Gaelic Blessing

Authors Note: Bonus cookies and Sev smirks to whoever manages to spot the butchered Sense and Sensibility quote in this chapter…..I simply couldn’t resist!

Unfortunately, Harry’s recovery was only temporary. That evening Severus felt that Harry was doing sufficiently well enough that he could leave him for the evening. With that in mind he saw all of the children to bed including the older children, placating them with the promise that they could see their guardian the following day. For the older children Harry was a combination of big brother and favourite uncle whilst for the younger children he was the father that they’d never known.

Accepting the sandwich and glass of scotch that Dobby brought him, Severus retreated to his room with a well-worn novel that didn’t demand huge amounts of concentration from him. He ate his food and read several chapters of the novel before he decided to turn in for the night. The worry about Harry’s illness had worn down his reserves as had brewing the potions that morning and checking on the children’s welfare and he fell asleep literally as soon as his head hit the pillow.

It was the early hours of the morning when he was rudely awakened by a shrill ringing in his head. He shook his head sharply several times, thinking that he was imagining things before realisation dawned; the ringing alarm in his head was the monitoring spell that he had on Harry. The ringing alarm meant that something was wrong with Harry. As soon as the thought hit him he sprang out of the bed and, grabbing a robe and his wand, ran down the hallway a few doors and into Harry’s bedroom.

The sight that greeted him was one he had hoped not to see. Harry was in a similar state to the one he had been in when Severus had arrived back at Heathmore two days ago. Harry lay in the bed but the covers were tangled around him and completely drenched in sweat. Similarly, what had been a clean pair of pyjamas were now drenched in sweat and the shirt was rucked up showing just how much weight the young man had lost. He was tossing and turning and beads of sweat decorated his forehead. Severus rushed to the side of the bed and even without touching Harry Severus could feel the heat emanating from the others body. He swore viciously and headed straight for the fireplace, grabbing a handful of floo powder and throwing it into the empty grate. Closing his eyes he thrust his head into the green flames. When he opened them again he found himself staring at the interior of the Hogwarts hospital wing.

“Poppy!”

When he failed to receive an answer the first time he continued to call out loudly and insistently until the medi-witch ran into the room, hair falling in tangled waves around her shoulders and still belting her night-robe into place.

“Severus, it’s three am. What’s the matter?”

“It’s Harry. His conditions deteriorated dramatically. The monitoring alarms went off ten minutes ago and I don’t have the necessary medical experience.”

Poppy lost the colour in her cheeks and swore. “Damn! I’d hoped we’d be able to get several days worth of nutrients potions and liquids into him before this happened. I’ll grab my things and come through. In the meantime, I need you to get a cold bath run but not too deep, several basins of water and as many clean cloths and towels as you can find. Go! Now!”

As always, Severus followed the medi-witch’s orders although this time he did so with no complaints or procrastinations. He called for Dobby and ordered the little elf to fetch the necessary water and start running the bath. As soon as the elf had disappeared Severus ran and grabbed the bed clothes from his own bed before he raided the line cupboard in the hall for blankets and thick eiderdowns.

Just as he returned to Harry’s room, Poppy stepped through the flames, still in her night-robe but now clutching her wand and a bag that clinked as potion-bottles knocked together.

“Severus, there you are. Good, you’ve got the blankets. Where are the basins of water? Have you run the bath?”

Literally the minute that Severus opened his mouth the speak Dobby popped back into the room with several large basins of water.

“Master Severus! Nurse Poppy! Dobby is bringing water for Master Harry and the bath is run like Master Severus ordered.”

Poppy had already bustled over to Harry and was stripping the sodden shirt off of him leaving Severus to deal with the elf.

“Thank you Dobby. Can you go and check that all of the children are still asleep?”

“Yes Master Severus. Dobby is doing that!”

Severus quickly strode over to the bed and saw that Poppy had managed to remove Harry’s pyjama shirt and had ripped one of the bed sheets into multiple pieces.

“Poppy, what do you need me to do?”

The medi-witch looked up briefly before she turned her attention back to her patient.

“These rags all need to be soaked in the water and then we need to drape them over Harry. Our main problem at the moment is his temperature. If he gets any hotter then its entirely possible that he’ll have a seizure and we really don’t want that. It’s too dangerous.”

Severus stood stock still and simply stared at the woman for several long moments until she noticed.

“Severus Snape, get your arse in gear. Yes it’s dangerous but its only a possibility and a possibility that won’t happen if we treat him aggressively. Now, start wetting those cloths.”

Severus jumped and started doing what she told him to. He really didn’t want Harry to get any worse than he currently was. Once they had covered Harry’s torso and arms with the wet cloths they stepped back and took a seat by the window. They sat for several minutes before Severus stood up again.

“Poppy? Do you want a cup of tea? I’m going to go and make one for myself.”

The woman nodded. “That would be lovely. You could just call for Dobby though, you don’t need to go and make it yourself.”

Severus smiled ruefully. “I need to have something to do Poppy. If I don’t I shall go mad. Now, tea?”

The older woman smiled at him gratefully. “That would be wonderful Severus. The cloths will probably need to be redone by the time you get back.”

