Dusk and Her Embrace

*all characters are trademark of JK Rowling, I just play with them*
* all characters are of age*

Sorry, it\'s been awhile, I\'ve been busy with work and stuff. So here\'s a new chapter, sorry it\'s not that long, but i felt bad not writing anything for a week or so. I\'ll try to get chapter 8 in soon.


Chapter Seven: Heaven Torn Asunder

Severus laid in bed that night staring at the black dungeon ceiling. The events that had occurred that night were repeating in his head like a reel of an old black and white movie. How could he… why did she…. Did he just almost rape a student? The guilt he felt was burning through his veins… but she had reacted… at least it had seemed like she reacted… it didn’t matter, he thought, as he tried to push it all through his head, she was a student, and he was a professor… it was just uncalled for. It could never happen again.

Luckily Hermione was far easier to avoid then he thought she’d be. With her head girl duties, and her extreme load of classes, the only time he had to see her was when she was in his own class… He had taken his meals in his suite of rooms, something he was sure the headmaster had noticed. He had gotten a glimpse of her in the hallways of the castle. She seemed to be entombed by Potter and Weasley who followed her around like a pack of lovesick dogs. They would gaze angrily at anyone who went near her, hands on their wands… now he supposed Hermione did look more vulnerable then usual. Her skin seemed so pallid that you could almost see the bluish veins underneath her skin, and the circles under her eyes had hollowed and darkened… He tried to tell himself a myriad of times that it wasn’t his fault, it was her workload, or her head girl duties, or a combination of both of those… but deep down inside he knew it was all his fault…

He was sitting at his desk in the office grading a batch of parchments from a group of second year students on antidotes. Most of the papers were lousy, had many spelling and grammatical mistakes which was something that did irk him. A good majority of them were below the required length… There was a knock on his door.
“ Come in,” he said.
Fire-headed Weasley and Potter strode in, their fists balled up. “ What did you do to Hermione?” Potter demanded.
“ How incredibly like your father you are, Harry,” Severus sneered, “ Defiant and Arrogant and thinking your above everyone else. How dare you stroll into my office making accusations like this.”
“ If you did anything to her,” Weasley butted in…
“ How dare you make your inane accusations at me, Mr. Weasley… I shall be reporting to McGonagall about your disrespect, and I think thirty pts from Gryffindor that would be fifteen from each of you.”
“ Hermione was fine until she went into your office the night of the Halloween Feast… what did you say to her?”
“ Would you like it to be forty, Mr. Weasley?” Severus sighed. “ She just asked about the work she missed and I told her she could have as much time as she needed to make it up, and then she left my office, after that I do not know what happened to her.”
“ She came back looking all distraught,” Weasley remarked.
“ I do not know how Miss Granger came to look distraught. I assure you she was quite in her right mind when she left here.”
“ We’re… We’re just worried about her Professor,” Potter remarked, “ Every since that night at the graveyard… her health has just being doing downhill. We’re worried she may have a relapse or something.”
“ If you have any concerns about Miss Grangers health, I’d suggest you relay your concerns to Madame Pomfrey, that is her department, not mine.”
“ You really don’t have a heart, Professor, Hermione risks her life for you… and this is how you treat her and us… why if it wasn’t for us….”
“ Out of my office, both of you, NOW! Or there will be no points left from Gryffindor for me to take!” The two of them backed out of his office, the looks on their faces deadly, as they were leaving, Severus looked down at himself… he couldn’t help feeling guilty because for once in their lives, Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley were right about him, this was all his fault…

The headmaster came to see him a few days later. The expression upon his face was grave one, and his face was streaked with worry wrinkles. “ Headmaster,” Severus said in greeting. He wondered if the headmaster was going to tell him how worried he was about Hermione as well.
“ Severus, I need to talk to you,” he said sternly. The tone in Albus Dumbledore’s voice was enough to make Severus tremble.
“ Yes, headmaster?”
“ I’m worried about you, Severus…”
“ Me, headmaster, why me?”
“ You’ve just been more antisocial then usual. I miss your presence at the staff table… and many of the professors are beginning to wonder if you’re even still alive since you’ve been acting invisible for so long.”
“ I’ve just been busy, headmaster, I have a lot of things I need to get finished before the Christmas recess.”
“ I understand, Severus…” His blue eyed stared straight in Severus’s black onyx colored ones. “ Severus, is there anything you need to tell me?”
“ No sir,” Severus quickly said.
“ Well, I’m always here if you change your mind otherwise,” Dumbledore said. He got up from his chair. “ I expect to see you at the staff table later.”
“ Yes headmaster.”

Later that night, Severus was still sitting in his office going over parchments… Third year papers this time… When there was another knock on his door. “ Come in,” he said wondering who it would be this time… Madame Pomfrey or someone… but instead it was the last person he had expected to see… Hermione walked in…. and yes she did look worse then she had the last time he had seen her… She looked skinner if that was possible, she appeared to be drowning in her Hogwarts robes they seemed so much bigger on her, blanketing her skinny frame. Her hair was more unruly then usual and the curls hung lifelessly around her face. The circles under her eyes were more bruise like, it looked like she had gotten punched in the face, rather then gotten a lack of sleep.
“ Can I help you, Miss Granger?” he asked.
“ I… I… I just want to hand in my…” she didn’t say anymore, her body crumpled over in a limp heap and her head hit the cold stone floor at an odd angle, as a roll of parchment fell from her hands….
“ HERMIONE!!!!” he screamed…