Beta love to the lovely CarbConnoisseur.
Thank you for all the reviews, it gets a wee bit less sad after this one!
The week was quiet, as Charlus demanded that the Order take time to process before they decided on their next move. Hermione had locked herself away in an effort to control her grief. Draco alternated between attempting to comfort her and losing himself inside his own head. He had taken to wandering the grounds of Potter manor in random paths to give himself something to do. Remus joined him frequently, attempting to provide comfort while Hermione was absent. Charlus found him by the pond, his tall frame curled in on itself. He was longer sickly thin, but he was still only an echo of the man he should have been.
"How are you doing?" he asked softly, sitting down next to him.
Draco shrugged, not looking at him. "I'm better than Hermione."
"I gather that would not be particularly difficult. Severus is in speaking with her now."
"She let him in?"
Charlus huffed out a laugh. "I don't think he gave her much choice. Thankfully he has a strong shield charm."
Draco laughed quietly. "He was always good at getting through to her when no one else could."
"I believe it's a case of shared stubbornness," Charlus replied with some amusement.
"Something like that," Draco agreed softly.
"You're avoiding my question," Charlus pointed out, not looking at him.
"I know."
"It won't help, you know."
Draco sighed, seeming to deflate. "I know. I….we had no time, really, to deal with any of it. And…they're all gone. Gods I didn't even like Weasley and I'd give just about anything to see him walk through that door and throw a fucking insult at me because at least that way he'd be alive."
"And one day he will be. Not the Weasley you knew, but a version of him. You're doing this for them," Charlus reminded him gently.
"And that's another thing! I know we have to do this, I do. Hermione would never fucking allow it any other way and I refuse to let her go without me, but when the fuck does it stop? When do we stop giving? She might actually die this time. Dumbledore sure as fuck doesn't care about her safety. I….and if she doesn't…. what happens when she loses someone else? She's barely functioning as it is."
Charlus sighed, attempting to marshall his thoughts. "I don't have an answer to that," he admitted softly, deciding that voicing just how worried he was about his granddaughter was not the best course of action. "We are going to do everything we can to ensure minimal casualties, but we both know any promises I may make would be empty ones. Hermione is stronger than anyone seems to want to give her credit for. She is here. She is willing to help. I know that she is struggling, but the fact that she hasn't given up tells me that she'll be alright eventually."
"What if she's just keeping going until it's all over and she can finally give herself permission to die?" Draco asked quietly, holding his body tense as if dreading confirmation of his fears.
"Do you think that's what she's doing?" Charlus asked gently.
"I don't know! She won't fucking talk to me!" Draco exclaimed like it had been ripped from him.
"I think she's just as scared as you are. You know she's just as scared as you are. She told you," Charlus reminded him finally.
"I don't know how to help her," Draco confessed softly, instead of acknowledging Charlus' reminder.
"Then perhaps….perhaps what you need to do to help her is just be there. Allow others to attempt to force her to talk. Severus seems the sort to not take no for an answer if he's convinced he's right. Maybe what she needs is someone who just allows her to be." Draco swallowed harshly but nodded. "And Draco? You must take care of yourself too. Hermione is not the only one who lost people."
