Chapter 2 – Summer 1996 (Part 1)
A/N: I am so pleasantly surprised by the attention this story has received. I really didn't expect anyone to read it! I love this ship and so I wanted to write the story that I've longed to read. This is it. I admit much of my inspiration came from mak5258's story "From first sight." If you haven't read that one, definitely go do so! To my reviewers NobleRose104, Purplehyena01, jmstd3, and Aristicmom2, thank you so much for taking the time to review. I never realized before how much those reviews could mean. To my very first reviewer, I used your name as inspiration for Severus' pub.
It had been an especially gloomy week in Britain. The atmosphere inside The Rose and Thorn pub in Cokeworth certainly reflected the atmosphere outside. It was a Friday evening, so there were plenty of patrons, but the news of the bridge collapse in London and a string of unsolved murders had cast its own sort of spell over the population. People were huddled together in groups, and the lack of the usual raucous laughter was palpable. In a corner of the pub conveniently located near the rear exit sat a dark man brooding over his pint, a newspaper on the table in front of him.
Emmaline Vance's death had made headlines, and Severus knew Amelia Bones' would be announced shortly. He'd planned to drink away his sorrows that evening but was interrupted several pints in by a small flash of flame in front of him and a scarlet feather left on the table. The flash caught the barman's eye, but by the time he looked over he saw nothing more than a man lighting up a cigarette, then gathering his paper and heading out the back into the drizzling night. The man had left money on the table, and as the barman pocketed it, he thought no more of the dark man who frequented his pub in the summers.
Vanishing the un-smoked cigarette with a twirl of his fingers, Severus then made a sort of beckoning gesture. Had a muggle happened upon the scene, they would have had a hard time making out Severus' shape as the shadows seemed to stretch towards him and engulf him. A half twist and a quiet pop later, Severus arrived in his sitting room, and promptly flooed to Albus' office. He had no great desire to see the Headmaster so shortly into the summer, but Fawkes would only have summoned him if there was great need.
The weather was even worse in Scotland. Rain pelted the high windows in the headmaster's office and lightning split the sky at regular intervals. An evil air permeated the room.
Albus was sitting in his chair, slouched over his desk, groaning and clutching his arm. A sword lay on the ground at his feet and a cracked ring lay further into the room. Severus rushed to Albus' side and nearly recoiled at the sight before him.
Albus Dumbledore's right hand was a mess. The tips of his fingers had turned black, and the rest of his hand was a putrid, grayish colour. The skin had a waxy, bubbling sort of look to it that gave the impression of something rotten. Veins bulged and writhed beneath the skin. Before Severus' eyes, the blackness seemed to be ever so gradually creeping along, withering the skin in its slow, sure path. Fawkes chose that moment to glide by Severus, jolting him out of his momentary horror. He promptly pulled out his wand and turned it on himself. With fiddly little swirling motion, he cast a hex of his own invention – the Sober-Up hex. Immediately, the pleasant haze that had dulled his thoughts receded, his heart rate and breathing returned to normal as the alcohol was removed from his bloodstream and his lungs, veins, and arteries took up their usual rhythms. He began casting diagnostic charms. The first layer of the magic seemed to be a particularly nasty flesh-rotting curse. As he disentangled the web of runes and multi-coloured lines comprising his diagnostics, he finally recognized some sort of Sanskrit-based withering jinx for plants. It all appeared to be bound by intent. It seemed, however improbable, that Albus had accepted the enchantment. The binding of the enchantment to Albus was working in their favor for now. The curse was sure of its inevitability. It meant a slowed onset, though no doubt more painful.
Severs began casting the seven counter curses for flesh-rotting he knew off the top of his head. The fifth counter did the trick. A curse popular in the eighteenth century, one would place it on their own livestock. In the event someone stole the animal, its flesh would rot away, leaving the thief with nothing. Severus wondered what this said about the caster. The bubbling of the skin on Albus' hand slowly faded, though the withering blackness proceeded with its stately march. The first knuckle on his hand was completely black.
