Sorry sorry sorry for not updating yesterday like I planned! I have no excuse, except that my own personal Professor Snape gave me a wonderful day and I fell asleep in his arms before I had a chance to post this chapter. Forgive me?

Hope this makes up for it ; )

SS

Nothing, I decided. I wouldn't do a damn thing. She didn't want my help. She was a witch with more than enough power to dispatch a simple muggle. She was smart enough to know what Stockholm Syndrome was, and deny that she had it. She'd no doubt read enough books to realize that emotional trauma damaged the psyche and that without seeking psychological healing as well as physical, she'd never recover fully.

I'd healed the physical damage. She had no disease or impairment, her life was not in peril. She was an adult, old enough to make her own choices. I had no more obligation in the situation. Hell, I'd gone above and beyond the call of duty. No one could say I hadn't done more than necessary.

So I put her from my mind and went about my business.

Mostly.

Except for a few times a day.

When my mind would wander to her and how she was doing. Where she was. What she was feeling.

But as soon as I caught myself in these little weaknesses, I forced my thoughts to something else. I ignored my desire to go to her and protect her. It was just a lingering sense of duty from my years as a spy, surely. Nothing to be concerned about. I did not make any attempt to call her back to my office that afternoon or the next day. Sunday night she left the castle with the rest of the tutor students. Gone for the week, back to their families and jobs. Not to return till Friday.

I refused to let myself wonder what would happen to her once she got home.

Mostly.

Except for a few times an hour.

When I felt waves of anger and helplessness wash over me. Fear for her that I couldn't tamp down. What was she being subject to right that very moment? It was enough to make me sick.

The rest of that week, I stayed in my office as much as possible. I couldn't let myself among the students and staff more than necessary without blowing up at someone. So many houses lost so many points in those four days that even the boldest of students gave me a wide birth.

Friday morning dawned gloriously, the sunshine managing to pierce through the waters of the lake and leave murky gleaming on my floor and bed. I rose stiffly, uncertain if I was glad or upset that Miss Granger would be returning to the castle that day. I was to tutor her at ten that morning. Her last potion had been flawless, and I had no doubt that I could simply send her an owl with the name of the potion I wanted her to brew next. But part of me wanted to see her again face to face. To reassure myself that she was safe and whole. Ridiculous. Perhaps the most un-Snape-like urge I'd ever had. But it was there all the same.

Reminding myself that it was none of my business, I still decided to keep our appointment. If nothing else, to appease my absurd desire to hear her tell me in that spitfire voice that she was fine and didn't need my help. Hearing it from her lips would help me believe the lie.

At ten, she walked into my office and shut the door quietly behind her. I couldn't help the way my eyes roved over her, seeking any outward damage. I wasn't surprised when I didn't see any. I'd never seen any before, after all. No one had. The bastard had been careful to only leave marks where no one would see them. She dropped her bag to the floor and sank into the chair in front of my desk. Was it just my imagination or did she wince as she sat?

She didn't address me, and seemed to be abiding by my rule that if she wouldn't address me as Headmaster then she wouldn't address me at all. It still confused me that she wouldn't call me headmaster if she could help it. She obviously trusted me and respected me. So what, before the previous week obviously, had I done to earn her ire? She'd always been strangely respectful even in her insolence previously. So what had changed?

I wrote out the potion she would be brewing for the session and the name of the book she would need to find its ingredients in. Then I recalled that she wouldn't be able to find it in the library and whilst her bag seemed a veritable library of its own, she more than likely didn't own it already. With a sigh, I summoned my own copy of the book from the shelf behind her. Much to my consternation, the spell took a berth around Miss Granger rather than simply shooting past her. Of course, she didn't notice a thing. The spell was invisible to the naked eye, as most were, but I had always had a knack for seeing the strands of magic in the world about me.

While the book responded to my spell and flew gently to my desk, I studied the air by her head. What had caused the spell to deviate from its original path? And there, right in front of me, I noticed the faint shivering in the air. It would be invisible to anyone else' eyes, and even for me it was nearly impossible to spot. But it was there. The ever so subtle shimmer of a glamour.

