Disclaimer: If you recognise it, it's not mine. All credit due to J. K. Rowling and Gato Azul.
2. The Dormant Dragon
Granger had the suspicion from the beginning, since the moment she saw Potter crossing the door alone, when she looked at his green and sharp eyes searching for something in the Great Hall, frantically and anxiously. It seemed something unexpected had happened. Even weirder was the fact that Harry had dragged Poppy Pomfrey with him with the same flurry he had arrived with, without telling anything to anyone.
She waited restlessly for the boy's return and the three elders, but hours passed with no change. She speculated many theories: maybe one of them had gotten hurt when they passed under the Whomping Willow; it wasn't easy to carry a body and avoid the branches, after all. Maybe McGonagall, who wasn't so young anymore, and she had fallen; that'd explain Harry's hurry, but she had noticed in his face an ambiguous expression of hope and emotion, it somehow didn't fit. Maybe she had misunderstood his face, maybe he was just really nervous, but she had known him for so long…
Tired of the uncertainty, Granger and Weasley walked to the Shrieking Shack; if someone was hurt, surely they could help. Along the way Hermione had been thinking about Potter's expression, imagining the possibility he'd found some survivors, some injured student or wizard that could've stayed behind.
The redhead pulled her arm while they ran under the Willow as if they were one. He was dragging her with him, pushing her around until they walked through the danger and entered the house. So much physical contact with Weasley had made her blush. She watched him under the dim light with a half-smile.
"Let's go upstairs," the boy told her with a kind thread in his words. They heard from the stairs women's voices, low and muffled. When they reached the last step Harry's voice was clear in their ears.
They walked in silence, barely supporting themselves on the floor's moaning wood, following the noises until they reached an open door.
"… injured students for me to stay here, I am not going to leave them to attend a… this man; I have done enough."
The people in the room turned their heads to the youngsters standing in the threshold, surprised in the middle of a tense and awkward conversation.
"We thought someone was hurt," Weasley hurried to say, wishing he could erase those upset, threatening expressions.
The nurse started to talk again, raising her briefcase from the floor with one hand, without noticing the newcomers.
"I won't say anything to anyone, but you'll have to take care of this," she withdrew quickly without giving them a chance to protest, lightly pushing Weasley with her shoulder, making way. A few seconds later the sounds of her footsteps faded away stairs down.
"What's going on?"
The three wizards looked at each other, giving the impression of talking only with their eyes. Then Hagrid stepped aside; when he moved his gigantic body, he left to their view a man in a stretcher, covered in black clothes and pieces of a sheet. At the beginning they couldn't recognize him, they just stared at the lying frame. They had to think about it for a few seconds.
"Snape?" Weasley spat with a dose of healthy scepticism.
"What's going on?" the brunette asked, as if she hadn't done so a first time already.
"He's alive," Harry let the words fall, like pieces of heavy iron.
"What?"
"We saw him die!"
Potter looked at the lying wizard with seriousness, his breath dying out by a pitiful stab.
"He survived. I've no idea how, but he did it."
He was surprised Snape hung onto life like that. The young Gryffindor looked at the covered, bloody body.
"And what are we going to do with him?" Granger asked.
"Madam Pomfrey gave him first aids, but she won't help him anymore. We'll hide him here, for now; it's not safe to take him to the castle. Someone will have to stay here, to take care of him."
The five of them stared at each other.
"Is it true he was on our side?"
Hagrid and McGonagall turned their heads towards Harry, expectant. The youth nodded without looking back. It wasn't easy for anyone to believe something as big as that with only words, not even if those words came from Harry Potter. Nonetheless, his aura of seriousness didn't allow them to be incredulous either.
The wizard's silence was hazy and wide; their eyes were somewhere in between the dim light which flew from some unknown point, a clear, stormy ray of light.
"Who is gonna stay?" Weasley dared to ask, overwhelmed by the silent environment. Their stares turned even more awkward.
"I… sometimes I take care of injured animals," Rubeus cut in, voice rough, then he seemed to regret it and added, "Not like I know much, or that Severus', I didn' mean…"
"It's alright, we got what you meant, but it's for the best you return to the castle, you can help Poppy," McGonagall told him, whose eyes didn't stray from Snape, keeping them focused on him. "I'll stay," she added with a resolution that had something terrible and suspicious about it.
Harry thought about protesting, but the woman's rigid face raised in challenge.
"I have to stay, Severus and I…" she didn't seem to know how to end the sentence, and it wasn't necessary. 'Severus and I' was enough: their fight in the middle of the hall, the intrigues, the mistrust, the infinite web of doubts between them was enough argument, and everyone in Hogwarts knew it.
"I'll stay with you, professor," Hermione offered almost immediately, disturbed by the touching solemnity of her teacher, who seemed older and harder than ever. The woman looked at her for the first time during that conversation.
"Thank you, Miss Granger," her brief smile seemed sad and forced.
