End of March, Saturday Morning

Spinner's End

Despite wanting to leave early that Friday since Hermione was due to arrive in the evening, Severus had been forced to stay at the workshop with the over-night brews until it was late enough to be early and Vulchanov came down to the labs to check on something for his own brews. He wiped the sweat from his brow with a piece of cloth and muttered under his breath while adding the Salamander blood to the three cauldrons of Fire Protection Potion.

"I heard Warrington talk to Master," the soft-spoken Bulgarian said. "He said he was busy with an important errand for the Dark Lord and that you had said you could take the brews. Then I heard him say to his friends that he stuck you with the overnights so that he could go to a party."

Severus growled in frustration. It didn't surprise him too much, the younger wizard had a nasty attitude and still always managed to come out on top, pushing all the real work on Vulchanov and himself.

"If you tell me how to make this work, I can check them. Go back to your witch." Vulchanov pointed at his own research brews, two cauldrons that simmered over a low flame in the corner.

He wasn't used to accepting help from others, but the offer was very tempting. Walking over to the brews the older Apprentice was working on, he sniffed the cauldrons and checked the viscosity with a stirring rod. "You need a bit more Horklump juice and Staghorn powder to balance the snake fangs. Are you sure?"

Vulchanov nodded. "Thanks. Go before Warrington comes back."

With another nod at Vulchanov, Severus Apparated back to Spinner's End.

The witch was already asleep, but the knowledge that she was there was comforting, somehow. She'd left a cup of tea and a sandwich from Hogwarts in stasis for him in the kitchen, even. He finished both before heading to his own bed, nodding at Crookshanks who was watching him from outside the door to Hermione's bedroom.

~oo~oo~oo~oo~

It was well past morning when he woke up, feeling more rested than in a long time. The past months had been hectic, with long days at the workshop, starting early in the morning with a run and some strength training and then busy all day with brews for his Master and his own research, peppered with constant interruptions when Master Pyrites shouted at Warrington for yet another mistake or when Severus needed to handle a customer order or a delivery.

As he rose and stretched, he decided to forgo the morning run in favour of a long shower. He could afford one lazy day before returning to his Mastery preparations. Well… half a day, perhaps. A few hours, at least.

The door to Hermione's bedroom was open, and she was clearly not in. Crookshanks appeared in the doorway again and moved to stand in front of him as he headed for the bathroom. The cat meowed at him, clearly wanting something. Severus stopped, looking at the ugly creature who meowed yet again with his head cocked to the side as if assessing him. Did the cat want him to go into Hermione's room? When he took a step in that direction the cat meowed again and slipped inside before him, turning to make sure Severus was following.

The room was airier and lighter than when he had stayed in it as a boy. She must have done something to the wallpaper, and the lampshade was new. The cat meowed again and jumped onto the bed. He scratched at the covers, managing to snag them on his claws and pull them back a bit. Severus stepped up to help since the cat obviously wanted something, and then he froze. There were reddish-brown stains both on the pillow, towards the edge where her neck might have rested, and smudged stains on the bottom sheet beside the pillow. Was it blood? The half-Kneazle meowed again, as if to confirm that this was what he had wanted Severus to see, and then hopped off the bed to leave the room.

Dread filled him when he recalled what she'd looked like when she first arrived, with a cut on her neck and a slur carved into her arm. Was it possible that they still hadn't healed? But why hadn't she said anything to him? And how could he have forgotten about it? He knew the cuts were cursed, he'd seen up close what cursed blades and hexes could do, but he hadn't even cared enough to ask.

Restlessly he fixed himself a quick meal of eggs and toast and tried to scour his meagre library for more hints he knew didn't exist there. She had said Bellatrix was behind it, something Severus found all too easy to believe considering the witch's behaviour over the past few months especially, during raids and duelling evenings for the Dark Lord.

The front door opened and she entered the small room, carrying some grocery bags and a large box, humming slightly out of tune. She did a double take when she saw him and almost dropped the box.

"Hi?" she said, almost questioning. "I didn't hear you come in last night."

"Show me your neck and arm." He rose to take the bags from her. "Hermione?"