Taking a deep breath, Severus looked around. He rolled up his sleeves and summoned parchment, a quill, and ink. Recasting his preferred set of diagnostic charms over Albus, he linked the results to the quill. Severus was no slouch at curse breaking, but his Sanskrit was rusty and it would be best to keep a log of what changed as he worked.
The fire that had burned bright when Severus had arrived through the floo was burning low when he cast his last resort. It had been a long night of wrestling with the webs of spellwork that had intwined with Albus' hand. Many he had been able to sever, but he had finally admitted defeat. He needed to place his own kind of curse on the man's arm, which would be able to fight the curse already in place. Though it would not win in the end, it would buy them time.
With a final brandish of his wand, with which the Dark feeling in the air intensified, he set his own curse on his mentor, which did seem to halt the blackening spread. Albus stirred at last as the second curse took hold, feeding off the pain and therefore relieving the man. He looked down at his hand. The entire ring finger of Albus' right hand and the tips of the other fingers were a deep, mottled black. Splayed across the parchment littering his desk, you could almost believe he'd dipped the offending digits in his inkwell. Except for the cloying, suffocating feeling of the dark magic in the room. He looked up at his spy with such a weary, defeated expression, that Severus could not stand to meet his gaze. He spun on his heel and began pacing. He was furious with the old man. They were in the middle of a war and he'd gone and all but assured his death. Albus was going to die.
"Toppy!" Severus called, and a little house elf with rounded ears appeared. Before she could say a word, Severus was barking orders. "Fetch Poppy immediately," he said, "And then bring us water and food, if you please." Toppy bowed and popped away. Severus stooped down and hefted the sword that had been cast upon the ground, which he now recognized as the Sword of Gryffindor. Placing that back in its display case behind Albus' desk, he then levitated the cracked ring into the case as well, behind the stand and out of sight. No sooner had he resumed his pacing across Albus' office than in blustered the healing matron of Hogwarts herself.
"Great Merlin, what's happened now?" she queried the room at large. Thunder responded.
Severus motioned to the parchment he'd recorded his diagnostics on, which obligingly soared across the room to Poppy. It seemed to wobble in the air momentarily, but maybe it was just a trick of the eye as Severus' throat tightened. Albus was going to die.
Poppy scanned the report as Toppy reappeared, handing a glass of water to Albus, who unthinkingly tried to reach out his right hand. Switching to his left, he quaffed the water, getting most in his long, silver beard. Poppy cast her own favored diagnostic charms and sat down rather heavily in one of the chairs facing Albus' desk.
The runes floating above the old man seared themselves in Severus' mind. Albus was going to die. He was frantically trying to keep his mind from fracturing into a million pieces. Albus was going to die. Only the voice of Poppy Pomfrey kept him grounded.
"Albus, you accepted the curse. It won't be curable." The words were said as though commenting on unremarkable weather, as though to say, "It's a fine day we're having. Might fancy a stroll by the lake later." It was the peculiar gift of Healers to be able to give the worst news in the most ordinary tones. Severus barked a laugh at the absurdity of the situation. Albus was going to die. It was followed by a choking sound they both pretend wasn't a sob.
Taking his own seat as he gained control over himself, he took a fortifying beath and agreed with the witch. "It's deep in the bones. You have a year, maybe, Albus."
The tea set Toppy had brought took the opportunity to pour them both cups of tea prepared the way they liked it. Both Severus and Poppy automatically took the cups and saucers that floated to them and sipped at the drink that proposed to calm all nerves.
"What shall we do, Headmaster?" Poppy asked. Albus cleared his throat and levered himself into a more upright position. He was surveying the diagnostic runes hanging above him with a grim expression. "I think we must inform the others. Much will need to be set into motion."
Turning to the many portraits who had watched the scene unfold, he said, "Please, fetch the other Heads."
