Arithmancy for Muggles

Chapter Five: The March of Time

Severus woke suddenly, cold with sweat. He fumbled over the side of the bed for his wand, recalling too late he was not in his own bed and bashing his knuckles against the unfamiliar nightstand. He closed his lips over the soft whimper that escaped. It was odd, Severus thought, that he’d endured Crucio without screaming, but an unexpected bump rarely failed to elicit a reaction. He found his wand and quietly cast a cleaning spell. He hated the itchy feeling of drying sweat.

Dropping his wand to the floor, he lay back. It was still dark. The woman beside him sighed softly in her sleep, illuminated by a faint red light. Seeking the source of this light, Severus saw it came from a series of glowing runes on an object set on the windowsill beside the bed. As he watched, the last rune changed abruptly, silently. Severus blinked, but continued watching. It was a mystery more intriguing than the cracks in the ceiling above the bed, which is what he usually stared at when he woke in the middle of the night and could not sleep.

The runes changed several more times. When he noticed the pattern, he nearly laughed. The red runes were Arabic numerals, but rendered in a blocky, stylized manner so that each number could be outlined in no more than seven straight strokes of red light. Still intrigued, Severus read the current display silently to himself. 05:17. He watched the numbers change incrementally from 05:17 to 05:38 before realizing what they indicated. The device was a clock, counting minutes precisely enough for astrological calculations.

He had no idea that Hermione was interested in astrology. The teaching staff of Hogwarts still remembered her tantrum over Trelawney’s divination class. Sybill was a gifted seer, but a poor teacher, particularly for a mind as hungry as Hermione’s. The girl had not been content with knowing the technique. She had always demanded the theories behind it.

Hermione began to whimper. Turning his attention from the mystery of the astrological clock to the deeper mystery of the woman beside him, Severus examined her features. She gave up her secrets almost as easily as the clock.

Whimpering became moaning. Moaning became words, a name. “Harry!” Hermione tossed her head on the pillow. “Harry! No!”

Severus brushed her face with his hand, tentatively smoothing her brow. The dream would pass. It was the horror one endured waking that scarred so badly.

“Don’t. Don’t!” She whimpered again.

Severus was reminded of those last minutes of the final battle, when Voldemort had nearly won. Ron and Hermione had taken position next to the Boy Who Yet Lived, protecting him from stray hexes. But nobody thought to protect them from Potter. When Voldemort had taken possession of Harry, Ron and Hermione had both been hit by curses.

“Harry, you’re hurting him.” Hermione’s body tensed, her face screwed up and she tossed her head again. “Stupefy! Stupefy!”

Harry had eventually fallen, insensible to the battle raging around them. Severus had not seen the event, but the rumors flew wild around the three heroes for months. Though hundreds of witches and wizards had seen the final conflict, few agreed on what they saw. They only agreed that Harry was suddenly on the ground.

“Damn you, Harry. Don’t do this,” Hermione muttered.on’ton’t make me do this.”

Many believed that was the moment Voldemort had lost, the decaying hulk of his body hitting the ground at the same time, disintegrating as they watched. But some people had seen his red eyes glowing in Harry’s face. Ron had backed away but Hermione had pressed forward, shielding Harry from the crowd.

“Harry!” she pleaded, whimpering again. “Don’t make me do this.”

What few realized until later was that the battle had only moved into Harry’s mind. The great conflict was decided in Harry’s head as two wills fought for dominance over Harry’s brain and body. It was over a few minutes later and Harry the victor. But all anybody had seen was Hermione’s cloak shielding Harry as his body twitched on the ground.

“Crucio!”

Severus gasped as the residue tingle of the powerful word itched along his sensitized nerve endings. The three Gryffindors had refused to speak to the press after the battle, but this much was clear: Voldemort was gone and Harry still lived. Hermione, particularly, had been vague about her contribution to the last conflict, content to push Harry forward as the great hero everyone knew he would become, if he survived the day.

Had Hermione cast an Unforgivable curse on Harry during those last fatal minutes? That would explain her unwillingness to speak. It would explain a great many things. But why?

But maybe her dream was just that, a dream. In dreams we re-write our pasts, for better and for worse. And perhaps Severus was reading too much into a few muttered words. Dreams were not always memories. Just because all of his worst nightmares had a basis in reality, didn’t mean Hermione was similarly tortured. Besides, the girl he knew, the know-it-all of Hogwarts, should have been incapable of casting the Crucio curse.

