She Said What?

well, let me tell you that i\'m not going to put up one of my typical, goofy disclaimers. no sirree bob. just a plain old one. one without all the frills and funny business. i\'m just gonna come out and say that they aren\'t mine. not a one. i\'m only borrowing so that i can fill my sad and empty, pathetic little life. or rather, the lack of having one. they are all owned by j.k. rowling. she will get them back. some sooner than others. but she\'ll get them back. and let\'s not even talk about the money. i mean, there is none to talk about.

perhaps there\'s smut. perhaps there isn\'t. we\'ll have to see how those two feel about it. i mean... come on. do you really think they want to admit to anyone or themselves that they wanna play more? ok, so maybe they will. you\'ll just have to wait and see.

and ,as always, if you like, please feel free to let me know. a review would be nice. so would that brand new jag they just came out with. i love those cars. oh, sorry. i lost my mind there a moment. never mind.

Chapter Ten: The Morning After
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

\'Yeah, Hermione. Who is he? Who are you shagging?\' Ron asked with deadly intent. Hermione froze, wondering if she could hex her way out of it.

Shite, but she was in such trouble. Unless, that is...

She broke off and let her mind go over the possibilities as rapidly as she could. There was a thought forming, one she believed could work. It would, at the very least, trip the two of them up long enough to allow her to seek the solace of her rooms. She was so very tired and not up to playing twenty questions with the either of them. It was worth a try.

She crossed her arms over her chest, inwardly wincing at how tender her breasts were after having had Severus\' mouth on them. Slipping a mask of indifference over her face, she lifted a brow at the two of them and smirked. \' I didn\'t think you were so interested in my love life. But, if you really must know,\' she heaved what sounded like a long suffering sigh and pressed on. \' I\'ve been with Professor Snape all night long. He and I shagged for hours on end. He\'s absolutely marvelous. The very best I\'ve ever had.\'

\'Snape?\' Ron cried indignantly. \'You\'ve got to be kidding us. No one in their right mind would shag Snape!\'

\'You asked,\' she replied simply. As they continued to stare at her in utter disbelief, she decided to embellish on it as much as she thought she could get away with. \'For the past few hours, ever since I left the celebratory dinner in the Great Hall last evening, I\'ve been ensconced in Severus\' private chambers, fucking my brains out. He has proven to me that older men simply *know* everything there is to know about pleasing a woman. He was amazing. Absolutely amazing. I should think that I\'ve been spoiled off anyone else for the rest of my life. He was so attentive and... hung. He\'s huge, you know. Positively mammoth. I thought he would rip me in twain!\' For their benefits, Hermione made sure to add on a very dreamy sigh at the end of her little speech.

Both Harry and Ron stared at her a moment, then the youngest Weasley male broke out into fits of laughter. His dark-haired friend soon joined him, though Harry kept eyeing Hermione skeptically, as if he\'d never seen her before. One of the still glowing embers popped in the hearth, sending a few sparks up into the air before settling back down. She remained silent and watched them until their mirth finally died off. \'Are you quite finished?\' she asked them.

\'You have to admit that its terribly funny,\' Ron told her, trying to stifle his chuckles.

\' I see nothing humorous about it, Ron,\' she retorted. They both stared at her, took in the look of seriousness on her face, and once more started laughing. She glared at them for a few moments, then snorted in disgust and turned for the stairs. \'Right, then. I\'ve had enough of your juvenile behavior. I\'m off to take a long soak in the tub, then I\'m going to get some much needed sleep. Good night.\'

With that, she turned on her heel and stalked for the stairs. Their ringing laughter followed her up the stone steps and was only blocked out by the heavy wooden door of her rooms closing behind her. Heaving a sigh, Hermione quickly shed her rumpled clothing, leaving them in a heap on the floor to stalk naked into her bathroom. This was one of the times when she was so very glad to have her own bathing chambers. She wouldn\'t want to have to risk explaining to the other girls how she came by the bite marks and bruises that littered her skin.

Turning the knobs in the tub, she set the water and plugged the drain so that she could take a long and luxurious bath. Her muscles ached pleasantly, and she felt the need to relax them before climbing into bed and sinking into exhausted, sated slumber. Moving to the mirror, she stared at her reflection. Her hair was in wild tangles all about her head while her mouth still looked swollen. Her cheeks still held the flush of spent passion in them. But it was her eyes that said the most. Her eyes held a dreamy quality to them that she didn\'t think she\'d ever before seen in them.