And though it was now very late at night indeed, it seemed just a moment or two later that Filius Flitwick bustled through the door. The scene that greeted him filled him with foreboding: Albus, diagnostic runes still glowing above him, and Poppy and Severus with such troubled looks sitting in the chairs across from him. Severus stood quickly, expression sliding off his face. Filius hated when he Occluded like that. His years in the international dueling rings had taught him that mind magic was a dreadful business. People had gone mad practicing it and he knew it wasn't good for the boy. He stepped aside to let Minerva into the room. She was breathing hard, leaning on the cane in her hand, a tartan shawl wrapped around her nightgown. She had only been back from St. Mungos a month or so. They were joined by Pomona, muddy to her elbows, though her charmed boots left no tracks for Argus to mop up. It was probably a good night to harvest thunderbristles, Severus noted offhandedly.
Severus took them in. They had the steel set to their faces you saw in war time. Three of the most competent witches and wizards in Britain. He was immeasurably grateful he wouldn't be facing this alone.
Toppy appeared for a third time that night with a tray of sandwiches and something decidedly stronger than tea. There would be little sleep that night. The future of Hogwarts would depend on careful planning. Albus was going to die.
The following Tuesday evening, in the suburbs of London, a bushy-haired young woman sat on her bed in her parents' house and stared out her window at the dreary night. The heavy rain that had plagued them recently had settled into a steady drizzle for the evening. A book lay in the lap of Hermione Granger, a mere prop in this scene of teenage brooding. She was thinking about Him again. He had been on her mind nearly constantly since he'd gone and upended her future. A soul mate. It was absurd. It sounded like the kind of thing that Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown would spend their evenings sighing over. Actually, Hermione was sure that her roommates had in fact spent a few evenings chatting about soul mates, but Hermione hadn't realised they were actually real in the magical world.
When she had woken up in the hospital wing, it had been late in the day and Madam Pomfrey was ushering Ginny, Luna, Neville, and Ron out the doors. "You lot head to dinner." Ron turned, protesting, but she spun him back around by his shoulder and continued herding the foursome out of her domain. "You may come back tomorrow morning, Mister Weasley, but Miss Granger has much more healing to do."
It was true, her chest was a constant ache with sharp pains when she breathed. She let out a pained gasp as she tried to take a breath. Madam Pomfrey, hearing her, closed the doors sharply behind the other teens and hurried over to her patient. From the array of potions on the table next to Hermione's bed, Madame Pomfrey promptly poured a pain reliever down Hermione's throat.
"I've got to spread the next three on your chest, dear," she warned as she folded down the blanket and untied her hospital gown in the front. Folding it away from the raw wound slicing its way from her collar bone to her navel, she then spread a numbing cream over every inch of the wound. It was the same blue potion Hermione remembered from the night before. As the pain faded away, Hermione was able to relax her body, which had gone rigid as she fought to breathe through the stabbing pain.
"The next potion is to clean out residual magic from the curse, which is quite painful without the numbing cream, and the last will be an antiseptic. And then you and I need to have a talk." Working quickly, the potions were applied, the hospital gown resituated, and the blanket returned to its proper place. Madam Pomfrey sat down in a chair next to her patient's bed and folded her hands in her lap. "I presume, from your response this morning, that you were not aware of the occurrence of magically suited souls?"
"I suppose I've heard the other girls mention soul mates before, but I thought they were a myth! Like they are in the muggle world…" As she finished that last sentence, it dawned on her how silly that assumption sounded. She wondered what else she had dismissed as a myth 'like it is in the muggle world,' and for a moment felt as ignorant as she had in her first year. Hermione hated feeling ignorant.
"How does it work? What exactly does it mean to be suited, magically speaking? Why couldn't I look away from him? Why did it happen last night and not the first time we saw each other? Why on earth did he kiss my hand?"
Madam Pomfrey considered her questions. "It's rather like when a wand chooses its witch or wizard for the first time. Do you remember the first time you touched your wand? Most people describe it as a moment of wonder, as though they are feeling their own magic for the first time. Perhaps a sense of euphoria overcame them. The first time two people whose magic is perfectly suited for each other touch, something similar happens. They are engulfed in that sense of euphoria as they feel the other's magic. It's why shaking hands became the traditional way of greeting one another. You'll notice that married witches and wizards won't do such a thing. It would be quite unlucky to be married already when you find your soul's pair. You must acknowledge the magic with a kiss—some of the sillier romance novels call it True Love's First Kiss—which is why Professor Snape kissed your hand. I don't suppose I would have thought of such a chaste option, but that was certainly a very appropriate course of action."