But the woman in bed beside him was clearly not the know-it-all child she had been. The years had changed her. Growing up had changed her. Last night, she had been quite right to deflect his protestation of love. How could he love her? He hardly knew her. What remained of the girl he had taught? Honestly, he could not know her well enough to love her. Severus loved the dream of a dimly remembered Hermione, a passionate student with a will nearly strong enough to match his own.

His thoughts spun too quickly to catch. As Hermione relaxed into a more peaceful sleep, he listened to the soft snuffle of her breath. Though he might not love her, Severus realized he could learn to love her so easily. Yes, she would break his heart, but she would break it well. They might even remain friends, as she had remained friends with the young Weasley. Severus could visit her after the romance of the forbidden had lost its novelty. They could drink tea and discuss the latest bizarre pronouncements of the Ministry with as much snide irony as they could muster between them. Then, having finished their tea, he would take her hand, salute her knuckles with a chaste kiss and leave again.

Could he leave her?

It was still dark. The red lit clock changed from 05:59 to 06:00. Severus wondered what that meant in real time. The clock in his rooms at Hogwarts changed from “Why are you awake?” to “Go back to sleep!” until it was time for “Get up now!” and “Why are you still in bed?” Hermione rolled away from him, now sleeping peacefully. Severus resented her for it. He was still tired.

Looking out the window, Severus could detect a faint tinge lavender light. Soon the sun would be up and he would have an excuse to wake Hermione, demand sex, demand breakfast, maybe even demand some answers before they returned to their respective lives. But then he’d have to leave with those dark eyes watching him.

Could he leave her?

Maybe it would be easier, Snape thought, to leave now. Hermione was sleeping soundly. He could ease himself out of bed, gather his clothes and find his shoes where she’d placed them on the floor by the foot of the bed. The memory of her words as she took his shoes hit his sternum with a sharp pain. “When you are ready to leave, they’ll be right there fou.” u.” If he acted as his selfish little heart wanted, his shoes would remain where they were.

But better that she resent him for sneaking out (sneaking like a Slytherin, he heard her say in his head) than to overstay his welcome. He wasn’t a stray kneazle who, once fed, refuses to leave. Although, a traitorous thought insisted, Hermione seemed to like kneazles well enough.

He slipped his feet out from under the duvet and encountered icy air. Pulling his legs back under cover, he shivered slightly. Maybe he’d wait just a little longer to make his escape. It was too cold this early. He turned his eyes to the ceiling. The cracks above Hermione’s bed were no more interesting than the cracks above his own.

Severus must have slept. He woke with the sun full on his face and Hermione leaning over him, her bushy hair tickling his shoulder. “Morning, sleepyhead.”

“You’re beautiful.” Her hair like a bramble halo, her eyes still filled with sleep, she was rumpled and appealing. “Come here.” He opened his arms to her. “Teach me those new rules for Exploding Snap you mentioned last night.”

“You mean, Exploding Snape?” She grinned, her hands already on him. “The rules are simple. I win when I make you explode.”

Hermione won. Snape suggested a rematch. They both won.

Flung across him in post-coital languor, Hermione sighed. “What do you want to eat?”

“Again?” Severus sounded slightly aggrieved.

“I meant food for breakfast, sex fiend.” She giggled and slapped his hip lightly. It was all she could reach from this angle.

“Tea is fine. Toast.” His suggestions were reasonable.

Hermione sighed. “I knew I should have gone shopping yesterday.”

Hunger finally propelled them out of bed to rummage in the cupboards. “My mum brought me a bag of things last week, but I haven’t had a chance to do a proper shopping.” Hermione had tea, but no milk or sugar, no bread but an open roll of digestive biscuits.

They made do, sitting on the bed with the teapot on a tray, eating biscuits and getting crumbs in the sheets. At least they hadn’t had to get dressed.

“Severus.” It still felt a bit odd calling him that, but Hermione persisted, luxuriating in the novelty. “When do you have to leave?”

“So eager to be rid of me?”

“Not at all,” she protested. “But I had hoped to do some unpacking today. I was wondering, if you didn’t mind very much, would you stay and keep me company?”

“If that’s the best you can do for entertainment,” he sighed, “I suppose it will have to suffice.”

“I don’t want to use you as a crutch.” She brushed crumbs from her stomach. “The muggle world is as much my home as the magical world. I’ll be fine if you don’t want to stay.”

