Disclaimer: Harry Potter, Albus Dumbledore, Severus Snape, Minerva McGonagall, Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, Draco Malfoy, and all these other people are characters belonging to J.K. Rowling. I claim no rights to them, their surroundings, or their situations. Much to my sorrow.

--- 20 Snape: That You Will Never Learn

Severus was mightily confused. Add to that the fact that he deplored hospitals, had never been a morning person, and had just been obliged to drive off a powerful Death Eater using nothing more than his bare hands, and already this was shaping up to be a Very Bad Day.

He was also acutely aware that the young lady who'd just unexpectedly taken shelter in his embrace was a good bit more...developed...than he had previously noticed. In such close contact, it was impossible to ignore the tantalizing softness of her, separated from him only by a few layers of thin cloth...Now where the hell did that come from! Get a bloody grip, man, she's half your age! This is no time for a mid-life crisis!

"It was Malfoy--Lucius Malfoy," he snapped at the belated rescuers as they crowded anxiously around, barraging him with predictably inane questions. A massive shudder ran through Hermione at the name, and he instinctively drew her a bit closer, filing away this strangely protective impulse as something to be investigated later. Maybe.

"Lucius Malfoy you say?" one jowly, ruddy-faced Healer exclaimed. "Why, but isn't he--"

Snape cut him off impatiently. "Yes, yes, I know he's supposed to be in Azkaban, but clearly someone forgot to remind him!" He glared at the speaker, daring him to protest further. The man dithered on a bit but retreated, glancing helplessly at the Aurors to either side.

"Well don't just stand there, you lot! If there's one Death Eater on the premises, there are very likely others! Go and look for them!" Unless he came here on personal business, Snape amended privately, but he wasn't about to say it aloud and endure the questions that would inevitably be forthcoming.

Most of the Aurors had already filed out, and all but two now followed; one took up a watchful position near the door while the other examined the wreckage scattered about the room, never straying very far from himself and the girl. How very comforting, he thought venomously, now that the bastard's already been and gone. I'm sure if we'd been killed they would have gone to great lengths to ensure that nothing happened to our corpses. Of course it was quite impossible to provide personal guards to every patient in the place, there just weren't that many Aurors available, but Severus was in no mood to be reasonable.

Hermione's weeping had subsided, but she still trembled as though in the grip of some pernicious ague. "Come on, help me get her up...she's suffered the Cruciatus and I don't know what else." Also, if she hasn't already caught on to the effect her proximity is having on me, she will any moment now!

Several willing pairs of Healer hands reached out to help lift the girl gently onto the bed. He found he was curiously reluctant to let her go, but contented himself with hovering nearby, scowling impatiently as the mediwizards conducted a cursory examination and administered a calming draught.

"I'm all right...really...just a few bruises. I'm so sorry to have made such a fuss," she was protesting, blushing rather fetchingly.

"Nonsense, child," one of the mediwizards murmured, probing gently at her shoulder. "The Cruciatus curse is classified an Unforgivable for very good reason. You're dealing with it remarkably well, I'd say."

"I've heard grown men squall like infants after an assault like that," Severus remarked. He intercepted the empty potion vial by force of habit and sniffed at it cautiously. Astragalus membranaceus, Echinacea purpurea, powdered moonstone...not the precise formulation he would have chosen, but adequate.

"Has anyone seen my wand?" Hermione asked. "I think I dropped it..." Still analyzing the scent of the potion, Snape glanced around the floor, spotted the item in question, and bent to retrieve it.

It was at this point that the extremely inadequate coverage provided by the open-backed hospital garment made itself apparent...to all present, judging by the chorus of delicate coughs and throat-clearings at his...back.

Somewhere, he could almost believe he heard the ghost of James Potter having a jolly good laugh at his expense...

Look on the bright side, Severus old boy, he thought resignedly as he straightened up, turned, and gravely handed the girl her wand, you've just guaranteed your name will be legend in the House of Gryffindor unto the fiftieth generation, at least. Hermione's eyes were as big around as saucers and her face burned bright as the sun, for the brief glimpse he got before she ducked her head and mumbled an abashed thank-you.

"Yes, about that," he said, crossing his arms with what dignity he could, and carrying on as though nothing had just happened, "would someone be so good as to inform me where I might find my own wand?"

"Th-the drawer in the nightstand." A likewise red-faced female Healer pointed.

