Snape's Redemption

Disclaimer: Do I look like JKR? Am I bothered? Look at my face! AM. I. BOTHERED.

Chapter Fourteen – What ceremony of words can patch the havoc?

It was Remus, of course, who finally broke her self-imposed exile.

He entered the room she had sequestered herself in cautiously, his sensitive werewolf nose wrinkling at the lingering smell of Hippogriff.

“Hermione?” he questioned softly.

Hermione shifted on the bed, turning her back to him.

“Hermione, we have to talk about this,” Remus continued more forcefully.

“No, we don’t,” she replied emphatically.

“Yes,” he asserted, seating himself on the bed next to her. He flinched when she quickly scooted over to the other side of the bed, as far away from him as possible. “We do.”

With an exasperated snort, Hermione sat up, pushed her hair out of her face, and raised her tear-stained face to his.

“What’s happening between you and Severus?”

Hermione rolled her eyes and shook her head. “As he said, I’m his apprentice.”

“Is that the truth?” Remus frowned at her.

Hermione just looked at him flatly.

“Hermione,” Remus began before stopping to draw in a deep breath. “We know he’s trying to get you pregnant,” he stated.

“Do you?” she replied sceptically. “Or have you just added one and one and come out with forty-two?”

Remus rubbed his forehead in frustration. “Hermione …”

“It’s only you and me, Professor Lupin. You don’t have to keep saying my name,” she snarked, crossing her arms over her chest.

He gazed at her, shocked. Eerily reminiscent of Snape, she raised one eyebrow.

“This isn’t you,” Remus stated quietly.

The eyebrow came down and the rest of her face collapsed. Tears welled in her eyes and she angrily scrubbed her arm across her face.

\"Oh, child,\" he whispered brokenly, opening his arms and wordlessly offering her comfort.

With a shake of her head, Hermione swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood, once more with her back to him. She desperately wanted to go to his embrace and be the child that he still saw her as. But that time had long since passed.

\"Just leave it alone, Professor. Please,\" she begged, her shoulders slumped in despair.

“The others will …” he started

“Then make sure they don’t,” she snapped. “If you really want to help me, just … I don’t know … stop them or something. I can’t …”

“All right,” he soothed her. “But please, you need to come downstairs. It’s dinner time, and you’ve already missed lunch. I’ll go first and … deflect them all. Yes?”

She nodded and he left the room, closing the door softly behind him.

In the corridor, he met the worried gaze of Tonks and Mr Weasley and shook his head resignedly. They both headed downstairs to deliver the story they had previously fabricated, leaving Remus standing guard outside Hermione’s door. Heart sore, he rested his head against the wall, a silent tear dripping from his face to the ground.

~*~*~*~*

Hermione entered the kitchen and slipped quietly into her seat. She was relieved to note that Ginny was absent. Around her, conversation continued, artificially bright and innocuous. She was aware of the sideways glances shot at her from the twins as she hungrily spooned the thick stew into her mouth. Ron and Harry, however, ignored her completely. She turned to the twins.

“Shouldn’t you be in your shop?” she queried.

“Closed down,” Fred answered around a mouthful of food. “Ministry decided our inventions could too easily be used against Aurors.”

“Yeah, they came and took our entire stock,” George interjected grumpily.

“Come on,” asserted Tonks. “You have been compensated!”

Both the boys snorted dismissively. Hermione looked enquiringly at Tonks.

“Jobs developing stuff at the ministry,” she expanded. Then, with a look of intense concentration, her nose changed to the pig snout that used to make Hermione laugh.

Hermione smiled weakly.

“Looks like everybody’s got new jobs,” spat out an irate Ron.

Hermione looked up to find herself subject to irate glares from her best friends.

“Ron!” Molly hissed.

“Yes, Ron,” she replied calmly. “I do have a new job. I’m actually working with someone who appreciates my mind and is interested in expanding my knowledge.”

“I bet that’s not all he’s expanding,” came a snide voice from the doorway.

“Ginny,” replied Hermione, without looking around. “How nice to hear your dulcet tones.”

“You’re even beginning to sound like him,” Ginny ground out.

Hermione ignored her and finished her stew. Then she stood, preparing to leave the room.

“Hermione.”

This time it was Harry. Hermione sighed and raised her eyes to meet his glittering green ones.

“I’m sorry we didn’t listen to you,” he continued.

Hermione’s face registered her shock. Of all the things she expected him to say, that was not it.

“I can’t stand the thought of you working with … him, but you were right; we do need him. It doesn’t mean that I’m not going to kill him when this is all over,” he finished with firm resolve.

