…"
Potter had brewed a tolerable potion! Merlin's balls, hell must have frozen over and even Fiendfyre wouldn't thaw it out! And yet, the Serpentum universale worked, he understood it by the waves of pain and heat retreating somewhere deep inside to completely disappear within a minute. Hermione Granger loved him. Harry Potter had saved his life. What was the world coming to?
Snape opened his eyes to finally see a clear view of the world. The view of the world loomed over him with her chestnut bush of hair, smiling at him as though they were the only ones on Earth. And then she kissed him.
"I won't give you to anyone and won't let you go anywhere else," Hermione informed him in all seriousness, and it was evident that she'd force him to have a deep regard for her opinion one way or another. "I almost lost you. For the second time within the last twenty-four hours. There must be no third time."
"Harry, I think I'm seeing things…" Ron muttered very quietly.
"Uh-huh," Harry grabbed his frozen friend by the elbow and pulled him aside. Their presence was clearly unnecessary.
"I'm not, am I?" Weasley's voice was almost sorrowful, with a hint of doom. "No, I don't understand it. I parted with the diadem too soon…"
Snape sat up with difficulty, leaned against an icy tree and glanced at the blood-stained Gryffindor's sword lying nearby.
"Professor Dumbledore ordered me to give it to Potter…"
Sitting close to him, Hermione raised her eyes, in which – apart from everything that was not appropriate to think about on the threshold of a battle with the darkest wizard of their time – Snape could clearly see shame.
"I guess there's no point now… The sword was needed to kill the snake – you already did that."
If she were afraid that her professor would be angry again for her not sharing information with him, then she was mistaken. Snape had no desire to argue once more over the ingenious plans of the most secretive of manipulators. Besides, Hermione had already begun her story, anxiously squeezing his hand and drawing incomprehensible patterns on the back of it.
"I couldn't tell you before, please, don't be offended. Dumbledore allowed Harry to tell only me and Ron…"
Oh, certainly… Secrets and baskets… Albus, you son of a witch, what have you inveigled these kids into?
"Voldemort is immortal because he created the Horcruxes. Have you ever heard of them?"
"Not sure…"
"This is very dark magic; even Professor Dumbledore knew almost nothing about it. Voldemort divided his soul into seven parts, enclosing it in several objects: Slytherin's locket, Ravenclaw's diadem, Hufflepuff's cup –"
"The ring," Snape mouthed, putting the puzzle together.
"The ring," agreed Hermione. "Also a diary – remember that incident in the Chamber of Secrets?... And the snake. Dumbledore managed to destroy only the ring and Harry got rid of the diary back in our second year. But our job was to find and destroy all the other Horcruxes. The sword is one of the ways to kill a shard of Voldemort's soul. As long as at least one of them remains intact, the Dark Lord will rise again and again. Do you understand?"
Of course he did. What was there not to understand? The old puppeteer had intrusted three kids to search for pieces of soul of the most powerful and lethal dark wizard… However, it was hardly a great idea to swear in front of Hermione, who was already quite frightened, that he would personally revive the damn old man in order to kill him again.
"Have you found at least one?"
Resentment flashed across the girl's face as he'd seemed to have touched a sensitive chord of the valiant Gryffindor soul. Note for the future – don't assume the minimum when it comes to Gryffindors.
"We found all of them," Hermione said proudly, casting a glance at her friends standing at a distance. "And destroyed all of them… Or rather the snake and the cup were finished off by you…"
This girl would be the death of him.
"I remember the snake but not the cup?"
"Forest, Fiendfyre…" Hermione babbled, not risking raising her eyes to him.
Snape snorted.
"Now it's clear to me why I received Sectumsempra last night."
Having said that, he regretted it immediately, seeing her eyes filling with tears again. Least of all he wanted to revive her horror and guilt from yesterday.
"Hermione…"
She covered her face with her palms and burst out crying, not realising that by doing so she rewarded him with pain that could not be compared even to the first-class poison of Nagini.
"Hermione," a method as old as time: hug her trembling shoulders, kiss her frizzy hair and change the subject, "if all the Horcruxes were destroyed, does it mean the Dark Lord is mortal now?"
"I broke your memories!" the method failed, and she only sobbed harder into his robes. "Forgive me! We were fighting on the Astronomy Tower and –"
It was necessary to seize this self-flagellation as soon as possible; Snape pressed his finger to her lips.
"Hermione, stop it. I remember you – isn't it obvious? Memories from the phial would, perhaps, add some brightness to my memory, but this is not a tragedy worth shedding tears for."
She hiccupped and fell silent. Prelapsarian innocence – had she really believed that without the damn vial he could forget her? Naïve Gryffindors… But, Salazar, how flattering it was to know that his feelings for her were so dear to her! Not able to resist the marvellous sensation of warmth, Snape pressed his lips to Hermione's temple.
"I promise you: we'll create new memories as soon as the war is over. Now tell me, is the Lord mortal?"
"Don't know… We thought so, but the Fiendfyre didn't kill him which means we miscalculated somewhere."
"Fiendfyre?" Snape's eyebrow rose in disbelief. "Who?"
"Me!"
Another note for the future – the easiest way to distract a Gryffindorian was to finally give them long-awaited praise. At least, his amazed and admiring gaze turned out to be the best cure for Hermione's hysteria.
"My Fiendfyre incinerated all the Death Eaters that were there, but Voldemort rose from the ashes as though he still has a Horcrux! But we had definitely destroyed all of them!"
