“Wow, Hermione, why didn’t you do that ages ago!” The voice was loud and annoying, and everything was much too bright.
“Because there wasn’t a reason to, before. A good reason, not Malfoy calling me names.” A hand touched Severus’ feathers.
“Come on, it was just a stunner, he’d do worse to you. The look on his face when you got his owl –“
“He’s not dead, but I don’t think Hagrid can fix that. We’ll have to take him to Madam Pomfrey.”
Severus had never been so glad to hear Granger’s voice. It wasn’t really that unpleasant a voice, he decided. Perhaps she wasn’t all that bad.
“Although it might be kinder to, um, put him out of his misery ...”
Or perhaps she was ten times worse.
“No! We have to try!“
That was Harry. Potter.
„Okay, okay, no need to yell at me“, Granger replied.
Hands picked Severus up, and reminded him of the fact that while his head hurt quite a lot, the rest of his body wasn’t in good shape, either.
It was agony.
Why had that stupid owl even been there? It was daytime, Lucius and Narcissa knew better than to send an owl during the day unless there was something urgent ...
“He looks exactly like the one that saved me, you know?” Harry’s voice sounded disturbingly close. „I know it could be a different one, but … I just have to try to save him.“
„It’s okay, Harry, I don’t want to kill him, either. It’s just what my parents always said when I found an injured bird ...” Granger rambled on. “They always recovered pretty fast, I wonder whether that was accidental magic, pity I can’t do it on purpose ...”
Severus zoned out. It was hard to focus on meaningless conversation when your head felt like ... when your head had, in fact, been hit with what qualified as giant rock, considering his current size.
The ceasing of some of the pain in his body got him to pay attention again.
“It would be kinder to put it out of its misery.”
This time, it was Madam Pomfrey’s voice. Severus tried to open his eyes. He didn’t have the energy to turn back, but he had to show her somehow that ...
“Please try? You can fix it, can’t you?” Harry pleaded softly.
Since when did that boy sound so much like Lily?
“I can’t heal bird bones. I can vanish them and give him Skele-Gro, but feeling the bones grow back ... I have done it with some owls, and they are at least intelligent enough to understand they are healing when the pain starts. With a chicken ...”
“It’s a very rare breed, it’s probably quite expensive and I’m sure the owner will be looking for it. They’re called Ayam Cemani and are from Indonesia, and ...”
Okay, perhaps Granger wasn’t so bad after all.
“It’s alright Miss Granger, I will do my best.”
Severus felt the pain in his wings leave. He tried to move them, but couldn’t. They felt like rubber.
Ah. Vanished bones. So that was what it felt like.
„I hope I can get it to drink the Skele-Gro, with owls, you can explain it to them, but a chicken … well ...”
Severus opened his beak so Madam Pomfrey could dose him with a few drops of Skele-Gro.
The stabbing pain told him Skele-Gro worked quite as it should on chickens.
He heard a pained noise that he realized with embarrassment was coming from him.
“How long until the pain stops?” Harry asked.
“Twelve hours, give or take.”
Twelve hours. Perhaps it really would have been kinder to put him out of his misery.
Severus often felt that someone should have put him out of his misery ten years ago, but of course there were still ... debts to pay.
Under different circumstances, Severus might have been curious about the Gryffindor common room, but with a massive headache, he couldn’t even bring himself to open his eyes.
Without Lily in it, it had lost much of its original appeal, anyway.
He was carried up another flight of stairs and then, finally, put down on something soft.
“You should put a towel under him, you know.” Miss Granger? What was she doing in the boys’ dorm?
“Why? Oh, right.“
There was some noise and then Severus was manhandled again, now so that someone could put a towel under him, he deduced when he was placed on it.
“He’ll need something to drink.” Harry.
“I’ll ask Fred and George if they can steal a saucer from the kitchen.” Weasley.
Severus tuned out.
The pain prevented him from getting any sleep, but he daydreamt about what he would do to Draco in retaliation, knowing that he couldn’t do any worse than give the brat one hour of detention, and even that was stretching it.
Making him scrub the whole castle from top to bottom under Filch’s supervision ... not likely.
One didn’t build a reputation as dreaded, heartless teacher by appearing to care about the wellbeing of animals, so he had made sure to appear gleeful at the opportunity to dole out punishment and unconcerned about the animal whenever he had caught students tormenting Mrs. Norris.
Punishing Draco for hurting an animal when the only witnesses were Potter and friends ... that would seem wholly out of character and was bound to make people suspect there was something more to it.
Realistically, the only thing he could do was to ... ah, yes. See to it that Miss Granger was not punished for her assault on Draco. Whatever it had been, Severus was sure Draco deserved it.
How had he never noticed before what an insolent brat the boy had become?
The truth was, Severus had to admit to himself, that Draco had always been like this. Looking at the way Lucius liked to kick the family’s house elf around, it was no wonder his son had developed a taste for cruelty towards animals.
Severus just hadn’t wanted to see it before.
