Dear Lily *COMPLETE*

cateye: Severus does need her doesn't he. Poor, sweet guy!

lisa: Minerva is something else. But you will find out what I mean by that. Yes, Hermione is well under Fenrir's paw...

Dee Dee: As for Hermione's rebellious side... that will show, trust me. I've got this story all written.

I want a vote... do you think I should just update the rest of the story, in one go or are you happy with one chapter a day??

Dear Lily

We went back to Grimmauld Place, well, a little back street away's off from it, where we found Lupin crouched in a heartbreaking position, he was shaking and sobbing, and I think retching as well. I caught a pungent smell, sort of sweet and sickly, so he had vomited. Whatever he saw it was not good! Harry went up to him and put an arm on his shoulder in an effort to calm him down. He just shrugged it off.

"Leave me!" he sobbed.

I had transformed by now and he looked at me; his eyes showing for the first time in my acquaintanceship with him, anger and frustration. If fire could come out of eyes I would have been scorched.

"You - you did this! You scum! You deserve to die!"

He lunged forward at me and grabbed my throat! He thrust me against the wall and then he punched me hard on the stomach. He then punched me in the eye! Harry thankfully came in and stopped it just before I became unconscious.

"Calm down, Remus, if you want to punch the living daylights out of him do it at HQ not here where muggles can see us! Come on. Lets go!"

He wrenched him away from me and led him forward and then he turned and looked at me.

"You better wait here for a few minutes whilst we calm him down. Whatever it was he saw it must have been horrific, he's bound to blame you!"

"Sure," I said. "Um, you will fill me in won't you!"

"Definitely," Harry said.

He led Lupin back to Grimmauld Place; I waited here in the shadow of an alleyway. There were a few bins and a lot of rubbish surrounding the bins, I looked into one of them to satisfy curiosity and as I suspected they were all half full.

From the alleyway I saw a few muggles coming and going, and decided to wait until no one was around before I stepped out into the sunlight. I spotted a gang of people across the road from me. An elderly woman was walking down the road, and the gang all moved forward to her, it didn't look friendly. Well, I thought, I can't rescue Hermione at the moment but I can do something for that elderly woman. I vaguely recognised her. The gang surrounded her and there was something menacing about it. I looked at the thoroughfare, and walked towards the gang.

"Problem gentleman?" I asked.

"Get lost freak show! Who do you think you are Dracula?"

"If I was Dracula I would not be seen dead in the sunlight, now as I asked reasonably, is there a problem?"

The woman looked at me. She was shrewdly investigating me.

"Yeah as it 'appens," a leery youth said. "She got money and we aint!"

"Money that is rightly hers!" I exclaimed.

"Who are you?"

"You really don't want to know!" I replied baring my teeth. The gang all looked at me. I gave them my best glare. "Now back away from this charming old woman or I'll beat you up! I am after all more of a challenge for such youth and strength, beating me would be more a test of your manhood, so go on I dare you!"

I put such venom in the last three words the boys looked as if they had tasted poison and ran away before I hit them!

"Well, Severus," the old woman said. I was shocked, she knew my name. As soon as the gang were out of sight she metamorphosed.

"Tonks?" I asked. "What the hell?"

"Not expecting to see me like this were you?"

"No, what happened?"

"Well, as soon as Ream left I felt something go! I woke up to find out what had gone missing and as soon as I was told I thought right I am getting the hell out of here and am going to do some serious damage!"

"Shouldn't you be resting?"

"I am an Auror Severus; we don't have time to rest. Mad Eye has brewed a potion to help me and I am actually feeling as fit as a fiddle."

"Hmm, I'm not so sure!"

"You are as bad as those nurses in Mungo's, Severus," Tonks sighed. "I can't sit idly by whilst the man I love is tackling that monster, and I can't rest anyway knowing what Hermione's going through. So what's the point?"

I shrugged my shoulders and sighed, I tipped my head sideways and admired her for the first time. This woman was strong when the occasion necessitated the need for strength. That was probably the reason that they accepted her in the first place.

"By the way Tonks you forgot something," I said feeling rather cheeky.

"What?"

"You forgot to say Wotcher!"

She just gave me a withering look. She sighed impatiently.

"Well, are you going to come or aren't you?"

I followed. I only realised just this minute how lucky Remus was to have her, and I also finally understood why he loved her.

We both entered Grimmauld Place at the same time and Molly immediately scolded her. I was handed a cup of coffee from Ginny.

"Got anything?" I shouted, a crash happened somewhere and the cow was screaming again. I just wished we could get rid of her for good!

"Uncle Remus is too upset yet to tell us anything at the moment," Ginny said.

"How are you Ginny?" Tonks asked.

"Fine, it's you I'm worried about. How can you just discharge yourself like that Tonks? I mean really!"

"Hermione was not exactly in best of health when she started to help us remember," Tonks said.

I sighed, remembering the scolding I gave her for it. I told her off, saying she needed to rest, and now where is she? How could she ever relax and rest now?

"Okay," Harry said coming out of the Library. "He's all right now."

We all went in the library, Remus saw me walk in and then he came up to me.

