lore (lore) wrote in lupin_snape, @ 2010-03-04 16:30:00 |
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Entry tags: | fic: pg, theme: second war |
FIC: Grasping, PG
Title: Grasping
Author: lore
Rating: PG
Pairing: Remus/Severus
Summary: In the war's aftermath, a hand reaches out.
Disclaimer: If they were mine, I would have treated them better.
Warnings: A wild sway between seriousness and silliness.
Notes: ~800 words. Written for bonfoi for various reasons, including a chat room challenge and her wonderful February of recs. Beta'ed by McKay and Karasu - all remaining issues are mine alone.
It wasn't that Nagini's bite poisoned Severus. He'd taken care of that eventuality by building up an immunity to the great snake's particular venom. Once Severus woke up in St Mungo's, he found that he had not anticipated the amount of damage fangs alone could wreak on his body. His left arm laid on his chest, useless but also numb to the dark magic that impeded its healing.
A week after the battle, Remus walked stiffly into the room. Severus' eyes flared with avidity before he could settle into a proper scowl.
"You married a woman."
Remus stopped and smiled, leaning backward as if from the force of Severus' statement. He splayed his fingers on his chest and said, "I pretended to marry Tonks to mask the pregnancy from his turncoat father."
Severus' raised an eyebrow and Remus continued. "Tonks figured out she was pregnant by a Deatheater wonk in Memos and Records when the Ministry was too overrun by Voldemort's loyalists to do anything about it. She was afraid of being hunted for her child, so, we faked the marriage." Remus appeared smug.
"Aren't you the master of drama," Severus muttered, turning his face away and closing his eyes. He used his good hand to point at the now twitching one laying on his stomach. "I suppose you heard- everything."
Remus drew up a chair on the side of the bed that Severus had turned to, but the stubborn man only shifted to look the other way. He laid his hand over Severus' good one. "Yes, including that you're nearly healed and refusing magical therapy. Why, Severus?"
Eyes closing to hide his pain, Severus muttered a single word. "Penance." The war might have been won, but weeks in a hospital bed with one working arm and sputtering magic only gave Severus time to dwell on those who had died while he remained safe in his cover. Charity Burbage, her death echoing the attack that nearly killed him, sounded loudest among the din.
Squeezing Severus' good hand hard, Remus practically growled, "You can't make restitution with a limb. It's too literal. And lazy." Now Severus turned toward Remus, furious, but Remus continued too quickly for Severus to retort. "Help rebuild the school, make free potions for the surviving family, take in a war orphan - all ten times more useful than you sulking in some dank hidey hole, flopping around an arm like jelly."
Even in his stiffness, Remus managed to undulate his free arm with enough fluidity to shock Severus into a barking laugh. "I'll help you rehab," Remus said, verbally darting in to press his advantage. "And I'll forgive you for believing I'd actually shag a woman if you'll forgive me for pretending to marry her in the first place." Remus batted his eyelashes theatrically.
Severus snorted, but his mouth quirked up at the corners, and Remus knew they were coming out the other side together. "I suppose I should have known better. I've never met a man more obsessed with arses, yours and mine especially."
Looking down at his trembling arm, already on the way to recovery despite his lack of effort, Severus' expression was still amused but holding a line of pensiveness between his eyebrows. "You'll have to tweak your own cheeks for the time being." Severus spoke with a light tone, but Remus knew Severus was fretting.
The healer had told Remus that there was a chance Severus' arm might not ever be the same, something Severus must have been informed of as well. Remus thought it unlikely, though -- not with the workouts he had planned for Severus' therapy. And yet, wasn't humour the best medicine?
Remus lunged forward, bringing the hand he was holding to his cheek, his words impassioned with heightened drama. "You must get your butt-grasping ability back, Severus. You simply must!"
No one but Remus would ever have known that Severus Snape could roar with laughter if only a team of nurses and healers hadn't bustled into the room at the exact same moment. The same team crushed each other in the doorway in their hurry to leave as Remus quelled Severus' fury at their intrusion with a desperate kiss.
A vast number of emotions burned through Severus all at once, but when he had the almost-forgotten scent of Remus, relaxed at its familiarity, and then once again tasted his lover's spice, Severus realised he only had one emotion left in his arsenal as Remus pulled him up and into his arms. Hope was powerful -- hope could heal -- and Severus decided to take it up and wield it like a wand now that he wanted to find the very light he'd fought for so long and hard.
-30-
love, lore