Evening Schnapps

A/N: Hehe. I know, I know. That was the cliffy from hell, but it was just too good. I had to. Well, hopefully this makes up for it, a nice long one!

J.K. Rowling is the owner of all except specific characters, situations, and plot bunnies that are unique to this story. I make no money, but lots of satisfaction from taking out her characters and playing with them for a while before putting them back.

Helpful vocabulary for this chapter:

Cirque; n. 1) A steep bowl-shaped hollow occurring at the upper end of a mountain valley, especially one forming the head of a glacier or stream. 2) A ring, or circle.

Cornice; n. 1) A horizontal molded projection that crowns or completes a building or wall. 2) A large over-hanging structure of compacted snow that is sculpted from winds at the top of mountain peaks or cliffs, most often shaped like a wave.

Many thanks to my ubber-beta SignoraAligheri, and my sweetie Evan! They just prove that you really can’t do anything in this world without people looking out for you.

So, keep your hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times, and here we go!


Chapter 6

Severus waited just inside the forest at the place where magic resumed, keeping himself sheltered, but giving himself a view of the open valley that lead up to the crest between his position and the town below. He wanted to pace, but it took an extraordinary amount of energy to move around in this environment, so he stood still. He looked up at the sky again and saw that the sun was still an hour from setting. He felt numb.

Granger was surely gone. He hated waiting like this, but he had told her that he would. The only thing that kept him from pressing on to town, to try and find her friends for help, was the thought of her hurt. If she made it this far injured, and he wasn’t there, she could die.

“If she isn’t dead already,” he muttered to himself.

Severus had watched from the trees as the avalanche had torn the face off the mountain. He never spotted her again after he started running. He waited until everything was quiet before cautiously moving out onto the slope. He was unable to make it very far, the torn up surface was littered with chunks and blocks of ice and snow. There were even imposing monoliths the size of small houses. He looked down slope, but the ravaged landscape extended beyond the event horizon, and he couldn’t see where monster had finally stopped. He tried to move around, but kept sinking down, even with the snowshoes. Reluctantly he had turned back around and made his way to the agreed upon rendezvous point.

Now, he found himself becoming more and more agitated. To give himself something to do, in order to relieve some of the tension he felt, he transfigured his robes into the same Muggle clothes that he had worn climbing up here the day before. He never cared for Miss Granger, but that certainly didn’t mean that he would see harm come to her. Even when she was a student and he was cruel to her, it was mostly just his extraordinary stress load from spying and teaching, along with the constant headaches that sharpened his tongue. What he had never expected was to meet her as an adult. The Wizarding World was a small one, but large enough that he didn’t expect to cross paths with her after the fall of Voldemort, let alone spend any time with her.

“Not to mention wrapping myself around her naked body,” he sighed. He hadn’t been able to get that sensation out of his mind. He wasn’t surprised, however, that she didn’t seem to think on it at all. She had just used him for his heat and hadn’t given it another thought.

“Stupid girl!” he hissed. ‘She still does not seem to realize that she had almost died from exposure. If I was not there to…’

His thoughts drifted off as he heard high pitched chittering sound echo through the valley. He looked up and spotted an eagle soaring across the sky, it wheeled around and began a descent down to the open meadow the lay in front of the trees Severus was standing in. As he stepped out to the forest edge, he watched as the eagle flew low to the ground, skimming along from the right. As it passed in front of him, it flapped its wings a few times, leaving imprints from its feathery wingtips in the snow. It swooped up and landed in a treetop to his left, gingerly stepping around the treetop and settling in facing him. The eagle held its mouth open and looked like it was panting. He thought it must have flown a long way to be so distressed.

Severus and the eagle watched each other for a few minutes, as it stopped panting. It was a massive golden brown bird, with large and wickedly sharp beak and talons. Severus found himself mesmerized by the bird’s huge copper-colored eyes, he looked into them until the sun set. Just as the light was fading, the eagle jumped and flapped its way deeper into the forest in silence. He watched until he lost sight of it in the thick treetops.

Pulled out of his reverie, he decided to start back towards the town. Miss Granger wasn’t able to reach him, and while he knew she had told him to wait another hour for the moon to come up. He thought he had better get moving. If she was still alive, but too hurt to get to him, it would only cause more harm if he kept waiting and didn’t get help back to her soon.

