webmistresses (webmistresses) wrote in severus_sighs, @ 2012-01-09 07:24:00 |
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Entry tags: | challenge, event: reviving severus *sighs* 2012, fic, member: hpstrangelove, pairing: severus/harry, rating: r |
El Curandero by hpstrangelove
Title: El Curandero
Author: hpstrangelove
Pairing: Severus/Harry
Rating: R
Word Count: 4100
Warnings: Violence, sex
Summary: El Curandero – witch doctor, magic man. He lives in the mountains, on the other side of the River. Only Señor Roa knows exactly where. In any of the towns in the Big Bend area, when someone gets sick, an offering is made at the closest church. Señor Roa will come and take a message to El Curandero. El Curandero always knows how serious the illness is. Sometimes he arrives within hours, sometimes not at all.
Beta: winoniel and Sestra-Prior – thanks so much, ladies, for your feedback and support.
A/N: Written for the severus_sighs 2012 Reviving Severus Challenge. I do not own or make any money from the characters or situations belonging, in all rights, to JK Rowling.
~*~
El Curandero
January 9, 2012
Dear Professor Snape,
Well, I know you’re not really my professor anymore, but I don’t think I’ll ever stop thinking of you that way. Not anymore. Dumbledore would be proud of me, finally calling you Professor. He tried for so many years to get me to do it, as a sign of respect for you. I didn’t understand it at the time. I hated you so much back then, the way you treated me. You were so unfair! I hadn’t done anything, and you hated me just because of who I am.
This isn’t saying what I really wanted to say. Sorry, I’m getting away from the purpose of this letter. Please don’t crumple it up yet. At least read it through to the end before you toss it into the fire.
First, I want to wish you Happy Birthday. Fifty-two today, right? Being raised by Muggles, fifty-two would seem old, but now that I know how long Wizards can live – well, you still have a lot of years left.
See, I figured something out. On my own, too. I didn’t even need Hermione’s help with this one (although I have to give her credit for working out how to locate you).
It happened like this. I thought it only right that you have a portrait in the Headmaster’s Office. After all the sacrifices you made in order to protect me, there was no way I couldn’t come to your defense, even if you were supposed to be dead. I didn’t tell them everything – you know, about you and my mother – but I did let everyone know you were the one who gave me the Sword of Gryffindor and the whole thing with Bellatrix and the fake sword. And I made sure that they all knew you had taken on the Headmaster’s position primarily to keep an eye on the Carrows. You protected each and every student at Hogwarts that year.
So, of course, they agreed that you should have a portrait in the Headmaster’s Office. Maybe you weren’t expecting that to happen. Or, maybe you just didn’t know about how the portraits work. I can’t imagine you wouldn’t know that, but with everything else you had to deal with, maybe it just wasn’t on your mind.
Or, maybe you did know.
Okay, okay, I know you’re thinking ‘Get to the point, Potter!’ So, here it is.
I had your portrait painted. It’s there, hanging right next to Professor Dumbledore’s. I wasn’t sure if that’s where you wanted to be, but thought if you didn’t, you could tell me when you woke up and I could move you to wherever you wanted. Except – your portrait never woke up.
Never.
I didn’t know much about the portraits at the time. I knew that they liked to snooze (they love to pretend to sleep when they’re eavesdropping), and I thought maybe that’s what it was at first. You were just enjoying a relaxing nap. Then I thought to have Professor McGonagall ask you for help. I remembered something about the portraits being required to help the current Headmaster (or Headmistress, since Professor McGonagall is a ‘she’ and not a ‘he’). Still, no amount or manner of asking you for help could get your portrait to wake.
That’s when I knew – you weren’t dead. Somehow, you survived Nagini’s attack. Somewhere, you were still alive.
I suppose I should have been suspicious when no one found your body. But, and I think it was a terrible thing to happen, so many bodies of the Death Eaters ‘disappeared’. Or, only bits and pieces were found. I guess it was to be expected. So many people suffered losses and torture and abuse at the hands of the Death Eaters, that when it came to payback…well, let’s just say I don’t condone what they did, but I do understand.
