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Chapter 17

It's Always Darkest Before the Dawn

"Miss Granger, will you please listen to me?"

"Absolutely not!"

Snape frowned and cautiously peered through the half open door into the hospital wing to see what the commotion was. His caution was partially due to his stint as a spy as well as the fact that Madam Pomfrey tended to hurl things at eavesdroppers.

Of course, the only reason he was eavesdropping was out of curiosity – which he had enough of to rid a cat of its nine lives and then some. Not halfway through his previous class (the seventh year Gryffindor's and Slytherin's), McGonagall had appeared to take Hermione to Madam Pomfrey. And from the look on the older professor's face, it hadn't been her idea and she disliked it.

So once he'd rid himself of the class for lunch, he headed towards the Hospital Wing to ask Madam Pomfrey why the Gryffindor had been pulled from his class. He hadn't been expecting her to still be there.

But it turned out that having Hermione still there made for good entertainment. From his vantage point, Snape could see a good way into the wing and that included the area were the mediwitch and student stood. Madam Pomfrey's back was towards him and Hermione was facing in his direction, which gave him quite the view. The girl's mane of hair haloed her face in a golden brown ring, her chocolate colored eyes flashing from a face flushed with anger. Across her chest, her arms were crossed and he could feel the anger radiating off the young woman even from the distance he was away.

"Miss Granger," said the mediwitch then in an exasperated tone. "Please. Let me do my job."

"No," came Hermione's stern reply with a slightly turned shoulder.

"You would force Mister Potter to see those scars every day and be reminded…"

The young woman whirled before the question was even finished and delivered a stinging slap to Madam Pomfrey's cheek. It hit hard enough that Snape winced from the impact and the mediwitch staggered backwards from the force.

Breath coming in harsh gasps, Hermione snarled, "You know nothing about what he's going through. And I won't continue to wear these scars to hurt him. I'll wear them to show people what a coward Voldemort is – that he has to have someone else hurt his victim's for him. That's why I'm not going to let you heal them."

"Good girl," murmured Snape as he continued to watch the scene unfold. He then pulled back from the door as Hermione jerked her bag off the floor and stormed for the door, only to be stopped by Madam Pomfrey's hand on her arm.

"Please, child, reconsider…"

"I don't need to reconsider."

The young woman viciously jerked her arm away from the mediwitch then stormed out into the corridor. She slammed the door closed behind her then flung her bag down and let out a harsh scream through her teeth, hands clenched so tightly that her fingernails dug into her palms.

When hands fell on her shoulders, she jerked away and around to hit whoever it was then ceased the motion when a slim hand captured her wrist. What was Snape doing standing behind her with…was that pride in his eyes?

"Sir?" she asked nervously, all ire vanishing in the path of her confusion.

"You, Miss Granger, continue to surprise me," said the Potions Master with a nearly non-existent smile as he released her wrist. "To go through so much and be thinking of someone else instead of yourself…"

Hermione's brown eyes lifted to his and he what he saw in them nearly made him – an ex-Death Eater – flinch. Gone was nearly all of her innocence, leaving only stark reality in those muddy orbs. She had seen the darker side of humanity head on and had survived – but not intact. And that simple fact made the Potions Master's heart ache for another child whose innocence had been lost.

"It's the only way I can keep going," whispered Hermione, wrapping her arms around herself. She swayed slightly as she continued, "If I think about it…if I wonder what c-could have h-h-happened…"

She valiantly held back a sob, sniffing and closing her eyes in desperation. When a gentle hand fell on her shoulder, she jumped then looked up at Snape, who was looking down at her with understanding in his dark eyes.

At the beginning of the year she would have laughed at the idea that she would one day be standing looking up at Snape and seeing anything but dislike in his eyes. Now here she was, in that spot. And she found herself glad that Harry had shown her another side of the harsh Potion's Master.

He looked down at her for a long moment then said, "I am truly sorry you had to see what you did."

"Thank you," mumbled Hermione. She then hastily added, "Sir."

Snape waved his other hand in a vague dismissal then laid it on her shoulder.

"Nevermind the technicalities," he said. "You and I both have seen the darker side of humanity. Because of that we are connected. And, should you ever need it, you will have my ear, my company, or my wand."

Hermione blinked in surprise at this pronouncement. Then she nodded and softly said, "Thank you."

"My pleasure. Now go to him. I'll make your excuses to Minerva for missing her class."

The bushy-haired teen gave him a relieved smile then dashed off. He followed her at a swift pace and arrived just in time to see her leap like a deer down the stairs that lead into the dungeons.

Smiling, he turned slightly and headed towards the Great Hall so he could tell McGonagall and Flitwick the Gryffindor would be missing their classes. When he arrived, he frowned at the near lack of sound. Generally the Hall was buzzing with the voices of so many adolescents that he was surprised he could even hear himself think. Now it had a nearly grave-like silence as clustered of students sat huddled together at their various tables.