Just as he took his first step, he heard a noise behind him. He pulled his wand and spun around to face the danger.

“You made it!” Miss Granger gasped out, pausing in her struggles.

She was sinking almost hip deep in snow with every labored step. Stopping to rest, she looked up at him.

He started towards her, but she held up a hand.

“No, stay where you are. You can’t help me, if you could even get me up to stand on your snowshoes with you, our combined weight would sink us the moment we tried to walk” she breathed. “I’ll get to you.”

Severus watched, helpless as she struggled and fought to get to him. Her coat was torn, and she had lost her dark spectacles. Her face showed dark bruising along the left side, there was swelling and a cut along her hairline above the left temple, and her hair was hopelessly tufted loose from the braid.

Finally, she got to within arms reach of him.

“Give me your wand, Professor,” she said as she held out her hand.

“Where is yours?” he demanded.

She chuckled ruefully, “I seem to be lacking. I lost my pack in the slide. Broke my skis, too.”

Silently, he handed her his wand and watched as she pointed it to a large tree, where a heavy branch protruded from the trunk.

“Bombarda!” she uttered, and the point where the branch connected with the trunk exploded and the heavy wood fell to the snow. She reached for it and tapped it with his wand. “Trabaverto.”

Severus watched as the branch turned into a kind double ski, bottoms touching, with the bindings facing out. Miss Granger reached over and pulled it apart, laying the two new skis on the snow. She reached back and picked up two small bits of shattered wood and transfigured them in to poles.

She held out a hand and he helped her up, taking just enough of her body weight so that she could step up onto the skis.

“Thanks,” she said after she had latched the bindings around her boots, “I just need to do one more thing.”

She pointed his wand at the large tear across her coat and uttered, “Induviae Reparo.”

The rip sealed itself up and she held out his wand. “Thanks for that,” she said as she let out a deep sigh, reaching up to smooth down her hair. “I think every thing is back to neat. Let’s get moving again. It’s all downhill from here.”

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Severus walked along through the moonlit landscape. The full moon cast its silver light on the snowy world and he found it comforting. The snow reflected the bright light, but the trees and sky were black, except for the brilliant white stars. The world seemed to reflect the best of opposite extremes, like daylight but without the bothersome sun.

Miss Granger was very much on his mind. He was astonished at her appearance in the trees. She had some how survived that monstrous avalanche, lost all her belongings, had obviously been beaten badly, and had somehow managed to struggle to the rendezvous point without skis or snowshoes or anything to support her, and she still had the ability to slip in a stupid pun?

‘Something isn’t right here,’ he thought, ‘as hard as it was for her to just struggle that short distance to me, she would have exhausted herself long before making it all the way back.’

“Miss Granger,” he asked finally, “what happened? How did you survive and make it back to me?”

She looked up at him and he felt himself regretting the familiar and slightly possessive tone of his question.

“Well, after the cornice broke free, I skied as hard and fast as I could. The fall line was wrong, so I couldn’t make it to the trees. I just had to try and out run it. I did for a while, but after I shot out over and into the next valley below, it caught up with me. I was thrown around and thumped up a bit, but eventually it stopped. I was lucky, my head was stuck out of the snow, even though the rest of me was tangled up and buried,” she said as she glided along side of him, speaking as she wound slow easy turns. “It took a while, but I was finally able to work myself loose. I was fortunate, as I was only caught by the toe of the slide and not by the main flow. If I was just a little bit faster, I would have out run it.”

“But how did you get to the meadow without your skis?” he pressed.

She just looked at him again, her shadowed eyes difficult to read in the monochromatic light of the moon, and gave a little smile as she said, “Well, I just did. I had to. It’s amazing what one is capable of when one has no other choice.”

Severus thought about that as they moved on.

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Hermione let herself ski a little further down the hill and wait for a moment alone, as Snape continued to follow. She was bone tired after her ordeal, and was trying so hard not to show him. Her assaulted muscles were torn and battered. She really didn’t think she was going to make it for a few minutes there.

