New Perspective 1
THE CHOSEN
By Bellegeste
A/N: 'The Chosen' was begun as a knee-jerk reaction to all the anti-Snape nonsense that circulated after the publication of HBP. So I make no apology for the blatant propaganda contained in the next two chapters. The case has been argued often and elsewhere, but I feel that the arguments bear repetition, and hope that the story itself is strong enough to carry them.
Chapter 8:TRUTH AND OIL
"Is it always this bad?"
Neville, leaning weakly against the railings of the river embankment, didn't answer. He sucked in another long, slow, deep breath and willed the sickness to subside, cramming the nausea down and trying to contain it, like a camper battling to squash a fluffed-out sleeping bag into its tight, drawstring cover. He hadn't been too thrilled at the prospect of this encounter anyway; Apparating there had been the curdled sour cream on an already unappetising cake. The three Ds, as far as Neville was concerned, were not Destination, Determination, Deliberation, but Dizziness, Disorientation and Disgorgement…
The more he'd thought about Hermione's suggestion, the less enthusiastic he'd become. Try to find Snape? Visit him? Take him the antidote? Were they mad? Even if they did discover his whereabouts, who was to say that they wouldn't be Apparating plumb into a cell of Death Eaters? Or, if he were by some miracle alone, what would there be to stop Snape cursing them on the spot? Killing them like he'd killed Dumbledore?
Hermione, unfortunately, exasperatingly, had an answer for everything. Snape wouldn't risk exposing Voldemort's location, she argued, so the rendezvous with Narcissa would be somewhere known to them both, where Snape could wait, unobserved, for Narcissa's arrival. Malfoy Manor, Neville had mooted. But Narcissa had, in public at least, been dissociating herself from any connection with her errant son. Why would she risk jeopardising this last tenuous shred of her family's tattered reputation? But, whined Neville, Snape might send someone to the pick up point to collect the herbs for him. Unlikely, disagreed the psychological oracle, quoting Neville's own letter in which he described Bellatrix's acrimonious talk with her sister. Didn't it say that Voldemort was getting impatient because Snape couldn't do his job properly - would Snape wish to draw attention to his infirmity and further antagonise You-Know-Who? Would Snape kill them on the spot? No, Hermione had said slowly, I don't think he will.
Of all his objections, this was the one that Neville had been hoping she would shoot down in flames with absolute, categorical certainty.
"Ah, you don't think he will?" Not quite categorical enough for Neville.
"No, I don't think so," she said again, sounding about as convincing as a lobster in a saucepan urging you to 'come on in the water's lovely'. "Either he'll be delighted to see a friendly face, in which case we're home and dry, or he won't. In which case… …he'll want to find out what we're up to. So, he's unlikely to kill us immediately."
"He'll do it after he's interrogated us? Champion!"
"Yes." Couldn't she have sounded a little less categorical on this one?
"But," she added, "we do have our trump card - Buckbeak's hair. He won't be expecting that. We can use it to negotiate our safety."
"Before or after he's Stupefied us, tortured us and taken it by force?"
Characterising Snape as ruthless, uncompromising and unfriendly seemed to Neville far more realistic than expecting the man to welcome them in for an ethical debate on his motives for murdering the elderly headmaster.
"And you were giving me a hard time about talking to Narcissa! She's a Pygmy Puff compared to Snape!"
"You don't have to come if you don't want," Hermione had huffed, undaunted, determined, a girl with a mission. "I'll go on my own." The clinching argument. Another trump card.
Behind them, dark and silent, the river lay like a dead, black snake, oozing into the night. The light from a lone streetlamp reflected back dully from its murky sheen, picking out, here and there, the outline shapes of waterlogged litter, drifting flecks of foam caking together in scurfy eddies, a punctured football, and the bobbing, drowning neck of a half-submerged bottle, its message of distress long lost and ignored, floating but motionless in the immeasurable flow.
Still wobbly, a puffing Neville clambered after Hermione into the cobbled street and followed her across the road. She was walking purposefully and seemed to know where she was heading. Neville, not for the first time, rued the success of his gran's adventure.
"I think it's about time I had a chat with my grandson's new boss," Mrs Longbottom had remarked grimly, on hearing a heavily censored version of their story. Believing herself to be assisting the Order in a plan to track down Draco, she had set off for Malfoy Manor armed with nothing more than a bottle of homemade Parsnip and Poppy-seed wine and generations of gritty, grandmotherly guile… Narcissa had been no match for either.