She froze, her lower lip stuck between her teeth. He tamped down the impulse to free it.

"Now?" She sounded hesitant. "I mean…"

With a wave of his wand the groceries flew to the correct spot in the kitchen, and he turned his attention back to her. "Will you do it or shall I?" He pointed his wand at her left arm.

She muttered something under her breath but started to roll up the sleeve of her cardigan before thrusting her arm out to him. It looked normal but there was a faint shimmer of a Glamour, which he promptly cancelled with a non-verbal Finite. The gruesome wound appeared, covering the length of her arm. Meanwhile she'd also pulled aside her hair and cancelled the Glamour she wore there, showing the gash along her throat. He reached for her arm, tracing the letters with a finger.

There was a clump in his throat. It was worse than he'd thought. The cut on her neck was both deeper and longer than it had been when he first saw it, and it was the same with the letters on her arm. Although the word on her arm was awful it was the cut on her neck that was the most critical. It was close to her carotid artery and wouldn't need to grow much more to kill her. "Why haven't you said anything?" He felt himself grow angry although he wasn't sure who was the target, Bellatrix probably.

She tried to pull her arm back but he held on to it. "I don't know! I lost track, I got used to it, I didn't want to go to Madam Pomfrey and try to explain it! I've been keeping them Glamoured but they open at night or when I've been casting a lot of spells."

He cast a couple of diagnostic charms over her arm, figuring he'd start there. He could almost sense the slick taint of Dark magic pulsating slowly along the lines of the cuts, feeding on her own magic to fester and grow deeper. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment to centre himself, before looking back at her. "This is really bad, you know. If I don't do something…" He trailed off, not wanting to say it. It felt so unfair, that she'd come all this way to help him and then risk death due to something that had happened before she even arrived.

"Can you heal it?" She looked afraid now, understandably, and that made him angry again.

He shook his head. "Not completely but I can try to stall it. I need to have the knife to cure it, or at least the caster, to know what the curse was."

"Please," she whispered.

Raising a hand to her neck he gently touched the area just below the cut, making her shiver. He needed to get this right or he'd end up speeding up the curse's progress, but he'd never attempted it before. At least the theory was sound. He took a deep breath, and began chanting. A pearlescent bubble appeared on her skin, surrounding the wound. Checking carefully that her carotid artery was outside the boundary he finalised the incantation and the bubble shimmered out of view. Relief welled up inside when he saw it had worked, at least for the moment. He did the same on her arm, encasing the whole word in a large bubble. He'd wanted to start with her neck since that was the most critical wound, in case the contained Dark magic reacted badly and lashed out when he cast the spell again.

"What was that? I feel…" Hermione looked at him with large eyes, looking a bit flushed and out of breath for some reason.

He cleared his throat. "It should seal off the area so the curse doesn't try to escape when I purge it. I don't think I can get all of it but perhaps drain it a bit." He inspected the wounds again. The cut on her throat almost seemed to hiss, malevolently. He could feel the curse simmering in the wound, trying to spread, but the containment seemed to hold and would keep it away from her artery. He aimed his wand at the cut again and took a deep breath to focus.

"Vulnera sanentur," he half sang, half chanted, focusing his magic deep into her flesh. The curse resisted him and hissed but some of the Darkness seeped out like smoke, and the redness receded a little. He kept it up until it was clear nothing more would happen. It wasn't healed and would start to spread again but this time it would have to eat through his magic first before attacking hers. He could reapply it but not indefinitely, a few times at most.

"I feel strange," she whispered, and he barely managed to catch her when she fainted. Swearing he clumsily manoeuvred her over to the couch and put her down. She was breathing and otherwise seemed fine, so he continued the process on her arm. It fought worse than the other wound but he managed to wring a little of the Darkness out of it before having to quit, feeling completely spent himself, black spots dancing in the periphery of his vision.

He woke her up with a Rennervate and then barely made it to the armchair before passing out, but the black spots gradually cleared.

She sat up shakily and looked at her arm. "Thank you, it feels a lot better already. But I can feel your magic?"

"Sorry," he muttered. He couldn't do much about that.