The horror she felt as she saw the Death Eaters had overwhelmed her. She had looked back and forth between the men coming at her and her former Professor. She was shocked that after all this time, that they had finally come for her, into her peace, into her sanctuary. In that split second, looking between the tall dark man in front of her and the evil men above her, she made up her mind and pulled out the gun.

She knew that the sharp report from the weapons discharge would do far more damage to the pursuers than the bullet itself, so she planted the shot into the base of the cornice. She felt like her life had leapt sideways as she made the decision in a fraction of a second. Her world was quiet literally, coming down around her. She had never skied so hard in her life. She had previously ridden out sluffs and small avalanches, but never had she allowed herself to get into a situation where she might have to face the monster that could so easily kill her. She was surprised in the end then, when the snow caught up to her and engulfed her, that as she was being spun around and beaten by the debris that was mixed in with the snow and ice, that she had not thought of Harry or Ron or her parents. She had instead worried about Professor Snape.

“Miss Granger?” A deep voice rumbled next to her, “Are you all right?”

Hermione looked up into his face, startled. She hadn’t realized that he had caught up to her and was standing there, waiting for her to move.

“Oh! Yes, sorry, let’s go,” she mumbled as she pushed off and slid past him.

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Severus shook his head as she floated off out of his reach. He had been about to reach out to shake her, as she had just been standing there staring off into space.

‘Stupid girl.’ he thought. ‘She thinks that I can’t see that she’s hurt. It is amazing that she has not been killed by now.’ He kept walking down the hill as he thought about her injuries. There didn’t appear to be any broken bones, but as badly as her coat had been torn, he wasn’t sure about that. Bruises, yes, she had plenty, and he bet that they extended well past the ones on her face.

He thought about stopping her to treat her injuries, but was much better at healing with potions than spells.

‘Best to just keep moving,’ he thought as he walked down the hill. He could see the lights of the town through the trees ahead. ‘We will be out of here soon enough.’

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They finally arrived in the small town. Hermione threw her skis and poles into the snow behind a tree. Professor Snape took off his snowshoes and tucked them, along with his poles, under his arm. They walked down the street together in silence.

Hermione couldn’t get the nagging thought out of her head, that the Death Eaters must have gotten information on how to find her. But they had come in from the route that led from a place where no one knew about her unusual living situation. Frowning, she turned to Professor Snape.

“I need to make a detour.”

He grumbled under his breath, but looked at her and nodded.

Hermione took them into the brewpub, looking for Mike.

“’Mione!”

Hermione looked up to see Muriel ducking under the bar to come to her.

“Oh boy, am I glad you’re here,” she gasped out. “Mike’s in the hospital and so is Raf. They were jumped and now Mike’s not waking up!” Tears started to well up in her eyes.

Hermione nodded, and hugged the girl. She knew that Muriel had a crush on Mike and that she hadn’t ever told him, because she was too scared that he would laugh at the idea of dating a girl who was too inexperienced to ski the backcountry with him. She had been jealous of Hermione when she and Mike became friends. But, Hermione only saw an acquaintance that could help her, not someone to date. Instead, she had offered Muriel friendship and clandestine backcountry lessons so that she would feel confident enough to approach Mike.

“All right,” she said, frowning at the news that the boys were hurt. She was developing a very bad feeling about this. “We’ll go over there now and see what we can do to help. You just sit tight.”

Hermione released the girl and turned to Snape. “Better give those to Muriel to put behind the bar, we’re heading over to the hospital,” she said, nodding at the snowshoes.

She watched as he frowned, the frown built to a glare and he was about to argue with her. She took two steps over to him, reached up and caught his upper arm in her hand. She yanked hard and his face came to level with hers.

“Just how to you think those Death Eaters found me?” she hissed quietly into his ear.

She felt him relax and released her grip on his arm. As he straightened, she started walking towards to door. She stopped and reversed her course, heading to the bar as Muriel ducked back under with Snape’s gear.

“Muriel,” she said as Snape walked up and sat next to her at the bar. “Kettle One, double.” She eyed the tall Professor and saw him nod slightly. “Make that two.”

Muriel nibbled on her lower lip, worrying the little gold ring with the tip of her tongue as she poured. She set the two glasses of vodka in front of them.

Hermione took hers and knocked her head back, swallowing the pain numbing liquid in one gulp.

