A Dish Served Cold

A/N - Thanks to Kate for beta-ing it for me


Chapter 5 – Reactions

Hermione walked with Harry and Ron into the Great Hall. After the five-hour marathon in the Headmaster’s office she felt about as energetic as a dead fish. Her emotions had gone through so many permutations that she was now quite numb.

“How are you doing?” Ron whispered under his breath to her.

“How do you think?” She heard such weary resignation in her own voice that she was startled by it. “I will get used to it all,” she assured her two best friends with a little more confidence than she really felt. Looking over at a smirking Draco Malfoy at the next table forcibly reminded her of how much worse it really could be. Flanking him on either side were Crabbe and Goyle, who were watching her with a predatory interest that was wholly unnerving. She shuddered and Malfoy smirked more broadly, apparently convinced of his success already.

“I will kill Malfoy one day, just gut him like a pig.” Harry’s eyes had followed hers to the Slytherin table and his face was bleak, but his tone was mildly conversational as though the subject matter was of no importance. Hermione glanced at him and wondered how he was going to deal with this marriage. Both of the boys depended on her to help them; she was the “brains of the operation”, as Harry liked to say. How would her marriage to Snape change that?

“Get in line,” Ron growled and Hermione felt warmed by their defense at the same time that she was concerned about their tempers. Malfoy had better watch himself around her friends for a while; they were angry and perfectly willing to take it out on him.

The Trio sat down and the rest of the table was watching them, curious as to why they had all been called to the Headmaster’s office. There were no lost House points for Gryffindor, so they hadn’t been in trouble.

The teachers filed in laughing and talking, except for McGonagall, Snape and Dumbledore who all looked a trifle grim. The new adjustment to the Marriage Law had not been reported in the Daily Prophet that morning and Hermione wondered if Fudge had suppressed the information or if the Prophet had had more interesting stories to report on. It was a bitter thought to her, that her future was being relegated to a back page story and she wasn’t sure whether a conspiracy theory was more or less upsetting. At least she could blame Fudge either way.

Professor Dumbledore waited to announce the revision to the Marriage Law until after dinner, probably so that everyone sixteen and over would at least have one meal in them before they lost all appetite. Hermione was picking at her food, hardly able to choke it down. The lovely roast beef and potatoes were an affront to her senses; she would have preferred thin gruel to go with her mood.

Severus ate his potatoes with dire vengeance, pretending they were the heads of his enemies. He bit into his father’s head with particular relish and imagined some of the things he would like to say to the old man if he had the opportunity, preferably while inflicting some Unforgivables on the bastard.

Memories of his excruciating childhood, torn between two bitter factions who both used him with ruthless cruelty to injure each other, warred with the memory of Miss Granger sobbing in the Headmaster’s office. Another generation of Snapes to be warped and twisted by a hundred year old vendetta, he thought with acidic venom. Miss Granger and he would have children who would, no doubt, despise him as much as he despised his own father.

Why his father had thought it would be prudent to marry the daughter of his family’s worst enemy, Severus could never fathom. Had he done it to get vengeance on both families? Had he truly fallen in love? His mother, Severus knew, had loved Taliesin once; she had defied her family and all custom to marry him, leaving her home and everything she was to be with him, but his father? Who knew? Taliesin was an enigma, even to himself.

Severus glanced across the Great Hall, noting absently the clear starry sky that drifted above. Miss Granger was sitting, staring at her plate as though the meal had somehow betrayed her. Severus knew precisely how she felt. He too felt betrayed, but more by his own complacency than by the man he called Father.

The minute the law was drafted, he should have thought of his father, but there were so many Death Eaters with no wives or with sons and daughters of marriageable age that he had become too preoccupied trying to guess their moves. Somehow, he had forgotten his own vulnerability.

Another even more horrifying thought occurred to him. He was getting married. Tradition dictated that the family gathered for weddings, namings and funerals. Merlin protect him, his grandmother would be coming to see him.

That thought alone banished his appetite like a Boggart facing laughter. His mouth went dry and he felt ill. He hadn’t seen the old bat since his mother’s funeral and he had prayed never to be in her presence again. Facing Voldemort with an itchy wand hand was better than the gimlet stare of the old harridan. She was evil incarnate; Lilith herself couldn’t make life more hellish for someone than Grandmother Sarit could.