Hermione smirked. “Sorry, Harry. I’ve got first dibs on that.”

They looked at each other before dissolving into laughter. Ron’s head swivelled between the two of them in confusion.

“You’re both mental,” he finally proclaimed.

But Hermione didn’t care. It looked like she and the boys had a new troll to fight.

~*~*~*~*

Later that evening, Hermione was curled up on Harry’s bed, thinking, whilst the two boys fidgeted uncomfortably.

“Hermione,” Harry began. “Remus told us when we first found out about the Vow that you might not be able to say anything, but Snape … is he … are you…”

“Do you still have the note that was in the locket?” she interrupted quickly, not wanting to have that particular discussion.

A flash of pain crossed Harry’s face. Wordlessly, he reached towards her but stopped when she flinched away.

“Hermione?” he questioned warily.

“Sorry,” she replied. “Umm … Professor Snape … he put a spell … I don’t know why … but when people touch me … one of his experiments. He must have forgotten to remove it,” she finished confidently.

“You’re a terrible liar, Hermione,” Ron interjected as Harry continued to stare at her. “You can tell us that you stuffed up a spell, you know.”

“Caught,” she replied brightly.

Frowning, Harry reached behind her and rummaged under the pillow she was leaning against, withdrawing the letter and handing it to her. She studied it intently, her eyes widening.

“Harry,” she murmured. “Look at it!”

“I know what it says,” he replied shortly.

“Not what it says,” she huffed. “Look at it!”

Harry looked.

And blinked.

And looked again.

“Holy fuck!” he breathed

“Harry!” Hermione admonished.

“What is it?” Ron questioned impatiently.

“The writing,” Harry swallowed. “It’s Snape’s.”

Ron grabbed it and studied it intently.

“No, it’s not,” he asserted.

“Not his writing now,” Hermione clarified. “From the book.”

“What book?” he asked, his face scrunched up in confusion.

“My … I mean Snape’s potion book,” Harry clarified.

“Bloody hell,” the red-headed wizard breathed.

“But what does it mean then?” Harry queried, raising confused eyes to Hermione.

She chewed on her lower lip.

“I have no idea,” she finally admitted.

~*~*~*~*

To Hermione’s relief, Ginny left the next day to return to Hogwarts. The school had finally reopened, over a month late and with a drastically reduced number of students, but it was at least open. She had heard Ginny protesting loudly at being sent away, but a whispered plea from Harry had finally ensured her departure.

The next three days found Hermione ensconced in the library. Together with Remus, they went through every book on Snape’s list, gathering information on Horcruxes, obscure potions and different forms of mind control and protection. All the information was condensed and simplified before being handed over to Harry.

There was also a full meeting of the Order of the Phoenix to which Hermione was not invited.

She tried not to care, but failed miserably.

~*~*~*~*

For the first time in a very long while (or so it seemed), Hermione let herself relax. Being back at Headquarters, studying, being with her friends made it seem as if the last three weeks had been nothing but a bad dream. With a start, she sat up, the book on her lap tumbling onto the floor. It had only been three weeks, she realised with an emotion akin to horror. How on earth was she going to be able to carry on like this for the rest of her life, bound to Severus Snape? Tears welled up in her eyes as she futilely tried to suppress her sobs. A small battle ensued, but finally Hermione let herself go.

She let herself weep.

She cried for the loss of her future as she had planned it.

She cried for the destruction of the girl she had been.

And she prayed. She prayed to whatever deity was listening for the woman that she was becoming.

Her tears swamped her vision and she was shocked to feel a pair of arms surround her.

“Oh, Mione,” came Ron’s broken whisper. “Let me help you.”

Whether by accident or design, his hand encompassed one of her breasts. Without thinking, Hermione wrenched herself out of his arms, spun around and punched in him the nose.

“OWWWW!” he squealed, hands flying up to his offended appendage. “Whad de fuck you do dat for?”

Hermione looked in horror at the blood seeping out from between his fingers.

“Oh, Ron, I’m so sorry,” she whispered, wiping the tears from her face and reaching out to him.

His eyes widened in fear as she approached him and he lowered his hands to push her away.

“Stay away,” he whimpered. Standing, he backed towards the door. “Lavender was right,” he continued. “Most girls like a grope, but not Hermione the Brain.”

“You talked to Lavender Brown about me?” Hermione asked incredulously.

“Yeah,” Ron retorted, flinging blood off his face and gingerly touching his nose.

“When?” Hermione crossed her arms over her chest.

Ron’s eyes abruptly shifted away from her.

