1 Chapter 9
I slammed the door to the hospital wing behind me and leant on the cold stone wall. Why had she said that? Was she beginning to love Ron again? Had I misjudged the situation so badly? I know deep down that she is right and that Ron shouldn't be the one that is looking after and that it should be me that is comforting her and making her happy. But how can I when I have just seen how attentive he is to her? I could never be that loving and caring. I am too selfish for that. I love her I am madly in love with her, but I still put myself first. I know I do but this isn't just her and me any more I have a child now too. What am I to do?
I push my self up off the wall and go back to my room. The room looks as dark as my mood. It shows all of me and none of her and yet she spends a lot of time here. True she has her own rooms but they show me in them too. There are pictures of me and her and things that I have given her. But in my room the only evidence of her, is the several strands of honey brown hair on the pillow and the cloak on the back of the chair. Other than that I could have been alone for months. I know I have to change. I know I have to do it for myself as much as her. There I go again thinking about myself! I am just like my father. Oh god no I don't want to be like my father! My father the man that killed for fun, that treated me as an apprentice rather than a son! The man that acted like I am now, that shunned me for being alive.
Pushing the thoughts from my mind I went over to my wardrobe and pulled out a cloak. I silvery almost liquid cloak. Pulling it around myself I disappeared from mortal eyes. I walked over to the door and opened it. To anyone watching it would have looked as if the door had opened itself, not that it would be abnormal here at Hogwarts. Walls have been known to pretend to be doors and some doors refuse to open.
Carefully I lock my room and walk back towards the hospital wing, avoiding anyone. Silence and solitude shall be the only company I should need while I ponder my actions.
I reach the hospital wing soon. I wasn't really thinking about where I was going and I just followed my feet. Pulling out my wand I mutter a spell and the door becomes transparent to my eyes only. I see Hermione sleeping with my son in her arms. My son. It sounds nice. Mine. Part of me.
I open the door quietly and shut it behind me just as quietly. Almost silently, shadow like I walk over to Hermione and lift the baby gently and hold it in my arms. He snuffles slightly in his sleep and soon settles again. I lay him in his crib and sit next to Hermione. She looks so peaceful and calm as she lies there. I can tell she is not in a deep sleep she seems slightly aware of a presence in the room and she seems to know it not to be harmful just there. I smile at her; her face is so childlike as she sleeps. She barely looks old enough to have left school let alone have been married and now a mother. I know she will be a good mother with or without my being the father. She is strong in a way I could never be.
I feel tears prick in my eyes. Trying to fight them makes my eyes burn and I blink hard. She is so honest to life and I have lived a life of deceptions and yet she says she still loves me. How can this girl change me? Turn me from independent to dependent? Turn me from cold to loving? From a man into a human? How could she love me?
She stirs in her sleep and turns over. She smiles as she does so and I hear her murmur one word in her sleep.
"Severus."
I get up and head towards the door. When I reach it I pause, a thought crosses my mind and I turn back. I walk over to Hermione and take down the hood of my cloak and kiss her forehead gently.
"I love you and my son. Whether I'm here or not I will always love you." I whisper in her ear.
I straighten up and turn to the door. There is Ron standing there and looking at me smiling.
"What do you want Weasly? Come to laugh at me now?" I snarl quietly not want to wake either of the room's occupants. The smile fell from Ron's face faster than Potter did when he fell off his broom.
"No I wanted to help. But of course your Professor Snape! How could you need help?" he asked coldly.
He leaves the room. What if he can help? What if he knows what's wrong with my son? I run after him.
"Weasly what? What can you help me with?" I ask, trying not to seem interested.
"Only that if you want to save your son you will need my help." Ron said matter of factly. He looked at me coolly, watching to see if I was ready to corroborate with him.
"Why will I need your help?" I ask hotly.
"Because your son has a defective lung and if we work quick enough we can counter act the way at which it is developing. He was premature so that lung is still growing, if we work together we can stop it before its too late." Ron said and looked at me.
