his little story was written for the Inaugural SSHG_Promptfest 2013, based on a prompt from an_oesis: One day in their life together. Apprentice and master, man and wife, unlikely flatmates, or maybe just colleagues – twenty four hours in their world..
Many thanks as always to the breathtaking stgulik, for her beta work and friendship. A good beta is essential, but a beta like stgulik is a gift of the gods.
They say the honeymoon's over when you no longer feel you have to hold back farting in the presence of your lover. If that were the case, their honeymoon would have been over roughly two and a half years before it actually happened. At the time, Hermione swore it was her leg sliding over his sheets. And Severus was intelligent enough to humour his lover, even though he knew she was lying between her teeth. She quickly stopped making up excuses and rarely apologised, but he knew that some things in a marriage are just forgiven, and this was one of those.
Severus Snape woke the way he had awoken since the last of his boyhood was burned away in a haze of Firewhiskey and singed flesh: wary, watchful, expecting the worst even as his dreams unraveled and dissipated like smoke over ice. His nerve endings jangled into consciousness, just as they did after the night he received his Dark Mark. It was no longer strictly necessary, but it was one thing to remind his body that the Dark Lord (Tom Riddle, Tom Riddle!) was dead and he was not, and quite another to relax an almost life-long practice of waking up to a constant stream of bad news, uninspired breakfasts and the grinding of his teeth, greeting a new day at Hogwarts.
The fact that he was still alive and enjoying himself was the reason he snapped instantly into wakefulness every morning. It was that split-second of fear, then the realisation that he was not worm food, and that all that had happened in the past five years hadn't been some wonderfully strange erotic dream with benefits. He was his own man now, which was something he had never been before he decided to become someone's husband. He had certainly not had the best role model for most of his parents' train wreck of a marriage, but his swotty little fart machine of a wife had decent provenance, as they say. Their marriage, as she was fond of saying, had good bones.
Now, he was older, possibly wiser, and much happier. And the reason for that was the warm, sexually deviant bundle of hair and soft rounded curves he woke up nestled against: Hermione Granger-Snape, his second life, his second skin, his second chance. She managed to make him laugh, furious, horny and breakfast on a daily basis, sometimes all at once, and he had never had so much fun in his entire life.
Just thinking about her reminded him of the morning wand nudging between the delectable, plump globes of her heart-shaped bottom. She often fretted that she would be like her mother and turn into a dumpling with middle-age spread, and he declared more than once that he'd leave her if she went to fat— a dire warning that fooled no one. He had never bothered to hide just how much he adored her rounded, marshmallow-soft flesh.
He had always been a bag full of sharp angles and jutting corners; cut-glass cheekbones, granite outcroppings of hips, bony knees and crane-like elbows. She was like a lovely inviting pillow, and he couldn't get enough of her; he feasted on her like a starving man. He marveled how he ever managed without her, and smiled inwardly when he recalled how he came to know the woman behind his memories of the know-it-all little brat she'd been as a student.
After his recovery from Nagini's attack, Severus fully expected to make the move from Hogwarts' most despised Headmaster to Azkaban's most despised inmate, but the fates yet again aligned him with a Potter to be indebted unto. When the newly appointed Minister of Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt, made restitution noises, Harry Potter jumped into the fray with both left feet and started blabbing to anyone who would listen about Severus' little dying confession.
Years later, Severus would still feel acid worming a hole in his stomach every time Lily Evans Potter was mentioned. It was not that he had stopped loving her; but he had stopped mourning her, which was infinitely more worrisome to him in the ensuing months after the war.
Lily had been the impetus to keep going when the only future he could see beyond the Dark Lord was a long dirt nap. Every morning, as he fastened each button of his robes, he whispered, "For Lily...for Lily...for Lily..." Every move was an act of tribute, every lesson taught was a sonnet to his dedication to her memory. He could not eat a meal without thinking of her. He could not sleep without dreaming of her. And on the nights near the end, when exhaustion and fear and hopeless resignation pushed even Lily out of his thoughts, he would feel sick with remorse for not reminding himself that he was in eternal mourning for her.
The very moment he'd awakened in St. Mungo's with the biggest sore throat in history and the knowledge that he was a free man and the Dark Lord was gone, Severus tried to summon his dog-like devotion for Lily to reassure himself that all 'this' was not a dream. She had, after all, become his compass, his beacon for what he'd fought so long to achieve. He had caused her death; she would be his life's cause.
