Part Twenty-Seven

AN: Greetings! I know you're all probably quite tired of excuses by now, and I have to apologize yet again, I'm afraid. Real life does get a bit testy at times, and the last few months have proven that fact beyond a doubt. Darnedchild had an operation to remove her tonsils, and my hubby was diagnosed with cancer of the prostate. All is well for now, so our little tale can move forward again. Many thanks go out to our dear, darling Lariope. You are a wonder. Enjoy!

"Clyde and Bonnie, Clyde and Bonnie..." Severus muttered under his breath while running a finger down a list of characters contained in Love's Labour's Lost by The Bard. Slamming the book closed when he was unable to find the cursed names, Severus glared at Yorick before rising, book in hand. He strode over to the bookcase and pushed the offending volume back in place. Crossing his arms and staring at the tips of his shoes, Severus walked back and forth between Yorick's perch and the desk several times before stopping. The level of his head didn't change as he twisted his neck to glare at the bird again.

"She's still punishing me, isn't she?" Severus asked with a calculating look on his face. "She had to have known I'd research those names."

He walked back over to the books and ran a finger over the volumes, counting them down. "I've searched Shakespeare's histories, tragedies and, finally, the so-called comedies and I'm still unable to locate the irritating Clyde and his blasted wench, Bonnie!" Throwing his arms wide, Severus turned and started walking again.

"I wonder if the Muggles have squirreled away some of Shakespeare's works and kept them secret?" he questioned the bird. "Some vast library containing a small assortment known only to them. It would fit. Hermione loves reading, loves books, and if there's one somewhere she hasn't read..."

The clock in the living room struck the quarter hour, broke Severus's train of thought, and pulled his attention.

"Blast! She'll be here in a matter of minutes, and I haven't started logging the results from yesterday's trials yet," he told the bird as he started moving in the direction of the lab. Severus stopped, turned and pointed a finger at his falcon.

"You hold your tongue, my chicken, or you'll end up like the original Yorick did. Not a word – peep, squawk, or whatever sort of noise you make – to Hermione. Understand?"

-~8~-

It was easier to get ready this time. She and Severus had worked together comfortably the night before. It wasn't too difficult to let herself ease back into the role of friend.

As for their work, she concentrated on their experiment as if it were a puzzle that needed to be solved, rather than thinking of the potentially life altering consequences of failure. Or success.

"Severus?" Hermione called out the moment she appeared in his sitting room. "I had a thought during my bath last night; do you think we need to give the mice some sort of contraceptive potion?"

She pulled a biscuit out of her pocket and offered it to Yorick. "New recipe – Leontes liked it, but he'll eat just about anything. Anyway, about the mice? I was just thinking that if the love potion does what it's supposed to, and we're not careful, we may end up with loads of new test subjects. What do you think?"

-~8~-

If he'd been a suspicious man, and unfortunately he was, Severus would be inclined to think Hermione had mentioned her bath to further punish him. Pushing memories of their one and only bath together out of his mind, Severus walked into the sitting room and leaned against the door jamb. Crossing his arms, he raised a brow.

"I think that I've already had the pleasure of being a master brewer for a snake. If you don't mind, I think I'll pass at adding the rodent population to my resume. If we keep them separated, in charmed cages, it should help control the population. Of course," he added while scratching his chin, "we could avoid the issue entirely if we pair off, say Romeo with Petruchio, Juliet with Kate and so on."

-~8~-

For a moment, she wondered if Severus had made contraceptive potion for Voldemort, and that wonderful thought was enough to momentarily short circuit her brain as she tried to keep any and all mental images from forming.

She blinked twice, then shook her head to clear it.

"Well, keeping them separated would probably work on most of them, but I was concerned about Clyde. He seems to be a very determined little fellow, and if he continues to be able to find his way out of cages, who is to say that he won't be able to find his way in to a completely different cage. Namely, Bonnie's."

-~8~-

There were those names again. The insufferable Clyde and his merry wench, Bonnie. Severus' eyes flicked over to his bookcase, the bookcase that had failed him, before they fastened on Hermione. Walking toward the kitchen, he attempted to stifle his irritation at not being able to find a reference to them.

"Why did you choose those names out of all the other names available?" he asked conversationally while preparing a pot of tea. "Clyde and Bonnie seem so – mundane compared to the others."

-~8~-

"I don't know, they just seemed to fit. Don't you think so?" She followed him into the kitchen and leaned her hip against a counter.

"Besides, not everyone can have names as interesting as Petruchio, Desdemona, Hermione or Severus. Anything I can do to help?"

-~8~-

He held his tongue long enough to organize the tea tray, gather the chocolate biscuits Hermione liked, and head for the dining alcove with their tea. Setting it down, he pondered the wisdom of asking about Clyde and Bonnie. There had been so many different times he'd not asked what she meant, whether from the fear of appearing ignorant or foolish, he didn't know. Perhaps it was the key he needed to finally understand her.

Like the time on the roof. What was it she said, and I didn't...

"Cake," he said while turning to look at Hermione. "What did you mean by cake, when we flew on the roof?"

-~8~-

"What?"

She had no clue what he was talking about at first. Hermione remembered the night they had flown above the roof, that was something she would never forget; but she had no idea what that had to do with Bonnie and Clyde or the names of the other mice.

"Cake?" Hermione reached for a biscuit as her mind tried to think of what she could have possibly meant by the word. She bit into the treat, then swallowed as it came to her.

