It Takes a Miracle

Chapter 21 – Bring me to life (part 2)


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“Are you alright?” He heard a murmur. Since when did his little voice become concerned about his well-being? “Bugger off,” he wanted to tell the bloody nuisance. He just had the most wonderful dream, and had no intention to hurry and wake up to the stench of vomit, and piss, and scotch in his dirty rooms.

Basking in warmth that still pulsed through him, he sighed, but stopped, forgetting to exhale -- the cool air smelled of vanilla and peach, and... Snape slowly opened his eyes, and, astonished, let his gaze skim over some dusty boxes. Merlin, it wasn’t a dream. It was not a dream…

“Are you alright?” he heard again. Snape turned his head and found himself nose to nose with Geraldine, who offered him a small smile. She had a kind of dreamy and content expression on her face, and he shivered at the strange notion that it was his doing, that it was because of him.

Snape shifted -- the urge to kiss her was irresistible. At that moment, however, he realized that he was lying on top of the witch’s tiny form. Apparently, his arms, which had been supporting him folded when he passed out.

He jumped up. “I must apologize… I…” He stuttered, unsure how to proceed.

“Shhh.” She touched her finger to his lips. “It’s okay, love.”

“I love you,” he suddenly wanted to say, but the words stuck in his throat.

He glanced around, as if looking for help. The room was darker now – almost no light was coming from the Entrance Hall. It was also very quiet. The ball must have been over by now, and the students were tacked away in their dorm. Snape took a deep breath, and returned his gaze to Geraldine.

Carefully, he brought his shaking hand to her face, and touched her cheek with his fingertips. Then he bent to brush her lips with his, straightened, and smiled. She smiled back, and at that moment Snape knew, if there was Heaven on Earth, this dusty, dark storage room in the pit of Hogwarts was the place, and Severus Snape was a happy resident there.

And then he heard footsteps across the Hall above.

“Did you find her?” called out a very familiar voice. Carnavale.

“No,” came a response, and there was another set of footsteps, coming from the other part of the Hall.

“Where could she be?” The footsteps converged, and stopped. “Minerva is having a little something for the staff. But I don’t think Gerry would have gone by herself, would she? Oh, and Val, afterwards, we are hitting the Gryffindor dorms… Man, it’s going to be a fun night!”

A muffled chuckle was heard, and then there was a sound of large door opening and shutting, and someone walked into the Entrance Hall from outside.

“Hooch! How many did you catch?” The Rag Clown’s cheery voice echoed in the empty Hall.

“Enough to keep the trophies clean all September. What are you boys standing here for? Why aren’t you going to Minerva’s?” Hooch’s steps went to the main stairway.

“We are waiting for Gerry. Did you see her?”

“No. Oi, wait, did you check Snape’s office? I saw her following him to the dungeons. It was well over an hour ago, but they might still be arguing about something.”

After Hooch left, the deep voice of Mr. Tresini asked, “Why are you laughing?”

“Snape…” It seemed Carnavele was choking. “She was going to do something to Snape. I knew it! Good girl! She’ll tell us all about it later. Let’s go to Minerva’s.”

For several moments Snape couldn’t breathe. It felt like his body had frozen solid, so that even the blood in his veins stopped running. But that would be impossible, wouldn’t it? With sheer force of will, Snape made himself inhale and exhale several times, before slowly, so very slowly, he stepped away from the box, not looking, not looking, not looking, at the girl. Another couple of steps. Yes, he could do it. His legs were a little stiff and wobbly at the same time, but he could walk. Away.

Another couple of steps, and he hit the wall. There was a hidden alcove somewhere around here. It led out… Ah-ha, there it was. Now, he could leave. He hit the wall again, but he was already outside the room, so he could continue walking.

It was awfully quiet. The ball… No, the ball was over. Students… He had to go and check on his students, who no doubt would be celebrating until morning. Drinking, laughing, screaming.