"What is it 'we' have to do?" I ask staring at Ron, he has the nerve to stand here and tell me what I have to do.
Ron gave me an exasperated look.
" I thought you were the sodding teacher here? You have to brew a potion! You know!" he said and looked at me incredulously. I was too in shock at his knowledge to think of a suitable comeback. I thought for a bit.
"You mean the panacée potion? That is one of the most intricate potions known!" I say shocked. "Is that the only way?"
"According to Dumbledore it is. And he says to work it needs to be made with in the next 12 hours." Says Ron.
"Well then follow me." I say and turn on my heel and head back to the dungeon with large strides.
I open the door and walk into the potion lab.
"I'm sure you still remember how to set up a cauldron?" I ask dryly.
Ron nods and goes to the cupboard and begins to take out the necessary equipment. I walk to my office and begin to search the rows of the books to find the necessary book. Finally I find it 'Most Powerful and Potent Potions' I have had this book for years and only ever used it once. It is the only book to have printed the most deadly and most painful poison known to wizard kind. The poison has no antidote and causes irreversible death. It kills you from the inside out, freezing and slowing down the entire body until it stops completely. I shudder at the time I saw it used.
"Are you ready to start?" shouts Ron impatiently.
I come back to earth with a bump. Striding out of the office I shoot Ron a deadly glare. Walking over to the table he is working at I dump the book in front of him open at the right page. The result is that dust flies everywhere causing him to choke. He waves the dust away from his face and read the list of ingredients.
"Half of these look French!" he exclaims.
"Erm that would be because they are," I say impatiently. "You can put anything past you."
He glowers at me and continues reading. I walk over to the book and put my wand on the page and mutter a spell. Immediately the words change and suddenly it is written in English. I sneer at him and walk over to my store cupboard and search the shelves for the ingredients.
"Blackbent root, powdered dragon blood, powdered sharks fang, snake oil," I laugh inwardly that a cure all contains snake oil. Muggles have believed snake oil to be a cure all for years, but unknown to them you have to mix it with a whole list of other things. I continue the search for the ingredients, "dried mandrake skin, veela hair and diamond water."
I take these ingredients into the room and lay them before Ron. He picks up the mandrake skin and begins to cut it up as directed in the book. I take hold of the vial of diamond water and a small bowl. Carefully a drop about 4 drops of the liquid into the bowl and then I pick up the snake oil. I shake the bottle and then pour half the contents into the bowl.
"Hey Weasly good stuff this snake oil." I sneer at him.
He looks at me suspiciously, wondering what the point of that comment is.
"Good for what?" he asks looking at the bottle.
"Makes brilliant lubrication, should you ever need it." I smirk.
He glowers at me and puts his head down again.
"So what is Malfoy like then? Better than Hermione?" he glowers again and mumbles something.
I grin inwardly and carry on stirring the fluid in the bowl. Slowly it turns purple and begins to bubble. I pour it into the empty cauldron.
"Weasly go into the cupboard and get me the bottle of tulip nectar." He follows my instructions with a scowl on his face. He reaches the tiny cupboard and forces his way in past the mess. "Oh I know it's a tight squeeze Weasly but I didn't think you'd mind that." I sneer again.
He emerges his face the same colour as his hair. He thrusts the bottle at me and stalks back to his work place.
For the next two hours we worked almost in silence following the potion recipe to the letter. I had to admit that it would have taken me three times as long to do this on my own as the preparation of the ingredients was complex and time consuming.
"Oh Weasly!" I yelled as he knocked over a bottle of diamond water, "do you know what that costs? Or how difficult it is to obtain? I trust you're not that clumsy with Malfoy?" I jeered as he cleared the mess up.
I could see him fighting with himself not to snap.
Finally it happened after I had made a comment about his roughness was to be expected due to his choice in partners.
"WHY THE HELL WON'T YOU SHUT UP?" he screamed at me.
He was shaking and his face was the colour of beetroot. His fists were clenched and his teeth were clamped together.