Her eyes said it all. The brown of them was smoky with desire and yet full of the need for sleep. Her eyes told the world she\'d just been involved in the best shagging of her life. Her eyes told anyone who cared to look that she was terribly pleased with her husband. She sighed, turning back to the tub. It was full of steaming water and billowing banks of bubbles. \'You look quite content, dear. It looks as if you\'ve had yourself a good shag. Perhaps you should consider making it a regular event. It might help loosen you up,\' the mirror chimed happily.

\'Perhaps,\' Hermione replied noncommitally, hiding her smirk from the mirror. She was in too good a mood to take offense from the silly piece of glass. She stepped into her tub and sank down, allowing the heat of the water to soak into those muscles that were overused and sore. A faint smile drifted across her face as she closed her eyes and thought back on the evening.

It had been completely not what she was expecting from Snape. She\'d figured on being lectured into boredom about what she\'d done to him. She\'d decided that she would likely be given hours upon hours of detention. She\'d expected to snap and snark at him about what he\'d done to her. She had thought that the two of them would be at one another\'s throats all night long because of the games they\'d been playing all week long. She hadn\'t actually expected him to give in and take her to bed. Literally.

It had been a shock to her that they had responded to one another\'s insults. She\'d thought of all sorts of names to call him. She\'d even used some of them in the midst of their rousing bouts of sex. It had seemed to only incite his desires, driving them to a fevered pitch. The only other time she\'d seen him that impassioned about anything had been that time in the Shrieking Shack her third year. To know that he could turn that single minded intensity toward something as pleasant as administering his touch to her body had her giddy with need. What had pushed her further over the edge had been his return jabs. For each insult she\'d heaped upon his head, he\'d returned one. And it had only made her hotter.

The time they spent in his chair behind his desk had been, in her opinion, wild and decadent. She didn\'t think it was like him to engage in acts of physical pleasure in an area that he likely saw as his professional domain. It had been heavenly to have him slide himself into her and encourage her to ride him in the chair. The angle had been one that allowed him to slip deep. Having to keep her legs over the arms was a trial. It stretched her muscles and limited her ability to move easily. Though having his hands at her waist the entire time helped her infinitely.

She\'d been surprised further when he\'d carried her to his private bedchambers after the culmination of their efforts in his office chair. The first time in his bed had been wonderful, an excellent compliment to the chair. But the second and third times had been slow and leisurely. He\'d taken a very long time to rouse her to the highest heights of passion before indulging in her body, using it to find his own release. His hands had been everywhere on her, his fingertips so soft and gentle that she shuddered even now just by recalling their touch. His dark voice had poured over her like the richest of chocolates, making her dizzy with need and crazed for more. She had been, she thought, quite insatiable.

Hermione sighed in peaceful happiness. It had been a very interesting evening. She\'d had her past experiences, had submitted her virginity to a family friend she\'d known nearly all her life. It had been a rather disappointing happening. Nothing short of forgettable with all the fumbling and awkardness, the sharp pain that she\'d felt when he\'d breeched her womanly barrier. But the two of them had given in to a summer fling instead of a one night stand made most memorable by the loss of her virginity. Their trysts had gotten infinitely better over time but they, and the few that followed, were nothing compared to the night of unadulterated passion and lust she\'d just had. With Severus Snape. Her Potions Master. All around bastard. Her husband.

She drifted with her thoughts, soaking leisurely in the tub until the water started to cool. When her skin began to feel the chill, she pulled the plug and stepped from the tub. Drying herself with one of the fluffy red and gold towels hanging over the gilt lion\'s head towel bar, she idly let her mind play over the fight that had started it all. Drifting into her bedroom, she found clean panties and a night shirt, then slipped between the sheets on her not-quite-as-comfortable-as-Snape\'s bed. Closing her eyes, she slipped into blissful exhaustion, vivid dreams of Severus and his talented hands, mouth, tongue, everything coloring her sleep.