Someone was screaming. No, it couldn’t be. Everyone had to be in their dorms. He should go and check… It just… The left arm tingled. Not where the Dark Mark was. Higher. And the tingling was spreading to the chest. Did someone hex him while he wasn’t looking?

Snape bumped into yet another wall, staggered down a short flight of stairs, and kept on walking. It became hard to breathe, and he was sweating as if he had been running for a long time. But he hadn’t, had he? He only needed to sit down for a moment, and then he could walk again.

There. There was an empty classroom. He could sit. Open the door, walk in, and sit. But the door handle was so smooth, it slipped out of his hand, and Snape, loosing his balance, tumbled down.

The floor felt hard and cold, and he thought it would be absolutely undignified to be seen by anyone, lying in the hallway like that. He made an attempt to get up. The pain that shot through his left arm was so fierce, he forgot for a moment about his effort.

He closed his eyes to fight the pain, and when he opened them again, he saw the absolutely white face of Ms. Ardant above him.

“You…” he hissed through his clenched teeth. “Stay away from me, you filthy…” And everything turned black again.


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Kissing Snape was everything she had ever hoped it would be, and more. So much more. But making love with him was… She couldn’t even put it to words. Amazing? Wonderful? Breathtaking? No, it seemed there were no words to describe it. All Gerry knew was that no one ever wanted her so much. Scratch that -- needed her so much. And being needed like that was a completely intoxicating feeling.

In fact she was so high on his need that she stumbled over the edge in her release, screaming something loud and absolutely incoherent. And later on, lying there sated and serene, she couldn’t muster enough irritation to feel upset about Snape unceremoniously collapsing on top of her. Rather the opposite – it felt intimate and warm, and she didn’t mind the weight. The only thing that did upset her to a degree was the fact that, save for the undone trousers, the dark-haired wizard kept his clothes intact. But then Gerry persuaded herself that she would have a chance to address this issue later.

She grinned, and tugged him lightly. “Are you alright?” He stirred, mumbling something. She turned her head, and the tip of her nose touched the hair on the back of Snape’s head. The wizard’s black oily strands glistened dully in the dim light. Gerry inhaled deeply, recalling the speculations about the Potions Master questionable hygiene. But his hair smelled rather nice, some herbs and smoke, and such. She inhaled again. Yes, she could live with it.

She smiled languidly at the thought, and suddenly realized that she already missed seeing his face, his eyes. “Are you alright?” she whispered again, and this time he turned his head and looked at her.

Under the gaze of his black bottomless eyes, Gerry felt absolutely boneless. She always believed that achieving an orgasm was the pinnacle of love making. She never knew there could be more, Merlin, so much more, but then, thanks to this man, she became privy to the knowledge. Almost afraid to breathe, she smiled her gratitude at him.

Her smile lightened, though, when the next moment the said man finally realized he was lying on top of her, and jumped up, scrambling to apologize. The expression on his thin face was so endearing, she couldn’t help herself but said, “It’s okay, love,” meaning, “I love you.”

She followed his gaze when he looked around. Yeah, this was probably the most unromantic place to use an ‘l’ word. Still, when he touched her face so carefully, as if she was too precious and too fragile for a real touch, brushed her lips with his, and then smiled at her one of his secret smiles, every cell in Gerry’s body tingled with the possibility of saying it.

However, before Gerry gathered enough courage to actually do it, she heard Jay in the Entrance Hall above, asking Val if he found her. She almost chuckled at the image of those two seeing her like this, spread out before the “greasy bat,” and enjoying it. But her laughter died in her throat when she heard the end of their conversation, the ‘she was going to do something to Snape’ part.

“Oh shit, oh shit,” flashed through her mind just as Snape’s face twisted and froze in a bad attempt at his usual sneer. “No, no, wait,” she tried to stop him when he began moving backward, looking somewhere past her. “Wait, let me explain,” Gerry babbled frantically. “I can explain everything, just give me a chance… You don’t understand… It is not what it sounds like…” But it seemed he couldn’t hear her.

