THE LUCRATIVE REVENGE OF SEVERUS SNAPE

Chapter One: An Unpleasant Homecoming

Author's Note: Here's my take on that old chestnut we all know and love, Hermione's apprenticeship at Hogwarts with Snape. This is a valentine to my fans, thanks so much for supporting my other story, Harry Potter and the Naked Lunch For Two! :)

Hermione Grainger looked at her new quarters with justifiable dismay.

The house elf who had brought in her trunk broke the awkward silence, wringing his little hands.

"Blinky hopes there is some mistake. I will find Treacher."

"I'm sure it's not your fault." Hermione soothed the little creature, as he rapidly dis-apparated.

She looked around and the cold, empty chamber. There were still housings on the wall with chains hanging from them. Long ago, someone had hung from them.

Or perhaps not so long ago, if those rumours she'd heard in 7th Year about Professor Crich had been true.

The room was dark, mouldy, cold and damp, in addition to having once been a torture chamber. The walls were alive with mould and slime, and though it was a warm day in August, Hermione felt an uncomfortable chill.

There was nowhere else to sit down, so she sat on her trunk.

"I can't believe this shit! I can't believe this is all I get! After everything I did during the war. Before the war! All those years as Snape's student apprentice? How many times did we stand shoulder to shoulder over a bubbling cauldron? Or sit up in the library, far into the night? How many battles did we fight? How may times did I help put him back together after he was wounded, or tortured?Who had to put up with black moods, his lies, his sarcasm, and above all, his endless capacity to be cold and distant? Who sat up all night, countless times, watching him chain smoke and listening to him rave about his tortured childhood, the ravages of his addictions and his lot in life? Who remembered his birthday, and his Chrimble? Who was the only witch besides Lily Potter who ever really gave a damn if he lived or died. Me. If he did this to me, that greasy, wicked old bastard, I'll kill him." Hermione raved.

So far as Hermione was concerned, she had been Snape's apprentice since that day in fifth year when he asked her to help him with the Purple Doom project.

Everything else was a formality.

Her reverie was interrupted by the evil squealing of the huge oak door with its iron fixtures, and Snape's entrance.

He was smoking, and he had on pair of his old black Levi's and a tee shirt Harry had given him that said "I Saved The World From Lord Voldemort and All I Got Was This Fucking Tee Shirt".

Harry had one made for everyone in the Order, and for Ron, Ginny and Hermione, as well.

"You rotten bastard, did you fucking do this to me?" Hermione yelled.

So much for hello, Snape thought.

"Of course I didn't! Treacher, look at this place! Is this shithole really where my apprentice is expected to live? I mean, this used to be a torture chamber. It's cold, it's filthy, it stinks of mildew, and there's no hearth! No one else's apprentice would be treated like this. Fucking typical. I save their precious lily white arses and they still treat me and mine like shit. Get up, Granger."

The last time she'd seen him, he was hunched over his desk working on his memoirs, for which he had been paid an advance price of four hundred thousand galleons

She only needed two semesters; she had complete most of the credits while at Hogwarts.

That had been a year ago.

"I'm leaving tomorrow. I'll be away at university, I won't be back for a year." She said.

"I'll owl you. I have a deadline to meet." He'd replied, distractedly.

He picked up her heavy trunk in one hand like it was a box of parchments.

"Treacher will find out how this happened, right away."

"I'd rather you take Miss Granger's trunk and put it in my rooms. Unpack some of her things. Clean up the place a little. Granger, some with me. We're going to go see Albus, right now!"

Then, as if he'd forgotten something, he took the cigarette out of this mouth, and put it behind his ear.

"Grainger?"

Hermione turned to say something and found herself being kissed.

Is Snape kissing me? Am I kissing Snape? Yes, I suppose I am.

He picked up his cigarette again, and she punched him on the arm.

"Snape, you bastard, is that it?' she asked, as she followed him out of the room.