At the end of a narrow alleyway Hermione stopped and pointed.
"This is it - Spinner's End." The whisper swirled away into the dank evening mist. The street was deserted, the houses dark and derelict. No light shone from any of the windows; the whole row was abandoned, empty, uninhabited. Neville felt slightly better… …and then infinitely worse as Hermione said,
"It's that one at the end. We might as well knock and see, now that we're here. Come on…"
By the time she realised that Neville was no longer behind her, she had already tapped on the door…
xxx
"You're late," a voice snarled within.
The door opened a fraction. In an instant Snape's black eyes had taken in Hermione's presence and shot over her shoulder, up and down the street, scanning the darkness. Their startled, ferocious glint reminded her alarmingly of Buckbeak. It was all she could do not to wrench the 'ring' out of her pocket and wave it in his face shouting, 'Don't kill me – I've got the antidote'. Before she could speak, his cold hand closed on her wrist and yanked her inside with a suddenness and force that took her breath away. His Expelliarmus! slid her wand out of her grip. The next thing she knew she was pinned up against the wall, Snape's hand over her mouth and his wand pointing directly at her chest.
"What are you doing here?" he hissed. "Are you alone? Where are the others? How many of you are there?"
She shook her head, unable to speak behind the clamping hand.
"Who's out there?" he insisted harshly. The wand jabbed into her sternum. "Even you, Granger, wouldn't be so rash…"
What had she expected - an outlaw? An invalid? A convict like Sirius, on the run, slightly crazed, ragged and unkempt? In the dim candle light it was difficult to tell, but he didn't seem vastly different from the Snape of old. If he was injured he was hiding it well. His clothes looked as though they might have been slept in, and he did look very tired, she could see that, his face even more gaunt and sallow than usual. She sensed a tremor in the restraining arm - either that or it was her own trembling, transmitting itself through him.
"You will keep your voice down," he instructed, loosening his grip, his own voice a low, hoarse whisper. "Now, answer me!"
Should she claim to have the back up of the entire Order waiting around the corner? Or that she was a sole agent, gung-ho with Gryffindor arrogance, on a single-handed, maverick mission? Even without Legilimens he'd know she was lying.
"Two of us," she gulped.
"Two?" The dark eyes widened in incredulity. A derisive laugh caught in his throat and he twisted away so as not to cough in her face.
"Potter?" His thoughts jumped immediately to Harry. "You've got Potter out there and he's sent you ahead to see how the land lies!" And to think he called me a coward! His nostrils flared in anger - the skin around them was red and cracked, as though the ugly, hooked nose had been blown once too often.
"No!" squeaked Hermione.
"Not Weasley?" He sounded weary at the thought.
"It's not Harry or Ron. It's Neville. Just me and Neville."
"Longbottom? Well, fetch him. I can't have that numbskull loitering about outside. He'll break something. Get him in here before he's seen."
By Muggles, Aurors or Death Eaters - which posed the greatest threat?
Hermione scooted to the alley, not knowing whether she would find Neville. But there he was, greenly apologetic.
"He says you're to come inside," Hermione panted, feeling strangely buoyant, like a vessel released from its docking clamps and set adrift, amazed that Snape had let her go. Now would have been an ideal time to make their escape. However, his negative reception had, if anything, strengthened her missionary zeal.
"Is he alright?" Peering at her, Neville saw, as yet, no marks of visible torture.
"A bit rough - no, not violent," she forestalled Neville's whimpering 'Nnnnn-no', "…rough, as in tired, run down, off colour. I think he might have a cold. But he hasn't Crucio-ed me yet…"
XXX
Now there were two of them wandless, backed up against the sitting room wall.
"If you wish to avoid a Langlack or worse, you will be silent." Snape directed his malice at Neville, prodding his wand threateningly at the boy's throat and applying pressure to the working Adam's apple. Neville gagged on fear. Then, as the lingering queasiness of Apparating was churned afresh by the terror of confronting Snape - a Snape who was quite patently not delighted to see them – an expression of sheer horror came over Neville's face and he cupped his hand over his mouth.
"He's going to be sick!" cried Hermione.
A hidden door in the far wall flew open.
"Through there, boy!" Snape shoved him across the room and out. "An admirable choice of bodyguard," he commented, the scratchiness of his voice taking the edge off the sarcasm. He shut the door to block out the sound of retching.
