A/N: penultimate chapter guys. I will try and post the last later this week. Cheers to everyone who had read and reviewed this

Chapter 9

"Hermione, come on. You haven't eaten in days, haven't slept in days, please take a break." She ignored Harry, turning another page in the book she was skimming without looking up.

She was settled on a comfy arm chair (which had been a hard wooden one until she had transfigured it) with a blanket over her waist and her feet propped up on Salazar's bed. Harry was right- she had only left Salazar's side for bathroom breaks over the last four days. She was faint with hunger but she wouldn't leave his side until she could find a way to fix him.

"Mione, listen to Harry. You're just going to make yourself ill." Ron's voice chimed in. So he was here too? Hermione was willing to bet that Draco had called them in when he had failed to get through to her. Sure enough…

"Granger, that's enough." Draco snapped at her. He grabbed the book from her hands and threw it on the bed.

She looked up at him and crossed her arms. "I'm not leaving him alone."

Draco looked around the hospital wing and then back at her with an expression that said he thought she was crazy. "Granger, he's not even slightly alone. Gryffindor is right over there and Hufflepuff and Rowena visit every day. Nothing will go wrong if you take a break and get some rest."

She pursed her lips in annoyance. She hated it when he mentioned the founders. They wanted to take both Salazar and Gryffindor back home and the idea wasn't up for discussion. They needed him back in the past and they didn't care how much Hermione wanted him here- how much she needed him.

"I don't like them visiting him. I want him moved into the Chamber of Secrets." She snapped irrationally. She knew she was being ridiculous but she didn't like that their presence were a constant reminder of their plans. He was not going back to the past without her.

"Hermione-" Harry started but he was cut off by Draco.

"No let her rant Harry. It's not like they're trying to help save him or anything. Do you think you're the only one busting their ass to help them? You're not. I'm trying, Helga is trying and Rowena is trying. We're all discussing ideas and trying to follow up leads while you wallow and refuse to leave your books long enough to talk to anyone." Draco ranted at her, his voice getting louder and louder until the whole Hospital Wing was staring at them avidly.

Hermione's temper snapped. She stood in a fluid motion. "Fine, I'm being unreasonable. Do you think that I don't know that? The love of my life is lying in a coma because I have his magic and it won't leave me to return to him. I can't sleep and I can't eat knowing that it is my fault that he is here."

She paused to take a breath and glared at all three of them. Harry and Ron looked chastised but Draco's face was still curled in disapproval. She wanted to rant and rave at them all but she was disturbing the other patients and the concern on Ginny's face was painfully obvious. Ginny alone knew how she felt but nobody was demanding that she pull herself together. Hermione couldn't take this. She needed to get away from them all.

She latched her hand on Salazar's arm and flashed them to the Chamber of Secrets. As he flopped on the bed, she placed the strongest wards she could conjure around the chamber. Nobody would be able to enter without her permission now.

She turned to Salazar and tucked him into bed, fussing at the quilt to ignore the tears that threatened to spill from her eyes. He didn't look in pain, she thought as she smoothed his brow with her palm, but neither did he look at peace. He just looked blank.

With a restrained sob, she crawled into the bed with him and rested her head on his chest. She knew she should be researching but she couldn't bear to leave the bed now that she was with him. If she shut her eyes, maybe she could pretend that this was just another day where she had woken before him.

"I miss you." Her voice caught as she whispered to him, knowing he wouldn't- couldn't- answer.

Safe in his arms, she drifted into sleep for the first time in four days.

"Mione." The whisper sounded in her ear as her dream formed into a grassy hill that overlooked a dark blue lake.

She turned as strong arms banded around her waist and pulled her closer. She melted into the embrace, the hard plane of his chest more familiar to her than anything else.

"Salazar, is it really you?"

He lightly chuckled in her ear and she knew it was him. That laugh spread goose bumps all over her body and affected her more than anyone else ever could. She could pick that laugh out in a crowded room full of people.

She reached up and met his lips with her own. His tongue mingled with hers in a fiery duel and she fisted her hands in his hair to hold him closer. She put all of her pent up emotions into their kiss: her misery, her anger, her despair and he met it with his own desperation. No kiss, even with him, had ever felt this intimate. In this instant her entire soul was bared to him in a way she had never allowed before.

Yes she loved him and had given him everything she could, but there had always been a part of her that was scared she would lose who she truly was if she gave him too much, if there was nothing left for her. But in this moment, her fear of losing him was greater than her fear of losing herself.

She pulled back and gasped for air and he took advantage of that to kiss to her ear and nibble on the sensitive lobe. Her breaths hitched as he tongued that sensitive spot that he knew drove her wild. She needed to be even closer to him in this moment. She needed to be as close to him as she could physically get.

Their clothes vanished as her dream strove to accommodate her and she saw his face flash with disappointment.

"I know you love me to strip for you, but not tonight. We don't have time- I could wake at any moment and I need to be with you before I do." She met his gaze and saw as white hot passion slashed in his eyes, erasing his doubts.

"You can make it up to me when I wake up." His deep voice caused another round of shivers and she once more closed the distance between them.

Her hands roamed over his bare chest, leaving red marks where her nails had been. He was pure perfection with those muscles and light dusting of hair which thickened under his navel travelled to his hardened cock. Oh how she would savour this body if she ever managed to bring him out of his coma. She would lick and bite and touch every delicious inch of him when she could. But right now, knowing she was a light sleeper and could wake at any point, she needed him deep inside her.

She tugged on his arm and lowered herself to the ground. The soft grass was cool against her back but she warmed as he laid himself over her and kissed her blind again. Her hands moved around to his arse and she tried to tug his hips into hers. He resisted for a moment, unused to the lack of foreplay, before his resistance shattered and he slammed into her in a hard, smooth stroke.

She cried out as he filled her and bucked her hips against his. But he kept his pace torturously slow as he teased her with measured thrusts. She growled and rolled him over so she was on top. He groaned in approval and a smirk lit up her lips- she knew he loved it when she took the lead.

Digging her nails into his solid chest, she moved against him forcefully and swiftly, never taking her gaze from his shuttered eyes. He moved a hand to rub slow, firm circles on her clit and she let out a jagged moan of pleasure at the contrast of paces.

He always knew how to drive her wild and was always coming up with new ways to do so. His spontaneity was one of the things she loved most about him but that list was too long to remember with the pleasure racking through her body right now and pushing her to the edge where she was so close to completion it was almost painful.

Grabbing her neck, he pulled her down for another kiss- this one laced with desperation- and rolled them so he was again on top. A blinding orgasm swept through her body and had her gasping his name as her body tightened against him. Her gasp undid him and he followed her into that perfect moment of contentment, holding her tight in his arms.

For minutes neither of them spoke. Hermione was too busy tracing lazy circles over his chest to remember what was wrong with the world and she could tell Salazar was preoccupied as well. Eventually though, she remembered that the rest of the world existed and that he wasn't really with her.

"Just a dream," she reminded herself. "Tell me how to help you."

He sighed at her words. "I can't. You're too worried that you will lose me to ever truly want to release my magic. It's not a magical solution you need, you need to trust that I'll be okay and then my magic will leave you."

It sounded so simple but she wondered if she ever could do it. It would be easier to give up her own magic than his- it was all she had left of him while he was comatose, but he wouldn't wake until she gave it back and now he had given her the answer she needed.