"What do you want me to do? Chain you to the wall? Be patient, Grainger. You can wait a little longer."

Hermione cursed, loudly.

Dumbledore was taking a meeting, so they sat outside his office.

Snape was working himself up into a temper, so Hermione tried to distract him.

"So, Snape, you getting any?"

"Nothing meaningful. Although after all this War Hero shit, ever witch in the world really does think I'm Severus Snape, Sex God. Do you know there's rumour going around that I'm a lord? With a fucking manor? Oh yes, plenty of Lords working as teachers who were wards of the Ministry. With Scouse accents. Nothing says fucking good breeding like a Scouse accent and multiple tattoos. Wait until my book comes out, and they find out where I really came from. They'll be wanting a Clorox douche. You?"

"The same thing, really. I got a lot of attention, because I'm General Hermione Granger, War Hero. I could have had the whole school, but I didn't want to. I did go around with a few blokes, and they all just pretty much wanted to nail the witch who helped to nail Voldemort."

"Well, I didn't think you'd get overly attached to any of those spotty-faced, drunken, lazy, over- privileged imbeciles that make up most of the University population. But, then again, I really had no idea, since you didn't so much as meet me at the Leaky Cauldron for a fucking butterbeer for a year." Snape snapped.

Hermione looked at her shoes.

"So, you are angry about that?"

"You're fucking right I'm angry about that!"

"You told me that I needed to see what else there was in the world besides you and Hogwarts!"

"I didn't tell you to disappear and ride off into the sunset on some pureblood Hooray Henry's million-galleon trust fund plonker!"

Before Hermione could reply, Dumbledore opened the door and ushered them both into his office.

"Hermione, Severus, please! The students will hear!"

"The students already know that I am a miserable, profane, greasy old git!"

"You certainly are!" Hermione agreed.

Dumbledore warded his doors and cast a silencing spell, and calmly sat at his desk and did some work while Snape and Granger hurled horrible vicious insults at each other.

At the next lull, he put down his quill.

"Was there a reason you wanted to come and see me?" he asked.

"Yes! Granger had been assigned to one of the old torture chambers. It's filthy, freezing, mildewed and there are still chains hanging from the wall! There's' no furniture, at all! Is there some reason my apprentice has to be treated like this? Longbottom isn't in a torture chamber. He has a furnished tower, with a balcony!" Snape protested.

"Severus, calm down. It was a mistake. I would never purposefully place Hermione in an unfurnished torture chamber with mouldy walls. I'll have to speak with Mr. Filch, and find out how this mix-up happened. Now, may I offer you two some advice?"

"You're going to anyway."

"Yes, I am. Hermione, you must learn to make a healthy balance between work and study and the people in your life. You can't just disappear on lovers and friends for a year and then come back and say, well, I was busy. As for you, Severus, I know all about the flat above the Leaky Cauldron that you and Harry hired out in which to entertain your legions of groupies away from the prying eyes of the press. Especially considering that you have no exclusive arrangement with Hermione and do not have a monogamous bone in your body, you have nothing to say to her about and beaux she met at college."

"Who said I expected fidelity? But beaux? That would imply some kind of emotional attachment, wouldn't it, Albus? Granger isn't capable of emotional attachment. What she wants is a bloke with tight lips and a stiff dick. And after all the years I provided same, she might have at least come for a visit!" Snape rejoined.

He lit up, and left.

"What am I going to do, Headmaster? Harry's not returning my owls, and neither is Ron. Ginny's the only one who will talk to me. Everybody's mad at me. I didn't realise it was a whole year. I just wanted to do well. And you know Severus. He might settle down around, oh, Christmas or so?"

Dumbledore opened his desk drawer and took out a plate with chocolate éclairs on it.

"Have an éclair, Hermione." He suggested.

"You're going to have to do two things you dislike doing very much. Be humble. And apologise. As for Severus, I think he ought to get over it by Halloween."