He staggered further and further away from her, either forgetting or unwilling to turn his back to her, afraid she’d strike him from behind. Finally, he hit the wall and blindly began to feel around for something with his shaking hands. Exit, he was looking for exit, she realized. “Wait, Professor,” she cried out. Professor? What should she call him now? However, before she had a chance to decide, Snape was out of the room.

Gerry jumped of the box to follow him, but when her bare feet hit the cold stone floor, she stopped and looked herself over. Shit, she couldn’t run through the hallways of the school wearing an open shirt and a bandana around her neck.

Gerry summoned the rest of her clothes, but then, standing with a pile of it in her hands, she knew there was no way she could dress fast enough to follow Snape. A flick of her wand transfigured her clothes into something that she hoped looked like a robe and would cover most of her body. The next moment, she was out of the door, the outfit she had created, flapping at her bare ankles.

“Professor,” she called out. There was no response, but she could hear someone’s steps not far away. She dashed forward. “Professor, wait!”

She ran, and the smacking of the balls of her feet against the stone floor echoed in the dark corridors. Smack, smack, smack. Damn Jay and his childish humor. Smack, smack, smack. Damn herself for never setting the record straight with Jay in regards to Snape. Smack, smack, smack. Damn herself twice for jumping into bed (or whatever it was) with Snape before they had any kind of civilized conversation. Smack, smack, smack. Damn the Hogwarts walls that had not only ears, but tongues as well. Smack, smack, smack. Damn Val for ever bringing her here...

Several wrong turns, an unexpected flight of stairs, and a collision with an inconveniently placed suit of armor later, Gerry was in one of the dungeons’ larger hallways. About thirty meters ahead of her, she saw Snape.

“Professor,” she called out again, and sped up. “Wait! Let me explain!”

But Snape kept walking, although his stride didn’t look like his usual arrogant, gracious sweep. He was swaying from side to side, his steps uneven and slow. At the end of the hallway, he turned to one of the classrooms, grabbed the door handle, stood for a moment, and then began to slide down.

“Professor!” Gerry screamed, terrified.

When she reached Snape, he was lying on the floor, his shaking hands stretched out as if reaching for the door. He jerked, making an attempt to get up, but slumped back down, wincing. His eyes fluttered closed, and Gerry dropped to her knees at his side, looking in horror at the helpless, pained body of a man who had just made passionate love to her.

“Oh, Merlin,” was all Gerry could think before Snape opened his eyes again. His face twisted at the sight of her, and he hissed, “You… Stay away from me, you filthy…” He didn’t finish, passing out.

Gerry recoiled as if she had been slapped, and bit her lip to will away the prickling in her eyes. Right. So much for explanation. But then she shook herself. There was an unconscious wizard in front of her, and all she could think of… Stupid girl!

Gerry bit her lip harder, so that the taste of blood tingled on her tongue. Her mind, still reeling from the events of the past hour, worked laboriously at wrapping itself around the situation at hand. She could imagine how shocked Snape must have been upon hearing Jay’s stupid remark. She would expect hatred, rage, but passing out…?

Meanwhile, Snape’s body remained motionless on the floor, his face, absolutely white against the blackness of his hair and clothes, was frozen in a pained mask. Even his hands seemed to shake less then, and his breathing appeared shallow, his chest barely moving.

A cold feeling of dread washed over Gerry, as she recalled how strange his walk had been, how boneless and ungraceful was his fall. She whipped out her wand cast a quick series of scanning spells.

White translucent images rose above Snape’s still form. Strangely, they seemed very blurred, yet as far as Gerry could tell, there was no serious damage anywhere, magical or otherwise, except for… Shit! There was something happening in the area of his heart.

“Is it broken?” Jay’s mocking voice unexpectedly enquired.

Gerry jerked her head to look around, but the hallway was empty. It was only her imagination. Nevertheless, it didn’t stop her from hissing under her breath, “Shut up, you fucking idiot! Shut up!”

