Disclaimer: Harry Potter may not be mine, but I can still have fun with his world.

A.N. The end of what I hope was a great fic for you all to read. It makes me sad since I had so much fun writing this, but it had to end sooner or later. I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did.

My Father

Chapter Twenty Four

Sarai's POV

"I thought for sure we were all done for."

"She's lucky he dove in there at the last second. We wouldn't be here now if he hadn't."

"I can't believe it's finally over. It just seems like it was meant to go on forever."

Voices were whispering around me, but it didn't make any sense to me. All I knew was that I was alive still, and this definitely was not heaven.

I opened my eyes, looking around at the sources of the voices. Draco was next to my head, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were grouped together at the foot of my bed. Lupin, Tonks and Dumbledore were on my other side.

"Ginny?" I asked.

Dumbledore moved aside so I could see the redhead lying in the bed next to mine.

"How are you feeling?" Tonks asked.

"Weird. I don't hurt, but I don't feel right."

I looked around, piecing everything back together again. Voldemort, Lucius, my father. . .

"What the hell happened?" I asked.

Dumbledore drew up a chair next to my bed.

"You were so incredibly lucky to get out of there alive, Sarai, do you know that?"

I nodded. "Who just said it was finally over?"

Lupin raised a hand. "It's all over."

"You don't mean. . .is he. . .gone?"

Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Voldemort finally met his downfall in Harry. Harry got him shortly after Lucius Stunned you. It was, by all means, a sheer stroke of luck for all of us."

I looked down at the end of the bed at Harry. He didn't look as happy as I would have thought him to be for finally ending the Dark Lord.

Cold dread began to gnaw at my insides.

"There's something more, isn't there?"

I looked up at Dumbledore. He looked serious. My brain suddenly registered that there was one person who was not here.

"Wait a second. . .where. . .where's my father?"

Everyone looked away, everyone except Dumbledore.

"He ran in front of you right at the very last second, Sarai. He threw himself in front of you before the Killing Curse got you."

I felt as though I had just been punched in the stomach. "That. . .that was him?"

"Quite the opposite of what I thought he would do. I had little faith left in him at that point. Sarai, Severus jumped in there because he knew that love was far stronger than what Voldemort said. He knew he couldn't live with himself if he allowed Voldemort to kill you. Believe it or not, Severus really did love you, despite what you thought. He gave his life for yours."

"So. . .so he's gone? Just like that, he's gone?"

"I'm afraid so."

It was weird, I didn't feel happy or ecstatic or anything like that. Despite how much I had thought I hated my father, despite him being the stupid bastard that he was, despite everything that he had ever put me through, including being face to face with Voldemort, I realized I didn't hate him. After everything that had ever happened in these past few months, after swearing I would never allow myself to love him, I realized that deep down inside, I really did love him.

My heart clenched with loss for the second time in months.

"Sarai," Draco said, grabbing my hand and squeezing it.

"I'm okay," I whispered, trying really hard not to cry.

"You've suffered far more than most of us here, Sarai. Let it out, you will find that it feels much better to get it out than keeping it inside. I think you will find that Harry might be able to relate to all this. Just don't keep it inside." Dumbledore said, standing up and motioning for Lupin and Tonks to follow him.

Lupin patted me on the arm and Tonks smiled sympathetically at me before following Dumbledore out of the hospital wing.

"You know, I'm really getting sick of this place," I said airily.

"Sarai?" Hermione asked uncertainly.

"Give it time, Hermione, it will catch up to her," Harry said grimly, watching me closely.

I looked all around the place, trying not to focus on any one thing or any one person. I knew if I did, I would lose it. But maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. Hadn't I been through enough to deserve it? I didn't want to keep it all inside anymore, regardless of what I had thought.

"So. . .so he just, ran in there, out of nowhere?" I asked, curious.

Draco nodded. "I thought that was the end. All I saw was the curse headed for you, and I couldn't do anything about it. I couldn't move, I couldn't breathe, I couldn't think. I think the others felt the same way."

Hermione let out a small sob. "It was awful. All I could think was that someone should jump in there, and I actually started to move towards you, but then Snape, he sort of snapped. He was watching, and he wasn't moving, but then, he just sort of came to his senses. I don't think I've ever seen anyone move that fast. It was like he was superhuman, he wasn't there, and then he was."

"And he just took it. There was nothing else to it," Ron said.

"Now I really am alone. And the funny thing is, I don't feel happy about it. All this time, these past couple of months, I just kept wishing that he wasn't around, that he wouldn't keep screwing up my life. I thought I hated him. I was so angry at him for the longest time for messing everything up. And now, now that he's gone, it's like I'd give anything for him to be here with me." I said, letting the tears start to fall.

The others climbed onto the bed with Draco. They all hugged me and did their best to make me feel better.

"Sarai, you will never be alone. Ever. You have us. Whenever there's something wrong, you can come to us. Always. There's no problem we can't fix, right guys?" Draco said.

They all nodded.

"Hey, don't forget about me!" Ginny suddenly called.