Hermione realised she hadn't noticed if the adult witches and wizards in her life shook hands when they met each other. Every adult at Hogwarts and in the Order already knew each other. "So… Professor Snape and I are meant to be together?" The idea was preposterous.
"Oh, it's not so set in stone as all that. There's no divination aspect to this. You could both marry other people and live fine lives. But magic chose to let you two know that you could be quite happy together, if that's the path you choose. In that moment, you saw what could be with each other, not what has to be."
Something unclenched in Hermione. "So, we can pretend this never happened."
Madame Pomfrey furrowed her eyebrows and frowned at that. "The Headmaster has made it clear that he wishes you to go on as though it did not happen, for the sake of Professor Snape's position in the war. But I do hope, when all this bad business is over, that you both will be able to accept this gift. Many great works of magic have been the result of a suited pair. Rather like a wand focuses your magic, your suited other enhances it. My grandparents were suited, and they always said they only felt complete when the other was around."
After that, Madame Pomfrey had given her a lecture on health, health magic, and a witch's options for birth control, which had led to a beet-red Hermione gladly downing the sleeping potion she was offered when her chest began to itch unbearably.
Now, the weather outside her bedroom window matched her mood. Hermione had sworn off crushes on professors after the disastrous Lockhart episode. Her heart had been crushed with the knowledge that not all books could be trusted. And of course, that Lockhart had been a fraud. She certainly harboured no schoolgirl crush on Professor Snape! He was a closed-off, unhappy man who seemed to do his best to make his students as unhappy as him. She wasn't sure of his age but he must have been around forty.
She called to mind his crooked, yellow teeth, his sallow skin, and his lank hair. After their moment in the hospital wing, she couldn't help but seeing the long lashes and piercing eyes he also possessed. How would she ever explain to Harry and Ron that their hated professor was supposed to be her perfect match? Oh, Ron. A lump appeared in her throat and her eyes itched. She was so angry! Ron had just started to notice her in the last few months. He'd made an effort not to gripe about her love of the library, had been very kind about his requests for homework help, and had even willingly studied with her for their final exams. In the week she'd spent in the hospital wing, Ron had visited every day. She hadn't seen Professor Snape outside of meals since the morning they'd returned from the Ministry. How could she even consider a relationship with him when she knew there was someone out there who was practically made for her? Or something like that.
Logically, Hermione knew that she and Ron would not have lasted long. He was brash and opinionated, loved sports, and despised pleasure reading. But she felt the experience of a first love that burned brightly until it ended dramatically had been stolen from her.
She stroked the cover of the book in her lap. Madam Pomfrey had lent her a copy of Love Magics. Though it sounded like some tawdry romance, it was actually a very informative book about marriage and love and ritual magics in the Wizarding World. The section on suited souls had confirmed everything Madam Pomfrey had said. It was a rare phenomenon, but rarer still was the suited couple who didn't end up married. In addition, Hermione had learned that she heard very little about divorce at school because apparently couples in the magical community married for life.
She drifted off to a fitful sleep. She dreamt that Ron had asked her to a Hogsmeade weekend, but she had to explain she already had plans in the dungeons with Professor Snape. Harry and Ron's disgusted looks seem to grow in size, surrounding her as they told her she had no business with the greasy bat until she suddenly found herself in a dusty classroom that had the damp feel of the Hogwarts dungeons. There were chalk markings and candles on the ground and Professor Snape stood across the room sneering at her. "I need your magic, you insufferable girl," he was saying as an ominous knocking sound began.
Hermione woke up in a panic, sitting bolt upright, as the knocking sound continued. Looking out her window and down to the person standing on her stoop, she met the unhappy glower of one Severus Snape.