"Look, I'm sorry for that attack, it's just that..."

"It was long overdue and much too mild in my opinion anyway," I answered truthfully. "Don't worry about it!"

"You sure I mean you are bleeding," Remus said.

"Not the first time you made me bleed is it Remus?" I asked. Remus looked down shamefacedly, blushing.

"I didn't want to Severus. Sirius, he - well - he wanted to get back at you for you snitching him to Filch about stealing one of the trophies from the cupboard and the fact that you foiled his attempts to frame you for it made him mad!"

"Must have been really mad if he wanted to kill me for it," I said. "And Potter, why did he want to do it?"

"James didn't know about it!"

"All right you two I hate to break up the cosy little chat but we have a friend and fellow Order member to rescue!" Harry exclaimed.

The chat was far from cosy, and I am surprised he didn't pick up on it. Surely he could smell his father’s name especially when I said it.

"Sorry," Remus said. He walked up to the front. I didn't know where to sit. So I stood up, but Flitwick in a strange sense of chivalry offered me his seat, that was nice considering he threatened me only a few hours before.

"All right, Remus. Severus and I can't do anything unless we know Hermione's physical condition."

I fumbled in my pockets and felt something metallic, and slippery. With all the excitement I had completely forgotten, the Horcrux!

"I don't really want to go into details in case, well," he looked at all of us. "She had bruises on her arms and both eyes blackened. Her lip was swollen and she was bleeding from the corner of her mouth. Some of her nails had been ripped off and she had ripped her clothes to use as bandages, she also had clumps of her hair missing." No wonder he attacked me! "But her expression is what frightened me the most, the haunted, dead look in her eyes. Her lights were going out, that spark of intelligence and knowledge was gone. If we don't do something soon she – she – well lets put it this way, she’s no longer that bright woman we knew only a few days ago, she’s been forced to grow up with the most nastiest ways imaginable."

The what? Spark and intelligence gone from those wonderful wide eyes of hers? How could he? How could anyone do that to my sweet Hermione? I stood up holding the Horcrux!

"I have a plan," I said.

"Huh!" said McGonagall. "You're plans have all ended in absolute disaster!" her Scottish accent vibrated distrust with every syllable.

"Let's hear him out, Professor," Luna said. "He already has rescued Hermione once and he can do it again!"

I knew Luna was loony most times but this time she was actually speaking sense, I personally found her Quidditch commentary to be quite refreshing, we can see what is going on, on the pitch, but to add in the shape of a cloud! For some reason I wasn't annoyed by it half as much as Minerva was.

"Thank you, Miss Lovegood," I said giving McGonagall a hard glare. "As I was saying I have an idea and it might just work. This is a Horcrux and something that is precious to You Know Who; he will definitely be wanting this. But he can also through a strong self-assured confidence overlook things sometimes. If we buy a muggle locket and transfigure it to look exactly like this one then maybe we have an advantage."

"You mean play swapsies?" Arthur asked.

"Precisely," I said. "Hermione is precious to us, and this is precious to him. But if he thought he had it we can steal Hermione back again and then we can help Hermione with the Wolfsbane."

"Hormunguous," Weasley Jr said.

"Beg you're pardon young man?" Mrs Figg said.

"Hormunguous," he repeated. "When Lockhart was teaching us he mentioned the Hormunguous charm, something like that, it can change a Werewolf back into a human!"

"Who's Lockhart?" Mrs Figg asked.

"An ex- Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher," Harry answered. "A total prat and an absolute fraud, he never did that Ron!"

"Yeah but someone else did," Weasley Jr said back. "It is not impossible."

"The boy is right," Filius said. "But it's an awfully powerful spell and many times the Werewolf ends up dead. Or you!"

"And we don't want that Ron," Harry said. "We have to accept that Hermione is a Werewolf and therefore we have to live with her condition."

Weasley jr slumped back in his seat.

"There's no harm in trying," he muttered under his breath. I rolled my eyes.

"All right, so we go with Severus unless someone else has a better idea?" Harry asked.

Everyone shook their heads and Harry nodded.

"Right, I will go and buy the locket, and then, Professor McGonagall, would you please transfigure it?"

"Who say's it needs to be a locket?" she asked acidly.

"You Know Who may be stupid when he's excited but he's not that stupid, we need an object that is as close to the real thing as possible," I explained.

She sat back and crossed her arms around her chest and sulked. She was acting very strangely I thought, this wasn't Minerva McGonagall, she wouldn't act like this. After the meeting I walked up to Mad Eye and asked to have a word.

"I don't trust you and that's a fact we need to establish here and now!" He greeted me with.

"You, like me, don't trust your own shadow Mad Eye now listen to me, there is something strange about Minerva, she's not acting the way I thought she would."

"She's a woman, Severus, they never do," he answered.

"No, listen, when I was a boy under her tutelage she was a straight laced no nonsense woman whom I am ashamed to admit I had a bit of a crush on, and when I was her colleague, she never presumed above her position, she was happy being Head of Gryffindor and she would follow instructions especially if it was given by Albus, and I don't see her becoming petulant and sulky because Harry is now the one in command, she knew what and who he was, she knew why we went through all that trash in his fifth year. She is not adding up!"

