Ch 46

The End

Wintering in Russia… it had been a terrible idea, he decided, just God awful. Why was he still here? God the cold. The locals kept telling him that -10˚C was balmy for a Russian winter, but Damn. No amount of magic could keep his bones warm in this wind. With vast relief he shuffled into a warm, cozily lit bar he often frequented on nights like this one. Despite the inhospitable climate, he did rather enjoy St. Petersburg. He kept returning time and time again. This was his fourth stay in the city in half as many years… He rather thought he might put up a permanent residence here. The wizarding community was flourishing, large enough for him to blend into the background. Besides, the Russians asked no questions.

Stamping his feet to will heat into his toes he beat the ice off the shoulders of his greatcoat. The wind here was far too fierce for snow to build up, but the sleet in the wind just loved to soak into the first layer of his coat creating a small polar ice sheet on his windward side. Once he had finished with this procedure he stepped out of the waterproofed atrium down into the bar. The air had a comforting haze of warm smoke, and smelled of vodka and food. The food here was hot and good, and the vodka… did what it was intended to. He surveyed the evening crowd, he recognized many of the faces, and they him. He was going by Prince again, Steven Prince, most of the locals had instantly latched onto Stephanovitch which he heard called by several voices in greeting.

But, something felt off. He scanned the room again, his eyes catching on a figure seated at the far edge of the bar. They were situated with the wall protecting one side and the bar the other, off to the side of the door, so a newcomer's initial sweep of the room would miss them. Prepared to take care of themselves then, a wise precaution.

The woman, the figure was too slight to be a man, was wrapped up in thick dark grey wool, a large cloak or similar garment. Slowly the stranger turned in her seat, and warm honey-toned eyes caught his. He only paused for a second before crossing the room and taking a seat beside her.

The bartender, familiar with him, came right over placing a shot of vodka down on the counter. Snape briefly lifted two fingers nodding to his female companion, his eyes never leaving her face. Reaching out, his cold fingers fumbling for the glass, he shot the contents with practiced ease.

She was smiling very slightly, her own nose and cheeks still reddened from the cold. When the barkeep placed her shot down, she broke eye contact with him nodding to her server. He did not breathe easy till her eyes were on him again. She lifted the glass in a tiny mock toast, and downed the drink with no difficulty, if she lacked the same smoothness that experience had given him.

"Hello, Severus," her voice was low and without any inflection to give away an ounce of emotion. The familiarity of her voice startled him.

"Hello."

A slight thump startled him and he ripped his eyes away from her to look at the barkeep who had just set down two steaming bowls and a plate of thick, crusty bread. It looked like some sort of beef stew. Entirely at a loss as to what etiquette required he do next he grabbed a slice of bread, dipping it into the bowl and taking a bite. He chewed slowly, still watching her as she likewise tucked into her meal. What did one say to a woman… one's wife… if it had been five years since one had seen her last?

"How long?" He finally asked.

"Two months, just three weeks once I realized you were still in Europe," She had slipped into an proper, if slow Russian, so as to avoid drawing undue attention.

"Damn."

They ate in silence for several more minutes.

"I found my parents. They have a nice little place in Croatia now."

Snape nodded and chewed, "How are things faring back home?"

Hermione shrugged, "I haven't gone back to Britain since I left. I hear Dumbledore's been elected Minister of Magic…again. Seems like things are starting to quiet down. They may even reopen their borders in a year or two."

They sat in that little corner of the bar for two more hours. Snape had four more shots, for courage, not that he'd ever admit he was scared of the witch not an arm's length away. Hermione ordered another bowl of the soup, which tonight was some regional variant of borcht with much less beet than Snape was accustomed to. The conversation was slow, finding its place in between bites of food, or shots of liquor, rarely more than two sentences were between them at one time before he or she would pull back, and take another bite of bread. It went as follows:

"Business or pleasure?" He asked.

"Pleasure."

…

"Why Russia?" She asked.

"The obscurity… And I enjoy the language."

…

"Да, язык сложный. Сам выучил, или заклинание использовал?" She ribbed gently.

"I cheated. No way to lose the accent without the spell," he smiled slightly at her continued teasing over using a spell rather than learning the language like she had.

…

"Where?" He asked.

"Australia, then the States, for a while. Then, up north, Norway is nice. I stayed with my family, for a year and a half while they settled in."

…

"You cut your hair." She said.

He touched the back of his head, "It's easier with all the travel, and less recognizable."

…

"You did not."

"Cut it?" She briefly touched a waving tendril which ended at her waist, "No, I couldn't bear hacking it short."

…

Snape was beginning to feel pleasantly warm and relaxed, by this point and rose to his feet, "Come with me."

In what he later looked back on as a momentary fit of madness, he reached out and touched her hand. It felt warm and smaller than he remembered and when she clasped her slender fingers around his … no happier man could have been found in the entirety of continental Europe.

The cold of the streets stole all feeling, save the pressure of her hand gripping his, as they made the trip from the bar in the wizarding section of the city to his home just on the outskirts of it, in a muggle residential area. He was currently renting a small home while its usual occupants, an older couple wintered in southern France.