Hermione looked up suddenly, her embarrassment pre-empted by surprise as he opened the drawer, reclaimed his property and examined it for signs of damage. "Wait...Professor, without a wand, how did you...?"

He smiled sourly. "Contrary to popular belief, Miss Granger, it is possible for any wizard to cast a spell without the use of a wand...in the same sense that it is possible for any novelist to write a literary masterpiece on the side of a barn, using only his own fingers and a goodly supply of pig excrement." He noted with satisfaction that his voice was settling back into its usual smooth cadence. "Far more difficult and highly imprecise, with less than quality results, but it can be done in a pinch."

She blinked at him in awe, as did a couple of the Healers. Well, score one for his deeply wounded pride. Picking up a fold of the odious garment--cornflower blue stripes; was there no justice at all in this world?--he transfigured it into a proper black suit-and-robes ensemble without further delay.

"Ah...can I take this to mean you'll be checking yourself out, then, sir?" one of the Healers asked timidly. His colleagues were drifting out of the room one by one, returning to their usual duties now that all the excitement was over.

"Indeed you may, and please, let's dispense with the verbal portion of the disclaimer." He adjusted his cuffs slightly, and put on his best Potions Master face to facilitate things a bit, frowning down his nose at the unfortunate fellow. "I will be only too happy to sign whatever waivers are necessary to protect this institution from the wrath of my duly appointed legal representative, should I keel over dead in the street due to a premature discharge."

Yes, he was definitely feeling more himself. The Healer nodded slowly, glancing nervously behind him as though in search of his vanished associates. "Ah...very well, certainly, I-I'll just go and have the paperwork drawn up then, shall I?"

"That will be acceptable." He seated himself in one of the room's wing-back chairs, knowing how slowly the wheels of hospital beaurocracy turned. "As for my companion, I believe she's not been formally admitted? Therefore no documentation should be necessary to obtain her immediate release."

"I, well, no, I don't suppose so...though I'd strongly recommend a day or so for observation after such a nasty incident..." the mediwizard offered weakly.

Snape glanced at Hermione, eyebrows raised in inquiry, and she shook her head mutely. As he'd expected, she was as eager to be away from this place as he, after her traumatic experience.

"Miss Granger is my student. I'll see to it that our resident Healer keeps an eye on her when we've returned..." He trailed off suddenly, remembering with a pang that they wouldn't be going back to Hogwarts. "...when we've returned home."

Luckily, the mediwizard was in too great a hurry to get the hell out of the room to notice his stumble. "Splendid, I'll see you shortly then!" And he made his escape with all the graceless alacrity of a terrified first-year Hufflepuff.

"I can scarcely contain my enthusiasm," Severus said drily to the empty doorway, piling on the sarcasm just because he could, and was unexpectedly rewarded by a faint giggle from the direction of the bed.

He turned to have a good look at Hermione, taking in for the first time just how thoroughly disheveled she was. Red eyes and tousled hair were only to be expected after a life-or-death struggle with the likes of Malfoy, but what was that greyish-white substance speckling her hair and robes? Not ash from the fire, surely? "Something amuses you, Miss Granger?"

"That sounds more like the Professor Snape I've known for six years." She smiled tremulously.

A reflexively snarky reply died on his lips. More than what? Just how long had he been here, and what sort of nonsense might he have let slip while drifting in some altered state of consciousness? Come to that, why on earth was the Gryffindor girl here at all?

Only a few elusive wisps of memory remained to suggest that his dreams had been unpleasant indeed. That, and an inexplicable sense of loss upon awakening, before Hermione's agonised shriek had snapped him back to full awareness and compelled him to act.

Terrible noise, that...no one who hadn't witnessed the employing of the Cruciatus firsthand really knew what nightmarish sounds the human throat was capable of producing...

"Professor?"

He realised he'd been staring off into the empty air, and the girl was watching him with a concerned expression. An unaccustomed warmth suffused his body. The last time a young woman had looked at him that way...Oh hells, this is not good. Put an end to it now, you fool. You know very well where this sort of thing has to lead.

"Don't presume too much, Miss Granger. You can be acquainted with someone a lifetime and never really come to know them," he snapped, and was a little taken aback at the ferocity of his own tone.

But instead of recoiling as he'd expected, she nodded thoughtfully, not in the least put off. In fact, a hint of a smile worked its way onto her face. "Then again, it's possible to make an educated guess on just a few short years' acquaintance," she retorted. "For example, I'm fairly sure that when you explained about casting spells without wands just now, Professor, you deliberately left out the part about undesirable side effects."

