Chapter Five: If Only

Disclaimer: see prologue.

Chapter reread by the wonderful somigliana.

Severus opened his eyes to a wondrous sight: a young, dishevelled woman was crying her eyes out on him, for him. She lifted her head and looked directly at him. Perhaps he was dead and had just been granted Paradise. He couldn't for the life – or death – of him remember anyone looking at him with such sorrow and relief before. What a strange combination.

"Severus, oh, Severus, you're not dead!" she gasped. "I thought you were hit by the Killing Curse!"

Severus thought it wise not to set her right; it'd raise too many questions.

"As you see, I'm very much alive, contrary to the Dark Lord, if I am to believe the racket in here."

Hermione hadn't realised that the Order had won, that Harry had beaten the monster. She'd been so thoroughly distracted by her personal epiphany about her feelings for the Death Eater lying underneath her, that she'd missed the signs of the obvious elation of the Order members.

Severus had experienced the same realisation. Like in an accelerated film, he'd recalled their meetings: the way she became accustomed to his sharp tongue (verbally only), the way she talked to him, smiled at him, laughed with him. They hadn't spent that much time together, but that time had been the fullest of his life; it was worth the whole lot of his thirty-eight years. He'd never felt such longing for anyone's company. If only Azkaban wasn't waiting for him...

They were pulled from their musings when a hand wrenched Hermione from him. The hand belonged to Arthur Weasley, who protectively shoved the young woman behind him and pointed his wand at Severus' chest.

"I won't let you use her as a hostage to save your despicable skin," he said in a grating voice.

"I have no intention to resist," Severus replied. "May I stand?"

Arthur narrowed his eyes but nodded. Severus stood up slowly, leaving his wand on the floor. In the blink of an eye, he was seized by no fewer than three Aurors. When she saw Severus being manhandled, Hermione seemed to come back to her senses.

"Don't hurt him! He helped us! It was he who gave us the location of one of Voldemort's Horcruxes –"

She was interrupted by an Auror saying, "And he's a murderer as well, Miss."

Severus warned her with a look not to interfere further. She understood that he wanted her to wait for his trial to speak up; there was no need for her to get into trouble beforehand.

The celebrations for the destruction of Voldemort were even more buoyant than those for his first downfall. Besides fireworks and parties all around the country, the public's attention was held by the trials of the caught Death Eaters that followed one another in a steady rhythm. At least one or two of them were condemned each week, usually to a death sentence; the Ministry was of the idea that it was better to eradicate evil from the midst of the wizarding society, and public opinion agreed.

The atmospheres of these trials were not unlike those at the end of the World War II in Europe, when those who'd merely been suspected of being collaborators to the Nazis had been attacked by the population. People wanted revenge, but for what wasn't always clear. Even those whose loyalty regularly wavered followed the dominant trend and demanded justice for whatever slight the Death Eaters had inflicted on them.

The last of the Death Eaters' hearings was the most anticipated one, too. Voldemort's right hand and most trusted advisor, Dumbledore's murderer, Severus Snape, who had terrorized half the wizarding world as a teacher, was to be judged tomorrow.

Severus Snape's hearing was public. Rufus Scrimgeour was facing elections soon, and he was looking forward to the free advertisement. And it was not as if the accused had ever been anything but unpopular.

Courtroom Ten was overcrowded two hours before the hearing was to start. Hermione was the only witness for the defence, as she'd found out that morning. Even Severus' counsel for the defence hadn't put much work – not to say heart – into this job. She felt like the decision had already been made outside of the courtroom and was waiting to be recorded in the Wizengamot's registers.

Harry and Ron had been incredulous when she'd told them everything that had happened since their adventure in the orphanage. They couldn't believe that Snape had helped them, but moreover, they couldn't overcome their hatred for the man. Well, Harry had seen him kill Dumbledore, that was undeniable, but they wouldn't have won so easily without his help – surely they would understand this? But no, they were persuaded that they'd have succeeded without his help, that it would only have taken more time. They refused to hear her about the spared lives that his help had allowed: if the war had lasted longer, more deaths would have occurred. Both the boys were now giving her the cold shoulder, and the Order had aped them when they discovered that she was to be a witness for the defence.

The Minister for Magic took his place on the front row, right in front of two seats destined for the accused and the witnesses. Percy Weasley and two other women Hermione had never seen before were sitting on either side of him. Then Severus entered, led by two sturdy Aurors. He was seated rather roughly on the left chair by them, and immediately, the chains on the arms on the chair slid around his body and fixed him tightly to the "piece of furniture".

Scrimgeour spoke and the crowd grew quiet at once.

