Severus Snape pushed the door to the unremarkable entrance of St Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries with a sigh. With tightly set features he made his way across the reception Hall that was at once a waiting room and an Emergency Ward. He walked fast. Snape hated the smells of disease and the sounds of suffering in the Hall. At this hour of the day, close to midnight, it was relatively calm, however.

Snape made his way to the fifth floor and descended the corridor with heavy steps. He nodded to a couple of medi-witches who recognised him. He had lost track of the number of times he had come to this desolate ward for Permanent Curse Damage. It was an unusual hour for visiting, but it suited him because it allowed him some solitude. 

Not that he met with much people at any hour of the day anymore. Snape’s social life had been greatly reduced when he resigned his post as headmaster after the war and declined to return to his previous post as Potions master at Hogwarts. Nowadays he confined himself to a private laboratory where he produced complex potions for the leading magical apothecaries. Snape’s thin lips formed into a grimace when he realised that his company these days consisted mostly of a moribund young wizard who did not speak and who rarely gave eye contact.

Snape stepped into the chamber where there was only one bed at the centre of the room with an armchair standing beside it. Conveniently, these late hours of the evening,when Snape often visited, were Draco’s best, when he appeared the most lucid. That merely meant that his pale, grey eyes were open and riveted far away.  Draco could move his right hand as well, but seldom did. He sometimes used to nip the blanket spread over his chest between his thumb and index finger and rub it slowly. That was all. The first time Snape had seen that small movement, he had tried to bring other kind of tissues with different textures, even animal furs, and gently eased them between Draco’s fingers, in order to provoke more response from the cursed wizard, but to no effect. Draco just did that small gesture from time to time, automatically. Snape could no longer pretend that it meant anything.

When Snape arrived, he followed the same routine as always when entering that room. He stepped up to Draco, looked down at the expressionless face of the young man, spoke his name, put his own hand over Draco’s for a short while, then sat down in the armchair. He picked up the case parchment that was deposited on a small nightstand and read the latest notations. Snape sighed again. He could not remember how many healers he had shouted at, how many medi-witches he had sent out crying from Draco’s room, in the first few months of Draco’s admittance to the ward. The avoiding answers and the foggy prognostications had been infuriating. The free access to the Draco’s medical records was a result of a deal with one of the most comprehensive and unsentimental healers who had understood that Snape wanted no comforting lies but needed the undisguised truth. Which was that Draco Malfoy was slowly dying.

The memory was still vivid in his mind, of the curse that shot out from Voldemort’s wand and hit Lucius and Draco Malfoy. A killing curse where the impact was shared between the two. Lucius, being older, had not withstood the destroying magic of the curse. Draco, young and resilient, had still appeared lifeless when Snape had arrived at Narcissa’s side and bent over the body. Only in the corner of his eye did Snape notice that Voldemort fell… Voldemort fell! He had lifted his eyes from Draco to Harry for just a second. Harry still had his wand raised. Shock, and disgust over what had just happened stood written in his face, translating into an impression of guilt and despair. How on earth could the boy feel guilty over killing that monument of evilness? Snape remembered thinking, before turning his attention back to Draco. 

Both he and Narcissa had tried to Renervate Draco. It appeared desperate, as if no magic was left in Draco’s body to respond to their efforts. Suddenly Snape had felt Harry’s presence at his side. The conquerer of Voldemort carried two wands, one in each hand. Snape recognised Dumbledore’s wand, the one Voldemort had stolen and tried to use. The Elder wand, Harry had called it. The ornate piece of wood seemed to glow in Harry’s hand. He lifted it. ”Renervate!” he said and Draco had finally responded with that resuscitation flash you needed to obtain in order to keep someone alive. Narcissa had let out a small cry of relief and sank down on her knees next to her son.

Snape sat unmoving by Draco’s side in the hospital room with his eyes riveted far away as he recalled the events of nearly a year ago. He sighed again and rose heavily. He was not at his best, himself. Such constant lassitude. During the stressful months as headmaster, under Voldemort’s orders, the pressure had been severe, but he had at least been alert and fit. After the battle, on the other hand, he felt like he had aged at least twenty years. It was not so much his body as his mind. Snape had concluded that he paid the price for the prolonged self-inflicted mental hardships in the form of Occlumency during his service as a spy. But he knew it was not only that. Harry Potter… Snape closed his eyes for a short while. No, he did not want to think about Harry Potter. He had better give the case parchment back to the medi-witches and then come back and do some quiet reading at Draco’s side before he left for the night. 

The medi-witches had nothing to add about Draco’s condition. Back outside Draco’s room, Snape arrested his hand that was about to grip the handle of the door. Waves and crackles of magic emanated from the room. Snape inhaled sharply. What if Draco had suddenly…? Snape threw the door wide open without further thought and was met by the sight of a well-known, slim silhouette standing by the side of Draco’s bed. Strangely, Draco had his eyes riveted straight at the visitor as if he really could see him, although his mouth was as slack and his face as expression-less as always. 

The face of the dark haired wizard was all the more expressive and it’s dominating emotion was desolation. His lips were slightly parted and he might just have said: ”I’m sorry”. A tanned hand rested on Draco’s shoulder. Snape exhaled in one short, shocked, forced, breath. Conflicting emotions soared through him. The dark head snapped up.

”Potter!” said Snape. 

The green eyes stared at him. Harry Potter no longer wore glasses and his gaze was more striking than ever. His black, unruly hair was longer than he had kept it before. He was as thin as he had always been, wearing discoloured, worn Muggle clothes. Snape could perceive a paleness under the tan, which made a sickly impression and on Harry’s left cheek there was a crusted wound that did not look fresh, but still appeared inflamed. At Snape’s exclamation a flicker of pain reached the green eyes. Before Snape had time to open his mouth to speak again, Harry Potter disappeared from sight. 

”Stay! Potter!” commanded Snape hoarsely.

He took a few quick steps forward as if to try to catch the man hidden under the invisibility cloak, but before he reached the spot where Harry had been standing, Snape heard the crack of Apparition and he could feel the withdrawal of magical energy from the room. Snape swore to himself and rushed to the window. 

Sure enough, in the lane beneath the body of the Hospital wing, a figure appeared and started to move away with hurried steps. Harry Potter did not glance back up at the window where Snape’s silhouette was clearly depicted against the light in the room behind him.