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She stood and walked for the door, seemingly unaware of Severus behind her. He looked at Muriel and she waved him off. He picked up his glass as he stood and downed the spirits. He set the glass on the bar and followed Miss Granger out into the night.

He waited for her to speak as they walked down the hill. Finally, she cleared her throat.

“Professor Snape,” she began, “Michael and Raf are the two young men who have made it possible for me to have the peace that I have enjoyed. They taught me everything I needed to know about survival out here, and they protected my secret for me.”

Severus started, shocked that she would let Muggles know about her. She shook her head and continued.

“No, they don’t know I’m a witch, rather they protect the secret of my location for me. Something like an Unplottable home, but this was based in trust and honor, rather than magic. In the Muggle world, living up there is a crime. If people found out about me, I’d be arrested. Mike helped me finish the yurt and he spends almost as much time up there as I do. He would never just tell someone where I was just for the asking!” she said, fighting tears. He watched as she took a steadying breath. “Raf has more street smarts than Mike, he can tell is a person is lying just by looking at them. He just has an instinct about who can be trusted. Because of him, the only others who know exactly where I live are Muriel and Gabe.”

Severus understood then. She and this Muggle Michael were seeing each other. No wonder she was so upset. Gritting his teeth, he decided to accompany her and see the night through. Although all he wanted to do was Apparate back home and go to sleep. ‘I can’t do that either, I need to return the snowshoes in the morning and settle accounts there and also at the hotel,’ he thought to himself.

Sighing he walked with her as they entered the hospital.

He remained quiet as she asked the lady at the front desk for her Muggle friends’ rooms. He followed along as she rushed to the first room specified. He found himself reaching out and resting his hand on her shoulder, to provide some comfort when she began crying upon seeing the young man unconscious, beaten beyond recognition and with tubes sticking out of his arms and mouth.

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Hermione sat with Mike for a few minutes, feeling Professor Snape’s warm hand sitting lightly on her shoulder. She was grateful for the small kindness, although she found herself vaguely uncomfortable. She was uncomfortable, she realized, because she found that she wasn’t uncomfortable with the idea of him touching her, and that thought was unsettling.

Finally, she stood up, aware as he withdrew his hand. She bent over and kissed Mike’s swollen and battered cheek softly.

Then she stood up and walked down the hall to Raf’s room, now very much aware of the tall dark shadow following behind her.

She gasped when she saw Raf. He was sitting up in the bed, looking supremely irritated at being confined in a hospital, but he was covered with cuts and bruises. She rushed over and hugged him.

Raf pulled back, frowning at her bruises, “You got caught by them, didn’t you?”

“No,” she shook her head. “This isn’t from those men.”

She watched as Raf closed his eyes for a moment before he said, “They jumped us in an alley. There were seven of them and they were just too strong. They beat Mike so bad, he passed out. They wanted to know where you were. So,” he said, with a sly look coming over his battered face, “I told them. I told them the fastest route. I told them to go to the other side of the range and take the Great Western Chair up from the resort.” He snorted, “I even told them where to get the damned snowshoes!”

Hermione just sat staring at him, comprehension dawning in her mind.

“You… you sent them into the Circle of Fire! It was you who set them up and had them cross the cirque face!”

Raf looked at her and grinned; wincing as the wide grin cracked his already split lip. “Yup! I sent those sons of bitches to their deaths. I bet they set off one hell of an avalanche!” he finished triumphantly.

Hermione looked over at Professor Snape, and smirked.

“Well, there was ‘one hell of an avalanche’, only they didn’t trip it.” She looked back at Raf, “the cirque was more stable than I would have thought. We were crossing and they were halfway to us before I saw them.”

Raf looked at her, then over to Snape and back at her, looking at the bruises on her face again.

“You tripped it?” he asked.

She nodded.

“You intentionally set off the Circle of Fire and rode that monster down?! Holy Cow! I can’t believe it! Our little ’Mione! You are going to go down in history! This is the stuff of legend!” Raf was practically bouncing on the bed.

She reached out and put a hand on his arm. “Raf, seven men died. I don’t think it’s a good idea to spread that around.”

He looked crestfallen, but nodded. “Yeah, you’re right. But I’m still going to tell Mike!”