"It's the Apparating. He's only just passed his test. He's -"
"What do you want?" Snape interrupted. Hermione searched his face for the scantest trace of warmth, but found only suspicion and hostility. "How did you find me?" He glanced at his watch in agitation. "You must leave at once. You foolish girl, what do you hope to achieve by coming here? Take your puking playmate and go - before I change my mind."
The menace of the threat was diluted as he turned aside to blow his nose. It was impossible to be intimidated by a man with a streaming cold. Hermione felt her courage returning.
"I want to speak to you," she stated.
"But I have no desire to speak with you. Get Longbottom and go – now!" he said thickly, the m's and n's clogging. "If you're caught here…"
"Who by? By the Aurors? I think that would be your problem, not ours. I hardly think we'd be arrested as traitors. Or did you mean by the Death Eaters? Yes, that would be awkward - you'd be forced to kill us, wouldn't you? And you wouldn't want to do that, would you - Sir?"
Let me be right; let me be right. If he wanted to kill us, we'd be dead already - wouldn't we? Let this be an act. Please…
"If this is an adolescent death wish, I can grant it." He raised his wand and levelled it at her. "Don't push your luck, Granger."
Had she miscalculated? No, she had to push, and push relentlessly if she was going to reach this outcast in exile. She faced him with resolution.
"You want us to leave? Why? Before someone sees us and accuses you of conspiring with the enemy? Of keeping in contact with the Order? Would you do it - would you kill again to maintain your cover? I bet it'll be easier the second time…"
"Get out! Before it's too late!" If he'd had any voice left he would have shouted.
Hermione saw the door behind Snape ease open, the bookshelves swinging back, and Neville's face peeping out, taking in the situation and, appalled, ducking away out of sight, waiting for a more opportune moment to make his re-entrance.
"But that's why you did it - didn't you? Didn't you? Say it! That's why I'm here. I want to hear you say it! You killed him to save yourself. But why? The real reason - I have to know the truth!" In goading him she was stirring the stockpot of her own emotions - she'd intended to question him in a sensible sequence, and here she was bubbling over, already riled and ranting.
"I cursed Dumbledore." The answer came as flat, harsh and cold as pack ice. "That, I would have thought, is common knowledge. Did you expect me to deny it? The old fool was asking for it. There, is that what you wanted to hear? Are you satisfied? What, Miss Know-it-all, would you like me to say? Perhaps I can oblige." He was mocking her now, cruel and contemptuous.
"You could try saying you're sorry!" flamed Hermione. She was finally entertaining the possibility that her personality profiling of Snape might be flawed. She scrutinised him, in vain, for any sign of remorse.
"Sorry? How very quaint! And do you believe, Miss Granger, that an expression of regret on my part would in any way alleviate the grief and loss you so blatantly display? What difference could it make? How could my supposed 'repentance' be of any help to you?"
"It might help you," she whispered.
Hermione thought for a moment she'd hit home, that his expression faltered, but it was just his facial muscles stilling and contorting before a sudden sneeze. He fumbled for a damp, overused handkerchief before the next sneezes shook and overtook him.
"You didn't have to do it." Hermione was determinedly impassive, muting the first faint twang of sympathy before its gentle reverberations could reach her heart. If he was sick why didn't he brew himself a Potion - wasn't that his job? If he preferred to pretend he was fine, she'd go along with that. She'd come for answers and she wasn't about to let herself be side-tracked. "Dumbledore was dying anyway. Did you know that? Or didn't you care? He'd drunk poison - you killed a dying man! Are you proud of yourself? Not such a coup, is it, to curse an old, dying wizard who can't defend himself?"
Harry had never expressly said that the liquid Dumbledore had drunk was poisonous - but given the evidence, how could it have been anything else? And how would anyone ever prove or disprove it? The cause of death was universally accepted as Avada Kadavra; there had been no post mortem. If Snape was shocked by her revelation he did not show it. He sighed heavily, mopping his nose.
"Poisoned or not, Dumbledore was weak - weak and feeble. He'd been ailing for months; his powers were in decline. It was more of a culling than a killing," he sneered. "I did him a service."
Beyond the call of duty.
"Did Draco a service, more like! I thought you didn't approve of helping other people with their 'homework'?"
"You are meddling in matters you do not understand. I could not allow Draco to fail."