Ronald grimaced with incredulity and distaste; she returned the gesture, watching him with disapproval.
"Don't say anything, Ronald," she whispered, without the professor hearing her. "Someone has to help her."
"I'll stay too."
"No way, Mr Potter. There are many things you have to do, may things to clean, if you know what I mean."
Harry had the impression the professor didn't want much company, and, given the situation, he decided not to insist, despite the strong feeling he had that it was his responsibility to take care of that man; after all, Snape was in that state because of him, because of him and Lily. He looked at the bundle of stained clothes for a few more moments. He didn't know what to feel, pity or guilt; he only felt the sensation of a cloak of silence spreading inside him, a mere quiet watcher.
He was surprised he never suspected the real face of the "traitor"; maybe he had been too conceited, or he had been too focused on hating him. He couldn't change what had happened between them; he was sure about only one thing about Snape's situation: he had to get him out of the predicament he was in, he had to get him out and made sure he lived.
Before he left, Potter stopped just outside the room. Ron and Hagrid had already left and Hermione was waiting for him in the ground floor: she'd do a trip to the castle, looking for potions and healing materials, after that she'd return to the Shrieking Shack.
Minerva stood by his side, as if she had expected that the young man would ask her a question, or as if she wanted to fill him with them. There was something unsaid between the two that was floating around.
"Do you believe me?" the boy began. "Do you think Snape is innocent?"
He didn't like that secretive air the professor's attitude radiated.
"I'm not sure what to believe, Mr Potter, but you don't have to worry about my intentions," she said, showing a wariness worthy of a Head of House. "My only goal is to find out the truth, and I won't manage it if Severus dies."
Harry looked at her intently, absorbed by her rigid, neutral stance, by the honest resolve of her face that seemed to harden over years and experiences. Then Potter nodded and left, now calmer.
Hermione had shrunken the potion's vials and the few guides of Mediwizardy she had managed to pull out of the rubble. After that, she went back to Hogwarts' grounds, pockets full.
She ran under the Whomping Willow, avoiding its lashings, his brutal whippings of branches and twigs.
She entered the house, creating a ruckus by stepping without caring on the old, telling wood that screeched under her weight.
In the room McGonagall waited, crouched by the stretcher, covered by an aura of silence and piety, looking at the dying man's face as if she wanted to unravel the spy's mysteries by sheer force of scanning his pale countenance.
"Professor…" Granger kneeled too, emptying her loot in front of the woman and engorging it to its natural size.
Coagulants, sanitizers, gauzes, pieces of cotton, auxiliaries to produce blood, strong antidotes… anything she could find.
"We best start as soon as possible, Miss Granger. He won't hold on for long."
Hermione would remember that afternoon like an uncertain come and go, a flight of vials, a collection of bloodstains on everything she touched, McGonagall's face constantly reflected on her eyelids. Snape's choked breathing, his wheezing and that awful convulsion he had at midnight, which had them waking up in horror.
For a second, Hermione, still in the threshold of sleep and vigil, thought she was in Malfoy's Manor, waiting to be tortured. Snape had reminded her of that.
She couldn't go back to sleep after the man's seizure, so she stayed awake skipping through that potion's guide. McGonagall stayed up with her, also reading carefully, looking and memorizing anything that could be useful.
Hermione was absolutely disconcerted. In some of those books she had read about poisons and its antidotes, and it was mentioned in a few lines the venom that big snakes produced, and according to the text it was extremely lethal and quick, practically unavoidable unless it was countered in the act by a powerful antidote. And yet Snape had survived for hours without any kind of attention. It didn't sound possible, but there he was, defying logic and laws of life, like a prodigy in endurance. The young woman couldn't find anything to assign this great luck; after all, nobody knew what a dark wizard could hide under his sleeve. She talked about that with McGonagall for a while, but neither of them could find any explanation.
To wake up in the Shrieking Shack…
Hermione cleaned the dirty bandages in a basin; there weren't many given how many had been injured, so they had to reuse them. And there she was, kneeled like a wagtail peasant, washing and conjuring spells to wash the stains away.
Meanwhile, McGonagall was wheezing, hands coated with jelly-like salves potions and crimson trails, cleaning her forehead with her arm and starting all over again. Sometimes she got nervous, feeling the maimed skin and bloody slits under her fingers.
"This is…" she raised her arms nervously, showing her hands. The brunette could see her palms stained red, full of thick blood, trailing down her fingers.
Hermione turned to her, a bit shaken, while she cleaned the bandages.
"The professor has always been strong; he'll survive," she didn't know if that particular fact calmed or scared her. Snape, after all, had taken Dumbledore away from them, and Hermione feared what he could do if he recovered.
After working all day both sat in front of him. Minerva pulled some rebellious hairs falling on her face back in her bun. Hermione looked at the big, silent, dark room with peaceful melancholy, which was empty of furniture except for that stretcher; from some corner light got in, a lunar veil that floated away in the room and swamped everything: her, McGonagall, Snape's sleeping face.
