A Dish Served Cold

A/N - Iseem to have gotten my lungs and my muses back under contol, at least on this sotry. : ) EPu and DB still languish, but I will be building a muse torture chamber and hiring Igor as Chief Muse Torturer, we\'ll see if they do better with ... incentive. Thanks as always to my beta Kate, any mistakes are mine of course. May I say that it is hard to type with a cat in your lap!

Thanks also to my reviewers: Raija, Luice, Spaz, jeanette, deblovesdragon, firestarter and Jana.

singstoangels - Taliesin was named by rather over-optimistic parents.

Mama Wolverine - Here\'s more dear. Thank you so much for the massive ego stroking, I blushed for ten minutes straight.

Droxy - Well, I live in LA and I have noticed that the biggest fish are actually rather nice and easy-going, its the people on te ladder below them that are nasty. Its one of those headology thingies, I guess.

Deb - No, Neville will not be signing anything without reading it again anytime soon. heh heh.

Chapter 10 – Jitters

Hermione sat on the bed and stared at the dress. It was white and had lace and drapey bits. Beads, it had beads too. There was a veil with crystals and silk flowers and there were white silk high heeled shoes that would do nothing to change the height differential between her and her fiancé. It was draped over a mannequin that had been charmed to her proportions. Madam Malkin had done an amazing job on it and it seemed to float there, looking lighter than air.

It was most definitely a wedding dress. You couldn’t really get around that fact. In fact, it was obviously HER wedding dress, designed to nip in at her waist, curve over her hips, and reveal way too much of her décolletage for Hermione’s comfort. A few tasteful silk flowers kept it from being obscene but it was most certainly an adult sort of garment. In her seventeen years, she had never worn anything like it. Now she would be wearing it for Snape.

She curled up in a fetal position on her bed with Bunny Wuffles. The once-pink rabbit was more beige these days, the ears flopped wearily and the fur had been rubbed bald in patches, but Bunny Wuffles had always been there for her. She wondered if Snape would let her sleep with him after tomorrow. After their wedding. Wedding. Small word for a huge transformation of her future. She crushed the stuffed animal to her chest and tried not to hyperventilate.

In less than twenty-four hours she would be losing her virginity to Professor Snape. She tried to imagine him on top of her and her mind skidded sideways away from the image. She had read every book on sex and marriage in the Hogwarts library, including many in the restricted section (you had to love invisibility cloaks and the friends that let you borrow them) and they had all been quite definite about the honeymoon. The rituals of the marriage ceremony culminated in the wedding night. It was a requirement of the rituals. No sex, no real marriage; no real marriage and Malfoy could challenge the legality of the union and all their machinations would be for naught.

She realized suddenly that she was weeping and it surprised her. She thought that she had accepted the situation and that she was prepared to do what she had to. Apparently not. A vision rose in her mind of an ideal she hadn’t known she’d had. Some young man with adoration shining in his eyes, kissing her with surpassing sweetness. She wanted her first time to be with someone she loved and who loved her in return.

But no one loved her.

Hermione wept for hours.

Severus stood in front of the cauldron, carefully adding ingredients and stirring. It was an ancient recipe designed to ease a bridal night and make the experience pain-free but he had never brewed it for his own use before.

He remembered Lily sneaking in to see him before her wedding, asking if he would brew it for her. He recalled their laughter as heked ked and the way her eyes crinkled in humor and good fellowship. Only she and Albus had believed in his reformation. Only she had laughed in his company -- with him, rather than at him. He missed her. He missed having a friend like her. He missed being trusted by someone who had no stake in trusting him.

Minerva was the one who had reminded him about the potion. Maiden’s Ease wasn’t overly difficult but it was rarely made anymore. It was complex and there were other things that did the trick nearly as well. Still, it was the ancient recipes that had the most potency. There was a ritualistic quality that made brewing them an almost sacred act. He watched the liquid glow with a faint opalescence and dropped the maiden’s head bloom in to dissolve.