He then noticed each and every group were looking at something and muttering. Curious, he crept up behind a group of Gryffindors – so quietly that neither they nor their compatriots heard him.

"Bloody hell," he heard Seamus Finnegan mutter.

"Harry?" gasped Dean Thomas from beside the Irish teen. "No, it can't be. He can't be what they say. Ron, you don't believe this rubbish do you?"

Ron Weasley's shaggy red head shook slightly and he replied, "Merlin, no! Mione wouldn't be with him if he was!"

"Why are you three on his side?" hissed one of the Patil sisters across from them (Snape could never remember their names, so he ceased trying). "He's a Slytherin!"

"A fact duly noted, Miss Patil," purred Snape, leaning over the heads of the three teenage boys, all of whom looked up in shock to find him hovering over them like the bat he was often compared to. "Now do tell me what the four of you are arguing about."

Beside the Patil girl, Neville Longbottom swallowed hard then stammered, "I-it's in the Pr-Prophet, s-sir."

"What?"

The five Gryffindors looked at each other then, surprised they knew something before one of the teachers. Then Dean pulled the front page from the paper and turned to hand it to Snape, who took it with a raised eyebrow. He looked down at the front page then and…

"Chyfrgolla 'i at Annwfn a bacia!"

Several students around jumped at the harshly spoken Welsh and those that knew the tongue looked at their professor in confusion. At the Head Table, Dumbledore rose and shook his head briefly at Snape, who caught the motion out of the corner of his eye.

The darkly clad wizard whirled, the front page of the Daily Prophet that spilled the whole truth of Harry's ancestry for all to see clenched in his hand, and snarled venomously towards the old wizard (still in Welsh), "A chyfrgolla 'ch at Annwfn cystal, Albus! Dyma pawb 'ch anaf!"

With that he turned and strode from the Hall, leaving the students to stare at him in confusion or shock, the former from being confused by him shouting in another language and the latter because they had understood what he'd shouted. After a moment, McGonagall rose from where she'd just seated herself, her eyes flashing venom as she turned to the wizard at her right.

"I suppose your eyes and ears in the Prophet were plugged up and blinded for this one, weren't they?" she spat before storming from the Hall in Snape's wake. The student's confused voices followed her from the big room but she ignored them. Instead she turned and went down into the dungeons, where she found Snape angrily duking it out with one of the walls. Blood poured from his shattered fists and stained the wall but he kept on pounding, his teeth clenched and his face a mask of wrath.

Then, with one last strike, he let out a scream of anger through clenched teeth and slumped down against the opposite wall, bloody hands cradled in his lap.

"You stupid, stupid, boy," hissed McGonagall as she rushed over and knelt in front of him. She picked up his hands, noting his nearly nonexistent wince, and waved her wand over them. "Be glad Poppy will be able to fix these else Albus would be looking for another Potion's Master and you'd be hurled into Azkaban by the Aurors. You know any injury on your person will make them suspicious!"

"Perhaps that would be a better fate," said Snape bitterly. He then looked up at her, dark eyes showing sadness. "They've ruined his life, Minerva. All of them. They've turned him into something to be feared. He's only a child despite all he knows and is. They've shattered yet another child's life!"

McGonagall looked sadly at him and whispered, "Severus, dear child, it will be alright. You and I will make sure no harm comes to him – as will others of the staff. But we cannot do it without you. You're the only one he truly trusts among we adults."

"Merlin knows why," mumbled Snape.

"Darkness knows Darkness," said the witch with a bitter smile.

The brought a brief glimmer of a smirk – a very bitter, grim one but a trademark Snape smirk nonetheless.

"Indeed," he said after a long moment. The black eyes then hardened with resolve and she smiled inwardly in a sad way. The Ministry had shattered his own childhood and she knew he would die before he allowed that to happen to Harry. She'd always admired him as a child and still did – he'd been quiet but brash and stubborn as well…and he still was, even though very few knew it.

"Well?" he snapped after a moment. "Are you going to help me up, woman, so I can go get my hands fixed and correct this mess Voldemort has no doubt dropped us into?"

McGonagall didn't do anything in response to his snap except help him to his feet and begin to walk with him up into the entrance hall then towards the hospital wing. As they walked, he cradled his hands to his chest and frowned in thought before he spoke in a soft voice that reminded the older witch beside him of the child he'd once been and not the man he had been forced to become.

"I'm afraid, Minerva," he whispered. "Deathly. For the first time in many years."

The graying witch lifted her hand and rubbed his back reassuringly, feeling muscles tense then relax underneath her hand. She turned her head to look up at him and gave him a little smile.