"Severus Snape, you have been brought here in front of the Council of Magical Law to answer charges relating to your membership to a prescribed and illegal organisation known as the 'Death Eaters', and to have judgment passed on you for the heinous murder of Albus Dumbledore. Said murder was done with malice aforethought."

Severus had heard him and nodded, yet his attention was focused on Hermione, who was sitting on a bench on the side, clearly isolated from the others by a large gap around her. He fleetingly felt remorse at the idea that it probably was his fault that she was alone, but she was his ticket to freedom.

A sneer remained plastered on his face as he listened to the witnesses for the prosecution, and hatred flashed in his eyes when Harry Potter told how he'd seen him kill Albus Dumbledore, "He didn't flinch, or hesitate, or try something; he just went to Dumbledore and did the Avada Kedavra."

His counsel hardly cross-examined the witnesses. The only good that came out of those tedious hours of listening to Snape's bashing was that the accusation of committing Dumbledore's murder with malice aforethought had to be abandoned. It seemed that the third part of the Unbreakable Vow with Narcissa, in which he'd promised to carry out Draco's task if the latter should fail, hadn't come into public, and McGonagall's testimony proved that he hadn't known of the Death Eaters' attack on that fateful night.

The time had come for Hermione to take place on the right chair. Everyone was very curious to know why one of Harry Potter's best friends was testifying in favour of the hated man.

"Miss Granger, please tell us what you have to say in the defence of Severus Snape," Scrimgeour asked her.

"Well, when Harry, Ron and I went to the orphanage where Voldemort had hidden one of his Horcruxes ... I met him while Ron and Harry were in the cellar retrieving the Horcrux."

"You met him?"

Hermione blushed. "He Stupefied me, and woke me in the basement. He told me of his desire to quit the Death Eaters. He could only do so by defeating Voldemort, and we came to an agreement with each other. He'd help us to defeat his Master. In exchange, he'd tell us ...er ... me, what he knew about the Horcruxes."

A wizard on the second row, a bit on Scrimgeour's left, spoke up. "Did you believe him? That sounds like a wife's tale to me."

"I ... had reservations, but he told me that night that Helga Hufflepuff's cup was in Bellatrix Lestrange's custody. I took this as a good sign."

Hermione had to answer a myriad of questions about her meetings with Severus, the kind of relationship they had – she had to admit publicly she was still a virgin for some interrogators suspected her to have been his mistress while they had both been at Hogwarts – the information he gave her, how he helped with the Order's attack of Voldemort's mansion. None of it seemed to move the way the members of the Council of Magical Law considered Severus Snape's case; she could see that in their eyes.

Severus could see it as well. Perhaps his plan wasn't that well thought out. He should have chosen escape and gone into hiding. His mind grew grimmer and grimmer.

"He threw himself in the way of a curse Bellatrix Lestrange cast at me!" Hermione was desperate. His accusers' expression didn't even mellow with that statement.

"Do you have anything more to say, Miss Granger?" Scrimgeour asked.

"No, Minister."

Without another word, the Council's members began to whisper furiously between themselves; the whispering lasted for around a quarter of an hour. Hermione was fidgeting on her seat, Severus was impassive – though his insides were in turmoil, and the crowd was whispering. Silence fell on Courtroom Ten, like a blanket of snow on a landscape, as soon as Scrimgeour turned to the accused.

"Do the members of the Council of Magical Law think Severus Snape should benefit from the mitigating circumstances regarding the crimes he was accused of?"

No hand was raised.

"Do the members of the Council of Magical Law think that Severus Snape deserves a life sentence in Azkaban?"

All hands were raised.

"Severus Snape, you won't be executed due to your help of Mister Harry Potter through his friend Hermione Granger. However, your actions were considered heinous enough, and the Council is of the opinion you shouldn't be left free, in case you should commit such atrocious crimes again." He looked at Hermione. "Miss Granger, you have helped a known Death Eater, a sought man. Your intentions were good, but you should have denounced him to the Aurors. For this, you're charged with a fine of one hundred Galleons, and you'll have to work for the Minister for a period of one year for no salary."

Severus was crestfallen. The only person who could put up with him, the only person that he hoped he could build a future with, would now hate him for having made an outcast of her, and he was condemned to a life-sentence in Azkaban – he who couldn't die, thanks to the Horcrux that he'd made! He might as well change his name to Sisyphus.

A/N:

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, and the Trial of Severus Snape at the Accio conference in England in 2005 have been my inspiration for this chapter.

Sisyphus tricked Thanatos (death) to escape hell. The Gods punished him for his treachery by condemning him to roll a huge rock up a steep hill, but before he reached the top of the hill the rock always escaped him and he had to begin again. Full story at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sisyphus.