With that she turned back to Snape and fiercely rubbed her forehead, trying to recall the spell for summoning Madam Pomfrey in case of emergency. But her wand, raised once again in the air, slowly went down. Even before she made a conscious decision, Gerry already knew she wasn’t going to call the mediwitch.

She jumped up and quickly went into the classroom, which Snape had unsuccessfully tried to get into earlier. “Lumos,” she whispered, and several torches lit up four damp windowless walls surrounding a bunch of desks and a teacher’s stand.

Gerry checked to see if there were any other exits or portraits -- unbearable chatter-boxes at times -- and was relieved to find none. Then she transfigured one of the chairs into a thick rug and placed it near the door, which she waved to open wider.

With that she went out again and looked at Snape. Her heart banged loudly and painful in her chest at the sight of him -- still motionless, his tortured face even whiter than it was before.

“Shit,” she swore under her breath, willing herself to stay focused. Resolutely, she stepped closer to the unconscious wizard, and cast a sleeping charm over him.

Under the charm, Snape’s body slackened visibly, and the harsh lines of pain on his face smoothed out. Then, once again he looked like the man who just made love, and fell asleep, happy and sated. As if he had never heard Jay’s and Val’s conversation. As if there had been no dash through the dark corridors, and no hateful words…

Gerry’s wand, hovering over the still body, trembled. Was she about to ruin everything? She bit her lip as suddenly a new fear, a fear of loosing something she just became aware of – an exhilaration of belonging with Severus Snape – joined with all the doubt and fears that had plagued her for the last several weeks.

“I should call for Pomfrey,” she thought with unexpected certainty. “If I go through with the Vita Redux, he would never forgive me for violating him again. He would never talk to me again… He would never let me explain… He would never…”

Gerry half-sobbed, half-whimpered, her gaze roaming over the dark-haired wizard’s features in search of reassurance, of hope. She couldn’t stand loosing him again. Besides, she still wasn’t certain that Snape needed her saving him, and the thought of enduring the imminent sickness, which might swallow months, may be years out of her life, completely terrified her. Merlin…

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the dancing tip of her wand and bristled. Gods, was she absolutely pathetic? Quivering, silly, little girl, standing over a body of a wizard, who needed help, and unable to actually fucking do anything. Fuck!

Gerry gulped back the tightness in her throat and steadied the wand. “You know this is your chance,” she told herself sternly. Hell, this was probably her only chance. This might very well be his only chance. She nodded slightly and forcefully dragged her eyes off of Snape.

She glanced around the dark hallway for the last time, to verify that it was still empty, and, trying to avoid looking at the Potions Master’s face, levitated his body (‘sorry, sir’), and motioned it to the classroom. She carefully maneuvered it through the door and followed in behind it.

Once inside, she gently lowered Snape’s body onto the rug and released the charm that held the door open. It closed with the soft click of an engaging lock. Gerry gulped again – there was no going back.

She warded the door, and cast the non-detect, keep-away, and silencing charms, one after another. She had to add several warding spells before she felt assured they were not going to be disturbed. Of course, none of it would be of much help if someone like Dumbledore or McGonagall were to look for them. But Gerry hoped that Jay would persuade everyone not to, at least for a while.

When she finally kneeled at Snape’s side, she trained her eyes on his chest. “This is your only chance,” she reminded herself. “This is his only chance.”

Gerry took a cleansing breath and summoned the familiar tightening sensation around her navel. As it spread quickly through her body, followed by the flow of warmth, she watched her palms turn slightly fluorescent. She held her hands over the wizard’s body, and waited patiently. Shortly, a shimmering green fog began to materialize in a small area between her palms and Snape’s chest. With that, the first chant emerged, and the fog was cut through by brilliant green lightning. As she went on, the fog rose and expanded until she and the dark-haired wizard were inside a big soft green ball.