He quickly folded his arms, trying to formulate a suitably indignant reply, or even muster a glare sufficient to cut short her impertinent prattle. Unfortunately the prattle was dead-on accurate, and he couldn't help but be impressed (if a trifle dismayed) at how quickly she'd managed to gather her wits.

Hermione continued ruthlessly, "I'd also postulate that you omitted that information, so as to avoid calling attention to the fact that the spell you cast against Malfoy also caused some fairly severe blistering to your own hands."

Defeated, he rolled his eyes and reluctantly uncrossed his arms, spreading his hands out to display the first- and second-degree burns that arced across parts of his palms and ran down the insides of most of his fingers. "Congratulations, Miss Granger, I am undone by your keen powers of observation. It's a pity you so seldom see fit to utilise them in my class," he felt compelled to add, mostly out of habit.

If she even heard the gibe, she didn't rise to it. She'd sat up and scooted to the edge of the bed, and brought her face to within a few inches of his right hand, studying the damage intently. He squelched a reflexive urge to snatch it away, curious as to what further conclusions she would draw from her observations.

This peculiar situation afforded him an excellent view of the young Gryffindor's pretty brown eyes. The delicate surrounding tissue was laced with red and purple splotches, where blood vessels had burst under the strain of the Cruciatus curse; the eyes themselves, though likewise bloodshot and red-rimmed with weeping, were now alight with a voracious hunger for knowledge, the same look he'd seen so many times in Potions class. That passion for knowledge marked her as one of the most promising, and at the same time most damnably annoying students to have passed through his classroom in a good many years.

Having that intensity directed at him personally, even just at the one hand, was...disquieting, to put it delicately. He was grimly amused to find himself starting to fidget under her scrutiny.

Then she lifted her own hand, and with the tip of one finger, very lightly traced an arc along the skin of his palm, just underneath one of the burns. Oh, heaven and hells, why'd she have to go and do that!...

"You grabbed hold of him and cast a fire-curse, didn't you?" she murmured, completely oblivious (he hoped) to the reaction her touch had just provoked. "You focused the spell through your own body instead of a wand...and contact would be necessary in order to direct the energy properly without one. But that meant you were subject to the effect, as well."

"Oh, very good," he said softly without thinking, and knew at once that he'd erred. Unaccustomed to any sort of praise from him at all, Hermione forgot all about obscure magical theory and looked up into his eyes, flabbergasted. She appeared so very pleased that he was mortified to find himself blushing slightly, and at the same time fighting down a powerful impulse to find something else nice to say about her.

"...considering that you've just been introduced to the concept," he added instead with a slight shrug, dropping his hand and tucking them both into his sleeves, trying to pass over the moment as insignificant. He had a distinct impression that she wasn't buying it, but couldn't think what else to do. Except perhaps to change the subject. "So. Just how long have I been incarcerated in this abominable place?"

"Less than twenty-four hours." She paused a moment. "So are you going to let someone take care of those burns?"

"They'll heal without any special attention," he said dismissively. In point of fact, the damage was fairly severe in places, and stung horribly, but he'd live with it. Nothing short of decapitation was going to keep him in this place a millisecond longer than was absolutely necessary.

"You'll spend the next few days leaving bits of skin sticking to everything you touch, you know."

He blinked at her almost stupidly, taken aback at such straightforward bluntness, then narrowed his eyes. "If I feel it necessary, I'll pay a visit to Madame Pomfrey when we get back to the Safe House--not that it's any concern of yours, Miss Granger. And since we're on the subject, what exactly are you doing here?"

He'd been puzzling over that right along, and still couldn't imagine why she would have any reason to be present. Unless of course it was all some ill-conceived notion of Minerva's...as though he wasn't perfectly capable of getting through a hospital stay by himself.

Well, but apparently you aren't, are you? If Malfoy had shown up and she had not been here..."Drew the short straw, did you?" he continued obstinately, informing that impudent little inner voice that it could bloody well go hang.

Hermione's position on the bed versus his in the chair put her eye level substantially above his, and he was now subject to the unique experience of a student looking down her nose at him. "Actually, no," she said coolly, "it seems I was the only person willing to draw. If my being here offends you, then I'm sure the next time they haul you off half-dead I won't bother."