Letting her in, he left her at the door to beat off the ice while he threw a few pine splints into the small wood burning stove that heated the home. Twisting the large knob on the side of the cast iron stove to open the air vent he used a small burst of bluebell flame to ignite the wood, before closing the door. Placing his hands briefly against the large metal chimney that funneled warm air to the rest of the home he thawed his frozen hands.

He could hear her moving around his home behind him. What in God's name was he doing? The panicked thought was quickly washed away by the lingering warmth of the vodka. Everything had grown pleasantly bright around the edges by this point.

Turning he caught her hands in his, warming her cold fingers. They were reddened and wind chapped and wet. She had been plucking at her boot laces. She now stood in thick, dark red, wool tights. She had shed her outer garment, revealing a long sweater dress. It made her look even smaller, the steel grey wool went up right under her chin, down below her knees, and covered her hands to the fingertip…

"Why did you leave?" He asked into the vast silence, "I had to. You did not."

He had sidled her up to the stove, not yet relinquishing her hands.

"I thought I would help with the reconstruction. I thought rebuilding would help me… get better. But there was too much death, and violence, and hate… I'd already seen too much, and I was hurting too badly. That was the problem, half the country was hurting like me. The only difference was that I had the power and the influence to inflict it on other people."

He still didn't understand, "Why did you leave them? They would have helped you." They, Potter, The Weasleys, even Black.

She smiled weakly, "I scared them. At those trials… I really didn't care if they were fair at all, death was too good for them, hell, Azkaban was too good for them. I wanted them to suffer and I didn't care if it had to be at my hand. I had to leave then. That would not have been justice, it would have been my justice… and I had no right to inflict it on anyone."

She was seated on his couch. He could feel her eyes following him as he shed his greatcoat and boots.

"You live alone?"

"Yes," he would not lie to her if she asked. There had been other women, through the years, one night stands, involving alcohol, and a lot of fantasizing on the part of both parties. Invariably he could not allow another person close enough for any chance at a semi-conventional relationship. Not when he was constantly on the move, going by a new name in every city, overlaying brown eyes and wildly curling honeyed hair on any woman who tried to get close.

He sank down into the seat opposite her, "Why are you here, Hermione? You left. I did not expect you to come back."

She bit her lip, shifting nervously, "Well… to be honest… I left you because I knew that if you woke up, I would want nothing more than to wrap myself up in you. I was so scared, and broken, and hurting… I NEEDED you," she raised a hand to hold off whatever he had opened his mouth to say, "Don't you see? I had to leave. If I'd stayed, I never would have been able to leave. Sometimes when the nights were bad and I just knew I had to go to you, I would lock myself down to some job, or project, or place. The worst of it was in the beginning, but I'd found my parents then, they helped me more than anything else. It was… nice, they didn't know, not anything, so I could just, well be around them without the constant reminders of what I done and what I'd seen. I think it helped that my grandda, he was a war vet… when he came back with all kind of disorders and syndromes they didn't even have names for… well it was family who had to fix it or try to and my father grew up with that. I think he saw it in me and… and just knew not to ask. Then I don't know when exactly… but eventually… the nightmares, the anger, the hurt… you can only hold onto those things for so long… and I finally stopped. Sometime after that I realized I still wanted to be near you…not because I needed to be, not because I was broken and hurting… but because I was lonely… and it occurred to me, that that was ok too… if you'll have me?"

Snape sat perfectly still, He watched the unconscious little fidget of her fingers along the edges of the long cuffs of her dress, saw her eyes, now a dark, rich, earthy color in the dim lighting, fall from his face. When they lifted to study him once more he saw the subtle shutter had been drawn closed behind them in the interval. She had ceased her nervous fidgeting and sat, nearly as still as he, her face unreadable and empty. She was waiting.

"Hermione, are you very sure you want this?" He gestured between them.

Her sigh was almost inaudible. Relief, and it occurred to him, that she had been fully prepared for him to deny her.

"Yes, I am."

He studied the firm resolution in her eyes. Honor demanded he give her fair warning, "Even if…after five very long years, I want to see if there can be more for us than our original agreement?"

"Yes."

"I will not have you if you only intend to endure my desires in order to have your own fulfilled."

"Severus Snape," Her voice, sharp with the bite of anger, was a rich reward for his deliberate baiting, "I would not have come if I was not ready to. I would not have come if I were still the broken, wounded creature you knew then, willing to wrap herself up in any guise to gain protection and safety."

"Good," He surged to his feet startling her into doing the same.

She was almost standing on his toes, her breath coming past her clenched teeth in quick bursts. The crackle of her irritation against his skin in the form of the magic that wrapped around her like a second skin was addicting. He leaned down, invading her space, pushing, and she pushed right back, her eyes pale honeyed amber, her power springing up like a winter squall off the Gulf of Kronstadt. She flexed her power and pushed him away, she had gained a lot more control of her ambient magic. When he had seen her last, the wild power had used her, not the other way around.