Gerry was bent low over Snape’s body, chanting and singing, carefully considering every word. This time there was no terrified, bewildered haste of her first Vita Redux, when Gerry didn’t know what she was doing. Neither was there the numb reluctance of her second Vita Redux, when she was saving the Potions Master’s life while reprimanding herself for it. This time around, she knew exactly what she was doing, how it was to be done, and, her doubts aside, why she was doing it.

She began with a general, diagnostic, chant. It echoed back with a request for a chant for the heart. Gerry responded with the most powerful chant she could think of that covered everything heart-related, and when it came back, bringing her the pain, she stored that pain away, forcing herself not to think of it. Another diagnostic chant, and she learned why Snape’s hands shook. As little as Gerry knew of medicine, she realized that the damaged nerve that caused the problem was so small, it would be practically impossible to heal it with a spell, and without one, the healing would take years.

“That could be the end of the Potions Master,” Gerry contemplated. But then she recalled Dumbledore’s reassurances regarding Slytherins’ determination to survive against all odds, and sent out yet another diagnostic chant.

This time the echo of the chant brought back to her a bunch of little things, things that would never warrant a Vita Redux, but rather a good rest and plentiful nourishment. Well, at least she was correct in her observations that Snape was neither eating nor getting enough sleep. And by the state of his stomach, he had been starving himself for quite some time.

“That’s why the scanning spells gave me such weak images,” Gerry thought with a shudder, but forbade herself to ponder it any further. Instead, yet again, she took away the damage and continued her search.

Several more chants and songs took care of minor problems -- a poorly regrown hip bone, several dark spots on his lung due to potion fumes. She hesitated, when she found a number of unhealed scars, one of them across his neck, as if someone tried to slit Snape’s throat open. At the end she decided to leave them be – Snape would be angry enough knowing she performed the ritual on him again, he didn’t need constant visible reminders.

She sent out more chants, but it looked like the Headmaster was right when he told her that there was neither serious physical damage nor a curse on Snape’s body. Still, she kept probing, combing through every muscle and bone, looking for that one particular ailment that could make the Potions Master welcome death.

Her meticulousness was, however, fruitless. She found tame traces of a few nasty curses and hexes, weak aftereffects of several deadly poisons, and remnants of rather recent alcohol overindulgence. She saw the tiny alarm trigger, which she inadvertently put behind Snape’s heart when she performed her first-ever Vita Redux. Then, she was so terrified of having him die right there, in front of Hogwarts’ main entrance, that she had woven the word ‘death’ so many times into her chanting, she somehow hit the correct combination of words, and created the alarm trigger to alert her if the wizard’s heart would ever stop. Surprisingly, the alarm trigger was well placed, and, judging by the events of last December, worked. Gerry paused, considering whether she should remove it, but decided to leave it in place.

Finally, she had to admit it to herself that she was stalling. She knew she should leave his body alone, and begin searching in his psyche…, his soul. Frankly, she knew it all along. Still, she paused again, the dismayed voice of Mrs. Doomsfield ringing in her ears. “And what about your connection with this wizard? …it appeared unusually strong the first time…it will be stronger, and it will last much longer. It may become inevitable for you to stay away from him. Far away.”

“Far away,” Gerry repeated bitterly, imagining enslaving herself to the wizard otherwise, or some such. Her eyes began to prickle again, but this time around she managed not to fall apart. She frowned and sent out a new kind of chant. A swirl of wizard’s emotions hit her in response.

It didn’t take her long to find proof of her most frightening suspicions. Still, when she did, she gasped, horrified -- the man had almost no will to live, and, judging by the gaping hole around it that Gerry hastily began patching, he used to have plenty of it (“survivors, indeed’).

“How could one lose something like that?” she wondered bewildered. More importantly, how could he have lived with so little of it left? A person, who had just committed suicide, would have more. Gerry shook her head and stored away the chilling void.

