A Terrible Temptation

A/N - I am a trifle overwhelmed by the response I am getting here, thank you so much. I can only post as fast as Kate betas so thank Kate for the speed with which she cleans up my sloppy commas.

Thanks also to: Star, ancientgirl, pipers, Diame Niamh, Katty, JennyLynn, April Grey, Ms. Pixie and Zagzagael - you are all total angels.

deblovesdragon - Yes
Zephyr - Draco had better watch himself!
Helen - Get better!
Brian - I post every day, isn\'t that enough? :(
Droxy - The hugging was just killing the poor man.
Debbie - Thanks, the fire and the rose was amazing and its still one of my favorite fanfics. At least, though, Sev won\'t have to deal with gender issues in this one!
Nocturnus - I have teenage friends that I get to observe in their natural habitat (malls) and therefore hormones have not been allowed to drop off my radar. :)
SterllerSnape - :) The Dursley become important again later on, you will all find out what he did, no worries!

Chapter 4 – A New Awareness

Hermione sat in the stands trying to read while looking like she was rooting for the Gryffindor team. It was a blustery day and the wind kept whipping the pages making it a real effort to get some studying done.

“What’s up with Harry today?” Lavender asked her just as she was getting to an interesting bit about deflating draughts.

“He just got out of the Hospital Wing, Lavender.” She replied absently. “Why?” Hermione drew her eyes from the Potions book and watched as Harry zipped by Stewart Ackerly, shoving him to one side as his hands closed around the golden snitch. The crowd erupted in cheers and shouts.

“Well, he just elbowed Stewart, for one thing! That’s not like him at all.” Lavender was frowning. “He used Slytherin tactics all game.” Hermione looked up at the scoreboard as the Gryffindor team crowded around Harry and pounded him on his back in joy. He looked a little startled by their camaraderie, but gave them a rather shy smile as he held up the snitch for the crowd to see.

“He seems okay now.” Hermione shrugged and went back to her book, missing the annoyed look she got from Lavender.


Hermione sat curled up in the Common Room, with a book on her lap. The rest of the Gryffindors were celebrating their victory but she was far too engrossed to notice.

“M – Hermione, what are you reading?” Harry’s voice came from above her and she looked up to see him peering over the back of the chair at her book. When had his eyes become so intense, she wondered, as he read the page she had open. “Oh, ‘Fletcher’s Booke of Potions Most Fyne’!” He exclaimed in obvious interest. “Where did you find a copy? It’s not in the Hogwarts Library.” He clapped a hand over his mouth at Hermione’s look of shock.

“Harry, how do you know about this book?” Hermione had found that Harry had no interest in Potions and after six years of watching him yawning through the class she was stunned he would recognize an obscure book by a renaissance writer.

“Professor Snape has a copy in his office. I got stuck reading it for detention once.” Harry looked at her with those guileless green eyes but she felt as though somehow he was not being truthful with her.

“Then how did you know it wasn’t in the Library?”

“Because I thought you would like it, so I went looking for it and it wasn’t there.” Hermione smiled up at him, suddenly understanding his uneasiness. He had gone to do something nice for her, been unable to and now he found she already had a copy.

“Don’t bother finding Potions books for me Harry; if it can be obtained by a minor, I’ve already got it.” She chuckled at his look of surprise. He sat on the arm of the chair and studied her with a very un-Harry-like intensity that set something to fluttering in her stomach.

“Like what?” He asked with apparently genuine interest. She was so happy to have one of her best friends show interest in something other than Quidditch that she quickly warmed to the topic and began listing off her Potions library to him, ticking off the volumes on her fingers.

“’Moste Potente Potions’, ‘Spillitons’ Grimoire of Arcane Potions’, ‘Nightshade’s Herbal’, ‘Flamel’s Alchemica’, ‘Magical Drafts and Potions’, of course, ‘Jigger’s Advanced Formulas and Drafts’, ‘Potions Making: the Wizard’s Fyne Arte’, ‘Brewing Perfect Potions’, and the book Professor Snape wrote.” She concluded.