"No, no it's nice."

He shook his head, not believing her.

She seemed better, at least, and went to the kitchen to put on some more tea. He hoped his efforts would buy them enough time so he could find a cure.

~oo~oo~oo~oo~

Severus went for a run after finishing yet another cup of tea. He felt jittery and angry, and it felt as if the Dark magic he'd syphoned out from Hermione's wounds clung to his hands. Menace arrived when he made it back to the house, cawing at him from the treetops. Everything felt a lot better after a shower, and he went to rejoin Hermione in the sitting room where she was unpacking the box she'd brought.

"Gargnak helped me buy a Pensieve. They're awfully expensive so I'm going to be paying it off until I'm eighty but we need one."

He nodded as if he knew what a Pensieve was. The object in question was a large silvery shallow dish with etched markings around the edge. When he touched it he noticed it was made from platinum, not silver, and it seemed to hum under his touch.

"Let's eat first. I think we have pasta and some chicken." Hermione went ahead of him and started pulling things out from the cupboards.

Between the two of them it was easy to put together something edible, with some onion, garlic and cream to go with the pasta and chicken. He liked that about her, that she was easy to work with. He'd almost gotten used to it, having someone there who didn't mind being around him, who could think for themselves and adjust as needed.

After dinner was cleared away they went back to the sitting room. Hermione brought out a small vial and poured the contents into the bowl. Shimmery smoke swirled in the bowl, almost threatening to evaporate but somehow staying inside the Pensieve. What looked like wispy shadow figures emerged and disappeared into the mist, but he couldn't make out their faces. Some of them did look familiar, though.

She looked a bit wary when she looked at him again. "Your old memories. Or his. He was dying, basically, so I don't think there was much time to choose."

"Can two people enter at the same time?"

Hermione frowned but then she nodded. "I think so, yes, but I've seen these already so I think it's better if you go alone, if you don't mind. Just lower your face to the mist and you'll appear in the memories. You can't change anything in them, of course."

Severus frowned, it felt a bit wrong for her to see his memories, even if they weren't exactly his. Still, there was nothing for it, he couldn't change what had already happened. The thought made him snort, after all she had come back to do just that, but there was no use dwelling on it. He took a deep breath and dove in, falling into the hazy mist until memories formed around him.

It was odd to see his own memories as if a third party had lived them. Some details weren't exactly as he recalled them, some parts were hazy and others skipped or enhanced. He didn't think they had been doctored, though, merely distorted through the lens of time, but it was still hard to watch himself as a young boy and teenager, scrawny and ugly and poor. He knew how others saw him, but apparently he thought of himself that way too. Shaking his head, trying to make sense of the pronouns, he continued to watch the scenes.

The event with the prophecy happened as Hermione had described it, but it was still disturbing. Watching the outcomes of his choice was worse, however. Going to Dumbledore, the Dark Lord making promises, and then Lily… it was almost too much. The aftermath was strange, but at least it allowed him to regain his equilibrium as his older self went through the motions at Hogwarts. The scenes with a now much older Headmaster and something about a sword weren't very interesting, but they did clearly show what side his older self had been on. He did seem to care about Lily's boy too, for some reason.

In the end he had more questions than answers, and a sense of complete befuddlement when trying to integrate his older self's memories with his own. Disoriented he shook his head and tried to focus. Eventually her face swam into view, and another question arose in his mind.

"Show me that last day, Hermione." It was not quite an order, but more than a request.

She bit her lip and looked very nervous. "Are you absolutely sure?"

"I need to know." Not that he was sure, but perhaps it could clarify some things.

She took a deep breath. "Alright. You asked. I won't keep things from you, so I'll show you. This is the last day, my friends and I had just flown from Gringotts, we broke into the Lestranges' vault and escaped on the back of a dragon. This is from when we come to Hogsmeade."

"You broke into Gringotts…?" Severus felt himself starting to grin, that sounded wild. "Stole from Bellatrix and rode a dragon? You have to show me that too some day."

