Stages of Hope, Chapter 4
“But you hate him, Sirius!”
Sirius looked very much as if he wanted to flee the infirmary - or body-bind the very insistent Harry. Instead, he tried for patience. That was the teacher showing, Severus guessed.
“Nonsense. We are best friends. Have been forever. Now, could we please…”
“But why?” Harry whined.
Something in Severus snapped. Two hours ago, he’d been sitting comfortably in front of a warm fire, and now he was standing in the infirmary, in the middle of the night, arguing with a madman who seemed unable to understand why anyone could like him. Even his good humour only went so far.
“Alright,” he hissed. “That is quite enough from you! I forbid you to further question my outer appearance, my history, or my choice of friends. Instead, you will sit down and explain exactly what is going on here and what you think you know about us. In case of further reticence, let me just remind you that I am a potion expert! I can kill you in several unpleasant ways, and believe me, that option is growing more attractive by the minute! So sit! And talk!”
He caught a thankful look from Sirius and a reproachful one from Albus, but what really rattled him was the expression of profound relief that settled on Harry’s face as he closed his mouth, sat down meekly besides Hermione, and even smiled.
“Finally,” he whispered to her. “Something familiar.”
She, however, only sniffed. Severus could understand the sentiment.
“Maturity, Harry,” she said. “We talked about the concept, remember?”
He simply grinned. “And I still say it’s overrated, Hermione. Indulge me a bit, why don’t you?”
Something softened in her eyes - Severus couldn’t understand why, for the life of him - and she almost answered his smile.
“I would, normally,” she said quietly. “But Neville and Luna haven’t been found here, and while not running for our lives is a pleasant change, we can’t afford to lose any more time. He’ll know about Gringotts by now, and if he draws the right conclusions…”
Something changed in the atmosphere of the room, then, something so subtle and yet fundamental that it took Severus a moment to trace it back to its origin. Harry.
His grin was wiped away, his shoulders were straight, and his face, so full of contrasting emotions just a moment ago, was now filled with nothing but intent. Maturity, it seemed, had arrived without the slightest warning.
“You’re right,” Harry said, sounding eerily similar now to Hermione when she’d first woken up. “Let’s get this show on the road, then.”
And Hermione, who’d behaved like a long-suffering mother not a moment ago, suddenly looked a lot younger. She sighed in relief, sagged a bit, and met Harry’s eyes with the same calm determination.
“Headmaster’s office?” she asked.
“Sure,” Harry agreed. “Same procedure. You do the talking. I do the planning.”
Hermione nodded, rose to her feet, and turned towards the Headmaster.
“I assume there’s no reason not to continue this in more comfortable surroundings?” she asked pleasantly. “I also assume that the Order members you sent Sirius for will have gathered by now, and unless you have added to the castle in this dimension, they will probably wait in your office? Not to mention that I would die for a cuppa right now.”
Only now that he was addressed directly did Severus realize how quiet Albus had been until this moment. Normally the natural leader in any situation, he had been quite happy to hand the reigns of the conversation over to the strangers, and Severus could only assume that he’d done it to better analyse their behaviour.
Unfortunately, whatever conclusions he had come to, they made him smile nearly as widely as the madman Harry. He even made the suggestion of a bow towards Hermione, reached out his hand to offer her his arm, and nodded most happily.
“It will be an honour to oblige you, my dear,” he said serenely. “If you will accompany me?”
She answered his smile readily, if less carefree, and accepted his arm with unexpected grace.
As the two swept from the room, Harry walking after them with the pose of a soldier, Severus could hear Albus’ words echo out behind them.
“I am sure we three will get on splendidly!”
0o0
Of course it wasn’t that easy. Their swift progress was hindered first by Remus and the sudden - if only short - departure of Harry’s newfound maturity. Apparently, clinging to someone and claiming that he was sorry was part of Harry’s everyday routine. But Hermione only had to clear her throat in warning this time, and soon they continued on their way to the office.
Still they were forced to pause at what felt like every other step because of teary-eyed exclamations from Harry (“Look, the bathroom, Hermione! I wonder if Myrtle still lives there! And did anyone take care of the poor basilisk?”) and weird questions from Hermione (“So, Headmaster. Have there been more than the usual amount of strange disappearances these past years?”) that Albus answered without the least sign of perturbation.
As Severus listened and watched and remembered Albus’ chilling words about how Hermione could turn out to be their doom, he sincerely hoped that all of this made some sense in someone’s head - it certainly didn’t in his.
He had been a friend of Albus’ and a member of the Order for a number of years now, and had thus considered himself quite used to unusual and surprising circumstances, but the night’s events and their possible consequences were frankly making his head spin.
But Albus seemed to be keeping up well and Sirius seemed enormously entertained, if slightly overwhelmed, and so Severus had decided to simply play along and stay in the background, as long as they didn’t mention his robes anymore.
And he stuck to that decision, right until they entered the Headmaster’s office and were confronted with Minerva and Lily, standing in the middle of the room and arguing as usual.
Without conscious thought, Severus found himself standing between Lily and Harry. It had been fun watching Remus and Sirius being hugged to death, but he would not allow some unstable man-boy to grope his female friends.
For once, however, Harry’s reaction was less than melodramatic. He just went very, very pale, and his hand reached out to grasp Hermione’s in what had to be a bruising grip. His eyes were wide, resting on Lily without any expression at all, and then he whispered something.