It was fortunate that at that moment the young Auror examining the debris picked up what looked like a medical instrument of some sort and gave a low whistle. "Criminey. I've only ever seen one of these in a textbook."

"What is it?" Hermione turned to look at it. "Oh. Yes, Malfoy conjured that. I thought it rather nasty-looking. There should be some others on the floor here somewhere."

The second Auror came over and began searching the floor. Severus got up and walked around the bed to have a look at the thing as the first one said seriously, "You were right. It's an instrument of torture. Highly illegal, of course--even knowing how to make one can land a person in Azkaban."

Severus frowned at the sharply pointed and edged metallic device. He didn't remember seeing anything like it during his time among the Death Eaters. "I can imagine it would be effective, but what's the point when they've already got the Cruciatus? No amount of cutting or stabbing would be worse."

The Auror turned the instrument over in his hand, regarding it with deep distaste. "The Cruciatus is remarkably useful if all you want to do is torment your captive, break him, or drive him insane, and do it quickly. But it's rather crude, far too powerful if you're going for more subtle effects. Same thing with the Imperius. You can force someone to do almost anything, but if it's against their will or their nature, they're going to fight you. Eventually, if they're strong enough, they'll break free.

"This thing is designed for the true connoisseur--a tool to reprogram someone so completely, over time, that they no longer have any will except what's given to them. Or to extract a particular bit of information, while leaving the mind and body more or less intact. There are special binding and coercion spells that go with it--also classed as Unforgivables, technically, though they're nowhere near as well-known as the Big Three because they're so esoteric. Some sick bastard even invented a runic script, just for use with one of these."

He turned the instrument to show several small openings in its surface. "See, after it's been attuned to the victim's aura, the reservoirs can be filled with almost anything you want--a poison, a potion, a Muggle drug, even ink...or a combination. The instrument has to be set so that the liquid flows toward whichever surface is to be used." He manipulated the thing's clever sliding mechanism, showing how one could choose a pointed or barbed projection, or a straight or curved cutting edge. "And then--well. I'm sure you can imagine the sorts of nastiness a creative magus could come up with, given time to work on it."

Severus could indeed. He understood now why Voldemort had never introduced such things to the Death Eaters; the Dark Lord was many things, but subtle generally wasn't one of them. Though cunning, and capable of great patience when necessary, he preferred his torture straightforward, immediate, and overwhelming, with tangible results. Instant gratification.

But Lucius Malfoy was another story. Staring at the instrument--perhaps it had a name, but he did not especially want to know--he could picture only too well the ingenious uses that devious mind might make of such a tool.

And would have--had planned to. On him.

"So that's what they're teaching you about in Auror school these days," he said, intending to speak in a normal tone. It came out in more of a shaky whisper. He couldn't seem to take his eyes off the wicked, gleaming thing. It had a sort of diabolical elegance about it; its deranged creator had built it not only for utility but for aesthetic appeal as well. Yes, exactly the sort of thing that Malfoy might appreciate...

But then his line of sight was broken, and his horrified reverie with it, as Hermione stepped between him and the Auror. "Take that thing away," she said sharply over her shoulder, and smiled up at him. "Your paperwork's here, Professor."

He looked around and saw the pudgy little Mediwizard near the door, clutching a manila folder and smiling anxiously.

"So it is." He hesitated a second, caught between the knowledge of what she had spared him, and powerful opposing compulsions to be near her, keep her talking, and to get away from her--to get back in control of the situation.

When had that perfectly unremarkable voice become so fascinating? He hadn't felt this off-balance since his school days. It was highly disturbing...

Disturbing, hell. It's terrifying, that's what it is, and you don't have a clue how to deal with it. Say something to the girl, for Merlin's sake, even if it's wrong!

"Thank you, Miss Granger." He turned away to deal with the forms, but not before he'd seen her eyes light up.

She's not afraid of you anymore, that infuriating little voice taunted him as he grabbed the folder away from the quaking Healer (who thoughtfully handed over a quill before he could demand one) and signed the stack of release forms, his signature progressively less legible with each sheet.

Shut up, he told it fiercely. It's this damned hospital, it's throwing me off stride, that's all. Once we're back with the others there'll be much bigger things to worry about, and things will be...manageable, if not precisely back to normal.

Liar, it sneered, and he groaned inwardly as he realised just how badly he was likely to lose this argument.

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