Mad Eye chewed thoughtfully on his lip before answering.

"Hmm, you might be right," he conceded eventually. "Give me the evening to observe her!"

"Thank you," I said. "The last thing we need is a pseudo McGonagall running around the place."

"Yes," he said.

"About the only thing she did was slap me in the face but then so have other women," I said. "Er! that was humour by the way."

He looked at me sternly and then walked off. Remus walked up to me after and he smiled.

"I think we can finish our conversation now," he said urbanely.

"You said Potter didn't know?"

"He went furious when Sirius told him, Sirius was bursting into laughter and he was hoping James might find it funny too. But James called him an insensitive jerk and ran off to rescue you. Neither James nor Sirius spoke to each other for weeks after that, they made up over the holidays though!"

I sank down on my seat. That Potter would call Black that for putting thought into action and actually trying to kill me was a hard fact to be faced with. I had genuinely thought all this time that James was there finding it funny, laughing about it, and in actual fact he genuinely did care about whether I lived or died and he rescued me because of that care!

What had I done? What had I done! I had accused Harry in front of his face of being exactly like his father meaning the bullying, the proud, the arrogant side to him when it turns out ironically that he is just like his father, meaning the noble, brave, courageous side of him. So ends my revenge! It is now lying in the swamps of regret and has been swallowed by the mire of pride!

So, ends my hatred of James Potter! But, I thought with grim determination, it still goes on with Black.

**************************************************

"Right, Professor, transfigure," Harry said, when he came back a day later.

"Where have you been?" I asked. I had shed the black robe, now I was wearing something as dark but a proper colour. I, too, had been out shopping. Madam Malkin said that a dark rich purple would look just right on me.

"I have been trawling through London to find this damn thing now please I'm tired, hand this over to Professor McGonagall, and ask her nicely to transfigure it please."

As he handed me the muggle locket he inspected me closely.

"Where's the black?" he asked.

"I thought it was about time I went with a different colour," I replied smiling.

"Suits you!" he approved.

I then went to Professor McGonagall and gave her the two lockets.

"Are you in any rush, Severus?" she asked sharply.

"I'd have thought you would have been in a rush to save Hermione," I said back. This was not Minerva at all.

"Fine," she snapped, snatching the lockets out of my hands.

"Left was Horcrux and right the Muggle!"

"I know!" she snapped again. I shrugged and hovered a few feet away from her she did the spell and then handed them back to me. I put the real Horcrux in my left pocket and the pseudo in my right. Somehow the split soul made the object heavier, thus identifying it.

"Right," I said, and then walked away from her. I was snatched by the elbow by Mad Eye.

"I hate to say this but your hunch was not ill founded," he growled. "Yesterday evening when Molly was handing out orange juice she refused, and then I observed her drinking from her own flask and as you say that was not Minerva, when I asked what was going to happen at Hogwarts this year the only reply she could give me was a 'a new defence teacher obviously' and stalked off. The accent is also a little overdone. Someone is trying too hard!"

There were only two candidates I could think off that would pretend to be Minerva, Bellatrix, or her dearest sister Narcissa. Both would not play the part to perfection as Minerva was too opposite them for them to care about getting it right.

"We have to wait for Harry to have a little rest and then we're both going to rescue Hermione," I said.

"I'm coming with you as is Ronald and Ginevra."

"Ginevra?"

"Miss Weasley," Moody said exasperatedly.

"That's her full name?"

Moody nodded.

"Pretty isn’t it. That Potter is a lucky devil, as was his father, oh well luck favours the brave I suppose. Still I don't think married life would have suited me,” he regarded me for a moment before he asked the next question. “Why are you wearing purple?"

"Felt like it," I replied.

Moody shook his head disbelievingly.

Potter had a rest and something good and strong inside his stomach.

"Right, we're going now," he looked at Ginny putting her coat on. "Not you!"

"Two words, Harry," she snapped. "Bat-bogey!"

He glared at her and she buttoned up her coat.

"It's going to be cold," Remus said. He handed me a flask of brandy.

"Good luck everyone!" Arthur exclaimed I sensed he put a muffliato on Molly, as all she was doing as she was watching two of her youngest slip off into the unknown was glare angrily at her husband.

From the corner of my eye I noticed Minerva slip out of the room looking around checking to see if anyone had noticed.

I gulped as I squared my shoulders; this was going to be tough. I saw Tonks and Remus hug each other and as they both waved at me I spotted something glinting on Tonks finger.

I sighed. That little piece of knowledge gave me much more courage, I wasn't sure what I was doing or why at this moment in time, but like with all fleeting moments of doubt the sun shone through and I saw Hermione's face, not only her face but her whole self. I imagined stroking her hair and smelling it. I remembered what it felt like to have her tongue in my mouth, kissing me and exploring me. My tongue tingled at the thought. I steeled myself to do this.

After all Severus, cunning, guile and stab in the back tactics is what you're best at!

Next time Lily. Next time!

Severus

A/N - So, off on another rescue mission. What do you want? The whole story in one go?