"Finite incantatem," I whispered with a flick of my wand. The glamor was gone before she'd had a chance to hear what I'd said. I blinked, shocked, mad for being shocked, angry on her behalf, ashamed of myself that I'd allowed it to happen. Because despite my mind trying to insist that I had done my job, I had done right by her and then some, my heart felt as if I was the one who'd blackened her eye. I was the one who'd split her lip. I was the one who'd left that sickening bruise around her neck. Because I'd allowed her to go back to that.

What were you supposed to do, chain her to the wall in your office until she told you who'd attacked her?

Yes, if that was what it took.

She made her decision. She didn't want your help. She said as much.

No, she said that no one could help her. Which she obviously believed. The monster had gotten so deeply under her skin that she felt no one could save her. Maybe felt that she didn't deserve to be saved. Maybe felt that going back to him was her only option.

Why would she choose to stay? What possible reason could there be?

He'd been raping her for more than a decade. For most of her life. It was possible that she didn't see any other paths open to her. Or that he'd convinced her that he couldn't live without him. Made her truly think so little of herself that she needed him. Maybe he threatened her with something.

"Miss Granger," I started, my voice shaking slightly. I hated that weakness. I hated her for bringing it out in me. I hated that it had been done to her. And I hated the man that had done it to her with all the hatred one human is capable of feeling for another. "You said your life wasn't in danger, damn it!" I snarled at her. I shoved out of my chair and braced both hands on my desk, leaning closer to her. "You were so certain!" She blinked, pulling back into the chair in shock.

"Severus, I-" she held up her hand as if to ward me off and then stopped, horrified as she realized her glamor was gone. The bruises around her wrists were visible. Instantly, she pointed her wand at herself to replace the glamor.

"Don't,' I hissed at her before she could place the charm. She blanched, but lowered her wand.

"My...my life isn't in danger," she whispered. I stalked around the desk until I was directly in front of her. Forcing my hand not to shake, I reached out and ran my finger along the ring of bruises around her neck in a feather light touch. Her chest heaved, her body trembled, but she didn't flinch away from my touch.

"Did you feel so certain when he had his hands around your neck? Were you so sure while he choked you, closed off your airways and watched you struggle to try and draw breath? Were you certain in that moment that he wouldn't kill you?" Rather than respond to my questions, she merely stared at the floor. I placed one finger under her chin and lifted her face. "Does your life really mean so little to you, Hermione, that you are willing to take that chance again?"

I don't know whether she was more shocked at my use of her given name- was that the first time I'd ever called her that?- or just startled as the reality of what I was saying hit home. She blinked up at me with those huge innocent eyes, eyes that had seen far too much and yet so little all at once. Her lips parted and a soft breath passed their pink boarders. For one moment, one wild, disjointed moment, I wanted to kiss those lips. To press my own to hers and taste her. Not with a vulgar press of tongue on tongue, teeth on teeth, but a sharing of breath, sharing of spirit.

Immediately I dropped my hand from her and retreated to my side of the desk. I didn't know where the thought had come from, but it scared me to my core. I'd never, never had inappropriate thoughts about a student. Ever. I am a bastard, the lowest of the low, but even I would not stoop so low as to lust after the children in my care. Then again, Hermione was no child. She was a grown woman, not a teenager showing an expanse of cleavage that did more to give rise to my ire than my libido. But she was also a grown woman in obvious distress. If she knew what I was thinking, her trust in me, her faith that I could never do anything untoward, would be obliterated. She probably saw me as sexless as a eunuch. The thought that I could see her, even just those pink, parted lips, as sexual, would have driven her screaming from my office.

"I...I don't want to die," she whispered, oblivious to my inner turmoil. That, more than anything else, snapped me back to my right mind. She had obviously been ravaged by that monster once more. She was in need of healing. Healing that for one reason or another, she would allow only me to provide. And the day I look at a scared, violated woman during an exam and feel a stir of lust is the day I end my own life. Not one of the atrocities I committed in the service of Voldermort had driven me to that end, but feeling arousal during a medical exam of a young rape victim would drive me there straight as the crow flies.