To his dismay, he couldn't do it. The feeling of loss and heartache that had daily pressed on his heart was gone—he found he could no longer summon the energy to self-flagellate using her memory as his whip. That had profoundly disturbed his internal gyroscope; it upset the balance of his life. He was not used to not feeling remorse. What was he supposed to do with himself now that he had no desire to grieve anymore? How was he supposed to define himself, if not as the moral of his own story?
He asked Potter for his memories back, thinking that would restore the balance, but even they no longer held sway to his yearning soul. Thinking he was still suffering from curse work, he approached Madam Pomfrey, the only Healer whom he'd ever trusted. She ran every test known to Wizardkind and a few she'd made up just for him. Alas, a lingering curse as an easy answer was not to be found. Poppy patted his shoulder in her typical brisk, kind way and declared, "I'm sorry, Severus, but you are suffering from nothing more dangerous than post-war ennui."
He snorted, unsatisfied with the results. "That is not how it feels to me," he protested petulantly.
She put a motherly arm around him. "Severus, you're a complex soul. You have a good heart, but you've had a lot of bad experiences, which led to bad motivations and bad choices. But that does not make you a bad man. You don't have to mourn for what you've lost any more, dear. It's high time you learned to celebrate what you have."
He scoffed at her and left. He didn't know how to celebrate. He had never associated life with anything but Lily. Lily was remorse, guilt, punishment, redemption, anguish, loss, duty. He couldn't associate Lily with celebration; it felt sacrilegious. He felt bad that he no longer felt bad. His lack of guilt made him feel guilty.
As the months wore on, his confusion became denial, which burned away to resentment, then morphed into anger. If Lily Evans was the light of his life, why was every emotion he associated with her guaranteed to make him suffer? Even Severus knew that was severely fucked up.
Eventually, the anger mellowed into something that felt like acceptance. One evening, after a day of hiking in the woods looking for potions ingredients, he stopped by a small anonymous pub, and enjoyed a very nice lamb stew and a pint. Sitting among the cheery locals, enjoying his meal, he realised he'd not thought of Lily at all that day. And he didn't feel guilty about it.
He cried a little that night; not because he'd lost Lily, but because he'd learned to live without her. He wept for all that had past, and for all that he'd let go, and woke up the next day a man with a future that was now his and his alone to discover.
So he decided to leave the UK, reasoning that a change was as good as a rest. The plan was to go abroad for several years; using Minerva's excellent recommendations, he would broaden his horizons by studying in Hong Kong, Peru and Delhi.
Hong Kong alone cured him of that idea. After months of chopping up noxious ingredients like a skivvy and sitting at the feet of pompous, overblown Masters professing to know more than he did, when in fact he could outbrew the lot of them, he was soon bored off his tits. The exotic locale disagreed with both his temperament and his digestive system.
Grumbling, he suffered the multiple Portkeys back to Britain. He was a Manc boy; he supposed he was too British to ever feel at home anywhere else. Besides, he couldn't get decent fish and chips in Hong Kong for toffee.
The Ministry, that pantheon to 'Absence makes the heart grow fonder,' was thrilled to get its remaining War Hero chick back into the nest and promptly offered him a position in the Unspeakables Department. He showed up for work, looked at strange, cryptic memos, offered plausible-sounding postulations to a lot of nodding, pensive-looking, beard-stroking officials who, like him, pretended to understand what the hell was going on.
Except for a brief, youthful stint in shoplifting, it was the easiest job he'd ever had. And he got paid a bomb for it.
The female situation wasn't too bad, either. It was amazing how women who'd called him the Greasy Git of the Dungeons suddenly found him fascinating. The tortured, mysterious spy come in from the cold. They all played by the same rules; he gave them the billow and the voice and all the things they said made him irresistible, but in the end, he found them all searching him for something they couldn't find. Most of them eventually turned away, puzzled. He wasn't sure what they were looking for, and he wasn't sure why they couldn't find it.
After a particularly strained blind date with a lovely witch from Beauxbatons, who thanked him and Floo'd away before he could even ask for a second date, it finally occurred to him that it wasn't that theycouldn't find something; it was what they found that bothered them.
It didn't matter if they shared a history with him or not. It didn't matter that he was the hero with the mesmeric voice and the billowing robes. They didn't like the man that was left when the robes were still, and the silence stretched between them. Heroic he might be, but he still wore the same, unattractive face he was born with. He was still the greasy git, and no amount of legend was going to change that.
