A Terrible Temptation

A/N - Hermione got the scroll by accident, Severus must have forgotten it, :) Thanks Kate - love ya! Thanks to all my reviewers who are turning into a very large group!


Chapter 20 – You Can’t Go Home Again

Hermione crept into the Hospital Wing after classes and left the solved equations on Snape’s bedside table. He looked painfully thin, six weeks of nothing but nutritive potions had stretched the skin across the bones of his face and turned his nose from a peak to a promontory. He looked fragile and vulnerable. Hermione paused and feeling greatly daring she brushed a stray lock of hair off of his face. With a last look at the comatose figure she crept from the room.

Poppy Pomfrey found the scroll on the bedside stand and sighed. Opening it she glanced briefly at the top of the page. The handwriting was Severus’ so she supposed he must have left it here when last he visited his body. Severus had been looking increasingly unhappy when he came by and she was growing concerned. She could not call herself his friend, but she cared for his well-being and respected his wit and intelligence.

You also didn’t patch up a man as often as she did without having a stake in his continued health. It would be nice if he could just be happy for a change. Poppy sat him up and poured his nutritive potion into his mouth with a wave of her wand. With her hand she gently massaged his throat, getting his body to swallow. She settled him back down, cast cleansing and anti-bedsore charms and then took the scroll back to her office to give to him the next time he came to visit himself.

Severus entered the Hospital Wing with sagging shoulders and a weary, defeated air. He had lost the equations that he had so painfully worked out; not that he could solve them anyway, but he hated to have to start all over again from scratch with Vector. Without the equations, they couldn’t frame the activation spell that would cause the portkey element to tug their consciousnesses into each other’s bodies. Without the proper spell, there was no cure for his dilemma.

“Ah, there you are. You left your scroll behind, dear.” Poppy was calling to him as he approached the bed. Severus looked up in surprise and took the rolled up parchment from her. He glanced at it and noted with relief that it was the Arithmantical equations he had lost. He was about to roll it back up and shove it away when he saw Hermione’s round, firm handwriting on the bottom. There was the solved equation, written out by the young woman he was beginning to think had no equal in all the wizarding world.
With a surge of hope he went looking for Albus.

Severus groaned and tried to move, only to find his body sluggish and unresponsive. The elasticity of Harry’s musculature was replaced with his own wiry strength which had suffered from six weeks of inactivity. He opened his eyes and looked up into Albus’ deep blue gaze with a feeling of relief. No more glasses, he could see with perfect clarity.

After a few tries he was able to sit up unaided. Harry Potter was one bed over looking groggy and rather upset.

“Six weeks?” Harry shook his head in disbelief. “But that means I missed two games!”

“No, Potter, you played in both of them.” Severus retorted with acidic sharpness. Was that really the only thing the boy could do, whinge?

“I’m sorry?” Potter looked over at him in shock.

“Harry, you have been outside your body for the last six weeks and Severus here has been in it.” Albus tried to explain gently.

“And a less pleasant experience I have yet to have and believe me, that’s saying a very great deal.” Severus groused. He wished he had been able to say good-bye to Hermione and Ron but he hadn’t wanted to wait a moment longer to get back into his own skin. Besides, he hardly trusted himself around H – no, she was Miss Granger again. Either way, he knew he should stay very far away from her from now on.

“You were in my body?” Harry looked quite ill at the thought. “What for?”

“It was hardly by choice, Potter.” Severus shot back. “You shouldn’t complain; you have never gotten better grades before.” Severus scrubbed at his face, feeling the once familiar planes and angles under his fingertips. It all felt slightly odd and he was finding himself off-kilter.

“Well, didn’t anybody notice?” Potter was looking quite confused. Severus took a deep breath.

“Mr. Weasley figured it out two days ago, though he says he was suspicious for some time. Other than that, no one seems to have noticed. It is important that this remain the case, Mr. Potter.” Severus stared down the little swot and Potter turned to Albus with a look of appeal.

“Harry, Severus saved your life and preserved the secret of your incapacity for six weeks. He has risked his own life to keep you safe.” Albus’ voice was gently scolding and Harry looked up at him in surprise. “Please don’t endanger his careful deception. If anyone were to discover that Severus saved you and kept Voldemort from knowing that you were vulnerable to attack, it could prove quite fatal.” Potter nodded, still looking a little bleary-eyed.

“I’m just a little confused that’s all. What happened?” Potter was calming down and trying to find answers finally instead of flailing about in an emotional turmoil.

“What do you remember, Harry?” Albus asked him with a gentle tone.

“Well, one moment I was in the Owlery getting thil ail and then I was dreaming I think. I was in this garden and Hermione was there sometimes and Professor Snape and this little boy. He and I played together -- he was really nice. His name was Soot.” Severus went cold.

“What did you say?” He barked at the startled young man.

“I said I was in this garden with a boy named Soot, we were playing together.” Potter was giving him a puzzled look. Albus had an inquisitive expression on his face and was looking back and forthweenween them.

“That was what my mother called me. She used to call me Soot because I was always getting dirty.” Severus was staring at Harry Potter with horror.

“It couldn’t have been you, Soot was happy and smiling.” Potter was looking back at him with dawning comprehension.

“Perhaps being trapped neither in one body nor the other, Harry became stuck in a place that connected both.” Albus said as though he knew what it meant. Severus snorted.

“Then explain Miss Granger’s presence.” Severus glared at the Headmaster.

“Perhaps she was simply much upon both of your minds.” Albus suggested.

It was Potter’s turn to look back and forth this time ben Sen Severus and Albus. The boy wasn’t entirely thick, Severus mused; he knew that something was going on. Time to distract the young man.

“I was happy as a child before my parents died and I was sent to live with my Great-Aunt.” He commented stiffly. Harry frowned thoughtfully.

“So who were the two people arguing?” Severus wasn’t sure what he was talking about but then remembered the Occlumency lessons two years ago.

“My Uncle and Aunt, they lived with my Great-Aunt when funds ran low.” It was a dry comment for funds were often low; his Uncle tended to drink away any money they might have had. Harry nodded.

“Harry, Severus will need to give you at least some of his memories of the last six weeks so that you can continue the deception.” Albus’ voice had none of its usual whimsy and Severus tightened in discomfort. He would have to sort his memories carefully to be certain there were no betraying thoughts about Hermione. He would also purge himself of Potter’s memories.

“Is that necessary?” Potter screwed up his face in distaste.

“Absolutely.” Albus replied.

“If it is any consolation, you punched out Draco Malfoy and in a second confrontation caused him to faint dead away.” Severus smirked and Potter gave a bark of laughter.

“I would pay to see that!” Harry chuckled.

“You won’t have to.” Severus assured him.