There was peace in the act of brewing; it soothed the lacerations of his soul. Voldemort hadn’t summoned him. There was no message from Malfoy. His grandmothers had fallen into a coldly silent détente. He could feel the storm building about him but he was unsure as to when it would break. He thought that perhaps he should be grateful for the calm but he was too aware of the fragility of his position to be anything but nervous.

He hated waiting.

Helena stared at the parchment in stunned relief. Neville Richard Longbottom was her salvation, whoever he was, and she was deeply grateful to him. Without pause, but with trembling hands, she picked up a quill and signed her name to the bottom of the bid. Madame Maxine smiled as they watched the document float away and then zoom out the window, headed for the Ministry of Magic. The huge woman was daintily dabbing at her eyes with a scrap of white silk surrounded by a pound of lace and heavily drenched in rosewater.

“It’s a miracle.” Helena breathed out in relief.

“You see that you will have to attend ‘Ogwarts, ma cherie, non?” The Headmistress pointed out gently.

“Yes, I can see that.” After all, she would be living with her husband. Weird thought, but still it meant that she would also be free of her fatherhugehuge smile broke across her face. “I will miss Beauxbatons, Madame, but it is a small price to pay to not be a Malfoy.” Or a Snape, she thought to herself. Longbottom… the name was familiar. Oh yes, the Aurors who were tortured into insanity. Her father had used their fate to illustrate how terrible the Death Eaters were. Well, she could be certain that her new husband wouldn’t be a Death Eater then.

Despite the fact that she was bound to marry a total stranger, Helena felt light and happy.

Neville sat at the table with a cup of very strong tea and wondered what she would look like. The memory of the Snape Boggart in his grandmother’s dress flashed across his mind and he shuddered. It couldn’t be that bad. Nothing could be that bad. Even a mother would drown a baby at birth that looked that bad. Of course, they hadn’t drowned Professor Snape. Bugger.

Professor Dumbledore’s sitting room was comfortable and the tea was excellent but all he could think of was that the lovely scones and cream were by way of a last meal for the condemned. The Headmaster had abandoned him to his Head of House and they had sat in thoughtful silence for some time as he absorbed the information that he was to marry a Snape.

“Are you feeling better, Mr. Longbottom?” Professor McGonagall asked him gently as she poured more tea for herself.

“Yes, ma’am.” Well, he thought, the initial shock is past, but now the horror is setting in. Still, one couldn’t say that to a teacher.

“I remember Helena’s mother you know. I taught her.” The transfiguration teacher said thoughtfully as she leaned back in her chair. “She was a lovely girl, with green eyes and red hair. She was the sweetest creature; no one could understand why she married Taliesin.”

“Taliesin?” He enquired politely.

“Severus’s father. He had been widowed many years by then and Therese was ever so much younger than he was.” Neville found that he had not swallowed since the first word and gulped hastily.

“Are you saying that I am going to be marrying Professor Snape’s sister?” He squeaked.

“Half-sister, but yes dear.” She answered him absently. “The strange thing is I had no idea that they had even had a daughter.” Neville goggled at her; he was going to be Snape’s brother-in-law. Half brother-in-law, was that even a term? “Taliesin was always an odd duck, but not to even tell anyone that he had a child? I wonder if Severus knows?”

Neville heard the words but they didn’t really register. He kept imagining family portraits. Himself, his grandmother and several lean black figures all glaring out at the camera. He could see himself, with towering figures all around him, all with matching sneers and looks of disapproval. His children looked like really short versions of Snape, in the same black robes. He heard a rattling noise and looked down to realize that his teacup was shaking on the saucer.

He was doomed.

Ginny pored over the lists and idly crossed out a few names with a sigh. She had to marry someone of course; it was the law, but she’d be damned if it was going to be a Hufflepuff. There weren’t many Gryffindors that she thought were interesting enough to marry. Slytherins were ineligible of course, and that left either a Ravenclaw or someone from another school.

There were a bunch of students from Beauxbatons on the list and not surprisingly very few from Durmstrang. There were plenty of men far older than she was, but Ginny didn’t want a husband who would see her as a child. She had enough of that at home. She could marry Dennis Creevey of course. He looked like a skinned rabbit but he was sweet and would be relieved to marry another Gryffindor.

