Progress
She had visited Snape at least once a week ever since she had been released from St Mungo’s herself.
At first she’d sat frozen. She’d come in, sat down on the visitor’s chair, and spent two hours staring at his still form, dazed, without thought or feeling. After three or four weeks, whenever she’d entered the room she’d started shaking and crying. Eventually that had passed, though.
She had grown quite calm. When she visited him, she found herself grow as still within herself as he appeared, lying in that silent room, the only sound his shallow breathing. Outside, the world was moving on, memorial services and victory celebrations over, heroes and victims beginning to pick up the pieces of shattered lives and moving on. Inside this quiet room, time stood still.
At some point she’d grown anxious again, had started worrying again. The Healers promised her over and over again that he would heal and that he would live, but still he did not move, still he did not wake.
Had she saved him for a life spent in coma?
Her visiting hours were spent in nervous tension, watching, watching his face, his hands, for any change at all. But there was nothing. And when she left the hospital, she felt exhausted and drained.
Sitting next to him now she was even more scared than before. But now she was scared that he would wake up, and not that he wouldn’t. What if he woke? What would he say? Would he be able to speak? Would he even recognise her? Would she be able to act as if –
She shook her head.
The good thing about this situation—and about the only good thing about the situation – was that there was nothing normal about it. It wouldn’t matter if she was not able to behave as if nothing had happened, because so many things had happened, after all.
The Healers had no idea if he had lost his memories completely, or how many he had lost. The only thing they knew was that whatever Snape had done, it was not the normal method of retrieving memories for a Pensieve. At the moment a Memory Charms specialist from the Permanent Spell Damage Ward was working with Harry to copy the memories and purge them – as much as that was possible – from Harry’s thoughts and emotions upon seeing them.
Hermione winced. She felt really sorry for whoever would end up having to explain that to Snape. Not enough that he was still alive, when he’d planned on dying, he would get his most private and painful memories back as seen from the perspective of the one person alive he detested most of all.
Was that a movement? She started, bent forwards, her eyes intent on his drawn, pale features. Her heart started racing and her stomach constricted.
Was he waking up now?
She stared at his face, at that thin body underneath the white and green covers. He looked so much smaller than she remembered him as a teacher. Human, pale and frail instead of powerful, black and looming over them all.
She frowned. His breathing appeared to be deeper than it had. And not as regular as before. Was that only her imagination or had that eyelid twitched slightly?
The door was opened. Slowly, carefully. And Healer Mugwort poked her head in. ‘It’s time, Miss Granger.’
Hermione nodded and rose to her feet. She wasn’t quite sure if she was disappointed that yet another of her visits had passed without Snape waking up, or relieved.
When the door closed behind her at last, she sighed and turned to the healer. ‘Are you sure he’ll wake up soon?’
Muriel Mugwort nodded. ‘Didn’t you notice the changes?’
Hermione flexed her lower lip thoughtfully. ‘I am not sure, but he did appear to breathe more deeply. And not as regularly as he did before. And I think I saw one of his eyelids move.’
The Healer smiled. ‘He can breathe without magical help again. And he is moving his eyes in his sleep. He is really only sleeping now. He will wake. Don’t worry. He’ll wake, and he’ll live. And everything will be just fine.’
Hermione clenched her teeth. She knew that Mugwort only wanted to reassure her. But nothing would be ‘just fine’. It just didn’t work that way. Especially not with a life-sentence in Azkaban hanging over Snape’s head due to some misconceptions about Muggle justice on the part of over-eager Ministry officials.
She forced a smile. ‘Thank you. I really hope so.’
oooOooo
‘You look like shit, kid,’ George quipped when she entered Grimmauld Place. He’d moved in after the memorial service.
He couldn’t sleep at the Burrow, and he couldn’t sleep at the flat he’d shared with his twin. She wasn’t sure if he slept at Grimmauld Place either, for that matter. He was so pale that the freshly whitewashed walls looked colourful in comparison. His freckles stood out in dark flecks, making him look as if he had an attack of the measles.
‘You, too.’ She put her bag down and stretched wearily. ‘Are the others back in?’
‘Yes, you’re the last one to come back. I just came down to get more butterbeer to help oil that war – planning session.’
Hermione flinched. Some words just didn’t work anymore. A year or two ago, she’d have grinned at the term ‘war council’. But then Fred would have been alive to flap his hand over his mouth in a mock imitation of a war cry.
‘I’ll be upstairs in a minute,’ she said.
‘No changes then?’
She grimaced. ‘Some changes, the Healer said, but he’s still unconscious.’
‘Don’t look so glum,’ George said. ‘That gives us more time to come up with our plans. And taking on that big bad bat of the dungeons will require some bloody good plans.’
‘He’s not a bat. And he’s not bad,’ Hermione said automatically. ‘I just hope our plans will be good enough.’
What a great setup! I love the way you’ve modified the Marriage Law enough to make it plausible, as opposed to the ridiculous version of the original challenge. That choice shifts the dynamic, removing the distraction of needing to deal with why the Ministry has become so obviously corrupt. Making Severus the one who needs saving, instead of Hermione, is a great role reversal, and having Severus unaware of the plan is a very nice little plot twist – I anticipate a great deal of suspicion on his part, making things difficult for Hermione.