"Weasly don't you dare talk to me like that you insignificant little shit. You're the reason this happened!" he said in a deadly cold whisper.
"What the hell do you mean?" he yelled in fury.
"Well if you hadn't gone and caught the snitch for the other team then she wouldn't have left you and none of this would have happened. See Weasly you have a lot to answer for." I spit at him.
"My fault? Well let me just check, oh yeah who was the cheating bastard who had to shag her? Oh yes it was you! Why the hell she did it I will never know but she did and now she is paying for it." He said to me in an icy tone.
For a few minutes we stood there glaring at each other. At that moment the cauldron began to pop, indicating that the potion was done. If it hadn't there may have been a fight.
I stepped away from him and went over to the cauldron and stirred it. Using a ladle I took some of the liquid out of the cauldron and poured it in to a goblet. Steam flowed over the sides of the goblet and evaporated.
"It's done." I spit at him before turning on my heel and walk out the door.
I knock on the door of the hospital wing and walk in. Hermione is still asleep and Albus is sat next to her.
"Ah Severus is that the potion I told Ron that you would have to brew?" I nod, "good, well bring it here then."
I hand him the goblet and take a step back. He opens the baby's mouth slightly and pours a tiny amount in. the baby protests quietly and then calms down.
"Well that should cure him now. But there is the small problem of Hermione. She has not woken up. I have tried everything to wake her and none of it works, I fear that she is in a coma." He says sadly. "I told you this pregnancy would be hard and that it may result in the death of one of them, well now is the time to see if it is true. Her blood pressure is alarmingly low and her breathing is shallow."
I look at him in horror. Taking a seat next to Hermione I take hold of her hand. Albus looks at me sadly.
"I'll leave you alone." He says and walks out.
A/N wow well this turned out a bit more OTT than I wanted but well Sev will not be told what to do! Honestly he's a nightmare. Oh well now I'm sure you want to click the review button and give me the best goddamn review imaginable, so I'll let you get on with it.
I slammed the door to the hospital wing behind me and leant on the cold stone wall. Why had she said that? Was she beginning to love Ron again? Had I misjudged the situation so badly? I know deep down that she is right and that Ron shouldn't be the one that is looking after and that it should be me that is comforting her and making her happy. But how can I when I have just seen how attentive he is to her? I could never be that loving and caring. I am too selfish for that. I love her I am madly in love with her, but I still put myself first. I know I do but this isn't just her and me any more I have a child now too. What am I to do?
I push my self up off the wall and go back to my room. The room looks as dark as my mood. It shows all of me and none of her and yet she spends a lot of time here. True she has her own rooms but they show me in them too. There are pictures of me and her and things that I have given her. But in my room the only evidence of her, is the several strands of honey brown hair on the pillow and the cloak on the back of the chair. Other than that I could have been alone for months. I know I have to change. I know I have to do it for myself as much as her. There I go again thinking about myself! I am just like my father. Oh god no I don't want to be like my father! My father the man that killed for fun, that treated me as an apprentice rather than a son! The man that acted like I am now, that shunned me for being alive.
Pushing the thoughts from my mind I went over to my wardrobe and pulled out a cloak. I silvery almost liquid cloak. Pulling it around myself I disappeared from mortal eyes. I walked over to the door and opened it. To anyone watching it would have looked as if the door had opened itself, not that it would be abnormal here at Hogwarts. Walls have been known to pretend to be doors and some doors refuse to open.
Carefully I lock my room and walk back towards the hospital wing, avoiding anyone. Silence and solitude shall be the only company I should need while I ponder my actions.
I reach the hospital wing soon. I wasn't really thinking about where I was going and I just followed my feet. Pulling out my wand I mutter a spell and the door becomes transparent to my eyes only. I see Hermione sleeping with my son in her arms. My son. It sounds nice. Mine. Part of me.