"That stupid Vow!" exclaimed Hermione. "Whatever possessed you?" Behind the handkerchief, Snape's eyes flared in surprise. "Oh yes, we know all about your Unbreakable Vow. You should have known better than to think that would stay a secret for long. And Dumbledore knew about it too, didn't he? Don't bother to deny it. Hagrid heard you arguing in the garden."
That was a shapeless truth, cut to size, tailored to fit and delicately embroidered, but Snape was not to know. What, exactly, had Hagrid heard?
"Giant ears flapping, eh?" When in doubt, undermine the opposition. "One of these days the great oaf'll take off, like that accursed Hippogriff."
More like Dumbo, thought Hermione, honing the comparison for her own benefit, realising that Snape couldn't be expected to be conversant with Disney elephants. Not surprisingly, he didn't sound too fond of Buckbeak.
"Is that all you can say? Anyone would think you wanted us to mistrust you." She didn't understand his attitude. He was defensive but not as vehemently as Hermione had expected. When he next spoke, the statement had all the smooth sincerity of a Ministry manifesto.
"I honoured my Vow. I was carrying out the wishes of the Dark Lord."
"Don't give me that!" cried Hermione fiercely. She felt like slapping him. "I know what this is - I know what you're doing - 'plausible deniability', isn't that what they call it? If we get interrogated by the Death Eaters, you won't have said anything incriminating. Well, good for you, Sir, you haven't given anything away. You've covered yourself again and I'm merely a hysterical schoolgirl with bereavement issues! Do you think we made all this effort to find you, just to be fobbed off…"
She saw herself as an ambassador, as his lifeline to the outside world, but he refused to acknowledge her or reach out to her. Couldn't he see that he was missing an opportunity here? How could she help him if he didn't want to be helped?
"Be quiet!" Snape barked. He was checking the time again. "You dare to question my loyalty? I am not in the habit of harming children, but for you I could make an exception. Longbottom! Stop skulking in the hall. Get out - both of you. You should leave - now - while you still can."
Neville sidled back into the room.
"She's not coming," he announced bluntly, poised to leap out of range should this information provoke an outburst of rage from Snape. "You keep looking at your watch as if you're expecting somebody. Well, she's not coming."
"What are you talking about, you stupid boy?" Snape fired him the kind of withering glare that would stunt a Russian Vine(1).
"Madam Malfoy. She's not coming. She's, er, under new orders…" said Neville, trying to imply that this was all part of a master plan. Under the influence, more like, of Parsnip and Poppy-seed wine. His gran always swore it worked better than Veritaserum and you got a good, long sleep afterwards. In the morning Narcissa wouldn't remember a thing.
Instead of fuelling him to violence, the news that Narcissa was a no-show acted on Snape like a Sapping spell. Lowering himself into the old armchair as though his legs no longer had the strength to support him, he dropped his pounding head into his hands with a barely stifled groan. The two students exchanged uncertain glances. Hermione could almost feel the blocked sinuses throbbing. She'd anticipated that Snape would be in pain from the Hippogriff wound, but she could not have predicted him looking quite so seedy. With a jolt she realised just how much he had been counting on Narcissa bringing him the next dose of Datura. Even Snape could only maintain the unbreakable act for so long. He'd concealed his discomfort so far, bolstered by the prospect of an imminent, pain-killing herbal fix to get him through another day, but now even that slender hope was taken from him. In the space of a sentence he had aged: he looked thinner, older, more tired than ever. She wondered if he had the energy to keep going. Grey and hunched, all angles and wary pride, he reminded Hermione of a solitary, wounded heron.
She and Neville perched themselves opposite him on the threadbare sofa. In the chilly, unheated room the dingy upholstery felt damp and uncomfortable.
"Not the healthiest place to live," Hermione observed, addressing the air above the bowed head. "Couldn't you at least light a fire?"
Snape raised red-rimmed, watering eyes and glowered.
"And advertise my presence to any passing Auror? Use your intelligence, girl."
Hermione bit back the retort. Intelligence? At least he finally credited her with having some. If he preferred to freeze that was his business – this was no worse than the dungeons; if he couldn't be bothered to look after himself, why should she care? Did he value his life so little?
"But the Aurors could help you," she protested. "Some of them are members of the -"
"Shut up!" he croaked, and then, oddly, "There are rats."
Rats?
"I'm not surprised. This place is a dump." The whole road's probably swarming with the filthy things. It's a wonder it's not been condemned as a health hazard and demolished.