"No," he acknowledged softly. "But she lost more. I….friends are a strange thing in Slytherin. I'm not saying we don't have them, but there are rules and expectations and hierarchies. Blaise was a friend. But for all he eventually joined the right side, I couldn't tell him about Hermione. It put us all at risk and I was never sure where his loyalties lie. Vince and Greg….they should have been friends, but they believed the doctrine. They'd have turned on me quicker than I could blink if they'd known what I really believed. Theo didn't believe either, but he would never have defied his father. He was too scared and that made him dangerous. He was so starved for affection that he would have offered Hermione up without a second thought just to gain some approval. Pansy…Pans wanted to be a perfect pureblood wife. She believed what we were taught and because she didn't know anything else she hid her real personality behind the veneer she thought we wanted to see. She very much had her eye on becoming my wife and she would have seen it as her duty to save me from sullying myself with a mudblood. Daph and Astoria kept out of it. The Greengrasses fled to remain neutral, but because their stance was the same as they had in the first war, there was a divide. Staunch followers didn't trust them and I had to act like a believer, first to escape my father's punishment and later to stay alive. Tracy Davis was a half-blood. She also escaped the country with her muggleborn mother to prevent her from being locked in Azkaban. And well….half-bloods in Slytherin are a rarity. She was not safe to get to know too closely. I think if the war hadn't happened once we were out of school the friendships could have become something real with some of them. But in school, while we were still under our parent's thumbs? Everything was political and everything was watched and relayed back. It was fucking awful a lot of the time. I have never had a friendship like Hermione had with Potter and Weasley. I miss my mother. I loved her, but even she didn't truly support me. She could have gotten us out, but she believed that muggleborns were below us. Even knowing I loved Hermione, she hoped it was a phase. She might have helped us escape that night, but it was only after I incapacitated my father. She was happy to watch as the love of my life was tortured in front of us by my fucking deranged aunt. She was just another muggleborn who wasn't worth her time as far as she was concerned. If anything, it would have suited her for Hermione to have died, that way she wouldn't have had to worry about me sullying her precious pureblooded line. Did Hermione tell you what happened to her parents?"
Charlus shook his head as he desperately tried to process Draco's explanation. "No. She mentioned all she had was Harry, but she never explained how."
"She obliviated them. Erased all memories of her and sent them to Australia to keep them safe. She loved them so much that she was willing to never have them know her again and…I….I don't think anyone other than her has ever even come close to loving me like that. So yes, I've lost people too, but I'm not sure I really had many of them to begin with. It is not the same."
Allowing the silence to fall, Charlus contemplated how fucking awful Draco's words were as he struggled to comfort the broken love-starved boy next to him. There truly was nothing he could say.
"Hermione, you are going to talk to me," Severus demanded, sitting gingerly on the bed next to the witch who was curled into a ball beneath the covers. "People are worried," he continued softly. "I am worried and Draco….Draco is lost. Come on Pygmy Puff, don't shut us out."
Hermione turned slowly and Severus almost winced at the sight of her pale face and red-rimmed eyes. She looked fucking awful. "I don't know how to do this, Severus," she said softly. "I…I knew they were dead, but I don't think I had really processed what that meant. I'm….I'm never going to see them again, not my versions. They're all gone." She looked up at him, tears already falling. "I don't want them to be gone, Severus. I want them here. I need them here. Please….Please, I need them."
"Oh, Hermione," he whispered, gathering the now sobbing witch to him. "It's going to be ok."
"How?"
"I….I don't know. I don't know, but it will be. It has to be. You deserve at least that."
"It'll never be them though Severus," she sobbed. "They're all dead. I let all of them die. Couldn't I have done something? Insisted on bringing more of us back earlier? Why did they all have to die? It's not fair! None of it is fucking fair! Why did they have to die? Why was it me who lived?"
"You did not let them die," he whispered harshly into her hair. "This is not your fault. You are the one giving up everything to give them the life they deserved, the life you deserved."
"I…I just want them back," she sobbed. "I don't want to have to give them up."
"I know," he crooned softly, slightly horrified to find his face wet. "I know you do, and I wish I could do that for you, but I can't. All we can do is end this, Hermione. Give them the life they should have had."
"I want the life we should all have had too," she whispered.
"I know, little puff. And I'm sorry you can't have it."
"When will it stop hurting Severus?" she asked finally, her voice small.
"I don't think it does," he replied honestly. "I think you just learn to live with it."
With Hermione dozing on his chest, Severus settled himself on the bed, wondering how the fuck he had ended up here. He had no idea what he was doing. Surely this was some alternative universe when he was considered the best person to comfort another human being? And yet…she had refused to speak to anyone else. Not that what she had said to him had been helpful. He couldn't raise the dead, however much he fucking wished he could. But still, her trust in him was…intoxicating. No one trusted him, not completely, and yet this broken little witch seemed to. Honorary Uncle was how she'd described the Severus from her time. It was fucking baffling, and yet he couldn't deny the connection. Perhaps not Uncle. He was not yet that old. But cousin? Sibling? Something like that. And he had no idea what to do with it.
"It's jist me, lass. Yer Grandmother said I could jist come up." Severus' eyes widened at the sight of the elderly witch. "Oh. An' whae might you be, my lad?"
