Trauma Bonding

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/37326733.

Rating: Explicit
Archive Warning: Choose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Category: M/M
Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Relationship: Harry Potter/Severus Snape
Character: Harry Potter, Severus Snape, Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, Neville
Longbottom, Ginny Weasley, Poppy Pomfrey, Minerva McGonagall,
Kingsley Shacklebolt, background oc - Character
Additional Tags: Accidental Bonding, Accidental Marriage, soul bonds, Harry has the
weirdest luck, Severus Snape is So Done, Severus Snape is Bad at
Feelings, Enemies to Lovers, Awkward First Times, Red String of Fate,
Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Harry Potter Epilogue What
Epilogue | EWE, Soul Mates Subverted, Fluff and Humor, Light Angst,
Eventual Smut, Eventual Happy Ending, Severus Snape Lives, Harry is
a Little Shit, Powerful Harry Potter, Not Quite Crack (but gets close at
times)
Stats: Published: 2022-02-23 Updated: 2022-02-24 Chapters: 2/? Words:
1466

Trauma Bonding
by Somn

Summary

Sometimes the best intentions have the worst consequences.

Or...maybe they don't.

 Prologue: Awakening

Harry woke in a very familiar bed that was not his own. He blinked a few times to clear his vision
and looked around – he’d somehow ended up in the Hogwarts Infirmary, though how he’d done it
this time…

“Hey,” Hermione said softly from her seat beside the bed, and he turned to squint up at her. She
gently slipped his glasses onto his nose, and he smiled up at her gratefully.

“Hi,” he replied. He tried to sit up, but his muscles wouldn’t cooperate and he was only able to shift
onto his side to better face her. “Why am I in the hospital wing?”

“Well, you nearly died,” Hermione answered with a small smile that seemed a bit sad. Harry
looked at her in confusion.

“I did die. Then I came back, remember?”

“Yes, but…” She licked her lips, searching his face. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

Harry frowned. “I…was going to the shack even though you said it was a bad idea. But I had to
find his body at least, I couldn’t just – wait.” His eyes widened, panicked. “Shit, Snape! We have to
go back for him, he was still – ”

“Alive, I know.” She patted his arm reassuringly. “I followed you after a few minutes because I
was worried and caught the end of it.”

“The end of…what?”

Hermione pressed her lips together thoughtfully. “I suppose that when you found him and realized
he was still alive… Honestly, I’m not entirely sure what you did,” she admitted. “But Harry, there
was this light surrounding you and I couldn’t get near… It looked a bit like you were literally
giving him your life to save his. It was obviously draining you, at least until you blacked out. When
it was over, Snape was breathing, but you…weren’t.” She glanced away, her face scrunching up as
a flurry of emotions darted across it. When she looked back at him, her eyes were misty.
“Honestly, I don’t want to think about what would have happened to you if I hadn’t followed
because he was still unconscious. We really might have lost you.”

Harry stared at her in shock. “I…I don’t remember any of that, just that I was sure there was a
pulse when I tried to move him. How could…” He swallowed hard, his heart racing. “That…how
is that possible?” He glanced around, trying to peer around her. “But where is he now? Did he
make it? Please tell me the Aurors didn’t take him. They didn’t, did they? Because Hermione, he’s
–”

“He’s here, too. Relax,” she soothed, raising her hand to stroke his hair. “We all heard what you
told Voldemort and so, at least for now, they’re giving him the benefit of the doubt until they have
more answers. But Madam Pomfrey gave me strict instructions to make you drink some water and
take your potions and then let you sleep. Your body still needs to rest and heal – the damage really
was extensive.”

“But – ”

“Just drink,” she insisted, helping him into a sitting position. His muscles protested and burned,
and he felt like he could topple over again at any moment. She helped him lift the water to his lips
and watched carefully as he drank it slowly. “When you wake again later, one of us will most likely
be here,” she murmured. “She’s been letting Ron, Neville, and me sit with you in turns around the
clock.” She paused as she set the empty glass down, looking uncomfortable. “Sometimes Ginny,
too, but she’s having a harder time with…well, everything.”

Harry felt a lot of different things at once – guilt, dread, sorrow, pity, worry…it was too much for
him to sort through just then, because exhaustion was quickly setting in. “Yeah, okay. Okay. We’ll
talk more when I wake up?” Hermione snorted.

