It was the Headmistress who found her.

Hermione hadn't moved from where she had collapsed, eyes blistering red with no more tears in them to be shed, and still wrapped in one of his shirts. She was shivering in the cold, head resting against the slats of the wooden floor with her knees pulled up to her chest.

The sound of the Headmistress' voice bounced around in Hermione's mind like a quiet echo, one that was not easily discerned. It was drowned out by a much louder mantra rumbling through her mind like a raging thunderstorm.

Alpha isn't coming.

Your Alpha left you alone in this world.

Alpha died before he knew about you.

No Alpha.

Alone.

It wasn't that terrible things happened to unmated Omegas. Hermione would still be expected to live a full life. She could marry a Beta and bear children, if she chose, but something would always be missing. The scent would always be wrong. There would never be a knot to swell. She would never feel satisfied during her heats. She would have to be on suppressants to keep her safe.

She was too busy mourning the loss of her Alpha for it to set in exactly who her Alpha was. She'd never had the chance to know Severus Snape as anyone other than an acerbic, bitter man who died before he ever had a chance to find happiness. With everything she'd learned from Harry about his love for Lily Potter and having to serve two Masters from the time he was barely older than her, she couldn't blame him. It was easy to see why he was the way he was.

She could have been his happiness.

She could have loved him.

But now, she would never have the chance. He was gone.

Hermione barely registered that anyone was in Severus' quarters with her. She stared blankly at the floor, a broken woman at the young age of nearly nineteen, as a calming draught was pressed to her lips. It did little to dull the grief radiating through her.

Eventually, the Headmistress and Madam Pomfrey coaxed her from the floor and she moved with heavy steps to the sofa where a warm cup of tea was pressed into her hand. Hermione spent more time staring at the warm liquid than she did drinking it, wondering when the last time he'd touched the tea cup on the coffee table next to the stack of academic journals. When was the last time he'd had a chance to read any of the journals?

She knew his last year at Hogwarts had been hell. Neville, Ginny, and some of the other Gryffindors told stories about what it was like under Snape's reign with the Carrows constantly wreaking havoc. When she, Harry, and Ron witnessed Nagini's bite, Hermione had tried so hard to save him. She vividly remembered how her hands were coated in sticky, dark red blood as she pressed them against the wound on his neck in a paltry effort to stem the rapid flow. The small stores of medical supplies she had while they were on the run had dwindled and she had little more than her hands and what few healing spells she knew.

He'd saved them all that night and yet, she couldn't save him.

She'd been there when he drew his last breath and she hadn't known. Would it have even made a difference if she'd known she was his and he was hers?

A fresh wave washed over her as the memories from that night played on a loop behind her eyes. She was nearly certain he hadn't known. There had been no glint of recognition in his eyes. They were dark and cold and directed only on Harry.

Not her. Never her.

Alone.

The teacup shattered in her hands, shards of porcelain piercing her skin from her burst of accidental magic. The Matron and the Headmistress rushed to her side and quickly tended to her wounds as they spoke in hushed whispers. Her body felt heavy and she drifted in and out of consciousness, only catching bits of their conversation.

"She's in shock, Minerva. Emotional and Magical Exhaustion."

"How did she ever break through the wards?"

"This might sting, Miss Granger."

"Severus couldn't have known."

"She'll need a suppressant potion."

"Miss Granger, drink this. It's only a nourishment potion."

"Now this one. This one will help you rest, dear."

Hermione awoke again, hours later, in a hospital gown in a bed in the hospital wing. The scent of her mate no longer clung to her skin and it was like she could and couldn't breathe, all at the same time. Part of her craved it, her body revolting that she could no longer sense it near as the grief in her heart still held. But, without his scent surrounding her, reminding her that he wasn't there, everything hurt a little less.

It didn't stop her from wanting to march back down to the dungeons and bury herself amongst his things until she could no longer scent him. It didn't stop her from wanting to nest in his bed and make it perfect for them, even though she knew he wasn't coming. It didn't stop her from trying to memorize every memory she had of him.

It didn't stop her grief.

The Headmistress visited her early the next day.

"Did he know?" Hermione asked quietly, knees drawn up to her chest and her thin arms wrapped around them. Dark shadows marred the skin beneath her eyes.

The Headmistress shook her head, "No, my dear. He would have come for you, had he known. There's nothing anyone can do to stop an Alpha from finding his mate."

"He was my professor," she said, feeling like somehow that would have stopped him.