I open the door quietly and shut it behind me just as quietly. Almost silently, shadow like I walk over to Hermione and lift the baby gently and hold it in my arms. He snuffles slightly in his sleep and soon settles again. I lay him in his crib and sit next to Hermione. She looks so peaceful and calm as she lies there. I can tell she is not in a deep sleep she seems slightly aware of a presence in the room and she seems to know it not to be harmful just there. I smile at her; her face is so childlike as she sleeps. She barely looks old enough to have left school let alone have been married and now a mother. I know she will be a good mother with or without my being the father. She is strong in a way I could never be.
I feel tears prick in my eyes. Trying to fight them makes my eyes burn and I blink hard. She is so honest to life and I have lived a life of deceptions and yet she says she still loves me. How can this girl change me? Turn me from independent to dependent? Turn me from cold to loving? From a man into a human? How could she love me?
She stirs in her sleep and turns over. She smiles as she does so and I hear her murmur one word in her sleep.
"Severus."
I get up and head towards the door. When I reach it I pause, a thought crosses my mind and I turn back. I walk over to Hermione and take down the hood of my cloak and kiss her forehead gently.
"I love you and my son. Whether I'm here or not I will always love you." I whisper in her ear.
I straighten up and turn to the door. There is Ron standing there and looking at me smiling.
"What do you want Weasly? Come to laugh at me now?" I snarl quietly not want to wake either of the room's occupants. The smile fell from Ron's face faster than Potter did when he fell off his broom.
"No I wanted to help. But of course your Professor Snape! How could you need help?" he asked coldly.
He leaves the room. What if he can help? What if he knows what's wrong with my son? I run after him.
"Weasly what? What can you help me with?" I ask, trying not to seem interested.
"Only that if you want to save your son you will need my help." Ron said matter of factly. He looked at me coolly, watching to see if I was ready to corroborate with him.
"Why will I need your help?" I ask hotly.
"Because your son has a defective lung and if we work quick enough we can counter act the way at which it is developing. He was premature so that lung is still growing, if we work together we can stop it before its too late." Ron said and looked at me.
"What is it 'we' have to do?" I ask staring at Ron, he has the nerve to stand here and tell me what I have to do.
Ron gave me an exasperated look.
" I thought you were the sodding teacher here? You have to brew a potion! You know!" he said and looked at me incredulously. I was too in shock at his knowledge to think of a suitable comeback. I thought for a bit.
"You mean the panacée potion? That is one of the most intricate potions known!" I say shocked. "Is that the only way?"
"According to Dumbledore it is. And he says to work it needs to be made with in the next 12 hours." Says Ron.
"Well then follow me." I say and turn on my heel and head back to the dungeon with large strides.
I open the door and walk into the potion lab.
"I'm sure you still remember how to set up a cauldron?" I ask dryly.
Ron nods and goes to the cupboard and begins to take out the necessary equipment. I walk to my office and begin to search the rows of the books to find the necessary book. Finally I find it 'Most Powerful and Potent Potions' I have had this book for years and only ever used it once. It is the only book to have printed the most deadly and most painful poison known to wizard kind. The poison has no antidote and causes irreversible death. It kills you from the inside out, freezing and slowing down the entire body until it stops completely. I shudder at the time I saw it used.
"Are you ready to start?" shouts Ron impatiently.
I come back to earth with a bump. Striding out of the office I shoot Ron a deadly glare. Walking over to the table he is working at I dump the book in front of him open at the right page. The result is that dust flies everywhere causing him to choke. He waves the dust away from his face and read the list of ingredients.
"Half of these look French!" he exclaims.
"Erm that would be because they are," I say impatiently. "You can put anything past you."
He glowers at me and continues reading. I walk over to the book and put my wand on the page and mutter a spell. Immediately the words change and suddenly it is written in English. I sneer at him and walk over to my store cupboard and search the shelves for the ingredients.
"Blackbent root, powdered dragon blood, powdered sharks fang, snake oil," I laugh inwardly that a cure all contains snake oil. Muggles have believed snake oil to be a cure all for years, but unknown to them you have to mix it with a whole list of other things. I continue the search for the ingredients, "dried mandrake skin, veela hair and diamond water."
