And here it is.

Chapter 49 – Epilogue

/ /

More than the pain of the blade running him through, Nikos felt the pain of betrayal, as his fingers still weakly clutched at the Sword's hilt, his forehead dipping down to meet them, his death… and his failure.

Because he'd failed. Isis won.

He shut his eyes, tears smarting at the edges of his eyes even as his life blood drenched his clothes and his body, tainting the Sacred Spring's crystal clear water with deep crimson. I'm sorry, Aello. I'm so sorry!

Isis approached Eleni regally, but without her usual cool. Her eyes still glowed that angry serpentine yellow and her teeth showed through her feral sneer.

"You have not been adequate… and I have lost my Ausar," she accused.

Eleni recoiled some, and didn't dare rise from her bow.

"Mistress," she cajoled, "Thanks to me you now possess that which for eons was unattainable… your Ausar can be met in someone other than Osiris, now that you shall rule the cosmos for ever."

"That is correct." Isis smiled in a way that wasn't quite human.

Then, without warning, she touched Eleni on her bowed head. Eleni flinched but didn't dare move.

"Mistress?" she asked.

"Thank you," Isis said. Eleni's shoulders relaxed.

And then, the golden sheaths touching her scalp momentarily glowed, and Eleni let out a chagrinned gurgle and collapsed. Bloody matter and blood oozed from her ears and nose where she lay, dead. Isis laughed as she summoned the Keys again, to restart the process of completing the weapon.

"I need no one now."

Around the Omphalos, the Key of Fire ignited again, and the Key of Earth hovered again, and the Key of Water formed the orb again… but the Key of Wind, the Sword that Isis had used to run Nikos through wouldn't budge from where it had burrowed in the rock, pinning the last of Isis' significant enemies there.

Isis scowled. "What is this! Faciam Tibi!" she invoked again, making the sword shiver, and Nikos groan, but still the Key wouldn't answer the strong summoning spell, wouldn't fly to the Omphalos to complete the weapon.

It was then that Nikos felt it.

It had begun some time now, with a trickle he had no capacity to notice in his distress, of the Spring's water changing course to follow the Sword's blade, and stroke his maimed, dying body. And as Isis and Eleni spoke, more and more of that trickle joined the first, until Nikos felt warm watery hands embrace him snugly, giving him breath, quenching all pain, giving him the chance to finish this.

His weak fingers around the hilt gained strength, and as Isis tried again to summon the sword, he felt them tighten around it securely. He smiled, his head still bent.

"Faciam Tibi!" Isis was ordering again, more angrily, and Nikos chuckled low as he raised his head slowly.

"I think… that Nature doesn't want you to rule it, Isis." He was impressed with his own voice- it didn't sound his, and yet it was. Then he felt his hand pull the Sword out of the stone, and out from through his body with a slow, easy power, and he felt no pain even as more blood gushed from the double wound.

He took a few sure steps, holding the sword, the blade glowing with his blood, to his side as Isis stared in bewildered horror. Nikos wondered what it was she was seeing in him right now, for he was certain it wasn't just him.

Isis backstepped, coiling like a Cobra.

"And yet, I will," she hissed, raising her hands, fingers in a clawing position and sheathes ready to channel her strongest magic.

Nikos just continued to walk towards the half-assembled weapon, as if she was not significant, and his mind screamed at him that he needed to attack first, to summon his wand, to do SOMETHING- but the Sword hummed in his hand, and he just knew he could trust… who?

Isis growled, and unleashed her strongest killing curse, the one that had never failed.

Nikos raised the Sword before him as a shield- it was lightning fast, faster than he had ever moved, but to him it felt languish, relaxed. The curse hit upon the Sword, and with a beautiful note of unavoidable thunder, ricocheted and careened towards Isis, who watched in disbelief.

"It can't BE!"

But it was, and the curse she had hurled, hit her squarely, throwing her on her back as her flesh burned to cinders and her life was finally ripped from the earth, never again to return.

Nikos was left standing there, his devastating wound still bleeding, his eyes still glowing with the powerful light of Nature, Sword in his hand. He stayed that way for a few paces before he walked up to where the half-assembled weapon was.

"What shall I do?" he asked nobody in particular- and yet he received the answer, and he smiled.

With a surefooted stance, he raised the Sword once more, and smashed upon the Omphalos heavily.

There was a tremendous, deafening sound like the crack of a thousand thunders, and the light that permeated the entire School was that of a thousand lightnings. The Sword's blade broke, shattering as Keys flew in every direction, the Omphalos cracked, and the shards smashed against the Sacred Spring's cavewalls.

The weapon to rule all of Nature would never assemble again.

With a sigh, Nikos dropped the Sword. He fell.

And then he saw it.