The hot, heavy eyes bored into hers and, as from nowhere, a thought materialised - an intuition, an awareness - fully formed in her mind. Rats? Wormtail? Snape was under surveillance, and not only by Aurors. His wand too, was regularly checked for spell usage. She didn't know how, but she knew it, and the knowledge filled her with indignation. Voldemort still didn't trust him. Was he right not to? Was this the crowning irony? What more could Snape do to convince him of his loyalty? Wasn't killing Dumbledore enough? Would anything ever be enough?
"Rats?" She looked to him for confirmation. "Here? Now?"
"'They' come and go. 'They' have an irritating habit of following me around."
"Right. We'll see about that." Without waiting for permission, she summoned her wand; Snape made no attempt to block her. In fact he appeared to have opted out of the proceedings altogether and sat groggily watching her, breathing glue, intermittently dabbing at his nose.
"Muffliato!"Directing the spell at each of the four walls in turn, taking no chances, Hermione sound-proofed the room. Then, for good measure, she shot the spell at the ceiling and aimed a few extras at the skirting boards. While she was in 'Muffliato!' mode she nipped through the hidden doors and dealt with the stairs, hall, kitchen and bathroom.
"Let's see the rat get through that lot! Now, perhaps, we can talk," she said smugly, settling herself back down next to Neville. "The Aurors - "
"…will arrest me on sight. I'll be in Azkaban before you can say 'human rights'. The wizard world does not share your high-minded Muggle principles."
Hermione's mouth was shaping itself to protest, even though she was inclined to agree. Snape continued, squeezing a sour appraisal from the facts. Two weeks' ripening had not sweetened this bitter fruit.
"Scrimgeour is cheerfully condemning innocent scapegoats to boost his arrest quotas - what hope is there for a wizard whose guilt is uncontested? Amnesty? I think not. You wish to see me brought to justice, Miss Granger - your egalitarian zeal does you credit, but it is - as always – misplaced." He sighed. "What defence could I mount? Potter, Malfoy, Fenrir, Amycus and the others - they are all witnesses. I killed Albus." I killed Albus.
"But the Vow - that's as bad as being held at wand-point. You could plead coercion. Surely that would count…" argued Hermione, still militant, but vacillating now between defence and prosecution.
The Vow. Indeed. A prophylactic turned fatally toxic. How many times had he inwardly cursed Bellatrix's resentful distrust. Nothing less than the Unbreakable Vow would have convinced her; nothing less than total obedience would have satisfied Dumbledore.
"The Vow itself does not constitute a defence - a mitigation, perhaps; hardly grounds for an acquittal. It was freely taken. A calculated risk. If you take a risk you have to be prepared to live with the consequences - or die for them. Individuals are expendable, some more than others. In that situation I had to salvage what I could. I had little choice. Albus was aware of that."
Dumbledore had known all along. In Hermione's mind, Snape had finally exonerated himself. She had been bluffing before when she had mentioned Hagrid; she had needed to hear it from Snape himself. The events on the tower, as described by Harry, replayed themselves in her head and, with her inferences confirmed, it was as though an explanatory soundtrack had been spliced to a formerly silent film. "'He was asking for it'," she murmured, quoting the phrase she had earlier dismissed as a slur.
"Euthanasia is no defence either." Snape hung his head, staring blearily at the floor. The lank, black hair swung forward, concealing his face. No choice? That was not strictly true. There had been a choice – and he had chosen to live, though it was becoming increasingly unclear why. Choices? One ill-considered choice, so many years ago, and he'd been bedevilled by the consequences for the rest of his life.
"So, what now?" A jury would not let him off the hook; neither did Hermione. Understanding a criminal's motives is no guarantee of forgiveness. Dumbledore's death was still too recent, too raw, too shocking for that. "What are you going to do? Just give up, is that it? Work for Voldemort? How could you?"
His resignation to the inevitable verdict stung her like a betrayal of her most cherished belief – the rights of the underdog. She was disappointed in him, unwilling to reconcile the indomitable Snape of her experience with this pale acquiescence. A rusty sofa spring twanged beneath her as she leaned forwards. She felt Neville's hand plucking at her arm.
"Steady on, Hermione." But it would take more than ineffectual, friendly remonstrance to stop her now. Her interrogation fixed on Snape.
