Author's Note: JKR owns the Harry Potter universe and the characters therein.  Anyone you don't recognise is from my imagination.

Thanks as always to my wonderful beta reader, OzRatBag2.  Please read "At Any Moment," her latest work, on Fanfiction.net.

Chapter 17:  By the Roots and the Rocks…

Dame Angharad walked down by the lake in the soft evening light.  As she passed, the giant squid rose out of the waters and gazed at her with his one goggling wise eye.  She held out her hand in blessing, and the squid beat his tentacles in the water, turning it to frothing bubbles reflecting a million rainbows.

She sat down on a stone bench overlooking the water garden, with its floating lotuses.  The grey and black striped tabby cat at her side sat and tidily wrapped her tail around her feet.  They stayed thus in companionable silence for a while, and then the cat reached out her velvet paw and tapped a fold of the Green Lady's gown.  Dame Angharad moved over on the bench to accommodate Professor McGonagall, Transfigured back into her human form.

Minerva took off her hat and put it on the grass at her feet.  "It's as if one threw a stone into the lake –" here, she paused, found a small stone and threw it into the water – "it was only a pebble, but the ripples spread over the lake to every shore.  Nothing is left unchanged."

The Green Lady nodded in agreement.  "One ripple has reached an unexpected shore, has it not?  Now there are counter-ripples reaching back to Hogwarts.  I read the runes yestereve, Minerva. 

"What does the Headmaster say?" 

Dame Angharad noticed a stray lock that had escaped from McGonagall's prim bun, twirled it around her finger and tied an elflock into it. 

McGonagall smiled.  "Yes, we talked far into the night.  Albus is concerned about the release of the information to the wizarding world in general; he is afraid that there will be panic.  We've suffered so much…" She looked down, pleating the fabric of her gown in her fingers.  "I told him that it's all in how it's presented.  This is not the Black Plague."

"No," said Dame Angharad.  "Furthermore, it's been with us since the Beginnings.  No-one recognised it before; it was accepted as ordinary.  Some wizards, upon reaching extreme old age, become children again, and are cared for as such.  'Tis as it's always been."

"It's the Muggles," McGonagall replied.  "They never used to live long enough to become children again.  In the past fifty or so years, they've started to live longer and longer, and as they reach what for them is great old age – they become children.  Now there are cases in Muggles who are not extremely old.  They don't think of it as a natural thing.  They're terrified of it."   She looked across the lake, and her jaw tightened.  "They never take proper care of their own.

"When I read the letter from Beauxbatons, I was shocked.  I hadn't realised the extent of the problem. Beauxbatons have established a research clinic; they are working together with the Sorbonne to find a cure, and they asked me for a recommendation; a gifted graduate who could work as a researcher on the project.  Immediately I thought of Miss Granger; it's perfect for her."

"And so ye asked her?"

McGonagall reached for Dame Angharad's hand.  "It was dreadful," she said quietly.  "I told her that I had good news, and that she should come to my office.  She did – with Severus.  When I told her about the project, her eyes lit up.  It's what she's always wanted.  Then…" she looked down, compressed her lips, drew a breath and looked up again.  "She looked at him, and I could see the confusion in her eyes.  And as for Severus …" she broke off, unable to continue.

"Is it not strange, Minerva, that good news brings such conflict?"

"Severus… You've worked on him, Angharad, I must give you credit for what seemed like an impossible task well done.  What will happen to him?  He has just found his faith as he found his love, and now he is balanced on a thin edge between madness and grief."

The Green Lady rose, pulling McGonagall with her.  "Come, Minerva, there's little we can do sitting by the lake."

Two hours earlier, Professor McGonagall had received Hermione and Severus in her office.  "I'm glad you've both come," she said.  "I've received a communication from Beauxbatons.  They have joined with the Sorbonne and several of the teaching and research hospitals, both Muggle and wizarding, to try to find a cure for a disease you have probably never heard of."

Hermione looked curiously at her.  "Professor, how does this involve me?"

"I've been asked to identify a gifted graduating student who can work on the research team," she answered.  It's a four -year program, and the student will come from it with a doctorate at the very least, and probably a Nobel Prize if a cure is found.  Hermione, this is what you've told me you want to do."

Hermione felt her heart stop.  "The Sorbonne," she breathed.  "Severus," she said.  "It's the opportunity of a lifetime."

Severus' hand turned icy cold in hers.  He looked at her gravely. "You would be in France for four years.  Is this your choice?"