“You have a copy of ‘Alchemical Theorems and their Practical Application’?” Harry asked her in surprise. She blinked at him and he flushed again. “Snape made me read through about half his library at one point.” He added hastily. \"He thought that it might make me less of a dunderhead.\"

“Professor Snape.” She corrected automatically.

“What?” He looked startled.

“He’s a Hogwarts professor and you will show him some respect, Harry.” She scolded shaking a finger at him, and to her surprise he smiled at her; it was a tiny thing, more a slight stretching of the lips, but it was definitely a smile.

“Sorry, ‘Mione.” He did his best to look repentant and she laughed at his less than successful results.

Ron meandered over and flopped onto the floor in front of them. Hermione watched his red hair catch the light and woed aed again how it could have fallen apart so badly for them. At least they were still friends, if no longer perhaps as close as they had been last year. When he had taken her to the Halloween Ball last year she had been so happy.

“What were you two gabbing about?” Ron asked casually, interrupting her thoughts, and Harry raised an eyebrow at him, then seemed to change his mind in mid-thought.

“Potions.” He replied and Hermione wondered what he was going to say originally.

“Homework? You’re talking about homework on a day like today? We should go out to the lake or down to the kitchens to get some snacks off of Dobby.” Ron stretched and shot them a look of disgust.

“I think the House Elves have better things to do then to cater to us.” Harry snapped and then winced, as though he was startled by his own words. “I’m sorry, Ron. I’m really tired for some reason.” Ron, who had been looking at his friend with a look of shock nodded at him in understanding.

“It’s been a long day for you, hasn’t it?” Hermione patted him on the arm and felt an electric jolt go through her. Since when had Harry done that to her, she wondered in sudden alarm. Harry turned those eyes on her again, the measuring gaze that seemed familiar and yet alien all at once. The same flutter started up in her stomach and she felt herself flushing under his gaze.

“Yes, a very long day.” He replied. Harry turned the piercing gaze away from her and she felt far calmer, though his very presence beside her on the chair arm was disturbing in a way she had never noticed before.
“If you both would excuse me?” He rose rather awkwardly and gathering his things went upstairs.

“Did Dumbledore tell you what happened in the Owlery?” Ron asked her with his head cocked to one side.

“No, only that Professor Snape had foiled an attack on Harry somehow and he was in a coma because of it.” Hermione replied.

“Well, that crack about the House Elves sounded almost Snape-ish, didn’t it?” Ron asked her, blue eyes narrowed.

“Well, yes, now that you mention it and he was really interested in Potions.” Hermione’s mind began to whirl through a thousand possible scenarios, looking for an explanation.

“Well, do you think Snape used Legilimancy on Harry to save him for some reason and now there is some Snape in Harry?” Ron asked with the kind of innocent brilliance that cut through all her book learning and hit on the most likely truth. Though if it were true, what did that mean for Professor Snape? Would he be all right?

“Ron, you’re brilliant.” Hermione smiled at him and Ron stood and bowed. “Don’t let it go to your head.” She laughed.

“You laugh now, but when I am famous and rich, you’ll see.” It was a joke to Ron, but to Hermione it was the underlying insecurity that had destroyed their relationship.

She watched him head off with Seamus and Dean with a pang of regret. Ron didn’t live in the same present she did; he saw himself as the third person -- after Harry the Hero and Hermione the Brain, he saw himself as Ron, the Sidekick. To Hermione, they were the Trio, each as important as the other, prophecy or no prophecy.

He also didn’t have the same dreams and desires that she had and that, in the end, had really been what killed them. Ron wanted to be rich and famous, to stand out from his brothers, to step out from underneath Harry’s shadow; Hermione just wanted to go to university, find a potions lab somewhere to do research in and well, to be happy. In all the plans Ron had gone on about, he had never talked about happiness or contentment, only wealth and fame. Hermione knew she couldn’t live like that.