Thankfully, just thinking about such atrocities made the strange, demented desire to kiss her, wilt away.

"He was just so mad..." Her softly voice confession brought me back to the moment. I waited, knowing she would keep going if only I was patient enough. And patience I had in spades. "I fought him. I told him no. I didn't want..."

...you to be ashamed of me.

I slipped into her mind just as unobtrusively as I had before. Like this, I couldn't see specific memories unless she brought them to the fore, but I could see her thoughts, and could thus see any events she was giving thought to at the moment. It was more disjointed, the images jumbled and confusing, but almost totally undetectable. She wouldn't know to guard against it.

She didn't want me to be ashamed of her? That's why she had fought him? That's why this had happened to her? I didn't have time to contemplate this as I was assailed by her thoughts.

I just wanted to make him stop. I want to be someone worth fighting for. I don't ever want to see that look of disgust on Severus' face ever again. But he is so much stronger than me. Without turning my wand on him, there wasn't anything I could do to stop him. And he got so angry that I dared stand up to him...

Shut the fuck up you little whore! Take it like a good little girl and I won't have to hurt you any more-

I never want to see him so angry again. Would he really have killed me? Would he have let me die there under his fingers?

Gasping, lungs burning for air, eyes watering and staring at the ceiling praying for him to let go let me go please let me go. Praying too that he won't, just let me die, please just let me die and let all the pain be over. Severus. Fight so that I won't have lied to him. Live so that what I said to him will be true. So that his healing won't have been for nothing. Pain. Pain as he thrusts, pain as he hits, too late, Severus' healing is already undone, the bruises already forming-

No, don't think of that now. Lie to him, tell him I fell down the stairs. He won't believe it, of course, but maybe he'll accept it as a front of dignity. Maybe he'll let it pass and spare me. Please someone spare me. Someone save me. If I tell him the truth he will think the worst of me. A witch who can't even defend her honor. He will never understand. No one could ever understand. How do I tell him that I couldn't use my wand? That I couldn't inflict pain? That I can never simply end the love because of the hate? Tell him I want to live! Tell him that I need his help!

Hasn't he sacrificed enough for me? Enough for the whole fucking world? How selfish would I have to be to ask him to save me? He's spent so much of his life protecting me. Its not his job any more. I can feel safe in his presence, take refuge in his company, but it must be silently. That way he feels no guilt, no coercion. I have survived this long, I can keep on surviving. I am very strong. I am very strong.

"I can handle it," she said as I wrenched myself from her thoughts. But, oh, I'd seen inside her. I knew her secret fears and insecurities. Had I brought her to the point where she feared she would repulse me, by my own unrestrained reactions to her plight? Yes, probably. I'd never meant for her to feel that way- I felt disgust and revulsion at what her attacker had done, not with her. But she didn't know that. And now that I had seen the evidence of what he could do when angered, what he would do when she denied him, I vowed that this would never happen again.

Her days as this man's toy were over. His days of using her for his twisted pleasure had ended. His life was forfeit- he just didn't know it yet. I did.

"No, Miss Granger, you can't. More to the point, you won't. Because I won't allow it. You handled things your way. Now we will handle them mine."

"You- you can't!" Her eyes grew wide and flickered with something...fear? Did she think the despicable muggle could possibly hurt me?

"This is not up for discussion." I turned and transfigured the work table into an exam table once more. For the last time, I vowed. Why, why in bloody hell had I let her go home? Why had I so stupidly said that this was her problem to handle and that if she didn't want my help then that was fine? "You are in need of another exam and extensive healing, unless I am mistaken," I drawled, trying to keep my voice level.

"I-" She blushed and wrung her fingers together.

"Either myself, Madam Pomfrey, or a staff member at St Mungos will be preforming a healing on you, Miss Granger. The choice is yours."