Hermione looked at him, his face waxen pale.  How could she leave him?   She bit her lip.  "It's the work I've always wanted to do."  She turned to Minerva:  "What is the disease?"

Professor McGonagall sighed.  "It's never been of any concern in the wizarding world, but now that Muggles are leading longer lives, it's been affecting them in their great old age.  It was discovered by a Muggle doctor named Alzheimer."

"I have to think about this," Hermione said.  She looked at Severus.  His eyes were flat black slate, unreadable.  "We have to talk about it."

"Please let me know your decision as soon as you can, Miss Granger," said McGonagall.  She watched them rise together and leave her office.  She squinted her eyes:  Severus' aura had turned a pallid yellow-green.  She sighed. 

Hermione and Severus sat together on a bench in the garden, one of their favourite places.  He drew a deep breath.  "Hermione," he said, "we have talked much about what you will do in the future; we've discussed Edinburgh, St Mungo's, the Ministry and countless other alternatives.  You can write your own entrance ticket; you know that.  It's – just rather sudden, this summons to France…"  He looked down at her small hand resting in his.

"I think that nothing's a coincidence," Hermione replied.  "Remember, Severus, you saw the plaques and tangles of this disease in your Doors of Perception vision, and you were concerned that you would be afflicted by it.  I don't think that's the meaning; I think that because I may help to find the cure, it's going to affect both of us."

Severus put his arm around her shoulder.  He's shaking, thought Hermione with surprise. She reached her arms around him and held him tightly.  "No, love, don't be frightened," she whispered, wondering why she said it, and then realizing why:  "I'm not leaving you.  I won't leave you unless you toss me off the Astronomy Tower, and even then I'll Transfigure into a screech owl and fly back up and peck you on your nose."  He laughed in spite of himself.

Severus put her back and looked at her.  "I know you won't leave me – not forever.  But you are called to this work for a reason, and as you say, nothing's a coincidence. You should go, Hermione, and take the opportunity."  He held her against his heart, willing that the sobs not tear out of his throat.

"I have to tell you something, Severus," Hermione said into his shoulder.  "You told me once that you realised your loneliness, that you despaired of ever having the companionship and comfort of love – how did you put it?  'Someone to sit by the fire and read poetry with, cook dinner together with, walk along the lake together-' That is the life you've never known.  That's the life I want, Severus, with you."

Snape buried his face in her brown curls.  I can't let her throw her chances away… He sat up and brushed her thick hair back with a gentle hand.  "Hermione, I could beg you to stay, I could say, 'Let us live that life we dream of, stay here with me.'  I cannot and will not do that.  You must make your own decision, as you would want me to do were the situation reversed. 

"And ask you to wait for me?"  Tears flooded out of Hermione's eyes.  "Oh, Severus, how can I ask that of you?  If you were going, would you ask it of me?"

He looked down.  "No," he said, almost inaudibly.  "I could not."  He rose, straight and tall, proud and still.  "I will not keep you from your future," he said, his voice almost inaudible.  "Go, and don't look back, Hermione."  I can hear his heart cracking, she thought.

 "Goodnight, Miss Granger," he whispered, and ghosted off through the gardens.

 He managed to gain his office before he allowed himself to fall apart.  As if his equilibrium had left him, he staggered to his desk and fell into his chair, his head spinning.  An ugly iron door scraped open in his head, and hordes of monsters swarmed out, attacking him, chewing up his sanity. 

No-one to sit by the fire with, to read poetry with, no-one to talk out the dialogue of my heart with, no-one to finish my sentences, understand my obscurity, forgive my abruptness and warm my soul…

He put his head down on his knees.  The ice-cold wind of loneliness whistled out of the past, chilling him to his bones. Solitary confinement? Recollections of imprisonment gibbered at him, the timeless time in Azkaban.  He threw his head back and howled like a dog, like a solitary wolf.  He wailed inconsolably, his heart torn into shreds.  Better had I never known her…

She ran.  She flew down to the dungeons:  as she approached Severus' door, a powerful blast of wind hurled her backwards.  Warded…  She turned and ran back, her heart pounding, then stopped.  She crept back along the wall, holding on to it, till she reached the ward.  "Severus!  Severus!  Let me in!" she cried.  Her voice echoed off the powerful force field.  There was no answer.

She flew towards the staircases.  In the first corridor, there was a fireplace on the Floo network…gasping for breath; she threw in a handful of Floo powder.  "Professor Snape," she cried.  Nothing happened.   A cold hand crept up her spine; the hairs on the back of her neck prickled.  "Oh, gods!" she sobbed.  "He's going to kill himself!"

*~*