Disclaimer: I don't take credit for anything associated with Harry Potter. No financial profit is being made.
Unlikely Partners
Chapter 6
Severus sat at his mahogany desk beginning the first line of what was to be the letter that alerted Harry to
Hermione's kidnaping. A brass candelabrum was in front of him, providing him light in the darkening room. The dim light of twilight was nearly gone, quickly being replaced by the coal black darkness of night.
He turned his head to glance at Hermione, who had yet to come to.
She would be fine, he knew. She'd only been out for about a quarter of an hour and he expected her to return to consciousness at any moment.
The pain blocking potion had prevented him from bringing her back to consciousness. It wasn't unheard of for a pain blocking potion to cause a temporary blackout, especially in the concentration Hermione had consumed. If Severus used any chemical or magical means to wake her, he risked the possibility of inducing violent nausea. It was better to let the mildly toxic chemicals of the potion break down naturally, while she was still unconscious.
Severus returned to the letter he was currently penning by candlelight.
Dear Potter,
After murdering your beloved Headmaster Dumbledore I wasn't about to let you go off on some foolish quest to search for and destroy the Dark Lord's remaining horcruxes. While I do not doubt in the slightest that you would most certainly have failed, I couldn't risk the possibility of you somehow managing to succeed.
Right now will probably be about the time your stomach tightens as you wonder what I've done.
Severus pinched the bridge of his nose and rubbed his eyes.
He didn't want to be doing this right now.
He quickly reread what he had written. Satisfied, he dipped his quill back into the ink, preparing to begin another line. He looked down at the parchment and forced himself to look at the situation from the perspective of a man without morals or human feelings.
You know I'm smiling as I write this, Potter. The knowledge that I'm causing you to suffer terribly brings me great pleasure. You will receive a second envelope tonight, arriving approximately three hours after this one.
You will then know what I've taken from you.
Severus Snape
He had decided that it would be make him appear more malicious if he sent more than one letter to Harry. The first would be written to unnerve him and induce a sickening panic. Severus had thought about what he would have done if he truly was in service to Voldemort, and alerting Harry that he had done something to cause him pain, but making him wait to be told what exactly that something was,... Well that was just the sort of evil thing a true Death Eater would do.
Severus sat the first letter off to the side to finish drying and took a second sheet of parchment from the lefthand drawer of his desk. This next letter would be the one that had Hermione's picture enclosed in it.
Severus was just about to set his quill to the clean paper, when he heard movement behind him. Turning, he saw that Hermione was slowly moving into a sitting position. Severus set his quill down, put the lid back on the ink bottle and rose to walk over to her.
"How do you feel now?" he asked as he came to stand at the foot of the black sleigh bed.
Hermione raised her gaze to his. For several seconds she didn't say a word. She held his gaze without blinking, and there was something similar to but not quite like pain in her eyes.
"It's not gone," she said in a hollow tone. "Oh God, it's not gone. It feels like...like something is...strangling my soul..." Hermione took in a shaky breath and her eyes widened in discomfort.
"Downstairs your mind was screaming so loud I wouldn't be surprised if Bellatrix heard it, and she isn't even a Legilimens." Severus commented as he considered Hermione's last statement.
"Why is this happening to me?" Hermione half moaned as she started to tremble again, though this time was significantly less intensified than the last.
Severus looked at her as if he was examining some sort of potion ingredient.
"You must have an unusually bright soul, Miss Granger. I can think of no other reason for you to be having such a reaction."
"I can't stand it," Hermione choked out, squeezing her eyes shut in emotional agony.
Severus narrowed his eyes at her behavior. In all honesty he hadn't anticipated that Hermione would have such a sensitivity to Voldemort's presence. He had expected her to be afraid, even to the point of tears, but this?
Dammit Granger, why can't you fit the mold for normalcy in this situation?
This was the last thing he needed right now.
And because he'd never encountered this problem before, he wasn't at all sure what, if anything, he could do for her.
Hermione snapped her eyes open and opened her mouth in a silent cry of torture.
"Take several deep breaths, Miss Granger." Severus told her.
Hermione drew in an uneven breath, and let it out slowly. She then took in a second breath, one less full than the first, and blew it out.
"It's as if...there isn't...enough oxygen in...the air," she said weakly.
"I assure you Miss Granger that this room has a sufficient amount of oxygen."
Severus watched her take a third breath and shakily exhale.
"You need to relax as much as possible."
"I don't think I can relax at all," Hermione responded in a tight voice.
"You must try." Severus said firmly.
Hermione leaned her head back against the pillows and forced herself to even out her breathing.
"Good. Now I want you to relax using a method developed by ancient Chinese wizards in order to alleviate pain. Listen to my voice, focus on it, and clearly envision what I say in your mind."
Hermione took another deep breath and let it out as smoothly as possible.
"You are surrounded by cool, calm, darkness. You are floating gently down, the more you descend, the lighter you feel. You continue to slowly move downward until you come to softly rest on a wide current of slow moving water. Let the water support you, surrender your weight to it.
