Chapters 101-110

Wake Me

Hermione woke first. She woke slowly. For the first time in weeks she didn’t startle awake, jumping from nightmares into wakefulness with nausea wrenching her stomach and her mind reeling. Instead she became gradually aware of warmth and darkness. She lay with her eyes closed. A subtle scent of spices enveloped her, and the soft sound of breathing drifted to her ears.

Suddenly her heartbeat quickened and her stomach tightened.

She opened her eyes.

oooOooo

They lay on their sides, facing towards the middle of the bed. Her left hand and his right hand were stretched towards each other, almost touching, but not quite.

Hermione sucked in her breath and tried to calm the nervous beating of her heart. She could feel her rapid pulse inside her throat.

He was here. He was—Tears sprang to her eyes as the events of the day before replayed with horrifying clarity in her mind.

Azkaban. By the time they had reached cellblock C, it was an effort to move. In spite of the chocolate Harry kept pressing on her at random intervals. She’d felt so weak that all she wanted to do was to lean against the cold, damp walls and slide down to the ground. In the narrow gloom of a winding staircase mounting the next step had turned into such a supreme effort she didn’t even have the strength to cry.

At that point it occurred to Hermione that she counted her erstwhile Boggart as one of her happier moments by now. This thought was so bizarre it dispelled her stupor sufficiently to be able to ascend the last steps.

And then there had been no time to think anymore at all.

She blinked away her tears and looked at his face as he slept. Always thin and bony, his face was gaunt now, the cheeks hollow, his eyes lying deep in the skull. The lines in his face, that cut into his forehead between his eyebrows and that bracketed his mouth formed deep crevices.

OH GOD, the way she had found him in that cell. A silent scream rose in her mind. To see him like that, nude, exposed, abused, helpless, after what she knew had happened to him before—but knowing, knowing is not seeing—her whole body tensed at the memory. Involuntarily her left hand brushed against his.

He opened his eyes. For a moment Severus stared at her in confusion. Then he stilled, his body coiled, ready to spring, as his gaze focused, black and piercing as ever. Hermione bit down on her lip until it hurt. Her eyes were brimming with tears, but she didn’t even dare to blink. A tear escaped, sliding from the corner of her right eye down to the pillow. Another flowed down to her left nostril.

Severus exhaled softly. With his breath, the tension drained from his body. He regarded her with glittering eyes.

Unsteadily he moved his right arm. He frowned at his weakness. His expression turned to one of intense concentration, as he brought his hand up to her face. Gently he caressed her cheek and nose, his index-finger and middle-finger slightly curled. In the air above him, the IV followed his movements like a strange, translucent buoy.

‘Surely you do not cry for me?’ His voice was harsh and hoarse, almost like during the first days of his recovery in the previous year. ‘I’m here, Hermione. I’m here.’ He coughed painfully. ‘Free, I presume.’

She nodded vigorously.

‘If not,’ he grimaced, stretched stiffly and glowered at the IV, ‘completely unharmed.’

Her eyes spilled over in a flood of silent tears. He dropped his hand to hers, covering her fist with his hand. Curling his long, slender fingers around hers, he forced her fist open, until he could take her hand.

For a long while they lay in silence, as Hermione cried and Severus held her hand.

‘I wasn’t there, Hermione. Whatever they did—’ A dead look settled in his eyes, leaving them as hard and uncompromising as obsidian. ‘– they did it to an empty shell.’

Hermione winced. Her fingers intertwined with Severus’, holding on tight.

‘But,’ her voice was thick with tears and suppressed horror. ‘But this, this body, that is you.’

‘It is now.’ He caught her gaze. ‘Because you and Alina woke me. It wasn’t then and there.’

A frown creased his forehead. The skin tightened around his eyes, until the veins at his temples shone through the pale skin with a blue-green shimmer.

The evidence of pain in her husband’s face overcame her emotional turmoil. Hermione sat up. ‘Poppy’s left several things for you. Calming Draught and a Pain Potion, more bruise balm and something—’ Hermione concentrated on the duvet, trying to discern the individual threads that made up the fabric. ‘– something to heal…inner lacerations and prevent infection.’

Hermione got up quickly and moved to his side of the bed, picking up the Pain Potion first. Following her movements, Severus turned onto his back. Judging from the way he narrowed his eyes, she thought that this position must be more uncomfortable. She bit down on her lips and uncorked the phial. Knowing better than to try to just feed a potion to a Potions Master, she held the small glass bottle out to him so he could smell it. ‘It’s from your own stock.’

He nodded, his lips thinning at his increasing discomfort. ‘Make that two doses, please.’

She did. To her surprise and apprehension, he also accepted the Calming Draught, a triple dose of it. ‘I have not succumbed to substance abuse, Hermione,’ he commented, when he noticed her surreptitious glance at him. ‘But due to…my way of life I’ve acquired an unfortunately high threshold level for many medicinal potions.’

When she picked up the pots with the salves, he shook his head. ‘If—’ He scowled at her. ‘If you could maybe help me to the bathroom. I would…much prefer to do that myself.’