She shuddered and gestured at the Pensieve. "It was horrible but we had to. I can't go back to this, I'm sorry but I just can't. You already saw Harry in those memories, you know he was my friend. You'll recognise some of the Professors, then there are a bunch of Weasleys, you'll spot those easily from the hair."

Nodding at her he once again dipped his head into the swirling mist. This time the memories were different, the feel of them, since they belonged to someone else. Severus recognised her friend who looked like Potter but not quite and the other one, a Weasley, and tagged along quietly as they made their way up through the Castle, getting caught up in her last day in her original timeline. They looked dreadful, all of them, and as events unfurled he couldn't believe the scale of the destruction going on around them. How had anyone survived that?

A long time later he pulled out of the Pensieve. It was hard to breathe, something heavy was sitting on his chest and he didn't know how to dislodge it. She looked wary, as if half in flight already.

He didn't know what to say, and so he just stared at her. She crumpled.

"I just left you there, Severus! I'm so, so sorry! You were all alone and you died in that awful shack where you were almost killed by Remus earlier and I didn't help you!"

She was sobbing, snot and tears running down her face until she hid it in her hands.

"It's alright, Hermione," he tried. "I'm here, now."

She sobbed harder and shook her head. "No it isn't alright! You died alone and in pain and abandoned by everyone, how is that ever alright?"

Why was she crying over him? It didn't make sense. "I forgive you. I'm quite sure he forgives you, too, since I'm him."

That didn't help. Reluctantly he tried something else. "Come here, you."

He held out his arms for her and she fell into them as if it was completely natural for him, Severus Snape, to go around hugging girls like that. She smelled nice, her hair had some jasmine scents from her shampoo and her lotion must have been peach scented. He kept talking to her, as if to a wounded animal, and slowly she calmed down and relaxed further in his arms, melting against his chest. She was short enough for him to tuck her head under his chin, if he angled it just right.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"It's okay. You saved me from becoming a teacher, you know."

Slowly she calmed down, but stayed where she was. Severus didn't dare to move, for fear of upsetting her again. After a while longer she extricated herself with a muttered apology and a blush, and went to make yet another pot of tea.

He felt confused and distracted, by her softness and the way she smiled at him, by the rounded hint of a breast through her blouse and the way her hips swayed when she walked. The sudden urge to kiss her was alarming in its strength, and he hurried to dislodge himself while trying not to upset her further. She's not for you, Severus, his mind supplied. She'll end up with Regulus, or someone else with a pedigree and a Gringotts vault. Stop making a fool of yourself.

It didn't help though. The way she argued with him, the concern in her eyes when he'd been out on a raid, the way she actually trusted him even when she knew who and what he was. Her sharp intellect that rivalled his, challenging him to think in new patterns, breaking him out of pre-conceived notions and prejudices he didn't even know he had. There was also something about her that awakened his protective instincts. He wanted, no needed, to keep her safe, to know she was fine.

Later that night, in the shower, it wasn't Lily he pictured when he touched himself.

~oo~oo~oo~oo~

Weekend

Spinner's End

That night Hermione had trouble falling asleep. The day had been a lot more intense than she'd expected that morning. She lay in the narrow bed, looking up at the ceiling and the pattern of shadows cast by stray light from somewhere. Her arm and throat tingled, the Dark influence from the wounds shielded by Severus' magic. It felt strong, fierce, proud, humming against her skin. She hadn't realised how much the wounds affected her, not until they were subdued. He had said they needed to be removed properly or they'd grow back again, but she figured they'd work something out before that happened, between the two of them.

She sighed again. Everything felt so confusing. In one way, it had been a relief to show Severus… the one here, now, the memories she'd brought from his future self. At the same time it had been inordinately painful to revisit the events during that horrible war. It was all still so vivid. Hogwarts during that final battle, all the deaths, narrowly escaping the Fiendfyre in the Room of Requirement, finding the basilisk corpse in the Chamber of Secrets, and of course the memory of his older self's final hour in that awful shack. Extracting those memories had brought a relief she didn't know she needed, but then it had all come crashing back when she replaced them again.

