Iecur Fortis

Disclaimer: She wrote it (yay!). She owns it (super!). I play with it for fun and no-profit (neat!).

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December 1996

He was trapped in lightless, biting cold. So cold. And there was something else... pain. The pain rippled outwards from a deep place; a place that shouldn't feel anything at all, but should be going about its metabolic business in darkness and quiet. For a while...minutes? hours?...the cold and the pain were all he knew, twin agonies that beggared all other sensations and obliterated thought.

He passed out.

When consciousness returned the pain was still there. And it was joined by a different pain, this one on the surface, a sharp stinging slanting from his temple across his cheek and over his mouth, which tasted of bile and blood. A sort of dull heaviness weighed down his limbs and his head. Was this cold? No, numbness. It was worse in his legs, or where his legs should be. He couldn't feel them, really, at all. His hands and arms were like blocks of waterlogged, frozen wood. One hand wrapped around something slender. His wand?

He opened his eyes. Grey light...blinding for a moment until his eyes adjusted. Low clouds; dark trees. Hills. Lake. Hogwarts. Home. He passed out again.

And awoke.

Now the pain was muted. And the cold... or was he warm now? Hard to tell...his body didn't seem to have any shape to it. I'm losing my body. Maybe this will not be such a bad way to die... With that thought his eyelids flew open, as a racking surge of adrenaline knit him back together all at once. No. Hell, no. Not like this, you FUCKING bastard. He fixed his mind on the necessary memory, flung his wand hand up, and opened his lips to roar, brokenly, 'Expecto Patronum!'

The silver doe burst from his wand tip and sped away, melting through the school gates not thirty yards from where Severus lay on the lake shore, legs in the frigid water, head pillowed on a patch of frozen mud.

He passed out.

* * *

'What news, Poppy?' Albus asked, closing the door quietly behind him and casting a privacy spell over the room. It was a standard precaution...there were no other patients in the hospital wing.

The healer stood up from her seat at Severus's bedside and circled around it to stand beside the Headmaster. 'He hasn't surfaced yet, but he is resting now and I believe he's out of immediate danger,' she said quietly.

'I have treated the frostbite and the bruising, neither of which had a magical cause. They're healing well. The cut on his face is from a hex, but it's superficial and was not complicated to treat. I cast an overall analgesic charm, of course. But the broken leg will have to wait until he's stronger and until we can determine the extent and nature of the internal spell damage...I don't want any adverse effects from the Skele-gro.'

Poppy swept her glance over her patient before she continued. 'The spell damage appears to be mostly around the liver. I'm monitoring it constantly, and the force of the curse doesn't appear to be either growing or diminishing. If it were growing, I'd have to advise an immediate transfer to St Mungo's, risky as that would be. As it is, I'd like to wait a while for him to wake up and tell us what he knows about the type of spell and how it was cast.'

'Thank you, Poppy,' said Albus gravely. 'Your approach is a sound one, I believe.' He stepped closer to the bed and gazed down at the still form of his colleague. Severus was dressed in loose hospital robes and tucked under several blankets...his torn, filthy clothing was nowhere to be seen.

A livid gash extended from his left temple right across his mouth and down to his jaw...it already looked much better than it had when Hagrid had borne him, limp and bloodied, into the castle an hour before. His skin had a distinctly yellowish cast...the sign of a blighted liver. His closed eyelids were purple and looked bruised, and his lips were very pale.

Yet for all Severus's battered appearance, Albus reflected, he had never seen the younger man look so peaceful. Perhaps no one had, at least not since Severus was a boy. The Headmaster sighed heavily. Severus was a strong-willed man and a powerful wizard. He would never willingly let anyone glimpse his human vulnerability. That made it easy to forget that he was vulnerable, and entirely human. Do I let myself forget it too often? wondered Albus. I think perhaps I do.

A quick double knock sounded on the closed door, and a high, panicked voice gasped, 'Madam Pomfrey? Are you there?'