W00t! Great to see you here. 😀
The original MLC the lawyer in me stimply couldn’t stomach. But at the same time the *idea* absolutely intrigued me. And didn’t let go until I figured I’d try to twist it and bend it a little and see what happens …
Having Severus unaware of the plan was a lot of fun. And yes, he’ll be definitely a pain in the behind. But that’s his job!
What a great start. Lots to like. Luna being smarter than everyone thinks. Hermione marching off to a fate worse than death, feeling honor bound to do so. The sneaking suspicion that Luna is really getting Hermione out of the way so she can become a Weasley. She’d fit right in.
Mwahahahahahah!
mk
PS: It needs classic soap opera cliffhanger organ music.
Hi,
I really love your story so far, and I can’t wait to read on!
Just wanted to let you know that the link to part 2 does not work, either you get a warning that it “Cannot modify header information”, or the page closes down… *sobs*
Budgie
It should work now. I’ve been trying to get a caching plugin working to speed up the performance of the site, but the dratted thing won’t work and even worse, as you’ve seen, BREAKS stuff. *ARGH!*
Happy you like the story so far! 🙂
I love your whole plot. I am so excited to keep reading. You take things at an absolutely perfect speed– the characters developing bit by bit is perfect. The whole idea is brilliant.
I don’t think I’d be able to rave enough about your work. *claps*
Thank you very much for spending time with my story and even more for taking the time to leave a comment. 🙂
I’m very happy you like the story so much so far!
I think I’m going to love this! I’ve been an avid reader of SS/HG since 2003, and I especially love when an author does a post-DH fic. 🙂 I followed the link from some artwork on DeviantArt and am so glad I did! I’m also happy to see that this is a completed fic, so yay! I can read to my heart’s content and not worry about it being abandoned! 🙂
Thank you for spending time with my story and even more for taking the time to leave such a kind comment. I hope you will enjoy the rest of the story!
Followed your link from ff.net, and am so glad I did! I read this when you were first putting it up, and loved it then. I love it even more now that I have actually gone back and re-read the gloriousness that is Abhorsen. 🙂
Also, may I say that I absolutely love the site. There’s something about reading a wonderful story in a functional, beautiful setting.
You have always been one of my favorite fan fic authors for your skill, unexpectedness, the way you deftly take a story I think I know and turn it upside down and inside out while remaining true to the spirit of it, and this story is no exception.
Thank you for your kind words. That means so much to me! 🙂
Iv’e just read this entire fanfic in a few days, it was AWESOME. Of course, I didn’t take the time to write reviews then, I was too enraptured with the story. And when I saw you had a sequel, of course I had to read that first too. I did resolve to come back latter and leave a review on every tenth chapter, so here I am.
So, starting with chapters 1-10:
Really well done. I like the tension in Ron, Hermione, and Harry’s relationship. Especially that Harry and Ginny foresee the coming doom of Ron and Hermione’s romantic relationship.
I like the cute nicknames you give Harry, like ” the Boy-Who-Could-Use-Cusswords-Without-Being-Scolded.”
The healer at Mungos is a treat, extremely likable. 🙂
And best part: Arthur Weasley mentions that Snape’s sentence has some similarities to muggle theories of rehabilitation and Hermione just has to express her frustration. Her hitting her head on the desk is like a facepalm X 10.
And last but not least, I am definitely looking forward to seeing how the sequel develops. My only hope is that further maiming of our beloved main characters is limited. If the pace of terrible injuries maintains itself from this fic, by chapter 200 of the next one they’ll all be sitting around in Mungos each of them in a “johnny got his gun” kind of situation.
Intriguing setup. I’m not quite sure how I feel about Ron’s characterization, but after the summary, he has to get out of the picture. Even after finally reading all the books, my feelings for Snape are not overly friendly ;-).
You just totally and absolutely MADE my day. *dances*
Now, your comment: Yes, obviously writing SS/HG Ron must disappear. Mostly. 😉 But also, I never liked him (much) in canon, so … Otoh, I always adored Snape. In HBP I *knew* without any doubt that he hadn’t killed Dumbles … Also, one thing about “Apprentice” is definitely that I’m not always sharing the characters’ opinions. I have them being stupid and making mistakes, and being beastly, and doing things that made me go “DON’T DO THAT!” even as I was writing the relevant chapter. It’s pretty wild and sometimes even *gasp* controversial. But I had tons of fun, and I hope you’ll enjoy it, too — even if you don’t really like Snape. 😉
But you make him likeable. Through Hermione’s eyes, no longer a child, some of his choices make more sense.
I tried hard not to whitewash or bash any character. I’m happy the characterisation works for you so far! 🙂
I was referred to your story as a “must-read” and I’m happy that I followed this recommendation. Thank you for sharing such a wonderful idea. I especially enjoyed the way you made them behave “real” and how smothly you added Alina and her mother to the known characters.
I hope you will some day continue with the sequel.
Thank you for spending time with my story, and I’m thrilled you enjoyed it — especially my OCs. I know many people are dubious about OCs, so I’m always very happy when readers like the additional characters I created. I really, really want to finish the sequel (it’s all plotted out!). But offline life has been utterly awful since 2010, each year in its own way, and 2013 is less than fun so far, so I doubt much will happen this year. 🙁
I’m excited to start your story–I stumbled across it through a “favorite story” link on FF.net. I’m not sure how I feel about Ron and Harry’s characterizations so far, but then again I don’t particularly like either one of them in canon, either, so you’re probably spot-on.