He'd been kind to her. Even held her when she broke down. There was something about him that she found very intriguing, even without thinking too much about what he could potentially become. Compared to his older self, young Severus Snape was hot-headed and prickly when she engaged him in discussions, but also more open and less cynical and bitter. The bad hair was apparently constant, and his lankiness hadn't changed much over the years although it was hard to tell what he'd hidden underneath his billowing teaching robes while at Hogwarts. Their conversations over owl-and-Menace post didn't help clarify the issue either. In the beginning his notes had been short and to the point, but as time wore on he'd started to write about his own thoughts and experiences at the workshop. He could be wickedly funny, in that sharp kind of way, and always challenged her own ideas and thoughts.

Even when he berated her for not treating the cursed wounds she'd mainly felt relief, not annoyance. And his magic… when he chanted over her throat and his magic pulsed through her she'd felt flushed, out of breath, her stomach getting heavy. His hands, his long, deft fingers had touched her ever so gently, and then he'd held her close when she cried. It had been the smell of potions ingredients and something else, something male, mixed with sandalwood and cedar, maybe from his robes. He'd been close, close enough to… to kiss…

She sat up in bed, suddenly all too awake. Had she wanted to kiss Severus Snape? The last person she'd kissed was Ron Weasley, after destroying a Horcrux down in the Chamber of Secrets, and the main impression from that had been relief — over the Horcrux, not the kiss — and how wet and sloppy it had been. Viktor Krum had been a better kisser, not that they'd gone much further. She had barely thought about Ron since arriving back in time. Harry, yes, and several of the others, especially the ones she saw again in this time. But not Ron, and definitely not as boyfriend material… or even just for kissing. No, Ron wouldn't have been right for her. She wanted someone different. Someone intelligent enough to keep up with her, someone who had enough confidence in their own skills to let her find her own paths in life, someone with deft hands and long fingers and strong powerful magic that would wrap around her like velvet, who knew her and her history and who understood why she made the choices she had to make, someone who knew loyalty and what it was like to do what was right even if it was difficult, and a deep voice and dark hair…

Gods. No. She couldn't have a crush on Severus Snape. Never.

But the thought of him kept coming back. His shy half smile over a cup of tea in the morning, the way he'd felt pressed against her back under Harry's cloak when they spied on Professor Dumbledore at the Hog's Head, feeling her arm tingling with his magic, the way he traced his lips with a finger when thinking about something.

With a groan she pulled the pillow out from under her head and put it over her face instead. It didn't help. She was still, undoubtedly, attracted to one Severus Snape.

~oo~oo~oo~oo~

Monday

Spinner's End

Monday morning arrived and Severus found it hard to rise early for a run. He hadn't slept well the past few nights, and Sunday had been spent at the workshop after receiving an owl from Vulchanov to help out with a big order. Too much was swirling in his head, but the chilly morning run at least cleared his head. He needed details, and he needed to save her. There was no other option.

The day went by blessedly fast, at least. He had decided to present the mood-lifting potion to the Guild Masters, the one he'd finally perfected with the help from his older self's notes. It was relatively straightforward but still a substantial improvement over the common version. What he needed to focus on for the moment was learning everything else he needed to know, all the advanced brewing techniques, where to harvest and prepare ingredients, and the like. This knowledge was more difficult to gain on his own, but at least his notes gave him a starting point, again.

Despite it being a weekday he returned to Spinner's End again that evening. Hermione was sitting on the couch with a stack of his books on Dark objects on the table, and several notebooks and parchments out. She had ink marks on her cheek and fingers, and seemed a bit flustered when she looked up at him.

"Hi, is it evening already? I didn't think you'd come back until the weekend. Err, I mean, I'm happy to see you, I just thought you had a lot to do at the workshop?"

"The memory? Show me, I need to know."

"What? Oh…" She looked down, a hand on her arm. After a moment she rose and went to the Pensieve which was placed on a high shelf. She took it down and placed it on the side table, perched on a couple of books. She grimaced and pulled out a wispy memory strand, shuddering as she deposited it in the shallow dish.

Some time much later he emerged from the Pensieve and managed to rush to the kitchen where he threw up in the sink. Hearing about it was one thing but seeing it up close like that… He shuddered, wiped his mouth and accepted the cup of tea Hermione had made while he was in the Pensieve.