Over the years, he had grown used to his strange relationship to Lucius – pretending at friendship while secretly having come to detest large parts of the man’s personality – but Draco ... Draco was something else.
Unlike his other Slytherins, he had known the boy when he had been but a toddler. He had never talked to Draco about anything private, of course, it wasn’t in his nature to make small talk, but he had rather enjoyed the feeling that the boy looked up to him, admired him.
And now it turned out Draco was a sadistic little brat. Who was responsible for the stabbing pain in Severus’ arms – wings – and the throbbing headache.
“Harry? Are you coming?” Weasley shouted, interrupting Severus’ thoughts.
“No. Bring me some food if you can.”
“He won’t heal faster if you are watching him”, Weasley replied, but went away.
Severus risked opening an eye. It had gotten darker, must be dinner time. Someone had placed a saucer of water next to his head, but he couldn’t bring himself to lift his head to drink just yet.
“The pain will stop soon”, Harry said softly, somewhere behind him. “All will be well.” He laughed. „Silly me, talking to an animal. I’m not even sure Hedwig understands everything I say, and she’s very clever.“
Something touched Severus’ wing feathers. He froze. It was a hand. Harry’s hand.
„Perhaps that will help“, the boy continued. “It did help me. Or I think it did. It is all rather fuzzy. There was only Snape there, and he’d never pet my hair, so I must have hallucinated it. Perhaps I was so close to death my mum could reach me?”
The longing in Harry’s voice wrenched Severus’ heart. Oh, how well he could relate.
“Whatever it was, it distracted me from the pain”, he said, trailing his hand along Severus’ feathers.
Was that boy ... petting him?
Severus wanted to get angry, but between the stabbing pain in his wings and the headache, he just couldn’t work up the energy.
Besides, it really did help. The pain was still there, but at least it wasn’t the only sensation he felt anymore.
“... Snape’s been weird all year. I shouldn’t been complaining, I mean, I’m glad he stopped picking on me so much, but as long as I don’t know why he has stopped, I don’t know when he’ll start again. I thought I had figured it out when he said he thought I was still being affected by this weird thing that happened in summer, but he hasn’t really gone back to normal ... perhaps he realized I haven’t changed and it was all just in his head and I never really was all those things he said I was. That’d be nice.”
Severus had to concede that the boy did seem rather agreeable right now.
“He must have misunderstood something I said. Or no, that can’t be, he hated me right from the start. I just don’t get why”, Harry pondered, moving his hand along Severus’ spine. “I mean, Dumbledore said he didn’t like my dad, but that doesn’t really explain it, I mean, I don’t think I would pick on Malfoy’s son, even if he looked just as much like a ferret as Malfoy does. Not just because. He’d probably be just as nasty, but ... hm.“
Harry fell silent, but continued his movements. “I guess Snape thinks I’m like my dad, but it’s pretty impossible that I am like my dad, growing up with the Dursleys and all, you’d think I’d be more like Uncle Vernon – ugh, I hope not. Perhaps I am like my dad after all, but .... I don’t know, I wouldn’t pick on Malfoy’s kid – if he ever had one, that is – if I knew Malfoy didn’t get to teach him how to be a nasty little ferret.”
Severus tensed as something occurred to him.
Did Potter know who he was? Did he intentionally try to make him feel guilty?
“Hey? You okay? Damn, I have no idea what to do – please be okay.”
He forced himself to relax. No point in giving himself away before he was entirely sure.
“Just a cramp?” Potter continued to pet him. Severus tried very hard to hate it. “It’s nice to have someone to talk to. In summer I have Hedwig, but she doesn’t like being in a cage and here, she’s in the owlery ... I mean, I can talk to Hermione and Ron, but I can’t talk to them about everything. Ron wouldn’t listen, he thinks Snape is just nasty without a reason, and Hermione would just, I don’t know, analyze everything I say and then tell me about some psychological problem I have or some nonsense, and I just ... with some stuff, it is better to talk to someone who only listens.”
When Severus woke, it was dark.
So he must have fallen asleep at some point. He opened his eyes. Harry was still there, sitting next to the bed, petting him, but his movements were slower, as if he was about to fall asleep.
Severus managed to dip his beak into the saucer full of water and drink.
Immediately, Harry reached for the saucer and held it at an angle that made it easier to access.
Severus drank all he could, then placed his head back on the soft towel. His wings now felt like there were a thousand small needles inside them.
“You are getting better!”, Harry said softly. “Just some hours now. It’ll stop hurting soon.”
The boy went away. When he returned, he was in his pyjamas and carrying another saucer. This one was full of some sort of food.
“Just in case you are hungry”, Harry said, placing it in front of Severus.
He was hungry, but just couldn’t bring himself to move.
After a while, Harry started to pet him again.
Morning dawned, and Severus realized that his wings didn’t hurt anymore. His head seemed to hurt even more, though.
Next to him, Severus saw when he dared open his eyes, Harry was fast asleep, upper body slumped on the mattress, the rest of his body somewhere next to the bed.
Idiot boy, should have gone to bed in time.
Chapter 12