~*~*~*~*~

Slipping from the shower, Severus toweled off briskly and strode naked into his bed chambers. His bed was still rumpled and in disarray from his tumbles with Hermione. His sheets needed changing, a plethera of white spots littering the surface of the black silken material. Casually, he retrieved his wand and waved it in the direction of his bed. A softly uttered incantation saw the soiled black sheets stripped and replaced with silvery green cotton ones. Taking a small fraction of time to extinguish the flickering flames of the candles that lit his chambers, he slipped his wand beneath his pillow as he climbed into bed.

He was pleasantly lethargic, his body still thrumming with the exhileration of Hermione\'s body wrapped so eagerly about his. It was quite a wonderful sensation. Knowing that she had welcomed his advances so enthusiastically had been something of a shock to him. But he\'d gotten over his initial surprise quite rapidly and whole-heartedly given himself over to enjoying what she was so blatantly offering. He\'d never expected a student to welcome such attentions from him. He found he was rather impressed with the evening and himself.

When he\'d first spied Hermione walking up the hall alone, all he\'d been able to think of was properly punishing her for her uncharitable behavior toward his person. He\'d admitted, at some point yesterday, when he wasn\'t cursing her for her ingenuity, that he was rather impressed with her ability to pay him back in kind for whatever he did to her. That she\'d been able to find a potion in the school\'s vast library that produced the eternal, infernal erection had been quite an interesting choice after his administering of the slow working lust potion. That she\'d been able to coat his eating utensils with said potion without detection had been worthy of any member Slytherin House. If he\'d been able to, he\'d have awarded Gryffindor points for her cunning.

He wasn\'t sure how he\'d lost control of the talk in his office, but he had. One moment, he\'d been attempting to flay the silly girl alive for attacking her teacher in so cavalier a manner. The next thing he\'d been aware of, their mouths were locked to one another as if in eternal competition. He had to admit that the chit certainly had soft lips and she used them bloody well. Muscles contracted as he recalled just how well she used them. He stifled a groan, feeling his hips arch up into the remembrance of her mouth. Damn, but he already missed her presence next to him.

His mind was awash with the afterglow of sex, with the blinding orgasms she\'d helped him achieve. It had to be the reason why he wasalmost physicaly fighting the urge to stalk to Gryffindor Tower and drag her bodily from her rooms so he could take her again and again. Perhaps this time, he\'d use the wall. He had it in his mind to see what it would take to surprise her and throw her off her Know-It-All pedestal for just a moment or two. Perhaps he should start thinking of unusual places to have sex with Hermione.

A smile curled his lips as he imagined her face if he were to suggest a roll in the grass on the floor of the Forbidden Forest. Then there were the greenhouses. Of course, he\'d have to find some way to get Sprout out of the castle for a few hours. She had the most annoying habit of wandering about the damned things in the middle of the night. But Hermione might be open to the suggestion. He chuckled when he pictured the two of them fucking atop Trelawney\'s classroom table. Maybe they could put their hands all over her crystal ball. The energy from the two of them might go a long way toward making the damned thing work.

He sighed. Tired as he was, his cock was once more rock hard. Thinking upon Hermione seemed to have done it to him. He frowned at that. He certainly didn\'t think that she was attractive. Not in the conventional sense of the word. She had her good points. but she was still bushy-haired and a Know-It- All. He didn\'t think that he was enamored of her. This reaction of his body had to be based upon the fact that he\'d found her abilities in the area of sex to be almost as thoroughly annoying as in every other aspect of her life.

Not that he was saying she was the most experienced woman he\'d ever been with. It was more that she put all of herself into the act. She\'d been open to any suggestion he\'d made. Most of them had been silent, but she hadn\'t argued. And she\'d learned what pleased him quickly enough. Something that was and wasn\'t surprising, given who he was thinking about. It had been refreshing to not have to worry about hurting or pleasing his partner. He\'d known that he was giving her pleasure in spades. And he\'d known that he wasn\'t hurting her. Something told him that she\'d be most vocal if he did.

He thought that perhaps, given the fact that they were married, he might not mind too much having her around. Not that he wanted to actually live as man and wife. But some of the benefits could be worth it. Settling back onto the bed, he pulled the blankets up over his still naked form and closed his eyes. Indeed, there could very likely be some extremely pleasant benefits to this farce of a marriage.

The smile still curled his lips when he drifted off, his cock still standing at attention, waiting silently for someone to come and play with it until it exploded. Unfortunately for his erection, even snarky Potions Masters needed sleep.