“When, Ronald?” she hissed.

“Last week, when you were with the greasy git,” he replied defiantly.

“And she told you to grope me,” Hermione stated. “Possibly when I was feeling a bit less confident than usual?”

“Yeah,” Ron admitted. “And any normal girl would have liked it too!”

Hermione opened her mouth but stopped. She sat down and rested her head in her hands.

“Ron,” she began. “Just stop, okay? Let’s just … be how we were. You know, at the beginning.”

Silence. Hermione looked up to find Ron gazing down at her, pity in his eyes.

“Hermione,” he said carefully. “We can’t go back, we can only, you know, move forward.”

“There is no forward,” she bit out hoarsely.

They stared at each other. Finally, Ron nodded and, wiping up the trickle of blood that seeped from his nose, left the room.

Hermione sat there, alone.

But her tears were all gone.

*~*~*~*~*

The night before Snape was due to return found Hermione alone again, in the library. She was reading through an obscure text that discussed ways to dissolve the Unbreakable Vow. Although all the author’s experiments had resulted in a gruesome and painful death for the witch or wizard breaking their vow (which was not very helpful to her), he did have success in ensuring that the subject did not return as a ghost to serve their master indefinitely. She took some comfort in that.

When the door opened, she ignored it, assuming it was just Remus coming in to check up on her again. All the adults in the house had periodically looked in on her after her ‘traumatic’ break-up. She heard him riffling through her notes where she was trying to figure out a potion that would increase the ability of a person’s Occlumency skills.

“Why, Miss Granger, it seems you might be learning something from me after all.”

Horrified, she looked up into Snape’s smirking face.

“You’re not meant to be here until tomorrow,” she gasped out.

“I know that, Miss Granger. However, I decided to forgo the welcoming committee the Order had planned.” Severus walked over to the shelves and plucked off a couple of texts, shrinking them and secreting them in his robes.

“What are you talking about?” Hermione’s brow was wrinkled in confusion.

“Ah, my poor little Gryffindor - always kept in the dark,” he sneered. He withdrew his wand and waved it indolently through the air. From upstairs came a loud thumping before a door slammed open. “Come,” he ordered, striding to the door.

Hermione followed him to find a frozen tableau outside in the hall. Remus and Tonks were caught immobile in a passionate kiss.

“What have you done?” she asked resignedly.

Before he could answer, a yowl echoed down the stairs becoming louder and louder. Hermione looked up to see her familiar flying through the air towards her, claws out and madly trying to grasp at anything to stop his flight. She reached out her arms and gathered him into her arms.

“Do not worry, I have only immobilised the occupants of the house for the duration of my visit,” Snape reassured her as he flicked his hair out of his face.

“Lucky I’m not an occupant then,” came a voice from behind them.

Snape swirled, wand at the ready, but it was too late.

~*~*~*~*


A/N Title is from “Conversation Among the Ruins” by Sylvia Plath. Encapsulates Hermione’s emotions IMO. The disclaimer comes from a character on the Catherine Tate show (English comedienne).

Well, I thought you hadn’t had an evil cliffy in awhile, so here you go…..

Enjoy!!

Thanks once again to my tireless betas (in no order at all) – JuneW, Clara Minutes and GinnyW. These lovely people get paid nothing but willing give up their time to check all my work. Any mistakes are due to my stubbornness at not following their advice or to different punctuation rules. For those who are interested – Australian and American punctuation is different. Odd, I know, but true. Snarkyroxy will back me up on that (won’t you Snarky, uh, uh?)

And to JuneW again who pointed out all the faults in my Authors notes after I\'d posted at OWL. Oopps! Too much Vino before dinner *blushes*

And to my reviewers for last chapter:

KatelynXM: Glad you liked the attention - yes, I liked the treatment of Ginny as well!! Sorry there wasn\'t the nagging of Hermione in this chapter - they\'re all treating her with kid gloves (Well, she can be scary when roused). Hope you enjoy the Cliffy!

SteffieSnape: Yeah, Snape\'s too sneaky to live without a wand for long. Makes you wonder where else he hides them ;-) In regards to Snape falling for Hermione, hmmm... remember, Snape works on a different level to everyone!

Killer Kadoogan: Thank you for your lovely review! It\'s so nice to be back, even though there was a donkey that seemed to have my name on it .... Don\'t worry, shagging is on the horizon, and Hermione MIGHT be more resigned to her fate....

I’ve decided that I am quite happy to be bribed with lots of reviews before I post the next chapter (which I might add is done in draft already). Yes, I too have become a review whore. It\'s my only payment....

Toodles