With his Auguror eyes, everything turned to gold, everything turned to the wonderful threads of the cosmos as the Spring itself disappeared from view together with Isis, and before him the beautiful fabric of nature unfolded, doing him the honour of trusting him with the innermost workings, with the sheer capacity to see what had been, what was, and what would come to pass.

Every equation told him what he needed to know, and he saw. There was no fear anymore, and no worry.

"Uncle, I did it."

He turned around to look upon Rasmus' proud, hopeful eyes and he smiled, pulling him into a hug as the golden equations spun and grew around them.

"So you did. You did great, Rasmus Octavian Snape. You are worthy of both your name and your lineage," he told him warmly, joyfully.

He realized he hadn't felt joy in such a long time, and he laughed, and Rasmus laughed with him. But then Rasmus looked around, and the laughter died on his lips as he realized …

"You'll come back with me, won't you, Uncle?"

"I think I'm done, Rasmus. I want to rest. Don't you think I've earned it?" Nikos smiled.

Rasmus gripped him from his shoulders anxiously.

"But- but don't you want to reap what you have sowed? Don't you want to have a good life, without the Cultists? Without the Curse of the Galanos? With just normal, simple life?" he tried to entice his Uncle. His eyes watered. "…don't you want to be with me?"

"I've seen it, lived it all already," Nikos made a lighthearted, wide gesture with his hand towards all of the golden equations spiraling around them, like a giant galaxy of little galaxies of even smaller galaxies. "And I've been with you every step of your way, always. You will do great things, Rasmus, and I will be there to watch every single one. I already have."

Rasmus hugged him tightly, and Nikos returned the embrace.

"You should go back now."

"Can't… can't I meet my father first?" he asked in a small, quiet voice.

Nikos smiled.

"No. You see, that'll be your motivation. And when you are ready, you will Summon him."

Nikos kissed Rasmus on the forehead, and released him.

/ /

Rasmus opened his eyes, feeling the quiet sobs in his chest.

"He's dead," he whispered. "Uncle's dead."

Erna helped him sit up, looking at him sympathetically.

"Easy now… how can you possibly know that?"

But instead of answering her, Rasmus wiped his eyes with his shaky hand and looked at her.

"Harry? Hermione? Ron?" he asked hoarsely. "At least… are they alive?"

Erna hurried to nod. She pointed at his bedside where there were chocolate frogs, and a card.

"Yes! They left these for you to find when you woke up. Here, see? That's their handwriting." She handed him the card, and Rasmus idly read it.

When we were your age, these were better than medicine. Get well soon!

–Harry, Ron, Hermione

He tried to smile, but he couldn't just yet.

"Harry… was he hurt at all?"

"Yes, but he healed much faster than you," Erna said. "It's been three months already, Rasmus. Some weren't sure you'd ever wake up. But I was sure you would. I'll get you some food. You must be famished."

"No! Please… don't go just yet," Rasmus reached out to grab her forearm, and Erna sat back down at his bedside with a smile.

"You must eat, Rasmus."

"I'll eat the chocolate frogs," the teen said, with a flash of irritability that was very much from his father. "Please tell me… are the Cultists gone?"

"Most of them," Erna nodded. "The minister sent Aurors to round them up… and they put up resistance, but when Isis perished, their magic seemed to diminish a lot. They lost."

Rasmus sighed deeply, leaning back against his pillows. He was so very tired.

"I'll get your food now," Erna said, and got up to go. Rasmus didn't object.

For a little while, there was quiet in the infirmary, and Rasmus shed quiet tears. Then, the quiet was broken by his father's voice:

"Why tears on your day of victory?"

He flinched in his bed, and opened his eyes forlornly to look upon the portrait, now occupied by his father.

"Because I am all alone now."

"There is solace in solitude," Severus smirked. "It is a gift."

"Really, do you think black humour is going to help me now?" Rasmus made a face, glaring at his father's image angrily.

"You are blessed, boy; far more than I or your mother ever were. You accomplished the impossible- made a Snape and a Potter work together."

Rasmus couldn't help smirking some. "I thought you'd say I broke the curse of our bloodline… or sort of defeated Osiris, or something."

Severus smiled silkily.

"Those were feats indeed; but a Snape and a Potter friendship is a miracle." Snape's portrait then seemed to lean forward in challenge as Rasmus was chuckling, and added:

"…and since you did one miracle, there's no reason why you can't perform many, many others. Just set your goals, and get to it."

Rasmus mirrored that challenging expression.

"I'm coming after you next, then."

"You wouldn't be a Snape if you didn't," Severus said proudly, just as Rasmus' food arrived.

And somehow, even though his heart still wept, Rasmus could feel that things would be all right.

The End

And that's that! Finally done, as promised. A humongous story that was supposed to be tiny, now is complete. I hope you enjoyed the ride as much as I did.

*takes a bow*