Something was broken. Some part of his ankle, perhaps. But that didn't bother Severus. Right now, he couldn't feel. His world had been reduced to one simple task: searching for Hermione.

The ground was littered with bodies. He limped past them. Some of them may have still been alive, but he didn't care. Someone else could tend to them. He was not their hero. No. His eyes were peeled for frizzy brown hair and the slender form of Hermione Granger.

She was not among the living. Those standing had been accounted for. Nor was she among the dead. The lines of bodies stretched the length of the Great Hall. She was not one of them. And he had stumbled his way through the cots in the Hall where the sick lay begging for mercy. She was not there. But bodies littered the grounds of Hogwarts, and she might be one of them.

When he saw her-that hair was simply too unique to be passed over-his heart froze hard in his chest with the pain of dread. More than he needed oxygen, he needed her to be alive. And for a moment he couldn't breathe. Suddenly, he was crouched on the ground beside her, pulling her into his lap and leaning an ear over her mouth. Was that the wind or was she breathing? He could not be sure. Two desperate fingers on her neck could not determine a pulse, yet he needed her to be alive.

"Please, Hermione,"

He was rocking back and forth when the mediwizards found him. Somehow, his famous dispassionate rationale had deserted him in the face of her potential death. Her body was cold and her limbs were lifeless, but he could not comprehend the terrible thought that she was gone. All he could do was hope and wish and pray to whatever higher power there might be to save this beautiful witch from her demise. He could not accept that she was dead, even in the face of cruel, hard evidence.

They had to pry her from his arms. Somehow, he could not part with her like this. If she were really gone, he had to keep her in his arms forever. Once she was taken, it would really be true. And he could not accept that.

He followed them back to the Great Hall, but at a distance. With his ankle broken (or whatever part it was), he could not match the pace of the fit, young mediwizards. When he reached the hall, she had been placed in line with the rest of the dead. "No!" he shouted aloud, collapsing onto his knees beside her body. To have it confirmed meant there was no going back. Oh, what he would have done to go back in time and save her from this end. "No!" he heard someone shouting in the distance. "She's not dead!" It was only later that he realized it was him.

Someone was touching her. Someone was lifting her up and pressing slender fingers against her neck. His mind didn't register the person at all, for it was far too intent on memorizing the lines of her bloodless face. Those once ripe lips were thin and pale, but her eyes were mercifully closed. More than anything, he wanted to tell her how he felt for her; he wanted her to know how beautiful she was.

"You're right," a voice was saying. It seemed as far away as home in Spinner's End. "She isn't dead." But he did not comprehend. Countless deaths he'd seen over the years, but hers was different. He couldn't accept it because he had to believe it wasn't true. Everything hinged on her being alive. If she were dead, he might as well be, too.

Suddenly, she was hovering off of the floor, and he collapsed back in surprise, watching her be lifted into the air, weightless as a ghost. No! he couldn't help but think, scrambling onto his feet to follow after her. She was assigned a cot toward the left side of the room and a mediwitch began emptying bottles down her lifeless throat. Poppy, he realized, belatedly. Poppy Pomfrey was taking care of the girl, herself. He wanted to reach out to her, to tell her that there was no use, that the girl was dead, but he so appreciated the extra effort on behalf of the young Gryffindor, that he couldn't bring himself to voice the truth. And when Hermione's body coughed on a potion, choking back into life, he had to lean against the wall to keep from falling to the ground.

After that, everything was a blur of motion and sound. He was taken to a bed to be treated for his ankle (a procedure that lasted something like 4 or 5 seconds), and to stare up at the ceiling in relief as sudden exhaustion overcame him. Finally, it was alright to be absent. The Dark Lord was dead. The War was over. Hermione had come back to life. And he allowed the encroaching darkness to overcome him, pulling him away from the pain of reality, and into the dark anesthetic of the realm of dreams.

…*~*J*~*…

"Severus?"

"Mmm?"

"It's the funeral today. Aren't you coming?"

"…"

"Severus, Albus would have wanted you to be th…"

"Albus wouldn't have given a bloody fuck if I attended." There was a tense pause. "And he certainly won't, now."

Minerva stepped cautiously into the room, moving to stand behind her colleague and place a hand on his shoulder. "Severus, when things begin to settle again, there will be trials. You'll only be hurting yourself if you don't come with me."

"I don't care anymore, Minerva."

The graying witch let out an impatient huff of air. "Severus, her condition is stable. Nothing is going to happen while you're gone."

"She's fading every day. That's what the mediwizards say."

Minerva squeezed his shoulder. "I don't understand, Severus. You never… expressed any concern for her, before."

"Oh, just leave it alone, Minerva! Leave me in peace." With one angry twist, he wrenched out of her grasp.

"Fine. I will leave. But you would do well to consider what I've said."