“Mum.”
Hermione took a small step forward and to the right, until she stood slightly in front of her companion, mirroring Severus’ stance.
“Not your Lily, Harry,” she warned quietly, but Severus could see that her grip on him was as tight as his. “Calm down right now.”
Fortunately, the boy actually listened to her. Severus, overwhelmed by the implications of that single word, felt a bit weak in the knees as he abandoned his guard post.
And Lily, not having been present for any of the previous drama, simply put her hands to her hips and cocked a single eyebrow.
“Whoever came up with that prank,” she said archly, “it’s not funny. I’d remember if I had a son.”
Harry flinched, and Hermione pressed his hand even harder.
“I’m sorry, this is all rather complicated, but he is, in fact, your child,” she explained politely. “His full name is Harry Potter. His father is James.”
This time, Lily actually snorted.
“And what does that git Potter have to do with me?” she demanded. Harry flinched even harder. “Could someone explain to me what’s going on? Albus? Severus? Husband-dearest? I swear, Remus, if you’re part of this, I’m going to hex…”
Harry actually gave a short moan, and Hermione moved her grip from his hand to his shoulder. It looked as if he needed her to stay upright.
“Oh dear,” she whispered, then shared a rather unreadable look with the Headmaster and let her wand slide into her hand.
“I think we should go about this more organized,” she murmured, summoned a chair with a flick of her wand, and Harry sank down on it silently. She then swish-flicked again, and a sufficient number of chairs appeared in a half circle, facing Albus’ desk.
With a silent gesture, she invited them all to sit. No one did, except for Albus, who still looked utterly complacent as he summoned tea for everyone.
“So, just to get this clear,” Hermione said, sounding out of breath again. “You’re married to Remus, right? Not to S…Snape?”
Harry moaned again. It should have been utterly ridiculous, but somehow it made Severus realize for the first time what all this had to mean for the two teenagers in front of them. They had been torn from their own world, confronted with people they’d obviously known in their dimension but who were strangers to them here, and now the boy’s own mother didn’t recognize him.
Though Lily and James bloody Potter… that thought boggled the mind.
Although she knew nothing of the circumstances, Lily was sensitive enough to the atmosphere to drop the attitude. She actually looked at the girl with something like compassion, and her stance softened a bit.
“Yes,” she simply said, instead of demanding an explanation. “I’ve been married to Remus for twelve years now, though I dated Sev for a while. Who are you, if I may ask? And why does that boy think I’m his mother?”
This time, Harry didn’t make a sound, but Severus saw the tears on his face and looked away quickly. This wasn’t ridiculous at all.
The girl’s lower lip seemed to wobble a bit, but then she managed to give Lily a real smile.
“I’m Hermione,” she said, then sat down besides Harry and took both of his hands in hers.
“Do you want to leave for a bit?” she whispered. “I can do this alone, Harry. You don’t have to look at them if you can’t.”
Harry shivered all over, but then he shook his head.
“No,” he answered. “Just do your thing, Hermione. Don’t worry.”
Hermione nodded, took a deep breath, then looked up at them and again gestured for the chairs. No one sat.
“Okay,” she said, her voice high and nervous. “Okay. Before I start - was there a student at Hogwarts by the name of Hermione Granger? She should have entered the school in 1991 and was perhaps sorted as Gryffindor?”
While Severus stared at her - was she asking about herself? - Minerva answered the question with only a short glance at Albus.
“There was indeed a Hermione Granger, though she was sorted into Ravenclaw, my dear,” she answered. “However, I am sad to tell you that there was an accident in her first year, involving a troll, and though we did everything we could, Hermione didn’t make it.”
Again, the girl gave a short blink. Again, Severus was impressed. If this was the way she dealt with news about her own death, he didn’t want to know what would unsettle her.
“Right,” she said. “I guess that clears up the problem with our alternate selves. Good. I guess.”
She took another deep breath, and then repeated the gesture towards the chairs with something close to desperation.
She looked younger than before, but perhaps that was because Severus now knew she could be no older than nineteen. Her hair, where it wasn’t singed off, was frizzed quite badly, and even the baggy layers of clothing couldn’t hide how thin she was. There was a smudge on her right cheek of a reddish brown colour, and Severus had the dark suspicion that it was blood.
She looked bone tired.
Silently, Severus sat down on the chair closest to him, then tugged at Lily and Sirius to follow his example. Remus had always been the mildest tempered of them and simply sat without prompting.
Severus arranged his robes around him, hesitated, then leaned forward and poured the girl a cup of tea. She really looked as if she would die for one. After another moment of hesitation, he added a few ginger biscuits, then handed her the cup without a word.
She smiled at him.
“Right,” she said again, but this time her voice wasn’t so very high anymore. “I guess introductions are in order. My name’s Hermione Granger and this is Harry Potter. We are dimension travellers - though that part wasn’t planned. In our world, we’re pretty much all that’s left of the resistance against Voldemort, and Harry here is the prophesized Chosen One. Oh, and he’s also a Horcrux - do you have a Horcrux-problem in your reality, too?”
There was a clattering sound as, for perhaps the first time in a century, Albus Dumbledore dropped a cup of tea and choked violently on a lemon drop.