~*~*~*~*~

Dumbledore watched with a subdued smile on his face as Severus dragged his chair out from under the staff\'s table to sit. The man looked supremely smug, his face lacking it\'s usual scowl. In fact, he looked almost pleasant. The students were just starting to trickle into the Great Hall, and even they seemed to have noted already that the Potions Master was behaving oddly. Whispers ran up and down the length of all four House tables, the children trying to covertly steal a glance at Snape without alerting him to their curious looks.

Severus filled his plate from the offering on the staff\'s table, ignoring or not deigning to notice the students gaping at him as if he\'d suddenly sprouted white feathered wings. There was a very faint curl to one corner of his lips, though it was hard to see even from where Dumbledore was sitting. But his behavior was odd enough to attract the attention the entire student body seemed willing to devote to him.

Albus turned back to his plate, lifting a forkful of eggs up to his mouth. He noted that Ron and Harry were looked at Severus as if the man had just laughed out loud while sprouting a second head and a pair of wings. He could well imagine what the two of them were thinking, given the strange behavior of not only the Potions Master but their best friend as well. He flicked his gaze to the, as yet, empty seat that normally supported Miss Granger\'s bottom. It was unusual for that one to be late. His smile widened at the implication.

Blue eyes moved to look once more at Severus. Oh, that one was in a good mood if he could ignore the blatant staring and whispering that had so very obviously started the moment he stepped into the Great Hall. A clatter brought Albus\' gaze up to the doors as they swung shut. Hermione was just striding toward her seat in a hurry. Harry and Ron looked over at her, scowling at her with twin expressions as if the two of them were sharing one brain while trying to sort out just what was going on. A chuckle slipped out, bringing the curious gazes of the staff to rest on where the Headmaster sat. He managed a composed look, pretending that he had no idea what the noise had been or where it could have come from.

Hermione took her seat, only a few people staring directly at her. She spoke to Harry and Ron, most likely to apologize for her tardiness. Then she began filling her plate so she could break the fast.

~*~

\'Bloody hell, \'Mione!\' Ron gasped as he watched her put a fifth sausage link on her plate. It was nestled between a mound of scrambled eggs, a stack of pancakes that threatened to topple over, and a miniature mountain of potatoes that had been shredded and crisped for the meal. She doused it all with a good helping of maple syrup, then cut off a bite of the pancakes. \'Are you feeling alright? First you\'re late to breakfast, now you\'re eating more in one meal then you do in three. What\'s up?\'

\'Nothing. I just happen to be hungry,\' she shrugged, then forked a heap of eggs into her mouth. Harry was looking at her, slightly bemused by her behavior. She wasn\'t about to tell them that her night in Snape\'s bed had drained her of all the energy she had, and then some. She had woken up to the chatter of her mirror, who was apparently about to go tell the mirrors in the girl\'s loo about Hermione\'s obvious adventure the night before. She\'d been forced to throw herself from her warm, comfortable bed to threaten the mirror with a breaking hex, then had found she was late and had hurried to get ready and down to the table for the morning meal.

She didn\'t plan on telling her friends about the dreams that had assailed her as she\'d slept. How she\'d woken so hot and horny, she\'s given serious thought to running down to the dungeons to give her husband a proper wake up. But her stomach had over-ruled anything her head could come up with, so she\'d dressed and made her way to the Great Hall and the meal that currently sat heaped upon her plate like a mountain of food at an All-You-Can-Eat buffet.

\' If this is hungry, I don\'t think I want to see you starved,\' Ron shook his head and turned back to his meal, carefully avoiding any further looks at the female next to him as she continued to shovel food into her mouth as rapidly as she could. Harry watched her a moment or two longer, then went back to his own breakfast.

When she thought it was safe, Hermione shot a glance out of the corner of her eyes to the staff\'s table. Severus was paying attention to his meal. She couldn\'t help but notice his hands as he fed himself, how long and elegant his fingers were. How fluid his motions were. He was a large contradiction of many things. He was, to her, quite good looking. While he was not good looking in the classical sense of the word, he was by far not ugly. Everyone else seemed to think he was harsh and severe. She didn\'t see it.