Poppy turned and opened the door a little, standing in the opening to block it. 'Yes, Miss Granger? Are you ill or injured?'

'No, I... I'm not. I'm sorry, is Professor Snape here? Professor Hagrid told me and I came as fast as I could... ' Hermione gulped, only dimly aware of how absurd the words might sound. She had sprinted from Hagrid's hut to the castle and up to the hospital wing, leaving an astonished Ron and Harry still standing at the door of the hut.

Hagrid's distraught expression was burned on her retinas, and his words kept echoing in her ears: 'Ha' dead at least, poor bloke. Beat up summat terrible. Dunno how he managed a Patronus in that state, soaked and bleedin' and froze nearly solid... '

She tried again. 'Please, is he okay? What happened?' She was awash in dread.

The Headmaster appeared behind Madam Pomfrey. 'Miss Granger. Professor Snape is in here. You may come in for a moment, but do keep your voice down. He has been injured, and he is sleeping.'

Poppy looked up at the Headmaster with astonishment. 'Professor Dumbledore, I'm not sure...'

'... that it's wise?' He finished her sentence. 'I think Miss Granger can be trusted to look in on the patient without disturbing him.' Albus opened the door wider and beckoned Hermione to pass through. 'Would you give us a few moments, please, Poppy?'

Madam Pomfrey's eyebrows drew together in disapproval. 'I need to get a few things from the dispensary. I'll be back shortly.' She swept past Hermione, leaving the door ajar.

Hermione stepped into the dim room and halted a yard or so from the bed, her eyes fixed on Snape's waxen face. He looks so ill. 'Please, Professor Dumbledore,' she murmured, turning to the Headmaster. 'What happened?'

'We don't know just yet, Miss Granger. As Professor Hagrid may have told you, he found Professor Snape outside the school gates about an hour and a half ago. Professor Snape had sent a Patronus to Hagrid's hut, but he was unconscious by the time Hagrid reached him. Madam Pomfrey has stabilised him, and is confident that he will wake up soon and be able to advise us about the nature and origin of his internal injuries.'

It took a moment for Hermione to realise what the Headmaster was implying. 'Spell damage?' she breathed, horrified. 'Who... how... why?' Her mind was racing, and she gasped. 'Was it...He Who Must Not Be Named? Or a Death Eater?' It was hard for her to imagine that anyone but a very powerful wizard or witch could have reduced Professor Snape to this state.

'As I said, Miss Granger, we don't yet know. But I believe that's likely. Severus had some... business... with Tom this afternoon.'

Hermione blinked at the Headmaster's use of Professor Snape and Lord Voldemort's first names. She had at least a dozen questions. She bit back all but one.

'Has he been discovered?' she whispered.

Albus stepped close to the head of the bed. He gazed down at Severus in silence for a moment, then said, 'I think not. If Voldemort had divined his true loyalties at last, he would not be lying here in hospital. He would never have been returned to us alive.'

Hermione blanched, and her stomach knotted. No one had ever spoken to her so plainly about the extreme danger of Professor Snape's position. And she had never before been confronted with the evidence of that danger. Contemplating his drawn profile and listening to the papery rasp of his breathing, her vision began to blur with unshed tears.

'How can he go on doing it?' she wondered aloud.

Dumbledore turned his head and caught her gaze. 'Professor Snape is an extraordinarily brave and skilful wizard, Miss Granger. We are fortunate to have him on our side.'

'And he is... on our side... isn't he?' she faltered, needing the Headmaster to confirm it.

Dumbledore's eyes held hers in silence for a moment or two. Then he sighed. 'Dark days are coming, Miss Granger. This...' he gestured towards the bed, 'is only a taste of what Lord Voldemort is capable of. Shocking as it is to us, he would do this, and worse, to one he regards as his own, and he would do it with little or no provocation.'

He paused. 'Most of us will see, and some of us will do, things that will horrify us and break our hearts. But come what may, you must never doubt Severus Snape's loyalty. I never shall.' He turned his gaze back to Severus, and reached out a hand to caress the crown of his head.