"There's nothing to stop the pull of destiny, Hermione. That would not have mattered and allowances would have been made, were circumstances different." The Headmistress adjusted her thin, wire-framed glasses, "It would not have been the first time in Hogwarts history that a professor and a student were found to be a matched pair."

Hermione could only nod. Allowances would have been made for them. It rolled around her mind like an echo, pinging against the walls of her consciousness. They could have been happy, if they'd been given the chance and the time.

"What will I do?"

"Your attendance here is not mandatory, my dear. You have the choice to remain and finish out the year or to leave and do as you wish. Though I certainly hope you choose to stay and complete your education."

She thought it over briefly. She didn't really have anywhere else to go if she chose to leave. Her parents were still in Australia and her best friends were training to be aurors somewhere on the continent. They wouldn't be back for months. And, of course, taking her NEWTs and finishing school had always been so incredibly important to her. She needed some modicum of normalcy. She needed to move forward.

Or at the very least, try.

"I'll stay."

"Very well," the Headmistress said with a kind smile. "May I ask you one thing?"

Hermione nodded, turning her brown eyes to look at her former Transfiguration professor as her grip on her knees lessened. "Yes."

"How did you break through his wards?" she asked, "No one has been able to enter that room since he passed."

Hermione's teeth found her lower lip and her curls swung forward to hide her face as she pressed her forehead against her forearms. "I found a key. It was hidden in the desk in the potions classroom. I didn't break through the wards, Headmistress. They admitted me without hesitation."

"Is that why you asked if he'd known?"

Hermione couldn't bring herself to speak. Some small part of her hoped he knew but she knew it was impossible. He couldn't have known. She hadn't reached maturity until August and he'd passed in May.

"Soul magic is little understood, Hermione. It's possible he keyed the wards to his mate years ago in hopes that he would find her or that she would find him."

Cold air rushed into her lungs as she drew a deep breath. It was time to move forward. She shoved all thoughts of her Alpha away from her mind and swallowed her grief. She couldn't think about it anymore now. She couldn't think about him any more.

"When may I return to my classes?" she asked, lowering her knees to sit with her legs crossed on the bed.

"On Monday, if you wish," the Headmistress said.

….

Returning to classes wasn't easy. His scent followed her every time Hermione walked through the halls of Hogwarts, as though he were a ghostly spectre sent to haunt her. She'd turned around several times, expecting to find him scowling at her back, ready to take points for the smallest of infractions, but he was never there.

It was her only way to remember him. She tried to commit everything she knew about Severus Snape to memory since she'd never had the chance to form new memories with him. But there was so much she didn't know. In time, she intended to ask those who knew him for more information, but it wasn't something she could do right now. She was barely holding herself together as it was.

Hermione wondered how he would have reacted, finding out who his mate truly was and she made herself giggle when she imagined him taking points for a foolish Gryffindor know-it-all being his Omega. Of course, she'd burst into tears immediately after the thought crossed her mind and the giggles turned to whimpers as she sniffled into her pillow.

Ginny and Neville had repeatedly asked her what was wrong when they saw her at meals or in classes, but she brushed them off each time. How could you explain to two Betas what it was like to scent your mate only to find out he was no longer alive? There was no way she would be able to articulate the heavy burden of grief that had settled over her.

In time, perhaps, she would be okay. She would be able to move throughout her days without wanting to cry and every little thing. But she was making an effort despite the fact that walking the halls was akin to torture because his scent still lingered and her heart fluttered in hope that he would come for her.

Her mind, however, told her the truth.

Alpha isn't coming.

When Madam Pomfrey handed her a vial of suppressant potion, she stared at it for an hour before she had the courage to take it. It felt wrong and it tasted even worse. There was no getting around her heat, but it would hopefully make it bearable when it came.

It didn't.

The first tendrils of fever began to settle in when she was seated at the potions bench and only got worse as the day wore on. No matter how many sweaters she wore and how many cups of warm tea she drank, Hermione shivered. The only thing that seemed to ease the ache just a little was being in the dungeons where his scent still lingered. She could breathe down there in the damp corridors.

Each step she took was heavy, but she pulled herself through the ancient stone passage until she reached the dark oak door. Her fingers curled around the key in her pocket, hand shaking as she pushed it into the keyhole. She knew this was probably a bad idea and when her heat fully set in, it would make things worse… but she was powerless to resist the pull of him.

When she touched the door with her hand, it swung open on it's hinges, in exactly the same easy way it had one week ago.