"Whose side are you on? Do you even know yourself? What do you think you're doing? Poisoning defenceless owls! What a cheap shot! That was you, wasn't it? Blowing up bridges isn't quite your style. Goodness knows how you did it. What harm have they ever done you?"
"The Dark Lord finds the disruption entertaining." Snape didn't have the energy to argue. Not now, Granger. Not the moral outrage. Just go, can't you? I can't… cope with this right now.
"And killing wand trees? Talk about pointless exercises!"
"Likewise, a diversion." He breathed out heavily through his mouth. "Have any owls died, Miss Granger? To your impeccable knowledge? Have your precious trees lost anything other than foliage?" Would you rather I helped him plan an assault on Azkaban?
"Contaminating reservoirs then," she accused. "I bet you had a hand in that too. Hundreds of Muggles were taken to hospital, you know. You could have killed them. Is that what Voldemort intended?"
"The Dark Lord doesn't employ me to make medicines!"
"I can see that. Look at you! You wouldn't be much of an advert. What was it then, another amusement?"
"I persuaded the Dark Lord that a 'dry run' of the reservoir experiment was required – a wise precaution as it so happened. It seems the concentration of toxins was too dilute to result in fatalities. The Dark Lord was disappointed." Snape massaged his left arm, where the memory of Voldemort's displeasure still burned. "I have as yet been unable to repeat the test. The ultimate target, it may interest you to hear, is to be the water supply to Hogsmeade and Hogwarts…" I can't stall him forever…
Hermione's face crumpled in disgust.
"That's horrible. You're despicable. Any self-respecting human being would refuse to co-operate. To think that I came here because I had this airy-fairy idea about you deserving a fair trial! More fool me! You've got what you deserve. Come on, Neville, let's get out of here." She rose, dragging a wordless Neville to his feet.
That's right, walk away. Turn your back on me like everyone else.
Husky, low and lifeless, Snape's rasping rejoinder followed them to the door.
"Don't let me tarnish that shiny idealism of yours with anything so sordid as the truth. Truth and oil may rise to the surface, but neither is clear or clean. You want to know the truth? The truth, Miss Granger, is brutal and unpleasant. Am I working for the Dark Lord? Yes. I have no choice. Am I supplying him with dangerous Potions? Yes. Again, if I wish to live, I have no choice. Will there be casualties? Assuredly. It is an occupational hazard. I produce poisons not perfumes. Reality is unpalatable; a spy's life is no picnic. But don't worry, it will not be for much longer. There is, in the end, only one choice…"
He sank back in the armchair, his eyes closed, and for the first time Hermione and Neville could clearly see the pain and exhaustion etched on his features. The stress of the past weeks had taken its toll on his resistance and his morale.
If ever there was a candidate for healing Borometz broth, Snape was it. Why, Hermione berated herself, hadn't she thought to ask Neville to bring some, or Pepper-Up which the man clearly needed, or even Mrs Longbottom's pot of magical goo? She'd known - OK, hypothesised - that Snape would be in a bad way. And she'd viewed that as an advantage! Sick, Snape had represented less of a threat - she realised that now, though she hadn't openly rationalised it or admitted it to herself before. Bringing him the antidote had as much to do with intellectual curiosity as philanthropy. Initially she'd even seen it as a bargaining tool. Could she have been that calculating? True, she'd wanted to give him a chance to state his side of the case, but what had moved her to embark on this quest - genuine compassion or a more academic ambition: the search for the truth? Truth and justice – lofty, abstract ideals! All this time she'd been counting Snape's innocence, guilt or anything in between as factors in an ethical equation, a logical puzzle. She had hardly stopped to consider the human angle.
Neville regarded the hated Professor, laid so low by a simple virus, looking worse by the minute, fogbound with the cold and succumbing before their eyes to the ravages of the Hippogriff in his system.
"We can't go, Hermione. We've got to give him the stuff. He's poorly. He needs it now - all of it."
"What! Make him better so he can turn round and poison us?"
But Hermione knew Neville was right. They retraced their steps.
"Sir? Sir, we brought you the Datura plant."
Snape's eyes dragged open; disbelief turned to relief.
"And, Sir, I've got the antidote from Buckbeak."
Inexpressible relief.
End of chapter.
Next Chapter: A CHOICE. It's the last chapter : steel yourselves for some gory bits, some angsty bits and a bittersweet ending!
1 Russian Vine : Polygonum or Mile-a-Minute vine, renowned for its rampant growth.