"Severus Snape," he replied stiffly.
"Healer McMillan," she responded with a slight smile. "Where's yon laddie?"
"Draco?"
"Aye."
"I do not know. Things have been….difficult."
"Mair difficult than their usual?" the witch asked in surprise.
"I do not know what you know," he huffed.
"Not much, Mr. Snape," Madam Pomfrey bustled in behind the odd little witch. "But we're bound by so many oaths you can speak reasonably freely."
Severus nodded slowly, weighing up the options. "You are aware of where Hermione and Draco came from?" Both witches nodded. "They finished explaining the events leading up to their relocation at the end of last week. I think those events are just hitting them now."
"We knew it wisna guid lad, but I get the impression I canna quite comprehend how bad it was." Healer McMillan murmured, her face drawn into a sympathetic frown her eyes on Hermione.
"No," Severus replied softly, looking down at the sleeping witch. "Everyone was dead. She is….mourning and struggling with it."
"Everyone?" Poppy gasped.
"Yes. They lost everything."
"Dorea sent me up," Draco announced from the door, looking warily around the room's occupants before his eyes fell on Hermione. "She finally gave in then," he said softly, wandering over to the bed and running a hand over her head.
"Yes. I imagine sleep is required to replenish her tears. The gods know she cannot have any left currently."
Dracos' lip twitched. "Thank you."
"For?"
"Getting her to talk."
Severus shrugged awkwardly. "I did not do much. Certainly not enough anyway."
Draco hummed. "It's more than the rest of us have managed," he sighed. "Stubborn witch."
"I do not know how to hand her over without waking her." Severus muttered uncomfortably.
"You don't. I'm impressed she's stayed asleep through us talking. She really must be exhausted."
"Perhaps today is no the day to be lookin' tae be daein anythin ither than a check-up then laddie. I kin come back nixt week, anither week'll no dae ony hairm tae yer hearts. In fact, it might jist help," Healer Mcmillan interjected softly.
Draco nodded. "I'll trust your judgement. I don't think she could handle anything else right now."
The Healer smiled gently. "Dinna fash laddie. That lass o' yours is a strong one. She'll be alright in the end. Now then, as the lass'll require some wrangling, we'll start wi' you I think." Draco nodded warily. "We kin dae it in anither room lad."
"It's fine."
"Yer sure, lad?"
"Yes," Draco sighed, sitting down at the end of the bed.
"Verra well." The healer raised her wand. "Malnutrition is better. Nerves look much better. Heart is stable. Weight's coming up. Reproductive system looks better," the healer murmured as Poppy took notes. "Right, ye'll need those twae extra weeks o' the nerve potion, but ye should be grand aifter that. Yer weight isna healthy but is a damn sight better than it wiz. The malnutrition is almost gone. Those nutrition potions are dain their jobs weel. Anither week or twae and ye kin come aff them. Now, there's a wee bit I kin see I missed now some o the ither damage is healin' so if ye dinna mind, I'd like tae hae anither go. It shouldna hurt as much as before."
"Do I need to lie down?" Draco sighed.
"It does mak it easier," Isobelle agreed with a sympathetic smile.
"Fine. We'll need to go to another room."
"No you don't. I'm awake," Hermine mumbled, her eyes still firmly shut.
"Yes, you look it, Princess," Draco said drily.
"Just tired," she yawned. "Severus is surprisingly comfortable."
Draco snorted. "I'll be sure to remember that next time you can't sleep." She hummed, not moving. "Princess, you need to actually move if I'm going to lie down."
"Oh. Sorry. Sleepy."
"We'd noticed. Go back to sleep Princess," he murmured, running a hand over her head.
"Kay."
Draco huffed out a laugh as she snuggled back into Severus and promptly went back to sleep.
"You can't just leave me here!" Severus hissed.
"Why not? She's sleeping." Draco grinned, there was something reassuringly familiar about Severus' discomfort. The elder version of him had been similar.
"I am not a mattress!"
"You are currently," Draco snorted. "I'll come back and try and persuade her to move in a bit," he promised, following the Healer and Madam Pomphrey out of the room, leaving Severus to help Hermione put the pieces back together, whether he wanted to or not.