Of Days and Ends

Chapter 4—More Trust

Ron happened to be in the kitchen when she apparated in three hours before dinner and dashed to the door shouting, “She’s back! Mum, Professor, Headmistress--”

Hermione was horrified that they were suddenly aware of her return, but pretended to be calm and collected. “What’s all the yelling about?”

The three adults came in and Ron asked, “Where’ve you been?”

“I wanted to get out. I was by myself and feeling cooped up, so I went to go spend some time as a Muggle.” Hermione was building the story as she went along with seamless ease.

“Hermione, you should know better than anyone that going anywhere without letting someone know is dangerous and inconsiderate and--”

“I’m sorry,” Hermione, said, “I just feel so… cramped.”

“I see.” Headmistress McGonagall stated, “I was afraid it would come to this, but we’re going to have to find some system for the three of you.” McGonagall sighed and changed the subject, “I’ll let everyone know we found her.”

Mrs. Weasley seemed almost embarrassed to look at Hermione and quietly asked, “Are you hungry, dear?”

“No, thank you, Mrs. Weasley.”

Ron was looking at her oddly and she mouthed, what? He grabbed her arm near her elbow and steered her around the corner. “Where’d you go?”

She smiled and made him guess. She needed more time to think and his insistence that he didn’t know gave her enough time for a plausible story. “Okay, okay… I went to my old elementary school and asked my old teacher if she would let me help her, so she had me run some copies and take a kid to the bathroom and put together some snacks for lunch.”

“You used magic around all those muggles? Couldn’t someone have seen you?”

“No, I didn’t use any magic at all.”

Ron’s face became intently fixed on her with wonder, “Wow… how long did that take?”

“About an half an hour each.”

Ron was quiet and stared out of the window over Hermione’s shoulder, “Can you take me next time? I mean, you’ll have to watch me and teach me, but I would love to get out of here for more than a couple of minutes to look for a cat.”

“I’m sure Harry would too.”

Ron glanced back towards the dining room, where the Headmistress was drinking her tea and Moody was saying his goodbyes to Mrs. Weasley. “C’mon, Harry and Ginny are back and Harry wants to discuss the next stage for us.”

“How did things go for them?”

Ron shushed her and moved quickly and quietly up the stairs. Hermione followed him into Harry and Ron’s room where Harry was waiting on the bed. “Hey, Hermione, glad to see you back.”

“I went to my old elementary school.”

“Nice…” he seemed distracted and he lifted a book out from under the bed. “Look.”

Hermione moved closer and surveyed the title, Undetected. “What’s it about?”

“A little bit of everything, really.” Harry flipped though a few pages and stopped on a picture of a woman drinking a potion and disappearing. Hermione scanned the instructions and read the warnings. Harry grinned and asked what she thought.

Hermione got to the edge of the page and asked, “Is this a dark arts book?”

Harry glanced at Ron who tried to work a good answer out of the truth. “Well, we found it in the Black library.”

“That’s a yes then.” Hermione sighed and contemplated the leather-bound tomb. When a small voice came from beneath the bed, she jumped back.

Ginny stuck a hand up from beneath the skirt of the bedcovers that hid her from view, and said, “This could be good for us, Hermione.”

“Ginny! What are you--”

“My mother won’t let me come back to the house for a while. She thinks that if I don’t see Harry for a while it will keep me from sleeping with him, I guess. Anyway, like I said, this could be very good for us.”

“This could also be bad for us. Look at the potential dangers! Dragon’s claw, ground Bane root, Merscale, four clockwise stirs—”

Ron persisted, “There’s more, Hermione!”

Hermione snatched the book out of Harry’s hands, and looked over a few more potions with growing horror. “Absolutely not!”

Ginny’s voice floated out from under the bed again, “We don’t need your permission!”

“But you do need my help!”

“Please, Hermio--!” Ron began.

“No,” Ginny pulled herself up from under the bed and interrupted, “we don’t need you, Hermione!”

“Surely, you must be joking!”

“No.”

“Those are complicated potions! If you make a single mistake, you have a poison cloud, or a worthless bowl of soup that shocks the person it touches!”

“There’ll be three of us working on it. I’m sure between the three of us we could brew it properly.” Harry tried to diffuse the tension that had built between the girls.

Hermione took a deep breath, trying to think of a way to avoid insulting them too much. When she gave up and decided to be blunt, she released her breath. “Okay, you all have to realize that… I have read many, many, many books more than what was required for potions classes. Please, believe me when I say that you couldn’t do it without some of the things I picked up from those texts and I wouldn’t dare attempting it without Sn—a potions master.”

Ginny went red with indignation, and Harry touched her hand in a futile attempt to calm her. “I never thought I would ever hear you insult us so… so… I never knew you thought we were stupid.”

“You know I don’t think that. I just… these potions are dangerous, Ginny!”

“But not if you’re there! Huh?”