Oh, Albus… The responsibility to tell Potter about the main thing you, of course, had chosen to saddle on someone else… Snape mentally cursed and for the second time in the day felt a burning hatred for the former headmaster rising in his heart. Hermione, noticing his face falling, looked anxiously into his black eyes.
"Severus?"
"I need to talk to Potter."
"But –"
"Don't ask, Hermione. This is Dumbledore's instruction, and you of all people should know that he had a role for everyone, insisting to secrete it from others."
The girl blushed and nodded.
"Harry!"
The young man hurried towards them, diligently pretending that, despite their intertwined fingers, he was thinking only of the strategy of defeating Voldemort. Hermione reluctantly stood up and, having waited for a short approving nod from the professor, walked towards Ron, who was equally diligently studying the degree of icing of the lake, probing its frosty crust with his foot.
"Give me your hand, Potter," Snape held out his own one impatiently. He needed to get to his feet in order to come to his senses – no one was going to postpone the battle because of his poor well-being. Besides, he preferred to conduct the ensuing conversation in an upright position.
"Sir, did Hermione tell you –"
"Yes," the former headmaster of the former Hogwarts interrupted him, "Miss Granger told me about the Horcruxes. And now I have to tell you something that the late Professor Dumbledore, for some reason, chose not to reveal to you personally."
Frowning, Harry watched the professor drumming his fingers on the tree bark, considering his next words.
"Potter, I am hardly the best candidate to present the available facts, but we have no choice… Not long before his death," said Snape, making Harry shudder, "the headmaster told me something that, considering the story of the Horcruxes and resurrection of the Dark Lord after Fiendfyre, makes perfect sense now."
"There's another Horcrux," Potter guessed.
"Yes," the professor's dark gaze lingered on him for what seemed like an eternity. "It is you."
Severus averted his eyes, not wishing to see the blood draining from Harry's cheeks, and continued in the same detached voice:
"Sixteen years ago when the curse of the Dark Lord had reflected from you and killed him instead, his soul, clearly, had been extremely unstable due to the already created Horcruxes. So, a part of it tore off and slipped into the only living being that was nearby. Into you. That's where your aptitude for Parseltongue and ability to establish mental connection with the Lord come from."
"I'm a Horcrux?" Harry repeated calmly, making Snape wonder whether the boy was grasping the meaning of his tale.
"Not quite. From what I've gathered, a Horcrux is created deliberately with dark magic rituals. But the substance is the same – you contain a part of the Dark Lord's soul, and while you are alive he cannot be destroyed."
Harry was silent. Severus stared into his face, trying to interpret his thoughts without Legilimency – Gryffindors were generally quite easy to read. However, this time the professor was in for a failure – the boy seemed rather aloof, looking deeply into himself and not displaying any hint of fear or understanding.
"Potter?"
"I got it, sir. I have to die."
"Not just die, but to do so at the hand of the Dark Lord… Potter, listen to me," perhaps Snape would hate himself later for these words – Merlin knows, he wanted Voldemort's death more than anyone else in the wizarding world – but at that moment he simply couldn't help saying this. "No one, I repeat, NO ONE has the right to demand such a sacrifice from you. Your burden was already heavy enough. I'm telling you this tête-à-tête so that you can make a choice. I give you my word that if you decide to look for another way, no one will ever know about our conversation. Even your friends. Don't base your choice on your inherent Gryffindor nobleness – this is hardly the case. Even I won't call you a coward, and that says something, does it not? You shall make the decision yourself: I believe your friends don't need to know that you have a choice, although I'm sure they won't judge you either way. However, if you select the first option… I think it might be better to make it look like a duel, so that your friends won't suffer from guilt, thinking that they could have averted the outcome. Besides, it will prevent the Dark Lord from suspecting anything."
The boy nodded, still not looking up.
"You should consider it carefully."
Another nod. Salazar, Severus had expected any reaction but not a tense silence. The boy was either on the verge of hysteria, or at the stage of denial, or he'd decided to…
"Thank you, sir."
Harry finally looked his interlocutor in the eye, then turned sharply and headed towards his friends. Ron and Hermione rushed towards him, puzzled by his inscrutable face as well. Hermione cast a questioning glance at her professor, but Snape only shook his head.
"What did he tell you? Is it about the Horcruxes?" demanded Ron.
"Or about Professor Dumbledore? Did he appoint us a new task?"
Harry cleared his throat as if he had been silent for eternity.
"Me. He appointed me a new task."
"Come off it!" Ron snorted. "You don't actually think we'd let you look for some new doodads on your own, do you? Admit it: you couldn't have dealt with the Horcruxes without us."
"Of course I couldn't have," Harry agreed. "But I don't need to look for anything – just solve one small question. I swear to you, this concerns only me and my past. You can't help me in any way."
The guys looked at him doubtfully.
"Harry –"
"Hermione, I'd tell you if I could!"
"Has Snape got you to make the Unbreakable Vow?" Ron glanced suspiciously at the man still standing at a distance.
"Of course not!" Harry and Hermione exclaimed in unison.
There was a tense pause during which Potter scrutinised his friends, and they suspiciously scanned his face for the slightest hint of what was going on.
"I'll find you," Harry promised, handing Hermione her wand. "Or let's meet at the entrance of the Astronomy Tower later on."
Hermione shuddered – she was beginning to seriously dislike such goodbyes…