"If Only I Could…"
Prompt: [Hermione x Severus] "If only I could…"
for for-witchcraft-and-wizardry
Hermione threw herself down onto her knees and instinctively pressed her hand against Professor Snape's throat. Voldemort had only just left the shack, and already her teacher's lips were beginning to turn blue.
"You have to hold on, Sir," she said, in a much more commanding tone than she would have thought she was capable of. Keeping her hand in place, she forced her other arm deep into her modified bag, desperately searching for something, anything that might help.
"Mione…" Ron began, but she silenced him with a single look. They had argued over Professor Snape more than once during their time on the run. Hermione knew she should have been horrified by Ron's lack of sensitivity, to bring it up again now when the man was literally dying in front of them, but she didn't have the time.
A second later she gave up searching and tipped the bag up, releasing the two suitcases worth of mangled possessions all over the dirty floor. Her mind was reeling. There had to be something she could do.
Hermione looked over at the Professor again and felt her throat close, he looked smaller like this, lying out on the cold floor. All of her memories of Severus Snape were of him looming over her like an ominous cloud.
She heard Harry try to say something, but she didn't even bother with a glare this time. Hang what the boys thought.
Hermione had believed Professor Snape was on their side, even after Dumbledore had died at the end of his wand. She didn't have the answers, she couldn't explain it, but something didn't add up. Then, during the Horcrux hunt, she had thought he was helping them, but again, she had no proof.
Hermione had told many people in the Order of her suspicions, but none had believed her. Severus Snape was too easy to hate. Molly had looked at her sadly, and told Hermione that she was 'grasping at straws, trying to find goodness in a dark time'. The reactions of the Weasley boys had been less kind. It hadn't stopped her trying to defend him, she argued with any of them that would listen.
She hadn't told anyone about her crush though, that would have been too much to bear. She doubted even Molly could have feigned kindness in the face of that revelation. Hermione told herself that she couldn't help it, Severus Snape was just so bloody intelligent. She supposed his personality could have used a little work, but to a girl that had grown up reading Bronte, her Professor fit all too neatly into the template of an ill-tempered gothic hero who the fates had dealt a cruel hand.
While Hermione grabbed frantically at the scattered objects, a large, cool hand closed around her wrist. She looked down at her Professor, who was staring back at her without a hint of scorn.
"Please, Sir, you have to hold on," she begged.
"If only I could…" he choked out, his ragged voice barely above a whisper.
As his dark eyes rolled back, Hermione fought the urge to scream. It would do him no good now.
It was only later, much much later, after Voldemort had fallen to the floor with a wet thud and the celebrations began that Hermione remembered the time turner. She knew Professor McGonagall still had it, and her feet walked in the direction of her Head of Houses' office before her brain gave them the command.
That was how she found herself standing behind a desk, in a quiet part of the war-ravaged castle, with the familiar gold chain around her neck. Debating something so reckless, so selfish she hardly recognised herself. But now that she'd had the idea, Hermione didn't know if she could fight it.
With shaking fingers, she reached up to twist the cogs and the darkness around her twisted away.