I take these ingredients into the room and lay them before Ron. He picks up the mandrake skin and begins to cut it up as directed in the book. I take hold of the vial of diamond water and a small bowl. Carefully a drop about 4 drops of the liquid into the bowl and then I pick up the snake oil. I shake the bottle and then pour half the contents into the bowl.
"Hey Weasly good stuff this snake oil." I sneer at him.
He looks at me suspiciously, wondering what the point of that comment is.
"Good for what?" he asks looking at the bottle.
"Makes brilliant lubrication, should you ever need it." I smirk.
He glowers at me and puts his head down again.
"So what is Malfoy like then? Better than Hermione?" he glowers again and mumbles something.
I grin inwardly and carry on stirring the fluid in the bowl. Slowly it turns purple and begins to bubble. I pour it into the empty cauldron.
"Weasly go into the cupboard and get me the bottle of tulip nectar." He follows my instructions with a scowl on his face. He reaches the tiny cupboard and forces his way in past the mess. "Oh I know it's a tight squeeze Weasly but I didn't think you'd mind that." I sneer again.
He emerges his face the same colour as his hair. He thrusts the bottle at me and stalks back to his work place.
For the next two hours we worked almost in silence following the potion recipe to the letter. I had to admit that it would have taken me three times as long to do this on my own as the preparation of the ingredients was complex and time consuming.
"Oh Weasly!" I yelled as he knocked over a bottle of diamond water, "do you know what that costs? Or how difficult it is to obtain? I trust you're not that clumsy with Malfoy?" I jeered as he cleared the mess up.
I could see him fighting with himself not to snap.
Finally it happened after I had made a comment about his roughness was to be expected due to his choice in partners.
"WHY THE HELL WON'T YOU SHUT UP?" he screamed at me.
He was shaking and his face was the colour of beetroot. His fists were clenched and his teeth were clamped together.
"Weasly don't you dare talk to me like that you insignificant little shit. You're the reason this happened!" he said in a deadly cold whisper.
"What the hell do you mean?" he yelled in fury.
"Well if you hadn't gone and caught the snitch for the other team then she wouldn't have left you and none of this would have happened. See Weasly you have a lot to answer for." I spit at him.
"My fault? Well let me just check, oh yeah who was the cheating bastard who had to shag her? Oh yes it was you! Why the hell she did it I will never know but she did and now she is paying for it." He said to me in an icy tone.
For a few minutes we stood there glaring at each other. At that moment the cauldron began to pop, indicating that the potion was done. If it hadn't there may have been a fight.
I stepped away from him and went over to the cauldron and stirred it. Using a ladle I took some of the liquid out of the cauldron and poured it in to a goblet. Steam flowed over the sides of the goblet and evaporated.
"It's done." I spit at him before turning on my heel and walk out the door.
I knock on the door of the hospital wing and walk in. Hermione is still asleep and Albus is sat next to her.
"Ah Severus is that the potion I told Ron that you would have to brew?" I nod, "good, well bring it here then."
I hand him the goblet and take a step back. He opens the baby's mouth slightly and pours a tiny amount in. the baby protests quietly and then calms down.
"Well that should cure him now. But there is the small problem of Hermione. She has not woken up. I have tried everything to wake her and none of it works, I fear that she is in a coma." He says sadly. "I told you this pregnancy would be hard and that it may result in the death of one of them, well now is the time to see if it is true. Her blood pressure is alarmingly low and her breathing is shallow."
I look at him in horror. Taking a seat next to Hermione I take hold of her hand. Albus looks at me sadly.
"I'll leave you alone." He says and walks out.
A/N wow well this turned out a bit more OTT than I wanted but well Sev will not be told what to do! Honestly he's a nightmare. Oh well now I'm sure you want to click the review button and give me the best goddamn review imaginable, so I'll let you get on with it.