“Okay, that’s enough! I’ve given you my advice, but you don’t seem to want to take it.” Moving to the door and pulling at her hair angrily, Hermione had only one addition to make, “If I thought I was bright enough, I’d do it in a heartbeat, but the point is that I can’t!” Hermione didn’t wait for any further response, and left quickly. She stood outside the door for only a second before dashing down two flights to the room she and Ginny shared. She paced before finally pulling her satchel from her shoulder and unloading the 8 books she gathered from Snape’s house. Reading over the titles, she realized that Snape had put a book on Occlumency in the stack and opened it slowly.

After getting several techniques from the book, and taking detailed notes, she lay in her bed with the book on her chest. Now, according to the book, she had to be still and allow her mind to go blank. She was confident that it would be easy for her because she often tried to control her dreams the same way. Her experience helped and she found her mind easily thoughtless.

She repeated the process again and again until she found herself waking up several hours later to Harry entering the room. “Hermione,” he didn’t look happy, “Have you seen my invisibility cloak?”

Her eyes widened with realization, “Oh, yeah. I borrowed it while you were gone.”

He scowled and moved to her red satchel, lifting the flap and grabbing the cloak. As he was about to leave, he caught sight of the book on her chest and stepped closer. “Occlumency?”

Hermione held his gaze, “I thought I’d get us started on it, because you know you need to know it.”

“Aww Hermione! No! I hate this stuff!”

“I know, Harry, but--”

“No, not like potions hate. I mean a whole new realm of hate!”

“But Voldemort--!”

“I can handle him a lot better these days!”

“I don’t know, Harry…”

“Trust me, Hermione.” He knelt by her bedside and she propped herself up to meet his eyes.

“Is Ginny--?”

Harry hugged her comfortingly, “we’ve been through so much and she said that she understands where you’re coming from, but she thinks that this is important for our cause.” Hermione started to try to reason again, but Harry stopped her, “Dinner at the Burrow will be on the table soon.”

“I’ll be there,” Hermione answered, “wait for me, okay?” Harry waited and they went to dinner together.

The meal was delicious and everyone was in a cheery mood. The problem for Hermione was a feeling of isolation as Harry, Ron, and Ginny talked about which potion to start on, where to shop for ingredients the next day, the necessary changes to the nearly completed potions lab, and how the potions could be used. Hermione didn’t try to interrupt their conversation, but hurried through her food and snuck out of the house. She apparated to Grimmauld Place , entering and locking the door to her room. Finally she emptied all the books from her satchel onto her bed, and apparated directly to Snape’s library like he suggested.

The house sounded quiet and Hermione moved to the bookshelves, surveying the wall of books in front of her that nearly reached the ceiling with trepidation. Above her the last book that Snape marked was just out of reach of her hand, and she carefully stepped onto the first shelf. When the shelf extended to form a thin step and the shelf above her sprouted a handle, Hermione was startled and grasped the rung above her tightly. She looked up at the book and decided to grab the next two books with it as well. When she stepped down, the step immediately disappeared.

Hermione’s feet touched the floor and she smiled up at the wall of books, in awe of the magic involved. Thinking she was alone, she laughed softly and said, “God, I love magic!”

“You are privileged to have it.”

Hermione whirled around with a gasp, startled just as much by being caught without warning and what she saw. “Professor!”

He dropped to his knees on the carpet in the middle of the room. She ran to his side, used her own meagre body to help him stand, and guided him to the soft carpet in front of the fire. He grunted as he was lain down and allowed himself to slip from consciousness. He knew he was in good hands.

Two hours later, he awoke on his side facing the fire. He wasn’t used to sleeping with his arm under his head, and tried to roll onto his stomach to find that a small foot blocked him. He opened his eyes and surveyed the girl lying opposite the direction of his body. He almost wanted to laugh at her. She seemed to be using one hand and her hair as a pillow, her long, white skirt somehow got tucked into one brown boot, her jaw was slack, her expression relaxed, her blouse rode up just enough to see a hint of her young taut stomach…

She stirred and he continued to watch her. She rolled onto her back and stretched before opening her eyes. She didn’t realize he was watching her, and took that opportunity to survey the detail of the ceiling. He could feel his fingers start to tingle and moved one boot out of his way, chuckling when she gasped and yanked it out of his hand. She watched his amusement with awe and smiled in return.

Moving onto his stomach, he sleepily noticed that the gashes from Voldemort’s whipping curse were nearly gone and mumbled softly to her, too softly for her to hear.

“Did you say something?”

“Huh?” He opened one eye, “Yes. Thank you.”

Hermione beamed, and surveyed his back where the gashes had been deeper. The deepest one didn’t seem to want to bind, but the others were nearly healed. She stood and used her wand to levitate the first book back to its place in the stack of books on the floor. It took so long that as she started on the second book, Snape pulled his wand out and sent them directly to their places with speed.

She turned to grab her satchel, addressing him over his shoulder, “I’m going home now, sir.”

“Severus.”

“Excuse me, sir?”

“Severus. You seem resolute on calling me everything but my given name.”

“I’m sorry… Severus.” She said it with some hesitation and he shook his head and changed the subject.

“When will you be back?”

“I’m not sure. When will you be here?”

“Well, as I’m not employed right now,--”

“I’m sorry, that was stupid of me.”

