Hurt

A/N: This chapter contains a great deal of angst, includes a suicide attempt, and more flashbacks of what happened to Katherine and Snape in April of 2002. I have worked hard to not make it graphic, but it may be difficult to read.

***

Present time – August, 2007

Snape went to the Headmistress' fireplace to Floo himself back to Spinner's End. As he grasped his hand into the Floo Powder jar, his words came tumbling back to him.

"No one forces my hand."

It was like a knife in his heart.

He walked into the kitchen; it was empty. Severus went back towards his bedroom, but Katherine wasn't there. "Katherine!" he bellowed. He heard a groan from the bathroom and wasted no time dashing inside.

"Sweet Merlin!" he thundered. There was Katherine, naked on the floor with her wrists slashed. She was on her back covered in her own blood with her right leg swung over the bathtub. He took out his wand and closed the wounds and cleansed the blood from her body. She was unconscious. He started breathing hard. Flashes of the past crept upon him. A much younger Katherine laughing, and then blood all over the wild flowers she had picked.

He had heard her laughing as she worked, "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old Time is still a-flying. " He was laughing softly at her joy of communing with her precious flowers. Then he saw her smile turning into instant fear. His head jerked towards her gaze.

Then she was screaming, her head was turned to the side, her eyes shut tight as the tears squeezed through. Her blood was all over the rose petals, daises, lemongrass, and heather. Mercifully, she had finally passed out...probably from shock. And he was cowering on his knees, bloody, filthy, cut, and shaking against a tree, still recovering from the effects of the Cruciatus Curse, sobbing and broken as he retched onto the forest floor. Her screams, now mercifully silent, were still ringing in his ears...

He shook his head from the memories as he bound her wrists. After he finished, he glanced at her body. She wasn't little Katherine anymore. It was confusing. She had a woman's body. He had never thought of her as a woman before. He shook as a chill coursed through him. He berated himself for looking at her intimate areas. You are sick, foul, and lecherous! he screamed in his head. He took off his robes, wrapped her in it and then Flooed them to St. Mungo's. Damn Luddington! Damn them all!

***

The news of the annulment spread like wildfire across the gossips of the Wizarding world. She had been denounced as a whore. Her reputation was ruined. Snape blamed himself. He should have just killed the bastard, but Luddington's death would have only made Katherine's condition worse! He'd rather her know the truth of his vile nature then to continue a life believing her one true love had been stolen from her before they could reconcile. He had hoped against hope that Luddington might take her back once he learned that she had been violated. The time for all the lies to end was drawing close. This weighed heavily on him.

He tried talking to Katherine, but she was just beside herself. "Am I going crazy?" she asked him as she clung to him. "Why is this happening to me?" What did I do?" She begged over and over for someone to help her make sense of it all. Her parents and friends came one by one to see her. She had almost died. She had to take a great deal of Blood Replenishing Potion.

It was gut wrenching for Snape to see her in such anguish. Especially when, one by one, each person who claimed to love her told her they believed her, but Snape, who could spot a liar from a kilometer away, knew they all believed the worst about her. Day after day, he sat fuming in his chair in the corner, watching her life fall apart bit by bit.

After such terrible visits, he would sit next to her, stroke her light brown hair, and talk to her in soothing tones. He tried to use the same formality with her, as when she was a fifth year, but he couldn't. He couldn't be firm. The child, Katherine, was gone forever when he saw her naked on that floor. Everything was different now, and he did not know how to feel about it. She was a woman, and he didn't know how to deal with a woman. So, he just spoke to her gently and stroked her hair tenderly. Nothing much of consequence was said, just that he believed her, would always believe in her, and he would never leave her while she still needed him. It was during these times he noticed she would be able to truly sleep deeply. He would just keep stroking her hair or her arm. Once, he fell asleep in the chair next to her, holding her hand. Then one afternoon while she slept, she took a hold of his forearm and wrapped her arms around it like a security blanket. It was pure hell. He could feel the warmth and softness of her breasts against his hand, and he thought he was going to lose all control, strip down her gown and suckle on her breasts until she begged for him to take her. Stop it! Do not think of her like that! It's disgusting! he scolded himself.

The absolute worst day was when her parents came. Katherine had demanded to be examined by a Healer to prove her virginity earlier in the day. When the results showed that she was definitely not a virgin and that they had even found a small tear that had been healed a long time ago, Katherine went into complete shock. She sat in her bed and stared at her lap for a very long time. Finally, Severus tried to speak with her.

She turned to him with angry tears in her eyes and said, "It's like my fourth year all over again. Why? Why won't anyone tell me what has happened to me? I can't live like this, not knowing what has happened to me! Someone did something to me, and I can't even remember. Why me?"

She looked at her friend and mentor for answers. He wanted to tell her, but he could not find the courage to do it. She burst into hysterical sobbing and buried her weeping face into his neck as she grasped his frock coat into her hands. He wrapped his arms around her and held her until she fell silent. He leaned back and cupped his hand under her chin to look at her face and realized her silence was not a good one. Her eyes were glazed over. He laid her down on her bed. She was in complete shock. Snape sat by her side, his hands buried in his face. How could things get any worse? he thought. Well, they did.

