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“Do you ever wonder what would’ve happened if we chose differently?” Hermione asked, and Severus, next to her, just shook his head.
Dark had almost settled outside, the sky exploding in a sequence of orange and dark blue. And in contrast, within their little confines, the world felt almost colourless and stilted, as if slowing down for their impending end.
The man chuckled, the sound so at odds with their situation.
The audacity of this woman to ask all kinds of philosophical questions while they were braced for death was astounding.
…And also, this was not the first time it happened. Hermione Granger had an affinity for turning philosophical on him in moments of distress. It happened at least twice a week.
“Define differently, Granger,” he drawled. In front of him, there was yet another Pureblood heirloom riddled with an ancient curse, cast by someone too full of pride for their misguided kin.
In this case, a pocket watch coming from the noble house of Black.
Severus had studied the case well before coming over here. The heirloom spread a curse that had claimed the lives of several unfortunate Muggle collectors who had tried to get their hands on the otherwise beautiful item.
It was complex magic, and the last one who truly knew about it had fallen through the Veil years ago.
The curse was elaborate, too. Its effects, if their sources were to be trusted, varied depending on the afflicted’s pedigree. Purebloods would hardly be inconvenienced, while Half-bloods like him would experience mild illness.
Muggleborns and Muggles, however, were in danger of dying because the curse targeted their bloodstreams. It was almost as if the curse was trying to make a statement.
How devastatingly unoriginal, he always believed it to be.
Despite that, or maybe because of that, Hermione insisted they’d take on this case themselves.
The last time this artefact was seen was in the hands of a Muggle who disappeared on a hiking trail up Snowdon, more than two decades ago. A Squib happened to find it again recently and, sensing that the watch was too dangerous, threw it into the first cavern on his trail.
Naturally, the Ministry of Magic was notified, and the Cursebreakers of the Rare, Obscure, and Confounding Case Division prepared to tackle the case. That was how Severus Snape and Hermione Granger –the Division’s most notoriously stubborn duo– found themselves in this bind.
“Define differently,” Severus repeated, glancing over at her. While their current circumstances weren’t exactly conducive to this kind of conversation, he couldn’t help but answer. “Differently, as in my rejecting your partnership? Differently, as in my refusal to trust my hide to a Gryffindor and bring you along on this case? Differently, as–”
His tirade was interrupted by Hermione's protesting groan. Despite the situation, with them being currently trapped inside Glyndwr's Cave because of a bloody talisman, she was still being…her usual self.
The fact that he liked Hermione Granger being her usual self? He would take that truth to his grave, which could very well be this cave.
“You know what I mean, Severus,” she murmured. She pressed her pen to her notebook in a way he knew suggested that she wasn’t sure which Arithmancy formula would calculate their survival if Severus stopped casting that protective ward. “What would we be if we weren’t coworkers?”
For a moment, his already shaky hands paused. When would the best time for someone to answer that question be? He didn’t know.
So, he kept silent for a while. He took a look at Hermione’s pale face, then he refocused his attention toward keeping the watch’s destructive magic contained.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
Severus’s heart pounded in his ears in the same tempo as the ticking of that bloody clock.
“If we weren’t coworkers, I would probably have one less stressor,” he muttered. “I would have had an uneventful work life.”
He fell silent for a moment before adding, “Well, as uneventful as a Cursebreaker’s work can be.”
“You never had an uneventful work life,” she reminded him, and despite himself, he smiled.
She always had a way of making him smile, even if he didn’t want to.
“The pre-Second-Wizarding-War me didn’t have an uneventful work life,” he clarified. An unruly strand of hair slipped from his ponytail, and he tilted his head in exasperation. Hermione reached over mechanically to tuck it away from his face. “I’ll have you know, after the war, I created quite a normal situation for myself,” he added.
Normal but colourless remains unsaid. A new apartment instead of Spinner’s End or his old quarters at Hogwarts. A permanent farewell to the school that sheltered him for years. A fresh, quiet start and a chance to work on a new challenge.
Nothing unplanned, nothing too loud, nothing out of the ordinary.
When Granger strutted into his office four years into this new job, bringing in those ridiculous colour-coded binders and her even more colourful language –because her vocabulary had indeed become colourful; all that fraternising with Potter and Weasley would inevitably create a vice or two– her upending all his routines was not what he expected.
Severus looked at the dimming light of the ward he was trying to hold steady around the heirloom. The blasted watch depleted his energy faster than he wished, even though the ward was protecting them from its more severe effects. Still, he had to keep the ward up to protect Granger until she figured out their next step.
Carefully, he shifted the ward so more of his magic would be channelled right onto the hands of the pocket watch, then groaned in frustration when nothing seemed to change.