Severus could hear the insecurity in her normally confident voice. “Yes, you will.”

“But, if you’re here,” she smiled shyly at him, “I could go through my boxes and make sure all the shrinking charms were undone.” Hermione all but fluttered her eyelashes at him. “You’d help me with that, wouldn’t you?”

Snorting, he brushed the crumbs from his side of the bed to hers. “Somehow, I get the feeling that I’ve just been set up.” He did not sound as sour about this as he might. “Shall I set anti-apparitions wards around your apartment while I’m at it?”

Shaking her head, Hermione brushed the crumbck ock onto his side of the bed. “I did that the day I moved in.” Wrapped now in her dressing gown, she took the tray with the cups and teapot back into the kitchen. “You could de-crumb the sheets, though,” she yelled from the other side of the flat.

Severus laughed at himself. Perhaps it was best their relationship had been doomed from the start. He’d be a henpecked husband in no time. He cast a thorough cleaning charm on the bed, fluffed the duvet into place and plumped the pillows before hunting through the room for his clothes.

The astrologic clock competed poorly with sunlight, the illuminated numbers barely visible until a shadow crossed the face, throwing the glowing numbers into sharp relief. 10:34. Tapping on the window startled Severus from his contemplation. An owl perched outside, a message tied to its leg.

Severus opened the window for the owl and untied the message. He offered a digestive biscuit to the messenger. The creature looked offended. “It’s all I had for breakfast,” Snape argued, reading the address on the parchment: Severus Snape, Hermione Granger’s bedroom, followed by the street and number of the flat. Somebody knew where he was.

“Severus?” Hermione saw the owl perched on the headboard. The owl saw Hermione and took off screeching out the open window. “Was it something I said?”

“It didn’t like the digestive biscuits,” Snape quipped absently as he unrolled the parchment. “Someone knows I’m here.”

“Dumbledore, I bet.” She muttered under her breath.

Snape raised his eyes to look at her over the message. “What was that?”

“I said he’s a perverted old man. He was probably watching us this morning.” Hermione’s hair fluffed out around her head, she looked like a very disgruntled lioness. “I hope he got an eyeful.”

“That’s not all he was watching.” Snape rubbed his fingers over the overnight growth of beard. “There’s been a bit of an emergency, and he needs me back at Hogwarts right away.”

Hermione achieved record speeds on the journey from disgruntled to solicitous. “Oh, I hope everyone is well?”

“As do I,” Snape agreed absently. “Where did I put my wand? I don’t have time to shave properly.”

“On top of the clock.” Hermione realized a moment later he should not have understood what she meant. “You know that’s a clock?”

Snape smiled. “We’re old friends, this astrologic clock and I.” He took his wand, depilated and summoned his clothes in two smooth swoops.

“For someone who doesn’t hold with foolish wand waving, you do it quite well.” Hermione stood a bit apart from him, crossing her arms awkwardly over her chest as he cleaned each article of clothing before donning it in precise order: underwear, shirt, socks, trousers, coat.

Tucking his wand back into his sleeve, Severus crossed the divide between them and kissed her. “I have another wand I’d prefer to wave in your direction, but duty calls me away.”

“You’ll have to be outside to apparate,” she reminded him. “I set the wards very strong.”

“The window ledge is wide enough. Nobody will see me from there. I’ll crawl through,” he insisted casually, as if he apparated from window ledges every day. “It’ll be just like the old stories, the lover flees out the window in the nick of time when the jealous husband comes home.”

“I have no husband.” Hermione laughed at his whimsy. “You just like playing spy. Besides, Crookshanks is only jealous of humans that eat his tuna.”

Severus lifted an eyebrow. “I’ll have to remember that.”

“I think I’m going to miss you.”

He nodded. “You will.” He realized the terse reply might have sounded cold. Severus wanted to leave her with warm memories of him. “If it is any consolation, I believe I shall miss you as well.”

Hermione laughed again, though tears stood in her eyes. “If we keep practicing, maybe we’ll hit each other someday.”

It was a bad, stupid joke. He had to kiss her again. Unmoving, sealed together at the lips, they held each other tightly.

Eventually, Hermione pushed him away. “Go. Go now or I’ll drag you back to the bed and chain you there.”

He crawled onto the window ledge in his stocking feet. “I’ll see you again.”

Hermione turned her head to see that his shoes were still on the floor by her bed. When she turned back, Snape was gone.