"He'll be fine, child. We will all be fine."

A smirk twisted the lips of the man at her side and then his sharp, bitter voice was back.

"Are we a Seer now, Minerva?"

"No."

Snape looked down at her and found her to be looking up through a window at the cheery blue sky outside.

"An optimist," she finished before Poppy Pomfrey burst through the hospital wing doors and dragged Snape in by his ear, all the while shouting about foolish men and their ways.

- - -

Myelin looked at Hermione as she approached and already had her portrait swinging open before the girl could say a word.

"Go on in," she whispered. "But be careful."

The bushy-haired teenager frowned, confused by the portrait's words but moved into the main part of Harry's rooms. Myelin's portrait closed behind her with a dull thump and she looked around the room for any sign of the young man she loved.

Not seeing anything in the main room, she walked over to the half-closed door that led to his bedroom and pushed it open. Inside on the bed lay Meru and Wencia, both tucked lovingly underneath the blankets and sleeping soundly. The latter of two had tear tracks down her face and Hermione could see one of her hand's clenching convulsively at the sheets.

She then heard the sound of the fireplace coming to life and turning to find Harry standing there with his back to her wearing only a pair of blue jeans. His tail, which nearly reached the floor now to her surprise, flicked idly about his ankles as both his ears swiveled back towards her. He turned slightly as she walked across the room to stand beside him then looked back into the depths of the fire when she made it there.

They stood like that for a long moment before Hermione softly said, "You told Wen."

"Hai."

"Why?"

"I saw the Prophet this morning," replied Harry. "Hence my absence from classes. Wen also saw it. She came to ask if it was true at the same time Meru came to make sure I didn't do anything…drastic."

Hermione frowned then looked towards the table nearby. A copy of the Daily Prophet lay on it, the front page showing a picture and an article that chilled her to the very marrow of her bones.

"How?" she whispered, reaching out to touch then paper then pulling back away from it, as though it were acid or something equally vicious.

"Our dear friend Voldemort if I'm not mistaken," replied Harry with a growl in his voice. "As if he hasn't already plunked enough shit on my plate."

Hermione looked up at him then and found him looking at her with feline eyes that burned with barely suppressed rage. She took hurried steps toward him then, bridging the gap between them and pressing her face into his chest. Her hands reached up to brush over his shoulders, following the faint lines of striping down to his elbows, as his arms came around her.

"I want to kill him," she heard him growl, the demon half of him showing through in the darkness of his voice. "I want to kill him for everything he has done to my family and those I love."

She looked up at him and whispered, "Revenge isn't the way, Harry."

Emerald eyes looked down at her and he sighed.

"I know. But Merlin, I want it so much!" He frowned and moved away from her, beginning to pace in front of the fireplace, tail flicking angrily behind him. "And that's just it! I want to hurt him for what he did to you. So does the other half of me…and much more strongly. It's…it's hard to keep the urge to hunt him down and rip him limb from limb at bay."

"You have to," said Hermione. "I – I can't lose you."

Harry's pacing ceased and he turned to look at her, deep sadness in his eyes and face.

"I cannot lose you either," he whispered. "You're nearly all I have left."

"What about Will…"

Hermione trailed off as she looked down at the Prophet and saw the small article underneath the one about Harry. It was about his foster parents Haia and William Chamberlain, who had both been found dead in their home a week ago. The article didn't say anything about them being his foster parents as that fact wasn't a well-known one in England but it did tell how they died. Apparently Voldemort had found out about them somehow and had sent a few of his Death Eater's to take care of them. The Dark Mark reported hovering above their apartment building was proof enough of that.

"Oh my God…"

"He killed them," whispered Harry. Hermione looked up at him and found him staring into the fireplace. Then he looked at her and she nearly cried at the look in his eyes.

He looked so lost…

The bushy-haired girl rushed across the space between them in the same moment as the han-akurei's knees went out from under him. She caught him in her arms and they fell to the floor together in a heap, with him sobbing quietly into her shoulder.

Hermione, heart aching for Harry, gathered him against her as he cried for his loss. She ran her hands gently over his back in circles, grimacing with each muscle spasm she felt.

Silently she cursed Voldemort and his Death Eater's for all they'd done. To her, to the wizarding world, to the Muggle world, and to the half-demon teenager in her arms who had never asked to be what his was or fated to face one of the darkest wizards in all of Creation.

"If you don't kill him, Harry," she whispered fiercely as she ran her fingers through his dark hair, "I will."

"And I'll do it with a damn smile," she added in a low growl.

Translations

Chyfrgolla 'i at Annwfn a bacia: Damn it to Hell and back!

A chyfrgolla 'ch at Annwfn cystal Albus! Dyma pawb 'ch anaf: And damn you to Hell as well, Albus! This is all your fault!