She sank her head into her hands and tried not to weep. She was sixteen for Merlin’s sake. She was too young to be making a decision like this. The fact that her parents were allowing her to choose for herself was so much more than Hermione or any of the half-bloods MuggMuggleborns had gotten really. She should be grateful, but instead she was teary-eyed and wishing her parents had decided to be autocratic about this instead.

If they had just made the decision for her, taken it out of her hands, then she could have simply railed against fate if it went badly or be quietly grateful if it went well. This though, this desperate misery of a search was awful. She knew that some young man would be resentful of receiving her bid regardless of what she did. Someone would be unhappy no matter what.

A memory came to her of Tom Riddle and his whispering voice in her head. She remembered a spell that might solve her dilemma. It wasn’t a dark spell that he had taught her; no, it was just old and forgotten. She looked at the bid form and pointed her wand at it steadily, trying to remember the exact phrasing.

“Delectus maritus optimus!” She commanded and a name inscribed itself on the parchment. She had just enough time to feel a tremor of shock and then the parchment was gone, flying away to the Ministry as her official bid.

What had she done?

Sarit stared out the window ignoring her family as a small tight smile twisted her lips. She knew herself to be helpless and it was an unfamiliar and unwelcome experience. She could not prevent this marriage from taking place just as she hadn’t been able to stop Kaleen from marrying Taliesin.

She supposed that she could try and kill the bride at some point but the old man who ran the school had watched her with eyes that gauged and learned. He was too clever to get past and she was too well guarded here.

The Yidoni had existed before Merlin, had flourished before England had had a civilization. They had seen the glory days of Egypt and Babylon and never been cowed, never bent neck to anyone. Pride ran in the blood, Sarit’s grandmother Ruth had always said.

Ruth would never have approved of Sarit’s way of running the family but she was long dead and the world had changed. No longer could the Yidoni walk openly in the world and their powers were too dangerous to allow them to run unchecked. Severus had shown no sign of inheriting the darker abilities but what about his children? Who knew whether they would be born into the family’s full strength? What would Voldemort, that puling half-blood, make of a Yidoni child under his power?

She could not allow any of her bloodline to fall into his hands. She would kill every last member of her bloodline before she would allow that. Yidoni served no master but themselves; it had always been that way and it always would. Even that too-watchful Headmaster could not be trusted. The family cared for the family and controlled the power. She would allow nothing else.

Lucius sighed and shifted on his cot. Waiting was the hardest part of the whole prison business. Admittedly it gave him time, alone and undistracted, with which to plan but it also gave him too much time to see all the ways it could go wrong.

‘The wedding is tomorrow,’ he thought idly. Not his son’s wedding of course. He smirked. Law or no law, no impure bitch would ever carry a Malfoy child. If only he had had a girl, he might still have gotten Potter. Even as a brood mare, a daughter would have been more useful than his idiot son. How did he ever breed so incompetent an heir? No, the Granger girl would be marrying Snape tomorrow and wasn’t that a tasty thought.

He closed his eyes and visualized the cold, bitter, sarcastic man mounting the trembling virgin with all his disdain and disgust evident. It was a vision to make a man happy and warm inside. That would teach the mudblood to meddle in the affairs of her betters. Besides, it wasn’t as if the Snapes could sink any lower. After all, his father had married one of those cursed Yidoni.

The fluttering at the window distracted him from the fantasy of a weeping, blood-soaked Hermione Granger, crawling from her marriage bed to vomit in horror. He reached for the owl’s offering and opened the note with interest.

Mr. Malfoy,
Dumbledore arranged for Miss Snape to wed Mr. Longbottom. New orders?
Trevesco.

Lucius frowned hard at the letter. Now that was unexpected. He had looked forward to watching Draco take the half-blood girl. She would have been useful in so many ways. Still, Longbottom as Snape’s brother-in-law had some humor in it. He could just hear the stream of bitterly precise invective flowing from the other man. No one could curse like Snape, really.

He needed to plan further. He picked up a quill and began to scribble.