"I saw the knife," he said hoarsely after cleaning the sink with a quick Evanesco and rinsing his mouth with some water. He'd known Bellatrix was vicious, but this was on a completely different level. And seeing Lucius and Narcissa like that, pale and miserable but accepting that a young witch was tortured in their home, with Lucius wanting to call the Dark Lord to continue the torture just to gain some marginal amount of standing, was nauseating in itself. Their son appeared to be decent, at least, even if he was too weak to actually take a stand. But how could she live through that and remain sane? He shook his head, trying to focus. "I'll try to see if she has it, I haven't seen her with it so far but that doesn't have to mean she doesn't have it."

Hermione nodded slowly. "She probably has another thing too which we need to get hold of, I'm not sure of the timing though but it would make sense to look for both at the same time. Not sure, it was in her Gringotts vault in my timeline but don't know when she put it there, or when she got it to be honest."

"Now you're being all confusing again. What was it?"

"Helga Hufflepuff's cup. Hold on, you can see for yourself. Hope it's not at Gringotts this time, I don't want to do that again."

She lifted the memories he'd just viewed from the Pensieve but hesitated with the wispy strand still hanging from her wand. "I don't want this back in my head," she said quietly.

Severus nodded. That was understandable, he'd rather forget it as well. Her shrieks… The memory had faded to black at one point, likely due to her losing consciousness, and then resumed with her resting on a bed somewhere with a pale blonde witch trying to bind the wounds. He Summoned an empty Potions vial from his bedroom where he always ended up with a stash of them, and handed it to her silently. She deposited the memories inside and stoppered the vial.

"You have to keep that safe."

Severus didn't want to think about the consequences if those memories fell into the wrong hands, after all. He would have to work hard on Occluding them from his own mind, too.

Hermione nodded. "I'll keep them up in my room for now, you don't get many visitors anyway." She deposited another strand of memories in the Pensieve, and stepped back to let him enter it again.

Severus braced himself before entering, but this time the memories weren't as traumatic. They clearly started at some point not long after the previous set had ended, in a beach house somewhere, and the plan was completely mad. Breaking into Gringotts through impersonating a mad witch using Polyjuice? That they succeeded and actually made it out with the cup and in one piece was purely down to plain dumb luck, nothing else. It did explain the wand she'd brought back in time, however.

He was deposited back in the real world, feeling a bit disoriented. She was perched on the couch, feet pulled up underneath her, with a cup of tea in her hands. Another cup was deposited close to the Pensieve, he noticed. "That was… I cannot believe you pulled it off. What if the Goblins had caught you?"

She shrugged and looked at him over her cup. "I know. Hopefully I won't have to do it again, but if I have to, I will."

"That's almost Gryffindor of you." He raised an eyebrow at her.

To his surprise, she grinned at him. "Didn't I tell you? I was a Gryffindor, back when."

Well, that may explain it. They were all mad, after all. They fixed a quick dinner of sandwiches and more tea, neither of them feeling up for cooking. They didn't speak much, both of them lost in their own worlds.

"We need to start doing things, we need to meet up with Regulus too," she said suddenly.

Severus frowned. "Reg? Why?" He didn't see what Reg had to do with anything. Why would she want to share this, whatever this was, with anyone else?

Hermione didn't seem to notice. "He's been on our side since the beginning, practically. In my timeline he died trying to steal… something from the Dark Lord. I told him what to watch out for this time so he came to see me before going to… the thing."

Severus froze. His insides felt heavy, cold. Why didn't she tell him before, why didn't he say something? Didn't they trust him? No, of course they didn't, why would they. They probably made fun of him behind his back too. He'd been deluding himself thinking he had something special with her, of course she would turn to Reg instead. Someone normal, someone rich.

Without another word he snatched his cloak and spun away, not listening to her surprised exclamation.

Later when he was trying and failing to fall asleep in his old rickety bed at the workshop, Menace flew in through the window. The bird cawed at him, and Severus could almost hear the bird's annoyance with him. Obviously even Menace thought Severus was as foolish as he himself felt.