He did not reply, and with that she left. And he was all alone again. Alone with her. She had not woken up since they had found her, and though the color had returned to her face, it was diminished more every day. There were whispers that it would be merciful simply to let her die. But he wouldn't allow it. He stayed by her side day and night, hardly sleeping, never eating, never giving up on her.

More than anything else, he regretted never telling her how he felt.

"Mr. Snape, sir?" It was the young blonde witch who was training to be a healer, here at St. Mungo. The timid thing had gotten into the habit of leaning around the doorframe, as opposed to entering normally.

"What?" he grumbled. She was as easily intimidated as a Hufflepuff third year, and wore just as many irritating bows in her over-fluffed hair.

"Erm… I'm afraid I need to ask you to leave."

Severus tensed, slowly turning his head to lock eyes with the impertinent girl. If half the anger he felt made it past his exhausted façade, she was sure to surrender on the spot.

Sure enough, her eyes grew wide and watery with fear, and she bit her lip, retreating more fully behind the doorframe. "I'm sorry, sir, it's just… Miss Granger needs to have a sponge bath… else she'll get bedsores."

To his surprise, Severus found himself blushing. "Fine. But be quick about it," he growled, standing so abruptly that he almost knocked over his chair. The girl practically leapt out of his way as he swept from the room.

There was a thought irritating him somewhere in the back of his mind. It was as if, somehow, she had reminded him that he wasn't really intimate with Granger. He had only dreamt that he was. If she woke up-when she woke up-she would wonder why he was there. Would she be disgusted when they told her he'd been watching over her sleeping form? He just couldn't believe that was true.

Thinking back, for the thousandth time, Severus recalled the way she'd run up to him in the Entrance Hall. "Be careful," she had told him. Oh, how he wished he had told her to do so, too. There had to be something more to it than that. Even if it was nothing more than his dreams drawing on the tension that really existed between them. To think that there truly was nothing at all… he just couldn't accept that.

And what if it was her all along? Severus quelled the thought. It was foolishness to consider even the possibility. Or is it foolish to discount it altogether? He shivered. There was a way to be certain, after all. All it would take was one little glance, and he would know for sure. So, why was he afraid? Did he think that knowing for certain it hadn't been her, that she would die all over again? Or, perhaps, that he would be able to let her go? Preposterous! After all, his affection for the witch in his dreams rose primarily out of his respect for the girl in his classroom. Even if it hadn't really been her (and it was ridiculous even to think that it might have been), it wasn't as if his feelings would change. No, but it will mean that there is no way she could ever be interested in you.

Severus stomped right through a cluster of medi-students on a tour, scattering the irritating hopefuls in a flurry of purple robes. Of course, if it really were true… if she really had found a way into his dreams… maybe he could recreate it with her.

Severus stopped dead. The blood drained out of his face, leaving him cold, as his body tensed against the instinct to hope. The idea had not occurred to him, before, but now it seemed so obvious that he cursed himself for not thinking of it earlier. If she had gotten into his dreams, that might provide the key to waking her up from this perpetual sleep. Even if it was a long shot, she was worth giving it a chance. After all, he would know for sure with just a simple glance into her bedroom at Grimmauld. And if it was true, she was sure to have notes about it somewhere.

Emboldened by possibility, Severus ran. The potential for Hermione's salvation was enough to allow him to hope. He pushed past mediwizards and sick beds, alike, desperate for the Apparition Chamber.

Only when he found himself staring at her bedroom door, did Severus finally hesitate.

This was it. Whatever lay beyond this thin layer of tattered wood would answer his most secret questions with a glance. He could not allow himself to consider the possibility that he was wrong. Not now, when fear was threatening a stranglehold upon him, and the path to Hermione's cure might lie ahead. He pushed open the door.

And froze stiff at the sight that greeted him.

It really had been her. He had been so certain of his own foolishness, that he had to fight through disbelief. Forcing himself to step into the room, he looked around at the familiar surroundings. He knew this place. Hermione had shown it to him.

He stepped over to her bed, reaching a hand out to touch the soft, neatly folded blankets. In the pale blue light filtered through these sheets, he had made love to her. Comprehension attacked him all at once, sending him crumpling to his knees. His heart was torn between rejoicing and despair. Reaching out, he gripped the blankets as if to hold on to her memory. And sudden tears of pain and joy broke out behind his eyes. She really was his Hermione. And she really was trapped in her own body, slowly dying in a brightly lit hospital bed.

But he was determined to save her.

Her belongings were still at Hogwarts Castle. It felt strange charging up into the Gryffindor girls' dormitories. As a professor, the charm on the stairs did not affect him, but it seemed forbidden territory all the same.

His answer came in the form of an obscure potions manual, Recipes for a Wandering Mind. Of course! He was ashamed that she had deceived him with his own branch of study. Not that he was required, as Potions Master, to know every potion that had ever been invented. But it was embarrassing, all the same. Among an assortment of daydream elixirs, one page had been marked with bits of parchment (elaborate, but useless notes, no doubt). It was exactly what he knew he would find.