And so Severus settled back into his default setting; he treated everyone as he wanted to be treated—he left them the hell alone. Then one day, his annoying ex-student sailed back into his life, and to his dying breath he marveled how they managed not to get one another killed.
Being a Ministry worker was not much different that being a Hogwarts Professor—long bouts of total boredom and frustration punctuated with the occasional accomplishment which no one actually noticed or appreciated. At least the hours were better, Severus told himself.
Well, sometimes. Occasionally, he would be called upon to assist the Aurory with some delicate matter involving dark magic or suspected Death Eater activity. He didn't have the heart to tell them the Death Eaters were as defunct as the dodo, and anyway it broke the tedium for an hour or so.
One rainy Saturday morning, he found himself in an Auror stakeout in the overgrown gardens of Malfoy Manor, where his old friend Lucius waited with complete Pureblood aplomb to help catch a thief and an extortionist. The petty criminal had bumbled his way into the manor through sheer dumb luck. He had stolen a valuable trinket of Lucius', which contained a bit more dark magic than was proper, then had the stupidity to attempt to blackmail Malfoy Senior by threatening to report it to the Ministry as an illegal artifact.
That the artifact in question was, in fact, highly illegal, seemed a moot issue. Lucius had grown the good sense to register it as being of important historical significance, and deeded it to the Ministry anyway. Still, it was the principal of the thing. "When an imbecile like this invades my home, the time for being a good citizen is past," Malfoy had fumed to Severus the evening before. "I am a Sytherin, and an ex-Death Eater. And as such, I shall behave like one."
As soon as the extortionist had named his terms (a moronically small amount of Galleons which Lucius could have paid out of Draco's school pocket money), Lucius immediately notified Draco, who in turn had a quiet word with his close (and growing ever closer) friend Harry Potter. Harry, the Head Auror, took over the investigation with more discretion than Severus would have ever given him credit for. It seemed Harry had a vested interest in keeping both Draco and his father out of any unflattering spotlight. He intended to catch the blackmailer so red-handed he'd look as if he'd been dipped in paint.
"I want to keep this as clean as possible," Potter said quietly to his team. "No unnecessary wetworks, people. The MLE will have my head if this goes off the rails." Severus looked around at the grim faces of the three Aurors, huddled under a water-repelling charm, and thought of Malfoy, warm and snug in his manse, blithely waiting for chummy to show up and demand his blood money. Severus stifled a laugh, renewed his warming charm, and was about to ask who'd brought tea when a commotion sounded behind him.
"Johansen, let me through, you pillock!" Hermione Granger forcefully pushed her way past the resentful and uneasy Aurors, and marched up to their leader, who looked not at all glad to see her.
"Harry Potter, you've got some nerve—" Her hissed words were drowned in a sea of "Shh!"s and "Shaddup, Granger!"s and "Aw, fuck's sake, not her!"s.
"And you lot can fucking well fuck off as well," she snarled.
Bemused, Severus stood slightly apart from the group as Madam Secretary for Magical Law Enforcement turned to her next opponent, her lifelong friend, Harry Potter. "Harry, you were supposed to inform me regarding the deployment of this operation. Ordinance Eighteen-Stroke-Oh-Bee-Nine-Tiwaz-Alpha-Hash-Hagalaz clearly states that a Ministry Secretary must be present during incidences where Dark and-or Dubious Origin Magic or the Performance of same may be possibly used in the discharging of Ministerial duties—"
"Merlin's nads, Granger," drawled Severus, "did you memorise the entire Big Book of Ministry Bullshit?"
She whirled on him, her amber eyes flashing, loaded for bear, ready to pounce. When she realised who'd spoken, she drew herself up with immense dignity. "Mr. Snape," she said with a sniff.
"Secretary Granger," he replied, the very Voice of Gravitas.
She awarded him a tight smile before dropping it like a hot potato and turning her guns back on Potter. "Oh, I see. Snape here gets a shout-out, but you don't bother to inform me?" she growled.
Potter looked nervously from his friend to Severus and back. He smiled weakly. "Well, you see, erm, Hermione, he, uh, well, he's acquainted with Malfoy Manor and he's got connections—"
"And I've got dimples on my arse, and don't let's talk about who's better acquainted with Malfoy Manor, you prat!"
Severus noted with delight that she was working herself into a right state. The three Aurors shifted uneasily.