The only person I talked to about my thoughts that you were still alive was Hermione. She knew how important it was for me to find you. If you’re wondering why, it’s simple, really. You are the only one alive now, except for my Aunt Petunia, who can tell me anything about my mother. I know some of the professors can tell me the kind of student she was, but I want to know more than that. I want to know the little things about her, about what she was like when she was growing up and about her days at Hogwarts, not as a student, but as a girl. These are things only you can tell me.
It took years and years of research on her part to finally come up with a way to find you. I don’t know how it works exactly, but it involves the memories of my mum that you gave me and also the use of my blood. The spell called on the love we both have for my mother and used it to forge a bond between us, allowing me to find you.
Please, please, don’t hate me for doing this. The bond isn’t like a marriage or slavery bond or anything. If you don’t want to see me, I’ll respect that. I don’t know what your true feelings are for me. I know you loved my mum, but was that the only reason you protected me? Or was there something – else?
I imagine it’s difficult to look at me and not be reminded of my father and the way he abused you. Those can’t be good memories. But if you could somehow find the strength to see past my appearance, just long enough to talk to me a bit about my mum, I swear a Wizard’s Oath I’ll leave you in peace after that.
Well, that’s all I have to say. I’ll be staying at the Big Bend Motor Inn in Study Butte; I know you have other obligations, so I’ll wait a month for your reply. If I don’t hear back from you, I’ll assume you don’t want to see me and I won’t bother you again.
Sincerely,
Harry Potter
~*~
Harry looked over the letter for the hundredth – hell, thousandth – time. He wasn’t sure why he bothered. He had the contents memorized by now. It had to be perfect. It had to convince Snape to allow Harry to meet with him. He’d asked Hermione to help him compose it. She had, in a way. “Just say what’s in your heart,” she’d told him.
He folded the letter and sealed it in the envelope, then handed it to Señor Roa.
“Thank you for taking my message to El Curandero.”
“That is my job, Señor Potter,” the man replied, “to let him know when someone is in need of him. I cannot guarantee that he will come. He alone knows who may benefit from his healing magic.”
“I understand.”
Harry watched as the man drove out of the gravel parking lot, the battered old pick-up truck leaving a cloud of dust in its wake. It was thirty minutes until sunset, but the air was already growing cold. It had been a beautiful day, sunny with temperatures nearing seventy degrees. He thought that to be quite warm for January, but in the Big Bend region of Texas, it was apparently normal for the time of year. He couldn’t imagine what it must feel like in the summer with daily highs above one-hundred.
Harry’s room at the Inn faced west. The building was one-story, motel style, with a large cement walkway running along the front of the rooms. He dragged the desk chair out of the door and onto the walkway, opened a beer – longnecks, they were called, because of the shape of the bottle – and sat back to watch the sunset. He could see straight down River Road, a sixty-five mile winding highway, running east to west along the Rio Grande between Study Butte and Presidio. A few hundred feet in front of the Inn, River Road ended at Texas Highway 118, the road from Alpine, eighty miles to the north, down south to Big Bend National Park. He’d come to Study Butte via Alpine but hadn’t yet been down River Road. He wanted to take his time when he explored that way because there was so much to see: Barton Warnock Environmental Education Center, Big Bend State Park, Lajitas, Fort Leaton – and supposedly there was a steep grade at one point with fantastic views of the countryside from the top. He expected it would be the ultimate test of his driving skills.
When he and Hermione had performed the location spell, he never would have guessed Snape would be here in this desert land. At first glance, the place looked barren, nothing but rock and scrub brush as far as the eye could see. Now that he’d been here a week, the beauty and peacefulness of the land had infected him.
He’d gone hiking several times in the nearby national park. The variety of the terrain boggled the mind. The Rio Grande had cut Santa Elena Canyon on the west side of the park and Boquillas Canyon on the east. In the center of the park was the Chisos Mountains, the highest point being Emory Peak at almost eight thousand feet. It had taken Harry an entire day to hike up to the peak and back down around the South Rim, but the three hundred and sixty-degree view had been breathtaking.