And when she entered his chambers, she felt relief. She shed her sweaters and the rest of her uniform and pulled one of his shirts from the wardrobe, wrapping it around herself. The fabric felt itchy and wrong against her skin, but the scent of herbs and woodfire clinging to it eased some of the ache forming in her core.

A cramp tore through her abdomen as she crawled into his bed, tucking herself beneath the duvet and gathering the pillows around her in a makeshift nest before wrapping herself around the one that smelled the most like him.

Alpha should be here.

Alpha isn't coming.

She whined as a rush of slick coated her thighs and drenched her knickers. She'd never felt pain like it and deep down, she knew there would be little relief. She'd weather her heat alone as she would have to do for the remainder of her life and Gods, it hurt so much.

The walls of her cunt clenched around nothing and she screamed into the pillow she was holding as another cramp ripped through her abdomen. She was burning and shivering and she needed him and he wasn't coming.

When the cramp finally ceased, Hermione all but crawled out of bed, out of the safety of her tiny nest that he would never see. Never praise her for. There had to be a pain potion somewhere in his chambers. Something, anything, to lessen the pain of going through her heat alone.

She glanced at the configuration of pillows and blankets and fluffed or two before she took slow, painful steps away from it, every nerve in her body begging her to run back and tuck herself back safely amongst his things.

Hermione stumbled into the living room, the skin of her hands scraping against the stone wall as she desperately grabbed for purchase before she fell to the floor. She wiped the blood from several scratches crisscrossing her palms onto the fabric of Severus' shirt and crawled across the floor to the other door in the room she hadn't had a chance to enter.

She felt dizzy as she pulled herself to her feet and turned the knob, pushing the door open and stumbling into a potions lab. There were cauldrons still under stasis and ingredients strewn about the tables in varying states of preservation. It almost looked as if it had been used recently, save for the thin layer of dust on a wooden stool that was likely not protected by the same dust-repelling charms that the tables were.

Her hand wrapped around her stomach as she forced her eyes to focus on the label of each bottle, written in a slanted scrawl. She'd seen that script in every biting comment he'd left on the essays she'd submitted when she'd been his student.

None of the labels held what she was looking for and she moved on, stepping further into the narrow space.

When another cramp tore through her abdomen, Hermione crumpled, grasping at a table filled with crystal vials to steady herself. She missed the edge of the table and instead, knocked the antique stand filled with vials to the floor as she collapsed. Dust and multi-colored vapor swirled in the air around her.

Her head pounded in time with her heartbeat as she lay crumpled on the floor for Merlin knew how long. Hermione suspected she had lost consciousness because the inferno raging beneath her skin seemed to burn hotter and her skin felt slick with sweat as she shivered on the floor, arms wrapped around her abdomen and her knees pulled to her chest.

The torture ebbed when a cool hand pressed gently against her cheek and her nose was once more filled with the strong, comforting scent of her mate.

"It hurts," she whined.

"I know, little one," a deep voice crooned.

Hermione shook her head, knowing no one was coming. The feeling of the hand pressing against her cheek couldn't have been real. "How do I make it stop?" she whimpered, tears welling in her eyes, "It burns."

The hand threaded through her sweat-soaked curls. "Let me take care of you, Omega."

Hermione's eyes fluttered open, her gaze following the direction from where the voice had come. Her vision wavered, tiny stars flashing and blurring her surroundings. Her head throbbed with the smell of potions brewing. The scent of him grounded her, like woodsmoke and herbs, and suddenly, he was the only thing in focus.

He must have been a hallucination, but Severus Snape was kneeling beside her, his dark eyes wide and full of concern. He was exactly how she would have imagined he may have looked in his youth before he was aged beyond his years into the bitter man she had known. He was tall but thin, and not nearly as broad as other Alphas she knew, but he would still tower over her. His complexion was pale and his features were striking, though not conventionally handsome.

And he was hers.

But she knew it wouldn't last.

She held on to the vision as her eyelids began to flutter closed once more.

"Alpha isn't coming," she said quietly, the words slipping from her lips as she was once again bathed in darkness, though he didn't disappear as she expected. She still felt his blunt nails stroking through her curls and scented him as though he were there with her. She felt his presence at her side and if she listened hard enough, she could almost hear the beat of his heart as it thumped loudly in his chest.

"I"m here, Omega."

Her eyes flew open and she pressed her hand against his cheek, the skin of her palm meeting warm real flesh as he leaned into her touch.

He wasn't a mere vision.

He was there.

Alpha.

"Severus."