Triumph Out of the Bitter Taste of Ashes

Geekgoddess -- Thanks. I do too.
Jen -- lol ::blushes:: ummm, I don\'t know. I just love to write.
Shemham -- lol yeah, and he doesn\'t like that idea. :;smirk:: Of course, his major problem with it has been his own beliefs that were based on suposition instead of fact backed research.
Rilla -- Yeah, I thought it would be a cool idea. I mean we see the magical connections different happenings create in that world. I figured that being nearly inseparable throughout most of their school years combined with the rather extraordinary set of circumstances they\'d all gone through would create that kind of connection. Especially in someone so used to it.



**********
Chapter Seven
**********


Severus waited until his office door closed behind Potter before he bolted for his washroom. As he bent over the toilet relieving his body of every bit of food left in his stomach, he was forcibly grateful he hadn\'t managed to eat before assenting to Potter\'s request.

Not able to tell, himself, whether his dreams were the result of his own imagination and overdeveloped sense of guilt, or whether they were visions of some sort, the boy had wanted him to delve into them directly, via Occlumency, to determine the reality of the situation. More than surprised at the boy\'s willingness to go through that--

**Merlin! Am I getting sick of being surprised,** he thought sourly, remembering a time, such a short while ago that he\'d felt he was incapable of feeling that unpleasant emotion.

--he\'d finally agreed. Of course, at the moment he\'d made that agreement, he had firmly believed the dreams to be nothing more than a combination of wishful thinking, combined with a vivid imagination that knew only too well what happened to muggleborns unlucky enough to be captured by Voldemort\'s death-eaters.

Severus could not remember a time when he\'d been proven so utterly wrong so soundly before. Not even the truth about Sirius Black\'s innocence -- at least in regard to murder and the betrayal of James and Lily Potter -- had he been so wrong. In the case of Sirius Black all the evidence had pointed to his guilt, that combined with his own less than pleasant history with the man, had made the . . . mistake, understandable.

This time, however, he\'d made an *ASSUMPTION*, one that wasn\'t based on any hard evidence. On the contrary, it had been based on previous cases, coupled with a second assumption that there had been ample time before the Order\'s attack to \'finish off\' with Miss Granger. Apparently, if the visions Potter was seeing were accurate, and he now had no reason to believe they weren\'t, Miss Hermione Granger was still alive -- or was alive at the time of their attack. She had, at minimum, lived long enough to crawl away from the scene of her own torture and rape.

He stomach twisted again, trying to expel what was no longer there. Severus had no clue why this affected him so profoundly. As a death-eater, both in reality and as a spy, he had seen much worse than what occurred to Miss Granger. Worse, more by numbers than because of actual damage to a single person, however. If there was any accuracy to what he\'d seen in Potter\'s mind, it was more than evident that the elder Malfoy had been carrying out a rather personal vendetta against Miss Granger, one he cared about at least as much as the information he\'d been trying to get from her.

Unfortunately, the dreams were not . . . extensive enough to let them know where she was now, just that she had managed to leave the area. Potter had come to him for reassurance, really, more than confirmation. He\'d wanted to believe they were just dreams, almost as much as he wanted to believe Hermione was alive.

He\'d had to deny the first and grant the second -- to a degree. The visions hadn\'t meant she was still alive *now*, merely that she\'d survived her assault. Of course, Potter hadn\'t understood that. He\'d wanted to know why he\'d be having the bloody -- quite literally -- visions if she wasn\'t still alive.

He\'d had to point out that he doubted Potter was a true seer. Trelawney, incompetent though she was in most things, could spot someone with the gift a mile off. His nightmares about Voldemort had been caused by the connection inadvertently ted ted by dark wizard himself. Severus had reluctantly explained that his nightmares about Hermione, were likely caused by the close friendship they\'d shared over the past nearly seven years, combined with the fact that he\'d probably stood on the very spot where Malfoy had left the girl to die.

Potter hadn\'t liked that one bit. He\'d ranted and raled at the unfairness of her having survived all that to die only because *they* -- himself and Ron included -- hadn\'t looked for har hard enough, hadn\'t searched far enough. They had all given up simply because none of them had thought she\'d have been able to leave the area on her own.

In the end, Severus had ordered him to consume a calming potion, pointing out that getting hysterical was not going to help matters, regardless of whether Miss Granger was alive or not. He\'d then promised the boy, a renewed search would be made and given him a dreamless sleep potion, making Potter swear he\'d go straight to his room, drink it, and sleep. Severus had threatened, just before the boy passed out of the room and into the hall, he would send someone to check on him in precisely twenty minutes.

The calming potion, by then, had kicked in, and Potter had nodded calmly and left, dreamless sleep potion in hand.

Severus sighed, closing his eyes -- though that wasn\'t the brightest thing he\'d done in a while -- as soon as he did so, the images he\'d seen in young Potter\'s mind instantly began replaying on the backs of his eyelids like a muggle movie screen. He snapped his eyes open and lurched to his feet. He had to speak to the headmaster immediately. Beyond the search that had followed that \'day\' to rescue survivors and to recover the bodies of the fallen, no extra effort had been put in to find Miss Granger. He hadn\'t been the only one to make assumptions about the chances for her survival. The lack of a body hadn\'t even seemed suspicious. After all, they captured her before the attack, more than 24 hours before, in fact. Which in his, and all the other experts\' opinions, led directly to the seemingly incontrovertible conclusion that she was dead and her body had been disposed of.