"Gradually you move forward, and as you do there is a small light in the blackness above. As you move forward on the water, the light slowly begins to move closer to you. It descends towards you as you move down the current. Slowly the light becomes large enough to illuminate your entire body. Feel its warmth and let it free you from your suffering. The light gives you strength, the light gives you peace. Let it take all of the discomfort from your body, feel your pain leaving you. Breathe deeply and expel all of your agony and let the light destroy it. Now watch the light gradually fade away and go out, destroying with it all of your pain, suffering, and turmoil.
"Take one last deep breath and open your eyes."
Hermione did so and looked at Severus with a calm expression for the first time.
"Feeling better now?" Severus asked.
"Yes. I don't have words to tell you how much that relaxation technique helped me. Where did you learn that?" Hermione asked him.
"It's just something I picked up while studying Legilimency and Occlumency."
"Is the absence of the feeling I was experiencing permanent or temporary?"
Severus did not immediately reply.
"It is temporary, isn't it?" Hermione asked him seriously.
"Yes, Miss Granger, it's temporary. I'm quite certain you'll be able to sleep through the night without any problems, but tomorrow I'll have to make you an anti-anxiety potion and hope that does the trick to keep you from experiencing...whatever the hell it is you experienced from being in the same vicinity as Voldemort. In all honesty, the relaxation method is only a quick fix, and if repeated too often, you will become immune to its beneficial effects."
"What do you mean when you say you hope theanti-anxiety potion works?"
"Simply that I have no idea to what extent it will help you."
"What will I do if the potion doesn't help me?" Hermione asked quickly.
"We'll just have to cross that bridge when we get to it," Severus said curtly, not wanting to think about that possibility becoming a reality.
"You're certain that I won't wake up in the middle of the night feeling the distress again?" Hermione asked.
"To ensure that you sleep soundly I suggest that you rest now."
"I'm not tired."
Severus rolled his eyes.
"But I will do as you say," she told him.
"I'm leaving tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. I'll return around noon with a potion for you."
Severus returned to his desk and picked up the parchment and the candelabrum. He turned to leave the room.
"Good night," Hermione told him softly.
He nodded to her before disappearing into the adjoining room and closing the door.
Severus set the candles on a side table and tucked the pages of parchment into a portfolio on the table. He then extinguished the flames and kicked off his shoes before moving to the long black leather couch in the center of the room.
Severus stretched out on the piece of furniture with a heavy sigh.
If I give her a concentrated form of the anti-anxiety potion she should no longer suffer as intensely as she did tonight, he told himself.
But what you expect should happen and what actually happens are often never the same, he thought silently.
He hadn't thought this situation would have such an unwanted complication.
Severus took another breath and exhaled very slowly, wishing very much that he was able to take a dreamless sleep potion. Or rather, wishing that a dreamless sleep potion would help him to sleep.
Sound sleep and Severus Snape were strangers. The last time Severus had gotten a good night's sleep was weeks before the night Harry had survived Voldemort's killing curse.
Since the night Voldemort had lost power Severus's nights were filled with acute physical pain. One might have thought this was due to the fact that a Death Eater was magically connected to Voldemort and could possibly suffer some type of physical pain from being separated from his master.
But if that was true, Severus's pain would have long ceased as Voldemort was considerably stronger now than he had been before he had tried to kill Harry.
Severus breathed in again as an acute stabbing pain lanced through his head. His temples throbbed in time with his heart beat. It felt as if someone was driving an ice pick into the base of his skull. Every muscle in his body tensed as the pain in his head doubled. He experienced the sensation of having every major vein in his head pinched and pierced. He breathed out doing a tremendous job of ignoring it all.
But just because he ignored it that didn't make the pain any easier to bear.
The sensation of an ice pick sinking into the center of his brain continued while painful pressure built up around the sides of his head. It felt as if his skull was being split from the inside.
And through it all the only outward sign that he was in extreme physical agony was the tenseness of his shoulder blades.
His headaches came every night and would last anywhere from forty-five minutes to five hours.
Severus hoped tonight's was of the former category.
But he knew better than most that you couldn't always get what you wished for.
He turned onto his other side and settled down to wait for the excruciating pain to subside so that he could finally escape to the unconsciousness of sleep.
A/N: I want to know what you're thinking! I'm sure this little plot twist was unexpected. So you all must have some reaction to it. Any guesses about why Severus has headaches? Leave me a review and let me know your thoughts!
I won't be able to update this week because I have a big psychology presentation to give on Thursday and then I'm off to Pittsburgh on Friday to see Michael Flatley's Celtic Tiger and visit family.
Look for Chapter 7 the week after next. I'd much rather write chapter 7 this week instead of spending time preparing for my psych presentation, but unfortunately the presentation has to come first.
I'm hoping that this chapter will prompt many of my silent readers to review for the first time.