Everyone laughed. The tears kept falling, and I knew they would for awhile, but I knew that Draco was right, I wasn't alone. I had him there beside me to catch me when I fell, and I had four caring friends who were there to listen to me when something didn't sit right with me. It would be awhile before I would be able to say I was okay with everything again, but I knew that they would be there beside me through it all.

Madame Pomfrey allowed me and Ginny to leave the hospital wing the next day, since there was nothing really wrong with us. I spent most of my time with the others, not wanting to be on my own. When I was on my own, I cried more often than not, usually right before I went to sleep and when I woke up in the morning.

The week following my father's death seemed almost more difficult to handle than the week after my mother's death. Each morning was a struggle for me. I had to force myself to get out of bed and force myself to face yet another day. Life had never seemed more difficult. I was now parentless, and even though it never really felt like I had a father before he died, now, it was like he was there my whole life and facing life without him was almost too much to bear.

Dumbledore had informed the rest of the school of my father's fate. He begged them not to question me about it, and to just let it be. But nobody seemed to pay him any mind. My third day out of the hospital wing, I hexed the hell out of Pansy Parkinson. She cornered me coming out of the Great Hall that day after I had finished eating dinner. I was headed back down to the common room to finish a bit of homework.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't the filthy half-blood that caused her father's death. What was it like, watching him snuff it right in front of you, Sarai? Did you cry? Did you fall to the Dark Lord's feet and beg him to finish you too?"

I stared at her for a moment, my brain registering what she had just said.

"Whatever, Pansy." I made to walk away from her.

"I don't know if I could live with myself if I caused my father's death. I would find a way to end it myself. Hey, I know a great way for you to end it all, Sarai. All you have to do-"

I never found out what I had to do. All I know is that I had a funny ringing in my ears as I turned around and started hexing the hell out of her, anything that came to mind wound up coming out of my wand. When I finished, she resembled not so much as a slug stuffed into robes.

"The next time you try to get my goat, Parkinson, you might want to think about that decision. Otherwise, you might be the one that ends up dead."

I realized with a start soon after that Christmas was a mere two weeks away. Normally a happy holiday, I knew it would be far from it now that I had no mother or father to celebrate it with. I stewed about it for several days until Ron and Ginny came to me one morning during breakfast to tell me something.

"Look, we know why you've been in a bad mood for the past couple of days. We know it's gonna be hard for you this Christmas, and we don't want you to be on your own. Come with us to the Burrow and celebrate Christmas with us! Harry and Hermione will be there," Ginny explained.

I looked up into her earnest face. Her eyes were pleading with me to say yes.

I looked over at Draco. He looked sullen.

Ron followed my gaze. "Draco, you come too. We can all spend the holiday together."

Draco looked up, hardly believing his ears. "Really? I can come too?"

"The more, the merrier," Ginny said, grinning.

"Okay. I'm in if Sarai's in."

All three of them looked at me expectantly.

"Okay, okay! How could I refuse?"

We left the castle the day the term ended. We took the train back to London. The ride there was quiet, mostly spent looking out the windows at the opaque landscape. Everyone knew what was on my mind. They were the only two people that had really been on my mind these past couple of weeks. Every night before I fell asleep, during my sleep they were what I dreamed, and every morning when I woke up, they were the first ones on my mind.

"You okay?" Draco asked, invading my thoughts.

"I'm getting there. I was just thinking about the conversation Dumbledore and I had the other day."

There had been something that was bugging me, ever since I had left the hospital wing. When I had that vision of Draco being tortured by the Dark Lord, and when I had silently berated my father before he died, and he had understood every word of it, when I had never even spoke aloud. I went to Dumbledore to ask him about it.

He had found it most interesting. "There is a connection between us and the ones we love the most. At times, when they are in danger, or when the emotions are particularly strong, we can get a sense of what they are feeling or what they are going through. My belief is that the love shared by you and Mr. Malfoy is so strong that you were able to see where he was and what was wrong when he was being tortured. As for you berating your father, you had maintained direct eye contact with him, and you felt so strongly at the time that he was able to understand every word you were thinking. There was love forged there, believe it or not. He knew what was going on inside your head, he felt it too."

I had explained it to Draco when he asked how I knew he was at Riddle mansion. He found it astounding.

"Don't beat yourself up over the thing with your father, Sarai. In the end, he made the ultimate sacrifice." Draco said now.

"Oh, I know. I'm coming to terms with it. I know now that he really did love me. I just wish that I was a little nicer and a little more like a daughter."

"He knew deep down that it was there, he just didn't show it. And who knows? Maybe that connection Dumbledore was talking about works when the person is gone," Draco suggested.

I continued to look out the window. Maybe he was right. Maybe there was a connection there between me and my father. Even if it wasn't, I knew that he and my mother would always be right where I could always find them: in my heart.

I look back at everything now and know that I wasn't alone. Draco stood beside me, my friends stood beside me. My father stood beside me, even though it didn't seem like it.

But in the end, I knew, Severus Snape was my father, and he cared deeply about me. He sacrificed himself for me, and in all in all, there was no greater good of the 'cause' than that. Because I knew, no matter what, he was, and always will be. . .

My father.