He’d spent the week hiking around the park because, even though he knew Snape was in the area, he wasn’t able to pinpoint Snape’s exact location. The bottle of memories had led him here by indicating the direction of the memories’ owner. The spell caused the liquid in the bottle to tilt in the direction of the targeted person. But once he’d arrived in Study Butte, the liquid had leveled out. Snape was here, Harry just didn’t know where, exactly. It wasn’t as if the area was a thriving metropolis – all of Brewster County, covering six thousand square miles, had barely nine thousand people. Someone must know Snape.
He’d stopped at the Motor Inn Café to show Snape’s photo around. The first person he’d talked to, a waitress named Anna, had recognized him right away.
“That’s El Curandero.”
“El – who?”
“El Curandero – witch doctor, magic man. He lives in the mountains, on the other side of the River. Only Señor Roa knows exactly where. In any of the towns in the Big Bend area, when someone gets sick, an offering is made at the closest church. Señor Roa will come and take a message to El Curandero. El Curandero always knows how serious the illness is. Sometimes he arrives within hours, sometimes not at all if he thinks the patient can get better on his own.” She paused, looking him up and down. “Why do you need him? You don’t look sick.”
“Oh, no. I’m fine. This man, El Curandero – he used to be my teacher, years ago, back in England. I just wanted to check on him, see how he’s doing.”
“Really? I always thought he was Mexican. I didn’t know he’d ever lived anywhere else. He’s been healing in this part of the Big Bend since I was a little girl. He’s not one for talking. Rumor has it that a huge rattle snake bit him in the neck and that’s why he talks in a scratchy whisper.”
“Since I’m not really sick, how do I get in contact with Señor Roa?” Harry asked. “I don’t think it’s right for me to make an offering at the church since I’m not sick – not that I mind making an offering,” he added quickly, not wanting to offend, “but I wouldn’t want to get Señor Roa here on a false pretense.”
“Why don’t you get a room at the Inn next door. Señor Roa stops in here most Friday afternoons to get a few groceries. I can tell him you want to see him and he can take a message to El Curandero for you.”
That had been last Monday, Snape’s birthday. He’d taken a room at the motel and proceeded to spend his days exploring the national park. In the evenings, he’d walk over to the café for dinner. He’d never had such flavorful – and spicy – food. He’d caused quite a commotion when he’d mistaken a jalapeño pepper for an ordinary pepper, gasping and choking as he took in huge gulps of water to quench the fire burning his mouth. Anna had laughed so hard at him that she’d started choking too.
Word quickly spread that he’d been a student of El Curandero. Business soared at the café as a steady stream of locals came in to see him. It seemed that everyone had a story to tell him about the miraculous healing powers of his mentor. Many wanted to know if he was going to stay and work with El Curandero. He’d manage to redirect the conversation to another subject, though. He didn’t want to build his hopes up too high.
He’d stayed in his room all day today, Friday, not wanting to take a chance of missing Señor Roa. He’d brought a laptop with him and spent most of the day composing an email to Hermione, telling her about his trip so far. A little after 5:00 pm, there had been a knock on his door – a man of about sixty was standing there, wearing blue jeans and a long sleeved cotton shirt, cowboy hat in hand. His skin was bronzed by the sun, his hair dark and wavy. Harry thought the man must have had all the women in Brewster County chasing after him when he was younger. Even now, the effects of aging hadn’t diminished the man’s attractiveness. He’d felt jealousy begin to stir somewhere inside, jealousy that this man, the only one who knew where El Curandero lived, was someone special to Snape.
“Miss Anna said that you would like me to take a message to El Curandero.”
“Yes, please. I have a letter written up already. I just need to put it in an envelope.”
