AN:
So this work was originally conceptualized for a comp I joined in July of 2022. I clearly didn't finish it in time.
Since then, it has been patiently waiting in the wings with all my other, sometimes forgotten, works. Recently however (September 2023), the all consuming urge to write Snamione has returned. Currently this work is undergoing edits provided by the always wonderful hizqueen4life. I also have a new chapter that she is reviewing. That will go up on Wednesday, October 4th.
Thank you so much for y'all's patience as I have floated in and out of fandom and made the rounds amongst a half dozen or more other Hermione centric pairings. I hope you still enjoy this work and if you're new, that you do enjoy it.
Love,
S.L.a.G.
Chapter One: Minerva's Plea
Startling Minerva out of as deep of a sleep as she could get since returning to Hogwarts to teach under Severus's iron-fisted rule, Sybill's voice echoed with the hundreds of seers that had come before her.
"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord is dying.
"He is in the frosted forest with the girl; the one Hades has chosen but Zeus has spurned for fear of an ancient repeat.
"Blood, so much blood. She's trying to save him but the Fates have readied his string. She cannot stop it no matter how hard she tries."
Grasping Minerva's arm as she tried to get out of their bed, Sybill turned her all seeing eyes on the fallen goddess, and whispered, "We will lose. Without the Son of Hades we will lose. Our world may not be one for the gods to play in but we will die without them. He needs to ascend. She is the only way.
"She is the only way…
"She is the only way…
"She is the only-"
Tapping into the power she had been left with when she was sent to walk amongst the mortals - forced to age and die as they did - as her punishment for falling in love with the Seer who shared her bed, Minerva pressed her fingers between her lover's brow and murmured, "Sleep my dear. Sleep and dream of an existence where the deeds of our hubris and jealousies did not taint your world. We will make this right, I promise you."
Laying Sybill back to sleep on her pillow, Minerva - the overtly renamed goddess, Athena - brought the fallen duvet back up around her. Tucking her in and sweeping a wayward, frizzy section of hair with her wrinkled fingers, she kissed the Seer's temple and rose from the bed. Pulling on her dressing gown and collecting the wand that masked her feeble god power as magic, she slid into her slippers and hurried from their tower chambers.
Racing down flight after flight of stairs, as she ignored the creaking protests of her old, mortal bones, Minerva crashed through the castle's high doors into the dark night of Christmas Eve. Lifting up the skirts of her night clothes, she raced down the steep hills of the school's grounds, slipping and stumbling on the slick snow. Cutting her hands on a jagged rock as she pushed herself back up, she continued to chase the waning crescent of the moon, in search of a single beam of light.
Feeling her heavy tartan dressing gown, that did little to banish the Scottish winter from her freezing muscles, catch on a tree branch, she ripped the garment from her body and left it to hang on the edge of the forest. They only had one chance at this and should they not make it before Potter took his last breath, silly things like hypothermia wouldn't matter. It had already been foretold that if left undefeated, the plague of the Dark Lord would spread off the island, eating away at the rest of the world like a vicious cancer for the next seven hundred years forever tainting and altering magic.
The Forbidden Forest was dense, the small, silver sliver of the moon and the lit end of her wand hardly making a dent in the darkness. Still she carried on, tripping over protruding tree roots, dirtying her nightgown and scraping up her hands as they shot out to break her repeated falls. Minerva twisted on and off the different paths, searching for the singular spot of call, the fine hairs along the nape of her neck standing on end as the already quiet forest grew thick and silent around her. It was a tell that a predator had her in its sights thinking she was easy prey, but even on a bad day she could still cut anything that came for her down with the crumbs of power that remained within her.
Finally, as exhaustion was beginning to creep in over her adrenaline, she reached the clearing of sanctuary that had been erected for her long ago when she had become a student at the school. Behind her, a sharp bark of pain that was half man, half wolf-ish beast echoed throughout the forest, her pursuer rebounding off of the protective wards that had been erected by her fellow goddess. Dropping her wand on the plush ground that was devoid of snow and ripe with fertile earth, she stripped away her nightgown and approached the viney, antler topped altar.
"Artemis?" she called, sinking to her knees as she prayed over the moon goddess's temple. "We need to interfere. I know Hades and I are a cautionary tale as to why we shouldn't but the girl, Hermione, she needs to be found. We have to do something. He's chosen her; says she's the one for his son. We need only to bring them together."
"And what but Zeus's wrath would you offer me in return, Athena?" Artemis asked, looking as resplendent as the moon itself as she knelt before her in the grass that was untouched by winter. "I already sacrificed my own daughter, stepping out of her life, ignoring her benedictions even when she finds her way here to my temple."
"I cannot offer you anything beyond hope that by aiding Hades and myself in our interference, that your daughter may be spared living through this hate filled, war torn world you've been forced to abandon her to."
Humming her thoughts as she stood back up, Artemis paced the perimeter of her sanctuary, her hound, stag, and doe dutifully following her. Trying to remain patient as she made her third lap around the temple, Minerva continuously reminded herself that while in the clearing, time moved differently than when outside of it. Though she was taking far longer than she would have preferred to make her decision, she knew that if the dice fell in her favor, the Goddess of the Hunt could find Hermione far faster than Hades could.
On her fourth lap, she returned to her altar and once more knelt before Minerva, clasping their hands together.
"Your mortal time draws near. Make the most of what you have with Sybill," she said, by way of answer, sealing her words with a soft kiss to her creased forehead, the Forbidden Forest lighting up with the strength of the full moon as the goddess's companions took off in search of the mortals' salvation.