“If anything, you did well for yourself,” came her response from his left. Granger’s voice sounded tired. Despite being contained by Severus’ ward, the curse was affecting the witch. The fact that the cave’s entrance was sealed after her first attempt to approach the pocket watch added to their distress.
“I know I did well, witch,” he replied confidently. “Considering the bastard I’ve always been, I cannot complain.”
“Cannot complain? But you're always doing that.” In the semi-darkness, her voice shifted into a parodic version of his. “Granger, why did you have to be a Cursebreaker? Couldn't you just become Minister and leave me alone?”
“Poor mimickery won't get us out of this place, Granger. Get back to work.”
“But I amuse you,” she deadpanned, and for once, he had no reason to contradict her.
The silence that followed this moment wasn't what Severus wanted, though. Not this silence, filled only with Hermione's shaky breaths and the continuous ticking of the heirloom.
“You do amuse me on occasion,” he finally conceded. “I could have had a much worse partner at work. Merlin forbid I had someone like your best friends, The-Boy-Who-Lived-By-Sheer-Dumb-Luck and his mostly faithful sidekick. At least you're competent.”
“Oh, I should count my blessings, then,” she replied, and he couldn't help but chuckle.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick-tick-tick-tick.
“Talk to me then, Granger,” he urged her. While he was holding up the ward, he could hear her mimicking the ticking with her pen on paper, in an attempt to figure out the artefact’s weak spot. If she managed to find it in time, they would finally know when exactly to hit it with the counter-curse. Any wrong timing could result in that thing blowing the whole cave.
Severus then redirected his magic towards the top of the watch’s glass front. “Tell me what would’ve happened if we chose differently,” he challenged Hermione again.
In the growing darkness, with only the light of the ward giving colour to their surroundings, he heard her take a deep breath.
“I would fill our office with more colours,” she replied quietly.
He felt his hands shake harder, whether from the draining of his energy or the impact of her words, he couldn’t say.
“How many more colours could you add to our office, Granger?” he said. “From day one, you filled that blissfully colourless space with reds and blues and yellows and greens. You even brought that atrocious cat of yours to work–”
“That’s Crookshanks–”
“That orange atrocity became our office mascot, and I ended up having a furry abomination shedding all over my robes.”
Her laugh –quiet, breathy– echoed in the cave, and so he gritted his teeth and poured more energy into the ward.
“Crookshanks likes you, Severus, and that's an accomplishment. And orange definitely becomes you.”
“It’s not just that orange furball, Granger,” he muttered. Faintly, he could hear the watch’s rhythmic ticking lose its steady rhythm, as if time itself yielded to Severus’s words. “What else? Don’t stop talking and counting – I think we’re on to something here. The watch is slowing down.”
“I’d convince you to eat out more with me,” she hummed, her tone growing wistful. “For a Potions master, your taste in food is atrocious.”
“I beg your pardon–”
“There's this little bistro I had meant to ask you to come with me to,” Hermione continued, promptly ignoring his weak protest. “It’s close to the office. It's quiet, and its menu is so, so good. You’d like it very much.”
A quiet sigh, a moment of hesitation, and then, “I would even go as far as discussing work with you over one of those delightful quiches they serve.”
Severus took a deep breath that sounded embarrassingly shaky. He could almost taste the moment, the food, this witch’s argumentative words and the laughter that always followed whenever they argued about anything.
It didn't sound bad. Not at all.
“Is the prospect of that quiche enough to convince you to keep working, Granger?” he asked. He couldn't see his partner at this point; the daylight had already gone, leaving his ward as the only source of light. “Keep following the ticking. And for Merlin’s sake, don’t stop talking now.”
But he felt it –almost like a natural decision– how her head tilted and rested against his shoulder for support. He was growing exhausted. Pouring a continuous flow of his magic into the ward was difficult, but she was in a worse state.
“I can't believe I survived a Black's cursed knife during the war just to end up expiring from a Black's watch now,” she murmured tiredly. “That’s embarrassing, Severus.”
Just for one moment, Severus closed his eyes, thanking the gods for the darkness surrounding him. He’d die if this woman saw him lose his composure.
“You have outlived two hostile and one friendly Black so far, Granger,” he replied after a moment of heavy silence. “I don't give you permission to perish now.”
“Let me guess: you don't want to deal with the paperwork of a new office partner.”
He thought about it for a moment. This wasn't wrong, but also, it was wrong, because three years of working with Hermione Granger had changed him in little, subtle ways. His days seemed to be much more engaging when she was around, and he felt…less angry with the world in her presence. Her vivacity was sometimes exhausting, but always rewarding –reminding him that surviving the war wasn’t the worst thing that could happen to him.
She’d been annoying, loud, brilliant, a reason for him to get out of bed each morning and go to the Ministry just because she’d be there with a new challenge at hand.