"Why are you pushing?" She ground out.

"Because real is pushing. A relationship is pushing, and it has to be two ways."

A little half quirk of a smile kicked up the corner of her lips and she stepped back. He followed and she used his momentum and the hook of her stocking clad toes around his ankle to neatly sit him down on the couch. Gracefully she settled on the other end of the couch, "Women have better ways."

She leaned forward, and with the perfectly casual ease he had used toward her, touched the hand on his knee causing his fingers to curl into a tight fist, "I just have to make you think you want what I do. And if that takes a bit of a push… you can be sure I'm up to the task."

"May I enquire as to the progress of your objective?" He murmured.

She was so close now he could smell her, could see each and every fine strand of her amber and gold hair illuminated by the flames burning cheerily in the stove. Her face had changed little. She was still so beautiful. It was the first time, in a long, long time, he had ever seen her perfectly and completely healthy, no bruises marking her face, no lingering gauntness, no pallor of malnutrition.

"Very, very well."

He couldn't have even blinked, if he'd wanted to. She was filling his senses. Beating him in a way she always would, because he was weak, and she was addicting. He wanted to reach out and touch her, to prove she was real. He wanted to hold her small, warm body close to his, just to know she was there and wasn't leaving… but except for her hand she had not yet touched him, so despite her breath, warm on the skin of his cheek, he did not dare turn his head. Her body, hovering so very close, made him aware of the violent, throbbing ache of not-having-her. It was a pain that originated not in the physical body but in the soul, in his/her magic that said he was half a being without her.

"What are you afraid of?" she whispered into his ear.

"Of when I wake one morning and you want to be free of me."

"Why should you fear such a thing?"

"Because then I will have to let you go."

She leaned closer yet, pressing lightly against his side, lifting away the pain of her absence like a veil, "Did it ever occur to you, that because you will let me go, I never need to leave?"

"No," he turned toward her slowly, so his breath fanned her lips contemplating the curve of them, and how close they were, "But…" his eyes flickered to hers, assessing, gauging, half unwilling to take the gamble, "I'll entertain the hypothesis if it would please you."

She smiled then. It was breathtaking. He couldn't resist, leaning in the last inch, to touch her skin. He kissed the corner of her mouth, her forehead, her eyelids, the tip of her nose, anywhere… except her lips. Easing his hand slowly around her waist, giving her time to pull away if she wanted, he stroked his hands gently down her sides. Reminding himself of what she was. He waited until she relaxed, and he pulled her down into his lap holding her close, his fingers tapping out a lazy rhythm against the hollow of her hip.

She opened her mouth to say something, and by the slight quirk of her lips, he knew it would be one of her barbed pleasantries, before she could speak he cut her off, "Hermione, would you BE with me, just for a moment. Just a little while, without pushing and testing."

She blinked in surprise, to hear such a thing from Severus Snape! Take down their barriers? Impossible. Five years had been the building of two fortresses, one night would not breach their walls.

His hands were firm and warm at her hips, pressing insistently, his eyes soft.

"Please."

"Only if you promise me the same," she acquiesced.

"For one night? Do you think we will survive?" He kissed the curve of her jaw.

"Yes, we just might, if you promise to be very cryptic and ill tempered tomorrow morning," she smiled against his skin.

"Hmm… Well, if come morning, you are feeling quite snappish and prickly, I think I can manage."

"God I've missed…" She gasped out, her hands tracing across his back, feeling the strength in his shoulders and arms.

His arms tightened around her, he understood. Right now, at this moment, everything just felt…right. She was here, in his arms, not hurting, not crying, just happy to be there, just reveling in the wholeness of their power woven so closely as to make it indistinguishable as two separate energies... if they had ever been separate in the first place.

This was something wholly good, not tainted by NEED, or hurt, or desperation. They'd proven they didn't need this. They'd proven even old magic could not ensnare their minds. They had not allowed it to obliterate all that was their two individual lives in a wash of power. And because of that assurance, he could hold her with the perfect confidence that the affection he felt for her was real. He knew it was not something he could unwittingly harm her with.

Snape was almost thankful enough for that to make him back into a praying man.

Because Severus NEEDED Mrs. Snape to be more than a name on a dusty sheet of paper, he needed it—her to be real. He had had far too much of duty for any lifetime.

The End.

Wow. This has been a long and interesting journey. My profuse apologies as to the length of time it has taken me to decide on a fitting end. I cannot tell you how many times I wrote this chapter. This ending made me the most satisfied, and it being a fortuitous day I decided to stop fidgeting with it and post. I really can't believe this work is at an end. This is something like a novel in length if not quality- and it feels like it's been such a big part of my life for so long- I'm not sure what I'll do without it. Thank you all so much for your kind words of encouragement to finish and to keep writing, they helped immeasurably. Now that this is finished I'm hoping to begin work in earnest on my own original writings, so feel free to drop me a message if you're interested, I run a writing blog and a travel Pinterest page and I'm trying desperately to increase my exposure.

My Regards to you all