As the dark-haired man slipped silently out of the room Poppy pinner her hair up into her normal neat and tiny bun, keeping a close eye on Harry as she did so. The younger man couldn’t have fallen ill at a worse time with it being so close to Christmas. She was just thankful for the fact that Severus was visiting the house for Christmas. If he hadn’t been she didn’t want to think about what the consequences would have been had he not been.

She had to admit that she was highly intrigued as to the relationship between the two dark-haired men. Whilst Severus had softened up slightly since the death of Voldemort many students found that he was still an unmitigated bastard and she wondered when the two men had become so close that the children referred to the potions master as ‘Uncle Sev’. None of the four children had ever let on to their relationship with the professor during term time at Hogwarts. She was also intrigued as to whether Severus was the favourite uncle who spoilt the children rotten and bought them all the things their parent/guardian refused to or if he was the uncle who bought useful and practical but boring presents.

Poppy looked up as the door creaked slightly, protesting at being opened, and revealed the diminutive nightgown-clad form of Holly Creevey.

“Madam Pomfrey?”

Poppy smiled warmly and beckoned her in. “I thought Severus said that you children could call me Aunty Poppy, Holly?”

The young girl blushed as she came over to the older woman’s side. “Sorry. It’s just strange to call you that. Uncle Harry and Uncle Sev have always talked about you and I’ve known who you are since I started at Hogwarts but its different when we’re at school. We even call Uncle Sev ‘Professor Snape’ when we’re at Hogwarts. He’s too scary at Hogwarts, even to us.”

The door creaked open again to reveal Severus carrying a tray with three steaming mugs on it. Holly’s eyes widened as she saw who it was.

“Uncle Sev? I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t be here but I heard you shouting so I woke up and then I couldn’t get back to sleep.”

By the time that Holly had finished her nervous and panicky babble Severus had placed the tray down on a small table, withdrawn his wand and transfigured the chair he had been using into a small two-seater sofa. He handed one of the mugs to Poppy and sat down on the sofa, gesturing to Holly to take a seat next to him. The teenager hesitated for barely a fraction of a second before she threw herself at the man, happily settling into the older mans side with her feet tucked underneath her.

Severus handed her one of the remaining steaming mugs, a cup of rich hot chocolate. She looked up, surprised and Severus smirked down at her, black eyes twinkling with laughter.

“I’ve been teaching at Hogwarts for nearly twenty years Holly, I know when a student is out of their bed and the same thing applies here. I’m not angry with you; I know that you’re worried about Uncle Harry, we all are. Why don’t you sit here for a bit and drink some hot chocolate while Aunty Poppy and I look after Harry?”

Holly nodded and curled into the space that Severus vacated, clutching the mug of chocolate tightly.

Both of the adults discarded their drinks and moved over to the bed where they started systematically removing and re-wetting the cloths that covered Harry’s torso. Poppy frowned as she cast a spell to check Harry’s temperature and Severus’ quick eyes caught her expression.

“Poppy? What’s the matter?” He spoke softly but urgently, not wanting to worry the teenager watching them.

“The wet cloths should have had some effect on his temperature by now. It won’t have been much but any decrease, not matter how minute, would have been good.”

“So, what do you want to do? What’s the best thing to do?”

Poppy paused for several minutes, trying to make what she hoped was the best decision.

“We’ll keep on using the cloths for another hour or so. If that doesn’t work then we’ll have to think of something else. For the moment we’ll give him a fever reducer and hope that he can keep it down. If you could sit on the bed and prop him up against you then he should have more luck swallowing it.”

Severus did as she asked and between the two of them managed to get a vial of fever reducer down him. They waited for five minutes and, satisfied that he was going to keep it down, made their way back to Holly.

For the next two hours they repeated the process continually; removing the cloths, soaking them in cold water and then reapplying them. As time wore on the period between the reapplications grew shorter and shorter. What had started out as intervals of at least an hour between applications was now down to intervals of barely fifteen minutes.

Poppy looked up at Severus urgently.

“This isn’t good. His temperature is just getting higher and higher. The chances of seizure and delirium are highly likely now. I need you to go and put Holly to bed. I do not want her to see Harry if it gets that far, which in all probability, it will.”

It was at times like these; seeing the look of complete devastation and helplessness on Severus’ normally stoic face that Poppy hated her job. Within seconds though Severus’ face was shuttered and back to its normally blank mask and he simply nodded.

Leaving Poppy by the bedside casting various spells and charms he went over to the half-asleep Holly and scooped her up into his arms. The movement caused her to stir quietly.

“Uncle Sev? What’s going on?”

Severus grimaced quickly before he spoke.

“Nothing’s going on Holly. It’s just getting very late and I think you’re better off in bed. You being exhausted isn’t going to help uncle Harry is it? He’s going to need all your help while he recovers.”

Thankfully, there were no more protestations and he managed to get the sixteen year old back in bed quite quickly. As he re-entered Harry’s rooms Poppy directed him to go into the bathroom and add to the already cold water in the bathtub and to add chunks of ice as well.

Just as he finished doing so he heard Poppy scream for him from the bedroom. Panic-stricken he ran into the adjoining room and saw the one sight he had hoped not to see; Harry lay convulsing on the bed as Poppy struggled to hold him down.