However, before she had a chance to catch her breath, the first pang of despair reared its ugly head. Gerry knew she wouldn’t be able to suppress it for long -- the emotional damage that a Vita Healer took was much harder to control than the physical ones. It needed to be released as soon as possible, or it would affect the Healer. The longer was the contact, the greater the effect. But she couldn’t deal with it right there -- the state of unconsciousness it required would leave her too vulnerable.

She had to go, but before she left, Gerry wanted to make sure she didn’t miss anything. After all, it was her only chance. The trouble was that probing into the soul of the Potions Master, while trying to keep under control the overwhelming urge to die she just took from the man, was an excruciating task. As if a crippled will to live weren’t enough, the crushing onslaught of his emotions, which Gerry had to comb through, was filling her with gloom and misery, and she struggled hard to stay focused. Oh, how she wished she could ease his pain and take at least some of this wretchedness. But she knew she couldn’t -- she was there to restore, not to change the man. If he would ever give her a chance later, he’d see that she could make him happy without the Vita Redux. She’d show him… She’d… Oh no, she couldn’t think that, not then. Not for a very long time.

Meanwhile, one of her chants pointed out a large black mass -- guilt. Shocked, Gerry gasped for the second time, looking at that mass that had spread far beyond its now practically non-existent borders. She searched about for curses, or some such, but didn’t find anything. It looked like the man himself gave away his ability to rein in his guilt. Come to think of it, it was the same with his will to live.

“What could have made someone to do this to himself?” Gerry thought, trying to drive away the tears. How could anyone live with it? Finally, it became clear to her why his body was in such a worn-out state, and his soul in the clutches of despair. Merlin. He’s been carrying around all this weight, and no one knew. No one wanted to know. Oh, Severus…

As she worked hurriedly at restoring the wizard’s control over guilt to its original size, Gerry couldn’t stop blaming herself. “I should have known… I should have helped him a long time ago. I should have known… Gods, he had to live with all of this because of me…”

Gerry sobbed openly then and, blinking away the tears, she glanced at Snape’s face.

“I am so sorry!” she wailed in the middle of a chant.

Suddenly, it was too much. The guilt, the pain, the remorse, and more pain, his or hers, were overwhelming, breaking and smothering her. As she weakened, the Vita Healer in her began to retreat, giving in to a love-struck woman, paralyzed with worry for her man. With that, however, all the damage she had just taken from Snape began to escape the confines of the Vita spells that kept it stored away. It was spreading through her then, the pain, the guilt, the yearning for death, weakening her even more, attacking her mind, destroying her will.

At first, she fought fiercely to fortify the Vita spell, to recapture the damage, and to finish the ritual.

“Come on, you are almost done,” she encouraged herself. “Just a little push. Come on.” But somewhere at the back of her mind, a new thought emerged. “It hurts too much. I can’t… I don’t want to… It hurts.”

Then, she began shivering, feeling suddenly so very cold. Her hands, spread above Snape’s body, were trembling.

“I can do it… Just a bit longer,” she insisted, but the next moment she thought, “Merlin, it hurts… Make it stop… Let me die.”

Soon she was mindless from the cold, and the pain, and the misery. “I am sorry, I can’t … I don’t want to… Please, make it stop…”

The shivers intensified, and shortly she was shaking in earnest. Her knees were quivering under her, and she began swaying, unable to find the balance.

“It’s my only chance,” she whispered in her last attempt to regain control, and collapsed boneless on top of Snape. “I can’t…”

She lay there, unaware that the green fog of the Vita Redux began to dissolve. She didn’t want to fight any longer. Instead, she relaxed into the pain and welcomed it. All she had to do was to wait for the end. It shouldn’t take long, should it?

She was teetering on the brink of unconsciousness already, lulled by the rhythmic rise and fall of Snape’s chest, when a strange feeling began to invade her. It wasn’t the pain or misery taken in during the ritual. It wasn’t the empty cold of surrender. It was something completely different.