He wasn't eager to forget that and go back to working without her, or worse, to working with a new person.
Tick.
Tick-tick-tick-tick.
Tick.
While Severus paused to find the words to answer, the watch stopped for a prolonged moment, then resumed its new ticking pattern.
“Well, yes,” he admitted begrudgingly, almost hating how well Hermione seemed to know him. “But I have also grown used to your splash of colours in this bleak, washed-up daily life. I can tolerate your friends–”
“Severus–”
“Let me finish, witch. I can tolerate your brainless friends and your annoying cat, and–”
“Severus–”
“–and even those tasteless colour-tabbed binders you bring along, as long as you don't perish today. Because that’s where I draw the line of forgiving you.”
“Severus Snape, can you shut up for a moment, please?”
Severus, who was busy pouring out more words than he had uttered in the last four days, stopped talking abruptly. He huffed indignantly, but remained silent as she continued.
“The watch is slowing down,” Hermione said breathlessly. “The ticking gets erratic.”
Severus blinked, as if those words were the last thing he expected. Then it dawned on him that she had probably found their salvation.
“I poured more energy into the clasp,” he almost shouted, a rush of adrenaline washing over him at the realisation that Granger might survive this.
“Then keep the blasted watch from moving around, and we’ll strike it there in its next erratic pattern.”
Severus focused again on the silvery light of the ward. Moving his fingers in the air, he minimised the radius of the protective spell until it wrapped around the watch like a tight glove.
Tick-tick-tick-tick.
Tick.
Tick.
“I’ll strike with Exsolvo Incantatem at the interval between the quadruple ticking and the next beat,” Hermione said quickly. She lifted herself abruptly, throwing pen and notebook aside.
The materials landed somewhere behind Severus with a thud.
“Remember the protocol,” Severus reminded her. He knew it wasn’t necessary because Hermione was brilliant at following protocol most of the time. “If you want to cast Bombarda to turn this confounded thing into smithereens, you’ll only do it when Exsolvo Incantatem deactivates its magic. That will turn its gold into grey. Although I’d appreciate it if you left a sample to take back to the Unspeakables.”
A beat of silence, and then, “Good luck, Granger.”
“You too, Severus.”
Severus tightened his grip on his wand, tightening the other fist, and manipulated the floating watch into stillness. The ward’s light brightened, faintly revealing Hermione in the darkness –pale, but grinning in defiance.
She lifted her right hand, the one not scarred by a Black’s cruelty.
“Fuck the noble house of Black,” she muttered, and then colour exploded inside the cave. The bright red of Exsolvo Incantatem hit the watch precisely on the clasp..
For a moment, nothing seemed to change. Severus braced himself for the worst. Granger would die from the curse, and he would die from the barrier at the cave entrance that would keep him shut in.
Then the watch began to lose its colour, its golden sheen dimming until the whole heirloom turned a dull grey.
Simultaneously, the magic barring the cave dimmed and disappeared.
Neither spoke at first.
“Granger,” Severus tried carefully. “If you plan to bombard the thing, now is the time.”
“It’s okay–” she said weakly.
And then she was not okay at all, as her knees buckled.
Severus was quick to catch her before she crashed on the ground.
“Granger–” he hissed as he picked her up. “You cannot die on me now. You promised me a quiche, you infuriating witch.”
The heirloom, now deactivated and quiet, lay on the cave floor.
He left the watch on the floor for the Unspeakables of the Time Room to pick up. Instead, he made his distance from it, walking outside as fast as Hermione’s semi-conscious body allowed, where the cold night air seemed to help
Severus settled Hermione down carefully, then lifted his wand. He knew both the Time Room and Potter, as Head of the DMLE, were waiting for an update, so he was quick to send a Patronus to Potter and ask for a Healer’s immediate assistance.
While he was fussing with calling for help, Hermione was regaining consciousness.
“Severus–” she croaked, and the man turned around so quickly, he had whiplash.
“Damn you, Granger,” he murmured, and began casting a basic diagnostic charm over her, “–scaring me like this.”
She paused, and he heard her breathing calm. The diagnostic charm, to his immense relief, only showed exhaustion. Thank the gods, she wasn’t exposed to the curse long enough to be truly affected.
He didn’t want to think about what would have happened if they had taken more time to dispel this curse.
“You said we’ll eat a quiche together,” she mumbled, reaching for his hand as if this was muscle memory to her. “I didn’t imagine that.”
Despite his first instinct being to call her delusional, Severus responded by taking her hand into his. It was cold; he would warm it up.
His thumb brushed against her knuckles slowly, a reassurance that they had once again survived something big together.
“Yes, we will, Granger,” he promised quietly. “Just out of academic curiosity, mind you. Maybe you’ll stop pestering me about that quiche at last.”
A blatant lie, but for now, it was enough.