As if to show her resignation, she transfigured her clothes into the same hospital gown I'd used the first time and went over to the table. While I went through my potions stores and selected those I thought I might need, I heard her positioning herself on the table. My gut clenched and I tried not think of how vulnerable she must feel spread out on the table like that.

This time, I was prepared for the sight that greeted me. To be honest, it wasn't nearly as bad as the first time around. The most awful of the injuries had been healed and not remade. This was mostly superficial damage that I was able to heal relatively easily. Once I was done between her legs, I moved up to apply poultices and salves to injuries on other areas of her body. Her face was probably the worst, though her arms and stomach were also blackened with bruises. I applied each salve with the gentleness that only a Potion Master can manage. Once all the damage had been repaired, I moved to the other side of the room, disposed of my gloves and empty vials, and resumed my seat at the desk.

Hermoine quietly changed her clothing once more and then sat opposite me.

"Who is he?" I asked. It wasn't so much a question as it was a demand. She knew it.

"You'll kill him," she whispered, shaking her head.

"Yes." There was no doubt.

"I...I can't let you do that."

"It is no longer your decision to make. I told you. We did things your way. Now we will do them mine. This is not going to happen again. I will not allow it."

"You don't understand-"

"Then make me understand. Explain." I waited, seeing if she would elaborate. Silence stretched between us. She wasn't going to say anything more. Was his hold on her really so strong?

Apparently so. Because though tears fell from her eyes, though I could see that she wanted to tell me everything, throw herself on my mercy, she did not. She closed her eyes tightly and shook her head slowly.

"Very well, Miss Granger, you are dismissed. This is the potion you will brew for your tutoring." I handed her the paper and book. Blinking in surprise, she took them. "You will find the ingredients needed are listed in that book. I expect you to have the finished potion on my desk by sundown tomorrow." Without another word, I turned to the papers on my desk. For a moment, she simply sat there. Then she slowly began to gather up her bag. She tucked the book inside and rose to her feet. There was an ever so slight frission of magic as she cast her glamor once more. At the door, she paused as if she wanted to say something more to me. But she didn't. Just when she had put her hand on the knob to leave, I spoke again.

"Why do you refuse to call me Headmaster?" I hadn't intended to ask the question. I wanted to say something either reassuring or menacing, whichever rolled off my tongue first. But once the words were out, I sat there hoping she would answer. She let out a slow breath and didn't turn back to face me.

"You spent so many years hiding. Behind the Death Eater persona, behind your position as a Professor, behind your duty to the order. After the war...that was the first time anyone truly got to see you. The real you, Severus. I don't mean any disrespect. You cannot ever know how much I respect you. But that's exactly why I won't distance myself from you like that. I won't let you just be Headmaster Snape. You deserve more than that, even if you think its not what you want. I see you, Severus. You aren't a Death Eater to me. Or a Professor, or Headmaster. You are Severus Snape, the man. Someone needs to remind you of that. And I'm strong enough to do it. I won't let you alienate yourself from me." Without waiting for me to respond, she left.

I sat there, once more dumbstruck. How did she keep doing that? Leaving me speechless and shaken to my core?

She meant it not as an insult or disrespect, but as a way to stay close to me? To remind me of who I was, deep down? She'd braved my wrath more than once- this woman who'd been brutalized and traumatized- as a way of helping me?

I shook my head, utterly lost.

Now, my plan seemed even more imperative. If she wanted to be the one to remind me of the person I was, then I was damn well going to do the same to her. She wasn't just a victim, a sick plaything for that man in her life. She was Hermione Granger, the brains of the Golden Trio, woman who had helped save the entire wizarding world. She'd faced three headed dogs, trolls, a basilisk, dragons, and the Dark Lord himself. That was the woman she deserved to be every moment of every day. She shouldn't ever have to be the frightened, ashamed little thing that I had healed. And the only way to make sure she wasn't ever a victim again was to take the bastard out.

If she wouldn't tell me who he was, I had other methods of finding out. She had been brave enough to decide to keep calling me Severus even when I didn't want her to. I would do the same for her.