In her unhinged state of mind, Gerry couldn’t quite identify it right away, whatever it was. But neither could she ignore it. This new feeling confused her so much that she halted her descent into the abyss of unconsciousness and opened her eyes.

There was a piece of the black thin fabric of Snape’s jacket, and several little black buttons, in front of her eyes, and further away, at a distance, she saw the tip of the wizard’s crooked nose, and the sharp angle of his jaw. Suddenly too intent on seeing the whole of his face, Gerry forgot to wonder what made her come back to consciousness. But when she pushed herself up from Snape’s chest, she instantly knew what it was – the warmth. The warmth that the wizard’s body radiated. The warmth that her own freezing flesh greedily absorbed through the layers of their clothing. The warmth that was promptly replaced by the chill of the dungeon as Gerry got up, severing the contact between Snape and herself.

She shivered, her body longing to return to the comfort of the warm chest, and looked at the wizard’s peaceful face. It was at that moment when a completely terrifying thought occurred to her. What if while she enthusiastically lapped at Snape’s heat, he, in turn, had taken something from her as well? For example, the damage that she had captured during the Vita Redux and let loose when she aborted the ritual. Before Gerry finished the thought, her shaking hands were already over Snape’s chest, and she was summoning her powers of Vita Healing…

She was shaking all over, when the green fog of the ritual dissolved. The two Vita Redux in the row, with hysterics and breaking down in between, left her completely exhausted, physically and mentally. Her knees were barely holding her, and the idea of getting up and walking made her nauseous. But she knew she had to move at once. She was too weak to keep the damage she had taken safely spell-locked. Besides, it was imperative for her to get far away from Snape as fast as possible. She couldn’t afford the luxury of making another mistake. One more ritual could kill her, and destroy Snape in the process.

Gerry tried to get up, but failed time after time, getting more breathless and frustrated with each unsuccessful attempt. At last, dizzy with exertion, she gave up and summoned a chair, which at the jerky wave of her wand, turned into a short sturdy ladder. With one hand curled around her stomach, as if protecting the Vita Redux’s “spoils,” Gerry pulled herself up with the other hand, stopping at every step to take a breath. During all of these proceeding, she made sure to keep her gaze averted from Snape’s face, and once upright, she quickly turned her back to him.

Her legs were unsteady, but she managed to shuffle to the door, where she stopped, breathing heavily. Biting her lip, Gerry stood for several long moments, teling herself she was collecting her strength for the trip to the Apparating point. However, the truth was she just couldn’t leave without taking a last look at Severus, and she was afraid that if she did look at him, she might not be able to leave at all.

She settled on a compromise -- she’d look at him, but from afar. With that, Gerry removed all the wards and disguise charms from the room, and stepped into the hallway. She slowly turned around and trained her gaze on Snape’s sleeping face -- all the sharp bones, and harsh lines, and soft lips, and long lashes. Her gaze moved along his form, lingered on his finally motionless hands, his long graceful fingers. Then, it hastily returned to wizard’s face.

She tried not to think of anything, not to regret, not to hope, not to doubt. Just look. And she did for a long time, standing there in the dark hallway, one hand clutching to her midsection, the other gripping the doorframe. She stood, ignoring her weariness and pain, and the cold of a stone floor under her bare feet, failing to notice the tears that were rolling freely down her cheeks…

She must have been barely conscious most of the way, because when she reached the Apparating point, Gerry had almost no recollection of how she got there. But it was probably for the better, because when she turned around to look at the Hogwarts castle for the last time, she felt an agonizing urge to go right back.

“Oh, Merlin.” She staggered a step forward, before forcing herself to stop. “Please, let me go.”

The black castle loomed over the dark open field, unmoved, indifferent.

Gerry closed her eyes and whispered, “I am sorry. I love you.”

The soft pop of her Apparation echoed gently in the dead of the night. As if in response, the skies shimmered at the fringes and slowly turned one shade lighter, saluting the onset of a new day.
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END of PART 2
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A/N A huge thanks to my beta Odddoll