His personality was the part of him that was harsh and severe. And perhaps she enjoyed it more than she should. It was, for the present, the only part of him she really knew. She would have to wait and see if he exposed other parts of himself, or if the persona that he presented to his students was really him. Still, there was more to him than his personality. She liked his sharp wit and his rapid mind. He was terribly intelligent. That much was obvious to anyone who took the time to actually pay attention to him. Not his attitude. She would admit that he was very unfair and prejudiced to anyone not a Slytherin. But she supposed that was to be expected, given the mentality of the members and founder of Slytherin House.

He glanced up, his eyes locking with hers a moment. There was a brief lift of his lips, then his attention returned to his plate and he continued to eat his meal in silence. She looked down to her plate, once more stuffing a forkful of the mess she\'d piled onto it into her mouth. Obviously, he was sitting there recalling just what had happened between them last evening if he was going to gift her with what, for him, could be called a smile. She smiled to herself as she continued to eat.

\'Bloody hell!\' Ron snorted, bringing Hermione\'s head up sharply. She looked at him, his face turned toward the head table. His eyes were wide, his mouth hanging slack. She followed his line of vision and saw Snape glaring at the red-head.

\'Ron?\' Harry asked his best friend, giving only a cursory glance over to Snape before focusing all his attention on the youngest of the Weasley males. Ron turned his head slowly to stare at Harry, an expression of such horror on his face that it had to be something serious. \'What is it?\'

\'S-sss-snape!\' Ron gasped in a whisper. Harry and Hermione waited patiently for him to continue as he stuttered over the next word. \'He.... he was smiling!\'

\'Smiling? Are you certain?\' Harry sounded properly skeptical. Hermione frowned at Ron and went back to his meal.

\'He was smiling. In our direction,\' Ron nodded his head vigorously. Hermione found she had to stifle her desire to laugh, so she lent all her concentration to her food. The pile was rapidly disappearing, and she had caught more than one person staring at her with a kind of disgusted, yet bemused look on their faces. \' I think he\'s planning something!\'

\' I think you might be seeing things, Ron,\' Harry told him, turning back to his plate.

\'Not bloody likely!\' Ron insisted. The two of them launched then into a heated debate over what kind of motives Snape could possibly have. He had to be up to something, according to Ron, as the man never smiled. Hermione couldn\'t very well break in and let either of them know that he was smiling at her. Nor could she simply tell them the reason why. Again. They hadn\'t believed her last night, which she\'d expected. She couldn\'t imagine how they would react when they knew the truth.

The truth! Bugger, she had to tell them. Again. And she had to tell he parents. They still didn\'t know. Now, not only was she a married woman, but she was a married woman with carnal knowledge of her husband. And her parents didn\'t know. Damn, she didn\'t think she wanted to tell them anything. She\'d mentioned Snape to them once or twice over her summer hols, and what she\'d told them hadn\'t given them a terribly good impression of the man. Oh, they knew he was an excellent teacher and he had high standards. But as far as Severus Snape, the person, they thought he wasn\'t much above worm shite.

She paled, her appetite suddenly gone. Damn, but she did not want to have to be the one to sit down and tell her mother that she was married to the meanest, snarkiest man in Hogwarts. Standing, she moved away from the table. \'Where are you going, \'Mione?\' Harry asked her.

\' I just remembered I have some studying to do in the library,\' she told her friend. Before he could say anything else, she hurried down the aisle to the doors. Harry stared after her, watching her slip through the great wooden panels before turning his head and glancing back at the staff\'s table. Snape was avidly watching her go, a faint grin on his face that Harry thought might be calculating without any of the nastiness that the man was known for.

Turning back to his plate, Harry let his mind wander over the last week. It had all started with that rumor. Since then, Hermione and Snape both had been acting oddly. Almost as if they\'d been cursed or something. Not that he knew much about Snape beyond the classroom, but he did know Hermione. And she had been completely out of sorts lately. He\'d even noticed her concentration slipping in class more than once. That was so not like her. She was the most studious and consciencious student he knew. She took learning, and her grades, very seriously. Her behavior over the last seven days had been so unusual that there just had to be something going on.