A blush crept up to warm her cheeks. "I meant cake as in 'piece of cake'. I was terrified, and I was trying to convince myself that I could – oh, I think you wanted me to take my foot off of yours at the time – and I was trying to boost my courage somewhat. I told myself that I'd already done so many other dangerous things that taking one little step should be a piece of cake."

She tilted her head and gave him a confused smile. "What brought that up? Are we going back up to the roof?"

-~8~-

I was terrified... trying to boost my courage... already done so many other dangerous things...

"No, no roof."

Severus shook his head slowly. For not the first time, he felt wholly inadequate, a fraud wearing what were supposed to be a war hero's robes.

"Cake," he muttered absently while wandering back over to his desk. Picking up the letters he'd fully intended to send to Kingsley, Minerva and Potter, Severus glanced at them before he tore them into quarters and tossed them into the bin next to his desk. With his head lowered, he began speaking.

"You were terrified, but you didn't let it stop you," he said soberly. Turning, he leaned against the back of the desk and finally looked up at Hermione. "I've read accounts of what Potter did in the forest. When he thought he was going to die."

A few moments of silence passed before he began again. "I don't know that I could have...walked of my own accord toward death and that," he stated while picking up the medal he'd been sent not once, but twice, "makes me unworthy to accept this."

When she opened her mouth to speak, he held up a hand and said, "Please, let me finish."

Rising, he walked toward Hermione, took one of her hands, placed the medal on her palm, and closed her fist around it.

"It should go to Creevy, or Weasley or any one of those who were willing to, and did, pay the ultimate price, not me."

Walking back toward his desk, Severus turned and pointed a finger at Hermione before shaking it.

"Don't start telling me I risked my life by being Dumbledore's spy. It was different, and we both know it. I was never in real mortal peril until the very end, and that – that I'd taken into account. I cheated death, Hermione, and I knew it was possible before I faced it. I stoppered it, if you will," he advised with an almost nasty laugh that ended abruptly. Taking his position against the desk again, he knew the time for all pretenses had vanished.

"I've always been able to plan, take everything I could into account, and I'm telling you all this because...now I am terrified, Hermione," he stated while throwing his arms in the air and walking briskly back and forth between the desk and Yorick's perch. "And I don't have that piece of cake you Gryffindors seem to be able to find. I don't know if I can survive without...without Lily. I don't want Dumbledore's influence, but if my love has been sustained by a potion and it dies... I've never been without her at the heart of me," he said while bringing both arms to his chest. "I'd even thought to sabotage our efforts to find a cure, but I can't bring myself to perpetrate Dumbledore's last, best jest." His arms dropped to his sides, and Severus turned to face Hermione again.

"Will...what is me...cease?"

-~8~-

Her heart was breaking once more, this time for Severus. The poor man, he'd been through so much already, been betrayed by those he thought closest to him, used by so many, and now...

She should be angry that he had even thought about ruining the cure just so he could keep his fantasy, but listening to him speak, she finally began to realize a fraction of what he must be going through.

Right now, he needed reassurance, and as his friend – perhaps his only friend, other than Yorick – she would provide it if she could.

If he would let her.

Hermione moved to stand in front of him. "There is so much more to you than just who you love, Severus. So much. If we find the cure, and if your feelings change, you'll still be Severus Snape."

She reached out and placed one of her hands over his heart. "I think, even with the cure, you'll still love her in here; it just might not be in exactly the same way. I think Lily will always be part of your life, but if we find a cure, you'll be able to remember the good parts of your time with her without the potion dredging up the bad."

Hermione bit her lower lip and took a step closer, opening her arms to hug Severus if he would allow it.

-~8~-

Even as he accepted and returned Hermione's embrace, Severus realized that she couldn't know how much and how long Lily Evans – Potter – had been the whole reason for his continued existence. The fire that had burned inside him to finally and completely destroy the monster who'd slain her had been fueled by that love. Harry Potter had been the vessel, and he'd been charged with keeping that vessel alive. Severus had done so to the best of his ability for as long as possible. Seeing James alive again, but not her, had been almost unbearable. The occasional glimpse of her green eyes in her son's face had made it slightly less painful.

Hermione's embrace, and her words of wisdom, settled some of the imbalances within his soul brought about by the paralyzing fear of losing the core of his being. The soft vanilla scent she still wore gave him the courage to give her a firm squeeze before loosening his hold. Now – now a pair of brown eyes gazed up at him, offering hope, comfort and friendship that he'd never hoped to find. Pulling back enough to meet those eyes, he murmured, "I'll not hold it against you either way, agreed?" with a trace of a small smile.

-~8~-

Hermione smiled back, "Agreed."

Reluctantly, she took a step back and ended the hug completely. "Tea, then we've got a dozen love struck mice to tend to before we can start working on creating the impossible."

-~8~-

Throughout their tea and the long, tedious hours spent in the lab, Hermione's words kept teasing the edge of Severus' thoughts. Always just barely out of reach, refusing to fully emerge from one of the back rooms in his mind, was the quote he knew he'd read or heard somewhere before.

The craving this created was extremely strong by the time they shared a light supper, but it was almost overpowering when their labors for the day had ended. Severus had the needed presence of mind to make arrangements with Hermione for the next session prior to seeing her off, and tend to the relatively small wants of his chicken, before ending his day as it had begun: hovering and reaching into the shelves of the bookcase in search of that small tidbit of information to fill the gnawing void. This voyage of discovery ended quite differently than the one at the beginning of the day.

'The difficult is that which can be done immediately; the impossible that which takes a little longer.'... George Santayana

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