That had been almost an hour ago as he’d watched Señor Roa drive away. The sun had now set, the horizon painted a deep, dark blue. He took another swallow of beer, enjoying the quiet stillness of the night as it fell over the land. He heard the café door open and saw Anna come out, stopping to shield her cigarette from the breeze as she lit up. It was funny how, as soon as the sun disappeared, the wind would suddenly pick up, howling through the canyons and around the mountains.
Anna took a few puffs on the cigarette before she noticed Harry and waved, then walked quickly over.
“Hey, I saw Señor Roa drive out of here about an hour ago. Is he taking your message to El Curandero right now? I thought he’d at least get some dinner first. I bet El Curandero will be surprised when he finds out you’re here.”
Harry gave a short laugh. “Yeah, you’re right about that. But Señor Roa said El Curandero might not have time to see me, so I don’t want to get my hopes up.”
“What do you mean? After you came all this way? Of course he’ll see you. He’ll probably come straight here as soon as Señor Roa delivers your message. El Curandero gets around real quick when he wants to.”
Harry couldn’t help but be affected by her enthusiasm. “Thanks, Anna. It’s just that, well, we didn’t part on the best of terms. In fact, I didn’t even have a chance to tell him good-bye. He was just – gone. I didn’t think I’d ever see him again, and to be this close and not be able to tell him how I feel…” He trailed off when he saw the look of shock on her face.
“Harry,” she said softly, “are you – in love with him?”
He sighed. Americans were funny about the whole gay sex thing, but out here in the middle of nowhere, people had more of a live-and-let-live attitude. Still, he wasn’t sure how understanding she’d be.
“I don’t really know. It’s – complicated. I just know that – he saved my life, several times, in fact. I’d like the opportunity to at least tell him thanks. After that, who knows? He may not want me to stay, but if he does…do you think it would create trouble for him around here?"
“Heck, no. I mean, there’s always someone looking down their noses at you, but El Curandero has helped too many people. No one’s going to say anything.” She dropped her cigarette butt on the cement, grinding it out with her foot. “Look, I gotta get back to work. I’ll see you later. Have a good evening.”
“Thanks, Anna. You too.”
He sighed again, taking the last swallow of beer. He really hoped she was right. He didn’t even want to think about Snape refusing to meet with him after he’d come all this way.
He stood up and stretched. It was getting cold now. The weather report predicted lows in the thirties and it seemed it would be right. He pulled the chair back inside his room, then locked the door. It was early, but the stress of the day had tired him out, so he got ready for bed. If he woke up early enough, maybe he could hike the Santa Elena Canyon tomorrow. He’d only seen it from the road and it looked beautiful.
Yawning deeply, he crawled into bed, reached over to the nightstand and turned off the light.
~*~
Harry woke with a start, a hand clamping over his mouth. A small amount of light filtered in around the curtains but not enough for him to see who his attacker was. He tried to struggle, but his attacker fisted his other hand in Harry’s hair, forcing his head back. Harry was trapped under the man’s weight as the man moved on top of him. Harry tried to reach under his pillow, to get to his wand, but then froze when he heard the man’s whispered words in his ear.
“Try and get at that wand, Potter, and I’ll break your neck.”
Bloody hell – it was Snape!
When Snape apparently felt Harry wasn’t going to fight him anymore, he said, “I’m going to take my hand away from your mouth and turn on the light. Don’t even think about calling out for help.”
Harry’s heart was beating fast. He could smell the light scent of cinnamon on the man’s hand, feel the rough calluses on his thumb and fingers as they pressed against his mouth. Then the hand left, and the light came on.
For a long moment, they just stared at each other. Finally, Snape spoke.
“I want to know what the hell you’re playing at, Potter. How did you really find me? I don’t believe any of that drivel you wrote in your letter about using my memories and your blood. I’ve worked hard at establishing a life for myself here, a life that I like, and now I’m going to have to leave it, thanks to you and your meddling.”
Snape’s hand tightened in Harry’s hair, making his eyes start to water with the pain. The hand that had been over Harry’s mouth was now wrapped around his wrist, keeping him pinned to the bed. All the things he’d planned to say to Snape disappeared from his head. He’d only ever seen Snape this angry once before, the night of Dumbledore’s death, when Harry had chased him to the gates of Hogwarts and accused him of being a coward. He’d thought Snape might kill him then, and he thought the same thing now.