He looked down at his plate and the roast beef looked back, mocking him. He hated his life, he really did. If he could just make it long enough to watch Voldemort die, preferably in a long and extremely painful manner, he would be content to pass away and leave Miss Granger a relieved widow. He must remember to change his wizarding insurance policy to name her as the beneficiary; it wasn’t as though Albus really needed the money anyway.

Another glance at Miss Granger and their eyes met across the Hall. Her rueful expression matched his own as they studied each other rather warily. He was an intensely solitary person; he valued quiet and order above everything else. The idea of another person moving into his chambers, his room, his bed, unnerved him.

“Before you all retire to your Common Rooms, I have an announcement to make.” Albus rose and looked out over the assembled children who looked back at him with trusting and curious eyes. Severus noted Malfoy’s smug expression and longed to pound it off his face. Insolent little toad, he fumed. “All of you are no doubt aware of the Marriage Law that the Ministry passed this last August.” A murmur rose through the room as students and teachers alike made little noises of assent and interest. “Well, the Ministry has altered the age requirements from eighteen down to sixteen.”

A swelling of noise followed by an eruption of angry denials and panicked chatter as the older students realized that many of them would suddenly have no opportunity to finish school, especially the girls. The childbearing requirements would make schooling near impossible for a sixteen-year-old girl, unless the family that chose her had a great deal of money and loyal house elves, not to mention a willingness to allow her to continue to study. An unlikely event in a pureblood family, at least.

Severus’ glance took in Ginny Weasley; her face had gone pasty white and her brother had put an arm around her to console her. She was an odd sight, such pale skin with the flaming red hair and freckles. He wondered whom she would bid for; there were plenty of half bloods and Muggleborns in Gryffindor to choose from.

His own House had a few shocked faces as well. He noted them carefully, seeing whose parents had “neglected” to warn them. He would compare the list with the members of the inner circle and that would tell him a great deal about the lines of communication within the organization.

“I know this comes as a shock to you all,” Albus continued as the noise died down. “But the school has already begun receiving offers from Heads of Families on behalf of their offspring.” Nicely put, Severus mused, reminds the students that neither party has a choice in the matter. “Due to this change in the law and the actions of several Heads of Family, I have some engagement announcements to make.” Albus paused and looked out over the sea of horrified faces. “Please remember that none of the couples I am about to announce were given the right to refuse these matches.” A grim silence descended over the students and for once, Severus was wholly in accord with their mood.

Albus pulled out a scroll and began to read out a list, with his spectacles perched on his nose. “On behalf of Daphne Greenglass, to Colin Creevey.” The Slytherin table snickered as the bride flushed in shame and the groom simply looked ill. “On behalf of Blaise Zabini, to Lisa Turpin.” Zabini looked surprised and glanced at Miss Granger who was staring at her plate in fixed determination. At the Hufflepuff table Miss Turpin’s friends were patting her in commiseration. “On behalf of Severus Snape, to Hermione Granger.” There was a moment of silence and then the Slytherin table erupted in furious shouts and the Gryffindor table more closely resembled a rioting mob than a group of students.
Malfoy was looking at Severus with an expression of fury and he took great pleasure in simply shrugging at him. He had had no choice in the matter, the shrug said and Malfoy’s mouth snapped shut and his eyes narrowed. Severus could practically see the wheels turning in the boy’s head. It was not as though Severus’ relationship with his father was a secret.

It should only take the blonde idiot an hour or two to figure it out. Thank Merlin that Draco wasn’t Lucius’ intellectual equal, that the boy had been so cowed and beaten by his domineering father that he was practically incapable of independent thought. Severus blessed Lucius’ heavy hand and lack of forethought once more. He wasn’t sure he could have managed manipulating a young Lucius with the ease with which he managed Draco.

“Quiet!” Albus silenced the Hall at last, before it erupted in violence. Through it all, Miss Granger sat like a statue, head bowed and eyes fixed on her still mostly full plate. “Please remember that this law pertains to us all.” That brought the little brats up short, Severus mused grimly. They could any of them be married off at any moment. There was a great deal of shuffling and muttering as the students sat down and several Gryffindors looked at Miss Granger with pity in their eyes. No one looked at Severus Snape, where he sat at the Head Table. No one but Malfoy had even dared.