“--I’ll be here all day.”

She nodded and thought about it, “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

When she finally apparated to Grimmauld Place, she arrived in her room. It was Ginny, to her astonishment, who saw her first. Hermione froze at the site of the young girl. “I thought you were supposed to be at the Burrow.”

“I thought you were supposed to be here.” Ginny was looking curious, angry, and predatory. Hermione remained silent, so Ginny demanded, “Where were you?” Hermione maintained her stony silence, and Ginny narrowed her eyes, “Where were you?”

Hermione searched her brain for an answer, and finally came up with one, but decided to continue this course of action to make it look like a more convincing attitude.

“Fine,” Ginny said confidently, “if you won’t answer that, answer this.” She held up the Occlumency book and gestured towards the rest.

Hermione didn’t have an answer for that, but she tried to deflect the interrogation with a casual roll of her eyes, “I bought those at the beginning of summer.”

“Where? And where were you just now?”

“Neville’s grandmother, and I was in the mountains near Hogsmede.” There, she had managed to explain away everything.

Ginny shook her head, “you had everyone worried, Hermione. I’ve had to check this room at least three times already.”

“I didn’t care. I wanted time alone.”

“What were you doing?”

Hermione paused for effect, “nothing.”

“Seriously, Hermione.”

“Trying those Occlumency techniques.”

Ginny was silent and Hermione sensed that the interrogation was over. “Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that they’re looking for you. I’ll go tell them you’re back and uh…” She hesitated before continuing, “Ron, Harry, and I have decided not to do the potions. At least not yet.”

Hermione smiled, “I’ll have to study up on some of the techniques in that book and I will help you guys out, eventually.”

Ginny smiled and unlocked the door, leaving Hermione to think of the lie she just told with relief. Hopefully the adults would be happy with that information too. For the moment, she was tired, and try as she might to practice her Occlumency without falling asleep, she still found herself slipping until her mind went blank and she found herself waking up in the middle of the night to a soft tapping on the floor by her bed.

Rolling over at 2 o’clock in the morning, she found a shirtless Snape by her bed. He was tapping one foot impatiently and the muscular planes of his chest looked alluring in the moonlight. In one smooth motion, Hermione jumped up with her wand already in her hand, locked the door, turned, and hissed, “What are you doing here?”

“I came for you to finish this ridiculous excuse for mediwitchery you did on my back.” He sneered.

Hermione scowled, “It wouldn’t heal fully. I was just glad the bleeding stopped, and I had to get back here.” She stood and Snape turned away from her. The skin around the scar seemed to shine in the darkened room against the light of the moon. “Does it still hurt? The spell I used should have reduced the pain.”

“It works,” he assured her.

“Good.” Hermione yawned and got to work with her wand pointed at the scar.

Ten minutes later, Hermione sighed, frustrated with the lack of progress and laid her head against his shoulder. “One moment professor I--”

Snape interrupted her “Ms. Granger, I am not your teacher any lo…” he paused and listened to her snores. Hermione had fallen asleep against his back. He tried to lay her in the bed again without disturbing her, but the movement woke her up. She opened her eyes just as he lay her down and found herself within inches of the potions master’s face. At first he froze, his eyes locked on hers, and read every thought of tension there. When suddenly, there was a moment when he couldn’t read anything in her eyes, he sat up fully. “You’ve been studying the book.”

He was obviously impressed, but withheld a smile. When a new emotion began to play across her eyes, she stopped it dead in its tracks. “That’s the first time I’ve tried it and it worked so quickly.”

He shook his head in wonder and mumbled something about a know-it-all before saying, “Well, I actually thought I’d torture you a bit before I show you how to fix it, but I can see you’re too tired to figure it out on your own, so… here.” He bent his arm behind his back flexibly and began the spell, weaving his hand back and forth as though stiching, and Hermione watched in awe as his skin began to pull together. He dropped his hand quickly, “I can never do it for long, but I normally take care of myself.”

Hermione took her wand and prepared to do the spell. When she was ready, she lowered her wand to nearly touch his skin, and said “derma reparo”. Snape sat still as his skin recommenced pulling together, and Hermione admired the lack of reaction to the considerable pain he must be feeling, and were it not for the muscles twitching beneath the newly formed skin, she wouldn’t have known.

When she was finished, she laid the wand aside and asked how he got injured so badly. He turned, stared into her eyes, and that same new emotion flickered there before she cleared her mind again. He was intrigued by her interest and simply said, “The Dark Lord was upset that I had ‘lost’ you.”

He seemed like he was finished, but Hermione pushed him further, “And?”

“And what?”

“Tell me more.”

“I told him some of the secrets I got from your mind and he let me get away with the beating I had.”

Hermione was staring at the bed, “so…so you told him what you found in my mind?”

“Yes.” She nodded with disappointment and he felt the need to clarify, “well, not everything, some things I made seem more significant than they were.”

Hermione nodded her understanding and unsuccessfully tried to stifle a yawn. Snape stood from her bed and finished, “I’ll let you get back to bed.”

“See you soon.”

“Surely.” He disapparated home.