She was still in shock when her parents had arrived. Mr. Hannover, a German who had attended Durmstrang, and her mother, Lucy Hannover, who had been Lucy Shepard when she and Snape had been students (and still a student when he had taught her at Hogwarts his very first year as a young teacher) were so angry about the annulment it overshadowed their concern for their daughter's physical and mental health.

He had sat scowling in the back corner while they railed at her for the disgrace she had brought on them. She had cried and stuck to her claim that she had been a virgin on her wedding night. Finally, just as Snape decided he would put a stop to their cruelty, Katherine lost it and started screaming at the top of her lungs. Snape threw Mr. Hannover out of the room by the seat of his pants and glared at his former student as she scurried after her husband. Snape bellowed for the medi-witch, and Katherine had to be sedated.

After Katherine had been given a Calming Draught and Sleeping Potion, he turned to her parents and unleashed his venom on them.

"How dare you speak to us like that!" Katherine's mother had screamed at him. "You seem to forget, I remember when you were just Snivellus! Why are you hovering over our daughter anyway? Were you the one who did this? We should call the Aurors!" she shrieked.

"Do not test me, madam," he softly threatened. "Obviously, I was the only one Katherine could turn to when her dear husband unceremoniously threw her out of her own house! I knew from the start that boy was nothing but a filthy social climber. He only wanted to use your daughter for her brilliant mind. But she loved him." He sneered. "She has loved him since she was thirteen! There was never anyone else for her. She has been completely devoted to him! Although why I shall never understand!"

He stopped talking and turned his face away, unable to look them; his rage was so great. He wanted to hex everyone in this damn place! How dare they judge the things they know nothing about?

He turned around and with a malicious leer said silkily, "Oh yes, and I recall you as well from dear old school days. Wasn't your nickname "Loosey Lucy?"

Mrs. Hannover clenched her jaw, her face burning red as she flared her nostrils in anger. He smiled evilly and then swept back into Katherine's room to sit by her side.

***

Two weeks later, once she was stable, she was able to really start talking about Luddington and the annulment. She sat with Snape and McGonagall, the only two people she felt believed her. She was depressed, and all her hopes of being a respected Potions mistress seemed to be over.

"Stuff and nonsense!" spat McGonagall. "We will continue as planned. I think though, Severus would be more than happy to stay on for another year, not as a teacher, but more as a mentor, to help you adjust. Won't you Severus?" she prodded.

"Certainly, Minerva," he replied softly.

"I don't know if am capable anymore," she murmured dumbly.

Severus grabbed her face and forced her to look at him. "I did not waste nine years of my life, pouring my time and knowledge into cultivating your talents and putting up with your insufferable nattering just for you to give up now!" he growled.

She looked at him with wild rage in her eyes and tore her face from his grip. "What does it all mean now? No one will respect me, and I'm ruined. RUINED! I'll never get married, no wizard will ever touch me now!" She broke down crying weakly, holding her arms protectively and rocking back and forth. It was far too much for Snape. He got up angrily and left.

He went back to Spinner's End and found the original robe she came to him in. He held it to his nose, inhaling her scent. It was beyond him how that moron could throw away such a lovely woman as Katherine! He would do anything than allow her life to be ruined because of one evil day years ago. The evil wasn't even his choice! It had been a simple decision. Will Katherine live or die? He had never allowed himself to see her past that age. I never thought of her as anything but a child, my protégé.

But the person he had seen naked and bleeding on his bathroom floor was a different Katherine. She was no child. She had become a beautiful woman. She had always been beautiful, but physically he had never taken noticed her. She was absolutely breathtaking! And now, the only man Katherine had ever loved was driving her...this beautiful, exquisite woman...mad! He closed his eyes and continued to inhale her scent. He had to stop this torture. He couldn't stop thinking about how lovely her breasts and hips were. Then how her leg hiked up on the bathtub gave him a perfect view...STOP! STOP! Yet I could change all of this, if I weren't such a coward! After all, I was the one...NOOOOO! he screamed in his head.

Don't think about it. Never think about it. If you think of it then it becomes true, and it never happened! It never really happened. See, she wore white on her wedding day! But why can't I get the sight of those bloodstained flowers out of my head?

"Please stop! You're hurting me!" cried the young girl.

Snape threw his glass into the fireplace and started destroying everything he could find. The silence over the years was eating him alive, and it was killing Katherine. It was finally time to tell the truth and face the fallout. And if she demanded satisfaction, he'd gladly go to Azkaban, or if she demanded marriage from him, it was the least he could do. He would marry her and comfort her as best as he could. After all, she had become such a dear friend to him, and he would never touch her in that way or require her to fulfill any marital rights. He was sure he could make her happy, or at least content with life. He would do anything for her. She deserved the very best that life could offer. Whatever she wanted, he would provide. It was finally settled. He had been silent all these years, and it was time for it to end.

***

The poem recited by Katherine in the forest was written by Robert Herrick, entitled, "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time."