Last night had been the capper to the entire week. She\'d straggled in late, thoroughly mussed, and looking guilty as hell. And the story she\'d told. What if it hadn\'t been a story at all? What if she had been with Snape all night the previous evening? Frowning, Harry cast a glance back up to the chair where the Potions Master sat. When the dark man noticed his look, he scowled sharply at Harry and went back to his plate. The young Gryffindor\'s mind whirled with the gathered information. He was now more than certain that something was going on at Hogwarts. Severus Snape was in serious trouble for it, too.

Severus Snape had used magic to secure the willingness of one of his best friends so that she would sleep with him.

~*~

Severus watched Hermione hurry from the Hall, then caught the Potter git staring at him rather unhappily. The boy was looking at him as if he knew that Severus was evil incarnate. He scowled back and returned once more to his meal. Sod what Potter thought, anyway. Whatever happened between himself and Granger was none of the boy\'s business unless either of them made it such. And he was sure the halfwit suspected something. Potter wasn\'t actually stupid. Not by any means. He\'d likely seen something unusual in his friend and had deduced that it had to do with Snape, himself.

Which brought his brain to a screeching halt.

So far as Severus was aware, the Headmaster and Minerva were the only other two people, besides himself and Hermione, in the entire school he knew what had happened the previous weekend. Which meant that, once school let out, anyone could be told of the ceremony. Including her two idiot friends. He sneered at the thought of trying to tell those two anything that didn\'t involve getting into trouble or Quidditch. And it was a certainty that she would tell them.

Damn it to the seven levels of hell, he did not want to face those two down after they\'d been informed that their perfect Gryffindor girlfriend was his wife.

~*~*~*~*~

\'Well, old man. You look quite pleased with yourself,\' Minerva McGonagall glowered at Albus as she sat in a chair opposite him in his sitting room. He offered her a serene smile that didn\'t fool her one bit. She knew how his scheming mind worked.

\' It seems that my idea wasn\'t as far-fetched as some have been inclined to believe,\' he gave her a knowing glance over the tops of her half-moon glasses. She snorted and poured herself a cup of tea. \'Lemon sherbert?\' he asked her.

\'No, thank you. I still cannot believe that you\'ve done this to her, Albus. What has she done to deserve being saddled with that old snark?\' she asked him. \'And don\'t get me wrong. Severus is a colleague and a friend. In as much as he\'ll let any of us be friends with him. I think he\'s entitled to as much happiness as anyone else.\'

\'Then let him find it with Miss Granger,\' Dumbledore interrupted before she could continue with her tirade. She narrowed her eyes on him and glared, her lips pursed together so tightly that it looked as if she\'d been sucking lemons for days.

\'But why?\'

\'The tea leaves never lie,\' he told her cryptically, then reached for the lemony confection and popped one in his mouth.

\' I don\'t understand this, Albus. The school laws say...\' she began, but he held up a hand.

\'Yes, I know well enough what the school laws say. But Miss Granger will no longer be a student in a few short weeks. I think we can keep this under my hat, as it were, until then.\'

Minerva huffed softly, glaring at him soundly for a few moments before heaving a sigh and trying a change of tactics. Her look softened, to be replaced with one that could be called affection. He knew she was going to go down a different path to see if she could get what she wanted. \'Then why not tell them what is going on? Neither one of them knows.\'

\'They have to discover it for themselves, Minerva. I could tell them, but I highly doubt either one of them would believe me,\' Albus smiled at her knowingly. \'And, before you say another word, let me tell you that I cannot undo this thing now. It is out of my hands.\'

\'What do you mean by that?\' she demanded sharply, not at all comfortable with the look in his eyes.

\'The two of them spent the night with one another last night,\' he told her calmly, chuckling when bright red color suffused her face. She was as mad as a wet cat, and it took all he could do to keep from laughing in her face.

\'She will not engage in that kind of behavior while in my House!\' Minerva snapped loudly.

\'She is not engaging in any behavior that a married woman would not engage in. Don\'t get your knickers in a twist, Minerva. Simply trust me,\' he instructed, chortling softly behind one hand. \'This will come out right. For both of them. I promise you.\'

\'Famous last words, Albus!\' she growled at him, then practically threw herself from the chair and stalked from the room. When the door slammed shut behind her, setting his knick-knacks to clattering on their shelves, he gave in to his laughter. It took him some fifteen minutes to calm himself, tears slipping down his face.