The grimness of the Headmaster's words...or perhaps the tenderness of his gesture...made Hermione swallow hard to keep her tears back. It was no use; they spilled out.

Severus stirred and groaned faintly under Albus's touch, and the Headmaster pulled back his hand. 'Ah,' he murmured, staring intently at Severus. He turned to Hermione. 'Miss Granger, would you be so kind as to fetch Madam Pomfrey? I believe our sleeper awakens.'

'Yes, sir, of course.' Hermione spun on her heel and hurried from the room.

Poppy was in the dispensary, and with her were Harry and Ron. Hardly sparing a glance for her friends, Hermione spoke to the healer, her words tumbling out. 'Madam Pomfrey, Professor Snape is waking up. Professor Dumbledore asked me to fetch you.'

'Thank you, Miss Granger.' Poppy said, seizing a narrow wooden box from the counter. 'Mr Potter and Mr Weasley just arrived. If you wish, you may stay in the hospital wing and wait for news, but no more visits to the patient for the time being.' She stepped into the corridor and was gone.

Hermione turned her tear-streaked face to her friends, who were looking at her in confusion. She wailed and threw herself into Harry's arms, burying her face in his shoulder. Shocked and embarrassed, he put his arms around her and stroked her back rather awkwardly, staring wide-eyed at Ron over her head.

'Mione, what is going on?' demanded Ron.

Hermione only sobbed and burrowed her face deeper into the front of Harry's robes.

After a moment, Ron shrugged and reached into his pocket. 'Well then at least take this,' he mumbled, pressing a handkerchief into her hand. He patted her on the shoulder and sat down to wait out the storm.

* * *

Swimming up out of nothingness, Severus heard quiet voices. It was red behind his eyelids. The pain was there...a small dark star, swaddled somehow and secreted deep in his body. He smelled hospital smells...bitter disinfectant herbs and starched linen. And something sweet and clean. Lemon verbena.

A large warm... hand?... was touching his head. He shifted, and the movement sent muted pain messages along nerves in his leg and under his ribcage. He groaned. The hand disappeared, the voices sounded again, and a door opened and closed.

He opened his eyes a little, just enough to confirm... he was in the hospital wing. He was safe.

He closed his eyes again and allowed the memories to come.

Voldemort's summons came towards the end of his fifth-year morning lesson. He dismissed the class early, then hurried to pack his kit of restorative potions and arrange for Dumbledore to take his afternoon lessons, the pain roaring like wildfire in his arm all the while.

'Not... good... enough... Severus,' rasped Voldemort, his wand still sparking. 'It did not... last... any longer... than before... and now... it feels... like this. Prometheo!' The second spell arrowed into Severus's torso and blossomed into a web of nauseating pain.

So it was that Bellatrix Lestrange appeared outside the Hogwarts gates on a December afternoon, clutching the arm of a bleeding Severus Snape. 'Rot here,' she snarled, and jammed his wand into his hand. Loosening her grip on him, she aimed a last vicious kick at his shin. Something cracked. He collapsed and rolled down the embankment, managing to stop himself only when he was half submerged in lake water. He passed out.

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A/N: Iecur Fortis means 'strong liver.' It is my made-up potion. I'm guessing it tastes nasty. :)

So, I know the last couple of chapters were pretty light and fluffy, and this one's pretty dark. And I think I've been saying this in answers to reviews, but it seems like a good time to say it here: this is an angsty fic. There will be more UST as we go along, and also plenty of heartache (and a few laughs, sure), because I'm trying to be canon compliant for HBP, wherein some really horrible stuff happens. Nor are HG and SS going to jump each other anytime soon, for a lot of reasons. (Sorry!) I plan to get them somewhere good, but it's going to take a while to get it right. So... keep reading if it stays fun for you!

Thanks and love to lifeasanamazon and greenstuff, who are like those neighbours who bring over the extra cookies they baked...i.e., a dream to have around.