Both laid on the stone floor, Minerva closer to the wounded man, to watch him during the night and help him if he had a seizure again.
"What do you think about Severus, Miss Granger?"
Hermione shifted her head, awkward, speaking in a quiet voice.
"The professor has done very… bad things," Minerva looked chagrined at the man's face. "But Harry says he's innocent," she shrugged, implying she didn't know what to think.
They went to sleep in silence, although Hermione knew McGonagall wasn't going to close one eye that night. Her back was facing her and she was still as if she was sleeping, but the youth felt her open eyelids, her eyes fixed on Snape's face.
How long were those days for Hermione, reading and rereading the guide's pages; she had almost learned every instruction they held. And yet, she hadn't even touched Snape, just washed the bandages and diluted the antidote's dosage according to necessity. McGonagall actually did all the practical work. The young Gryffindor had much time to think. With her hands deep in reddish water like that in the basin, she thought about the man's prodigious ability to survive. Why? Of all the dead, why did he survive? Why not Remus or Tonks? Why Snape, of all people? Snape of the many faces, the murderer, the traitor. Harry couldn't erase all of the man's actions with some sentences; Hermione simply couldn't imagine what might redeem him from what he had done, and she also felt fear when she watched that fixed, pale face, each day paler… She believed in Snape for a long time, even when Harry and Ron didn't anymore. Her disappointment had been raw and overwhelming. She could never find an explanation and, in the end, just like everyone else, she convinced herself this man was a Death Eater, maybe the most dangerous one because he had fooled them all for years.
Snape, the dormant snake, the hidden cutting edge, the imminent dagger.
"Miss Granger," McGonagall's voice went through walls of silence, shaken, vibrant. "Miss Granger, please, help me."
The young woman turned hurriedly towards Minerva, who held with a hand the lifeless head of the half-blood. She closed the distance quickly, and her hands trembled when she felt the professor putting the man's skull on hers.
"Hold him and put pressure on the wound."
Her nervous fingers travelled to the crimson spot in the bandages, put pressure and Hermione realized he was barely bleeding. Everything seemed so weird: his resistance to poison, the haemorrhage's spontaneous halt; it didn't seem possible.
Snape's hair exuded a smell of blood and dirt, and he was warm and trembling by the fever. His nose seemed even bigger than normal, his skin wet and shallow.
Hermione experienced an unpleasant mix of pity and revulsion. McGonagall came back with a vial and emptied it in the lips of the Occlumens; a part of the fluid slid down from the fixed corner of his mouth. Minerva's face was squeezed in a rigid expression of focus, her eyebrows were drawn together, and her aged hands trembled slightly.
Brown eyes slid down the thick air, travelling down the woman's hair, over her drawn mouth, looking at the jelly liquid inside the vial that travelled lazily to the helpless, half-opened lips of the man.
Snape's closed eyes, his forehead wet with sweat, his jaded and faltering breathing.
Hermione's eyes descended: the eyes, the colossal nose, the unprotected eyes, the liquid falling over, the beginning of the pale neck, thin skin and shallow of colour, the prominent Adam's Apple, blood, the stained bandages, the ripped suit, chest, black and black, his cloak's waves, the fabric's complex turns. His pupil's movement stopped in-between the delicate folds and found a bright, soft feather; she extended her fingers to take it slowly, like an ethereal relic.
"Miss Granger, that…" Minerva had raised her eyes and lowered the vial.
"A feather from Fawkes?"
"I thought he had run away…" the woman's whisper faded away like smoke, her glassy regard directed to the unusual shine of the feather in the middle of the gloomy Shrieking Shack.
Hermione could only stare stunned at the same point where McGonagall's gaze got lost. Somehow, to watch that feather was to watch Albus Dumbledore's face, like feeling the shape of his spirit spreading all over the room, covering Snape, saving him, because it was now obvious that the Potion Master couldn't have survived without the phoenix.
She didn't know the reasons why Dumbledore would've wanted to save Snape; she didn't even imagine how he could have known he would have the opportunity to save him.
"Albus…" Minerva's words caused the blue memory of the old man's gaze to lighten up even more.
"Why?" the young woman asked, as if she was speaking to the feather itself. When her gaze trailed back to the professor's they were wet, with the constant leaking of her eyes that fell fateful on the man.
"For Merlin's sake, what Potter says… what Potter says, it's true?"
Hermione gazed back to Snape's silent face and couldn't find anything but the asphyxiating silence of his condition as a dying man. Maybe Nagini's dark magic and its poison were so powerful, not even Fawkes' tears could achieve more than stopping the haemorrhage and conquering death.
But the wounds didn't close.
"Professor Dumbledore saved him," Hermione repeated to herself, thinking about Harry's words, in his gravely, fixed face. A horrible knot closed her throat, a strong blow in her stomach… suddenly there were appearing bright spots of light in front of him, born inside her own eyes.
"Then… Snape? Snape?"
And she could talk no more.