She watched as his eyes darkened. Mike was his best friend. They had moved to the area as teenagers, hoping to live the life of ski bums and had done quite well for themselves. They were inseparable.

“He’ll be all right, Raf. You get some sleep and we’ll be back to check on you in the morning.” She winced as she stood up. Sitting and talking to him had stiffened her battered muscles and the vodka was wearing off.

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Severus walked her back to his room at the little hotel in town.

By the time they reached his room, he was getting worried about Granger. She hadn’t spoken and her breathing was getting labored. When they entered the room, she moved straight to the little metal cabinet next to the desk and pulled the door open. She removed several miniature bottles of cold alcohol and had downed one before she even moved to take her coat off. She shrugged it off and downed another tiny bottle.

He sat quietly on a chair watching her stand there with her eyes closed. She seemed to be gathering strength. Finally, she opened another bottle and drank that, too. Then she sat down on the end of the bed, and began gingerly pulling off her heavy pants. She let them fall out of her hands and lay back on the bed, only getting one foot up off the floor. Severus thought she didn’t even look like she was aware of his presence any more.

‘This is a girl who doesn’t have an ounce of energy left to her,’ he thought.

He wondered, now that he had seen her completely undone, what was going on the night before when she had ordered him to strip so abruptly? Had she really been in as much trouble as he had presumed at the time? He stood up and moved quietly to her side, leaning down he whispered softly in her ear.

“Why was I forced to get undressed and use my body heat to save you last night?”

She stirred slightly, and muttered, “Who said you had to?” Severus saw the slightest hint of a mischievous grin on her lips before she lost consciousness all together.

He stood up, alarmed. She had been playing a prank on him. She wasn’t in any danger then. He thought back to her standing there, eyes closed and naked in the freezing yurt. She had dried herself off, letting her sweat evaporate in the air, before crawling into bed.

‘Of course,’ he thought suddenly, ‘she had just climbed a mountain! She had a small furnace burning inside of her. As long as she was dry and under all that down, she would have warmed swiftly from the inside out.’

Severus grumbled as he rummaged through his trunk on the desk and found a few healing potions. He moved back over to the bed and looked down at her. He had been the victim of a colossal prank.

‘She probably just wanted to laugh about my body later,’ he grumbled.

As he stood there watching her sleep, he was struck by the feeling that she wasn’t laughing at him at all. Perhaps she had just been looking for a way to avoid a reasonably expected confrontation with an unpleasant person from her past. An abrupt bark of laughter escaped his lips.

“Clever girl.” he sneered.

He moved his wand over her, muttering an incantation that would remove her clothing, without waking her.

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A/N: Really, I know. Another cliffy. I guess I am just the queen of cliffhangers. *grin*

Trabaverto- Roughly “change beam of wood” vaguely following the JKR pattern of spell naming. From the Latin ‘Traba’ for ‘a beam of wood’, and the root ‘verto’ indicative of change, as is ‘converto’, to convert; ‘reverto’ to return or go back; and ‘adverto’, to turn towards or direct one’s attention to.

Induviae Reparo- Roughly “repair clothes” following the JKR pattern of spell naming. From the Latin “Induviae” for ‘clothes’ and “Reparo” from Latin, meaning ‘to restore, renew, make good/buy, or purchase.’

FLBanshee- no word yet as the identity of the Death Eaters, stay tuned!

Sheedy- Well, just so happens Evil Cliffy is my middle name! hehe

WickedWitch- Wow. Damn. Just wow! Thanks for the compliment. *runs off giggling cause I was a ‘recommended read’*

Ccrawley- thanks!

Kris- here you go!

Domine- Like I said “Evil Cliffy” is my middle name! But, here is you fix! Never say I was mean dealer!

Moyra- We aim to please!

Darian c- thanks! Here is you new update, you might even get 2 by the end of the weekend.

DawnEB- I loved slipping them in there, squish!


Megan Consoer- out of curiosity, are you a bot?

Pickles87- Thanks!

Estella- I hope this chapter means you can forgive me! As for the characters, my hope is to keep Snape in all His Snape-iness, and Hermoine in all her ‘can’t be ruffled’ know-it-all-ness! I love my job!