No one had believed that a school girl, no matter how studious, no matter how stubborn, could hold out against torture. No student could possibly be prepared for the reality that was torture. No lecture, no pictures, no nightmares even, were close enough to the real thing to prepare anyone to withstand that kind of thing. At the time, they *all* assumed she would break quickly, and had taken steps to protect themselves in the wake of her knowledge.

**Gods above,** Snape thought with incredible guilt. He\'d always hated assumptions. They were stupid, noninformative, and more than half time, entirely incorrect. Yet, now, he was being forced to face the fact that not only once, but twice he\'d allowed mere assumptions to rule his decisions. The first one had created the disaster that could be labeled as his life. It had led indirectly to his joining Voldemort. While it certainly hadn\'t been his reason for doing so, his disdain for muggleborn had certainly played a part.

This time, while the effects of his assumption were far less wide spread, they were no less devastating. Had he not assumed--

**There were others who did the same,** he thought defensively. **It wasn\'t my fault.**

He shook himself. He\'d never been one to lay blame elsewhere. It didn\'t matter that others had agreed; it only mattered what *he* did. Oh, he wasn\'t so self-centered as to believe that he was the cause of it all, and the he could have come riding to the rescue. No, that was much too Gryffindor an attitude to take. What he was upset about, was that by the very nature of his assumption he had allowed a student to suffer longer than she had to. He had allowed his personal beliefs about the student to color the conclusion he came to -- which he should not have done. He knew better than that.

//Do you? Seems to me you do it all the time.//

With a groan for the sudden arrival of his usually underactive conscience, Severus came to a halt outside the gargoyle guarding the headmaster\'s office. Quickly muttering the inane password, he bolted onto the moving stairs as soon as the entrance opened to him. He wasn\'t surprised to find the office empty. In all likelihood, Albus was sleeping. He moved swiftly across the cluttered office and stopped in front of the door that lead to the older man\'s private quarters. There, he knocked. Well, he raised his hand to knock. The door opened before he could, the headmaster standing right there in his nightclothes, blinking into the sudden light.

\"What can I do for you, Severus?\" he asked.

Severus hastily backed up, allowing the headmaster to emerge. As soon as they were ensconced in less personal space, he quickly told the headmaster about his meeting with Potter. The standard amusement that could almost always be seen in the headmaster\'s eyes, no matter the circumstances, disappeared early in Severus\' explanation.

\"Are you certain, Severus?\"

Slumped back in his chair, Severus could only shake his head. \"As certain as I can be, Albus. You know as well as I do that these things are never 100 percent. For all we know, she could have survived just long enough to crawl away. If what I saw from Potter\'s nightmares is in anyway an accurate portrayal of her condition when we attacked, she very well might have been fatally wounded. And before you ask, yes, what I saw was in line with previous victims I\'ve seen.\"

\"I\'ll contact the Order immediately, Severus. We have to make sure.\"

Severus nodded; those were his thoughts exactly. \"There\'s one more thing, warn them to include a woman in each search party that goes out.\"

Albus frowned, but understanding dawned all too quickly, his rise from behind his desk aborted abruptly.

Severus didn\'t make him ask. \"As far as Potter has \'seen\', it appears that only Lucius took her, but it\'s entirely possible it wasn\'t just him.\"

\"That poor child,\" Albus murmured as he rose. \"I\'ll owl the Order now, hopefully we can have search parties out by next daybreak.\ Nod Nodding, Severus stood and swept out of the headmaster\'s office. He had absolutely no desire to stay and discuss the situation. He still had the disturbing images flashing through his mind any second he wasn\'t concentrated solely on something else.

When he had to attend a revel in the days before the Dark Lord\'s final defeat, he had always steeled himself beforehand, prepared himself for what he knew he would see, and sometimes be forced to participate in. There was a special place in his mind that he ritually placed what he saw in order to keep it of hif his daily thoughts. Of course, because of that, they tended to come out far more forcefully in his own dreams, but that was better than seeing it all the time.

What he\'d found in Potter\'s mind had been unexpected, despite the boy\'s explanations; though, he supposed it really shouldn\'t have been. Potter had spent most of his time at Hogwarts with an half-open pipeline directly to Voldemort. The boy had seen so much that it shouldn\'t have been surprising he\'d seen as much of what had, in all probability, happened to Miss Granger. Despite should haves, Severus needed time to place each horrific picture into that place, that neat and tidy little box.

Unfortunately, he had a stop to make before he returned to his chambers. He had to make sure Potter really had taken the dreamless sleep potion and was, in fact, sound asleep in his bed. It would be just like the brat to run off on his own instead of leaving it to those far better equipped to handle the search.


TBC
Kirsteen
Feedback; as always mucho appreciated. : )
Kiristeen@kiristeen.com


.