“Please, sir – let me explain.”
“There is nothing you have to say to me that I want to hear. Haven’t I sacrificed enough for you? Now, when I’ve finally found some peace, you’re threatening to bring the wizarding world to my doorstep.”
“I’m not!” Harry protested. “No one but Hermione knows I’m here. No one but Hermione cares that I’m here. Things have changed back at home. The war’s been over for fourteen years. People have gone on with their lives. No one’s looking for you anymore – except me.”
Snape didn’t say anything, just continued to stare. Harry became acutely aware of Snape’s weight on him, Snape’s hand at the back of his head, the other gripping his wrist. Without conscious thought, Harry tilted his hips up, his cock hardening as he pressed into Snape’s groin. Snape let out a gasp, then pressed back, and Harry could feel the other man becoming hard too. Their movements became faster, more frantic. Snape took his hand from Harry’s hair and grasped Harry’s other wrist. Now both of Harry’s hands were pinned to the side of his head. He put up a feeble struggle, not because he wanted to get away, but because the feel of Snape’s hands as they tightened to hold him down felt so damn good!
Harry opened his legs and wrapped them around Snape’s back. Snape’s sharp hipbones dug painfully into the tender part of Harry’s inner thighs, but he barely felt it as they continued to rut against each other. Harry could feel his balls drawing up, and with a loud cry, he came hard, the edges of his vision shrinking in on him as the waves of pleasure coursed through his body. From a long way away, he thought he heard Snape groan, felt the man stiffen. Then Snape’s mouth was on his, his tongue pressed to Harry’s lips. Harry opened his mouth, taking Snape’s tongue inside. The kiss was hot and wet, better than he’d ever imagined it could be.
All too soon, Snape broke the kiss, rolled off Harry and onto his back. They both lay there, their arms touching, breathing hard from the exertion. Harry began to feel drowsy, but he didn’t want to fall back to sleep; he was afraid that he’d wake up alone.
Harry turned on his side, propping himself up on an elbow, and looked down at Snape. “This is a beautiful place, so peaceful. There’s something mysterious, spiritual, about it, as if a part of each person who’s ever traveled through here has remained. I would never do anything to jeopardize your future here. I haven’t even told anyone your real name – you’re still El Curandero to them. All I’ve said is that you were my teacher, a long time ago, back in Britain. I may as well have said the moon, as far as they’re concerned. They don’t care where you come from – they only care that you’re here. They need you – I need – ” you, he’d almost said.
There was an uncomfortable silence in the room. Then Snape sighed deeply, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Perhaps – I have misjudged you, Potter. You seemed to have developed an affinity to the land here. I think that being wizards, we are more sensitive to the aura of this place.” He paused. “I am set in my ways. It will not be easy for us to get along, but if you would like to stay with me for the time being, you may. But one thing needs to be clear.”
Harry looked at him warily. “What’s that?”
“This – sex – thing. I didn’t come here with that in mind. I…enjoyed it, but I would not expect it to happen again if you stayed with me.”
Harry frowned. “But what if I wanted it to happen again?”
Snape’s mouth turned up slightly at the edges. Harry supposed that was what passed for a smile. “Then, Mr. Potter, I’m sure we can work something out.”
“I’m curious about something,” Harry began. “How does Señor Roa know when someone makes an offering, so that he can take a message to you?”
“Señor Roa is a wizard. He has wards set in all the churches. They alert him when someone disturbs the area where the offerings are made. He Apparates there, picks up the petition, and then Apparates it to me.
“Now, Potter, I have had a long and stressful day. Apparating so many miles takes its toll. I think we should get some sleep and talk about this more in the morning.”
Harry lay back down on the bed, reached over and turned off the light. He felt Snape’s arm curl around his waist as Snape pressed up against his side. A moment later, Harry was fast asleep.
~ Fin ~
2012-01-06