The potion was simple enough. It took a week to brew, and in that time, he watched his Hermione fade. There was talk of stopping her treatment out of mercy, but Severus was having none of that. Neither, it seemed, was Harry Potter. The boy had been back and forth between his two best friends since the end of the war (Ron Weasley was conscious, but confined to his bed at the Burrow, where the Boy Who Lived entertained him).

When the healers took Potter aside and explained to him what would be in her best interests, he lashed out and shouted at them that they didn't have the right to do that. By the end of the day, however, he had been subdued. Sitting at the girl's side, he wept over her emaciated frame, clutching her lifeless hand in two of his own.

Severus had come to retrieve one of her long, curly hairs; the last step of his brewing. He hesitated in the doorway, not wanting to confront the Potter boy. And then he saw. The potions on her nightstand had been replaced with flowers, and the healing equipment was all gone. They had given up. The thought was so abrupt and crushing that Severus leaned against the doorframe, pressing a hand to his chest. It was up to him, now. And he needed to hurry.

"What are you doing here, Snape?" the brat spat.

Severus did not answer.

"Here to gloat, are you? Bet you're glad you won't have to deal with her anymore."

Before he knew what he had done, Severus had crossed the small room and backhanded the impertinent twit. The look of surprise on Potter's face would have amused him, but he was far too angry for that. "Check yourself, Potter. I may know a way to save the girl yet." He wasn't sure why he was confiding in the boy. Turning toward the girl, he reached for the dense thicket atop her head. "I only need a few of her hairs."

"What!? No you don't!" Potter shouted, leaping up to block him from his target. "They'll just end up in one of your potions, you pervert!"

Not knowing how to respond, Severus snarled. "I'm trying to help the girl! I might know a way…"

"You hate Hermione! Why would I trust you?"

Refraining from pushing past the arrogant prat, Severus took a deep breath. For Hermione's sake, he could put his hatred for the boy aside. If only for a moment. After all, perhaps it would be useful to have someone standing guard. "She dreamt with you, didn't she?" he asked, his voice low and dark and knowing. Potter's eyes grew wide, but he said nothing. "She discovered a potion that allowed her to step into your dreams." The light of understanding glowed out of those green eyes. "I have developed a batch of this potion and plan to use it to slip into her unconscious mind. If I succeed, I may be able to wake her from within."

Potter lowered his eyes to his professor's chest, seeming to turn over this information in his mind. At last, his brow wrinkled and he met his opponent's gaze. "Why you?"

"What?"

"Why should you be the one to do it? Hermione is my best friend. I should be the one to do it."

Severus snarled at that. "You entitled little brat! Always wanting to play the hero. It will be me because I have the potion, and you do not."

"But…"

"End of discussion! Besides," he added shrewdly, noting the look of rebellion in Potter's eyes, "I need you to guard the girl… be here when she wakes up." He could see his words taking effect as Potter considered.

"Deal," the boy smirked, sticking out his hand. Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Severus took it. Time was of the essence and they'd wasted enough of it fighting thus far.

He leaned over the girl, brushing the curls gently out of her face. He cleared his throat, embarrassed that Potter had to be here. But if he did not succeed, she might be dead by the time he returned. Still, desperation notwithstanding, he was still Severus Snape. It would not do to kiss the girl's forehead, or some other such nonsense. Why he even felt the need to was beyond him.

Plucking one long hair from her bushy mane, Severus enclosed it in a vial and tucked that safely within the pockets of his robes. He bid Potter good evening and good luck and left the hospital room before his fear could overcome him. This had to be done. It would not help her to sit at her side through this long, potionless night, wishing on miracles that she would come through.

There was work to be done.

…*~*J*~*…

Thank you all so much for your support of my story. There will be one more chapter after this. Your reviews really kept me going, and I want you to know how much they mean to me. So a special thank you to those who reviewed the last two chapters (because I forgot to add Author's Notes last time). So Thank You Montara, LimitedEditionGrace, Claudilla, JM2010, mama123, Serena, kaida171, jensteed, immigrant14, NinnA, Inn, Smithback, Lyra Lupin, DutchGirl01, severus-rickman-lover, incoherentlove, Tessieg, Lunajen323, Ann, Auroras Jenkins, viola1701e, Blue night fairy, CharmedArtist, Fantomette34, marzipan4, granger-slytherinboys, marianna79, Perry Downing, HatakeHinata, Vaila, Amarenima Redwood, Viteali Varishta, RhodaBush, MayP, just an anon reader, -sparrow, irononmaiden, giada, Jennydownes3, cwqueen, and several Guests! You guys are amazing and I love you!

:} llorolalluvia