When he could speak with out once again breaking into rolling laughter, he looked at Fawkes and smiled knowingly. \'The circle is now complete, my friend. We simply need to sit back and await the storm that will break lose when those two wake up and realize just what is going on.\'

The pheonix\'s soft trill was Dumbledore\'s only answer as he stared into the fire, his mind playing over all of the interesting little twists and turns that could be taken in the lives of his Potions Master and the man\'s Know-It-All wife over the course of just the next few weeks.

Albus couldn\'t help the smile that spread his lips when he thought about the hell that Severus would soon be going through. Hermione Granger Snape was going to be a handful as a wife.

end chapter 10.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

as always, thanks go to my small group of loyal readers who are constantly telling me how good i am at this. even when i don\'t think i am and they know i\'m not going to listen to them anyway. thye know who they are, and they can\'t know how much i really appreciate them. especially lately.

once again, i\'ve beta\'d myself, so any mistakes are all my own. they are purely unintentional. mostly my fingers moving too fast when i type or my eyes missing the most obvious, so please forgive any errors you find. i\'ll go back and correct them later. i swear.

and, in keeping with the norm, if you find that you like this, please feel free to let me know. reviews are always appreciated and i thank everyone of you. with that said... on to those thank you\'s....

to Pearle: i am so glad you like both this and Bound in Leather. i love that story, too. i\'m going to have to see about having someone do a drawing for me of Snape on stage in leather. oh boy... where\'s my drool bucket? as for borrowing Severus... you\'ll have to wait until i\'m done with him. and that should be in about.... oh.... twenty thousand years. and everyone says i write good smut. thanks. really.

to SeverusSnape: what do you think of how she handled that? i thought it was funny myself. though i\'m sure they\'re going to be less than thrilled when they find out that she wasn\'t joking. and i\'m glad your mouth is better.

to Red: HOT! HOT! HOT!? well, ok. if you say so. if i could have put it off longer, trust me. i would have. i\'m evil, don\'t you know? i\'m glad you, and your muse, were taken with the chapter. surprisingly, that one was and wasn\'t hard to write. i had to really think on how it would happen. but rest assured.... more smut will be forthcoming!

to Amber: what did you think of that? was that good, or what? it pays to tell the truth. i see that now...

to Talene:a wonderful tale? why thank you. *blushes profusely* i\'m so glad you\'re enjoying it. i\'m certainly going to see it through to the end. or at least, to a plausible end. we\'ll both see what happens together.

to Velvetina: yes, i\'m alive. sit down before you hurt yourself, please. don\'t make such a fuss. yes, Snape did make a joke. a very rude joke. i understand what you\'re saying about him. he\'s canon with his snarky attitude and all, but he knows when to loosen up and have a little fun when the need arises. sort of. now am i making any sense? at any rate, i\'m glad you liked it. thank you so much for reading.

to JustJeanette: i\'m glad you liked it. and you\'re right, she\'s not in trouble. as far as Harry being turned into a newt (a newt!? i got better), i think Hermione would do it before she\'d let Severus. either way, the boy would be in big trouble, wouldn\'t he?

to Jul: yes, i did keep you hanging. and you kept coming back for it, didn\'t you? *smirks* yes, i am evil. and i\'m very glad you\'re enjoying this!

to mariteri: great writing? thanks. *blushes* and an evaporated Pepsi? i didn\'t think i was that good. as for air conditioning.... *sends a Japanese fan her way* there ya go! fan away. *snerks*

to elementaldeity: um, yes. it was explosive... for the both of them.... *grins* sorry, couldn\'t help it. i\'m so glad that you are enjoying this.

to tomboygirl432: thank you for the compliment. and yes, it probably is unbelievable that the Ministry would do such a thing. but then there would be no story, would there? i hope you keep reading.

to spaz141: no, thank you.

to Fury:well written and stimulating. hmmmm, i\'m sensing a theme here. wonder if i should do this professionally. for money, i mean. as for what the Headmaster has going on... you\'ll find out. eventually.

to Leila5: DUDE!!!! i loved those commercials! no need to be embarrassed by the email! i love it! and thanks for the compliments. they mean alot to me. i\'m glad you are enjoying this story. i\'m having fun writing it!

to Laurie: thanks so much. i\'m glad you like.

to Shiro Ryu: i\'m glad you like it and i\'m glad that you\'re enjoying it. i hope you keep reading!