“Oh, I don’t think you could escape that.” She grinned and lifted a vial to his mouth. “Here you go
– down it quick, then get some rest.”

He didn’t even have time to register the taste of the potion before he was fast asleep once again.
 Prologue II: The Regrets of the Living

Severus Snape woke to a mild ache in his bones in a terribly familiar bed that wasn’t his own. He
laid there and stared up at the ceiling of the Hogwarts infirmary, unsure what to do, how he’d
gotten there, or how he’d even survived. His prophylactics were designed to slow the spread of
Nagini’s venom, but they could do very little for a gaping throat wound caused by multiple bites.
Were it not for the dull pain throughout his body, he’d conclude this was his version of the
afterlife, but…

Speaking of the afterlife, he wondered if Potter had viewed his memories and carried out the final
task expected of him, or if the mistrust had run too deep and everything had been left to chance
after all. A wave of disgust rolled over him – he’d deliberately sent the boy to his death. That boy,
her son, the one he’d… He closed his eyes as a different kind of pain gripped him. She’d been right
all along. Everything he touched fell to ruin.

He wondered if it had ended yet, and what the world would look like if it had. That he was here
and not rotting in a holding cell in the bowels of the Ministry didn’t bode well for the Light, but he
also hadn’t seen or heard any sign of anyone else at all since waking and so perhaps they were
merely getting their bearings. He wasn’t looking forward to Azkaban, but it would still be a far
better fate than what would await everyone, himself included, if he and Potter had failed.

He carefully dragged himself into a sitting position and examined his surroundings. The wing
appeared deserted…no, almost deserted, he realized when his eyes landed on the perfectly still
figure occupying the bed next to his, faced away. He peered at them closely, taking in as many
details as he could – the bloodstained shirt, the blood and mud-encrusted trainers, the messy black
hair… His blood ran cold. The boy wasn’t moving at all, didn’t even appear to be breathing…

I suppose he did it, then, Severus thought to himself joylessly. A lead weight settled into his
stomach – if the boy’s body was here instead of mangled and on display to serve as an example,
then they must have won; yet nothing about that realization felt like a victory. Not even eighteen.
He didn’t feel sorrow, exactly, but the regret he did feel was crushing.

Voices in the corridor caught his attention and he quickly fell back onto his pillow, feigning sleep
as he listened carefully for any hints of which direction the battle had actually gone.

“I’m telling you he’s going to go spare,” a familiar male voice that he couldn’t quite place was
saying. “There’s no way he would have agreed to something like that.”

“And that’s why we say nothing until Madam Pomfrey says he’s recovered,” a young woman
replied, and the sudden relief Severus felt when he recognized the voice as Granger’s was
incomparable to any he’d experienced before. If the rest of the Golden Trio had survived and
walked freely through the halls of Hogwarts, then Harry Potter must have won the war.

The doors opened and he heard footsteps approaching. It made sense, of course, that they’d want to
spend what little time remained with their fallen comrade before they put him in the ground. Even
if he were anxious to get up and investigate things for himself and their presence prevented that, he
could hardly begrudge them their final goodbyes.

“Old bastard’s still out like a light, looks like,” the voice he now recognized as the youngest
Weasley boy remarked, an undercurrent of disgust lacing his tone. Severus felt his previous good
will evaporate.
“Stop that. You heard what Harry said – they’ve both been through a lot,” Granger admonished
him. “Besides – ”

“You two are so noisy,” a third, far too familiar voice grumbled from the bed beside his. Severus
felt his heart stop, unable to prevent his eyes from flying open in shock. It wasn’t possible; it
couldn’t be…

“Hey hey, if it isn’t the bloke who tried dying twice in one day,” Weasley said far too cheerfully
for someone greeting their dead best friend.

“Succeeded once, too,” came the weak reply, and Severus couldn’t help it, his head turned entirely
of its own volition…

There sat Potter, alive and apparently whole, flanked on either side by his two friends.

Severus had experienced shock before, but it was the first time in his life he’d ever fainted from it.

“Huh. Guess he was awake after all,” Ron muttered, looking over at Snape’s bed.

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