Something out of the corner of his eye caught his attention, and Severus, who was the only one facing east of the manor, caught a glint of light that could only be produced by magic. "While I'm sure we could spend this lovely Saturday morning extolling the virtues of said dimples, Miss Granger, I think we should be focusing on the job at hand," Severus replied, pleased at how louche and indifferent he could still sound through suppressed laughter. He nodded toward the gate. "I believe our perpetrator has arrived."
All heads swung in time to see the dispersing puff of dust near the Manor gates. The thief/blackmailer, who pompously called himself Son of Tom, Disapparated and Disillusioned himself at the same time.
From their own Disillusioned vantage point in the garden, Potter gave the signal. As one, the Auror team swung out in a dragnet formation and moved silently toward the manor, leaving Severus alone with a still-fuming Hermione Granger.
Not fully understanding why he felt the need to explain, Severus said quietly, "In all fairness to Mr. Potter, I came purely as a favour to Lucius. Technically, I'm not really supposed to be here."
To his surprise, Granger sighed and looked suspiciously guilty. "Well, between you and me, technically I'm not supposed to be here, either. But I know Harry. If he thinks anyone he loves is threatened, he has a tendency to shoot first and ask questions later. I don't want him to get in trouble, and we need to make sure this Son of Tom can't get off on a technicality. He's caused a lot of embarrassment for the Ministry. People are wondering why a petty burglary is receiving such high profile casework by the Head of the Auror Department."
Severus regarded the young woman with a patented Relentless Stare. "So the rumours about Mr. Potter and Draco-?"
"Are true. He and Ginny have discussed everything. The boys aren't old enough to understand, and the last thing anyone wants is a scandal. They do love one another, but obviously they will have to make some big decisions soon." Her large, amber eyes were grave with concern. "And I know Harry. If this so-called Son of Tom tries to hurt either Malfoy, Harry won't hesitate to put him down." She made a 'what-can-you-do' gesture with one hand. "They may be fathers themselves, but Harry and Ron can be about as reasonable as twelve-year-olds when provoked. I want a live berk to question, not some oily spot on Malfoy's carpet." She winced at her final words, and her voice faltered curiously. Severus was about to ask why, when he suddenly recalled Lucius' mention of an incident involving her before the final battle.
Clearing his throat, he replied, "I take it, then, that Ordinance Eighteen-Stroke-Oh-Be-Mine-TisWaz-Heavenly-Hash-Haagan-Daz—"
"—is just some bollocks I made up, as well you know." She gave him a rueful smile. "Do you honestly think Harry bothers to read regulations?"
"Based on his track record at school, I agree it would be a stretch." He fought the urge to move closer to her. She smelled divine.
"And there you have it," she said with a smirk that looked suspiciously like one of his. "Sometimes it pays to be the swot. You can convince your friends of just about anything if you say it with enough authority."
Severus allowed himself a brief smile, just as the almost-silent pops of Apparation told them the Aurors were closing the net. "Then Secretary Granger, I suggest we proceed. Someone has to make sure the imbecile doesn't get his arse blown off."
She nodded, then looked at him keenly. "Wait. Were you referring to Son of Tom, or Harry?"
Severus looked down his nose at her. "I know the interior of the Manor quite well, Miss Granger, and the wards will recognise you more readily if you are in my proximity. May I?" He held out his arm.
She looked up at him in surprise, her expressive, warm eyes alert and crackling with intelligence. Sensing the challenge in his voice, she stepped into his arms expectantly.
"I'll hold you to that answer," she warned.
And I'd love to hold you to something else altogether, Granger, Severus thought, as his hands encircled her waist and brought her flush against his body. She felt incredibly warm and solid and comfortable against him, as if she spent time in his arms every day. The look of absolute trust in her eyes only added to the pre-battle ambience. Before he could say something he would have to get drunk to forget later on, he turned them, and they Apparated with barely a sound.
The first thing Severus realised when they Disapparated into the sitting room was that something wasn't quite right.
From a distance, they heard a voice shout, "Stunners only! I mean it! The man who brings anyone down with an Unforgivable will answer to me!"
"Bloody Gryffindor idiot!" Severus hissed to himself. The smell of ozone hung in the air, and they could hear the sounds of battle a few doors away. With a quick glance at one another, he and Hermione stealthily made their way down the hall. Severus noted approvingly that she was keeping close to the wall, treading cautiously, wand in battle-ready position. She'd always taken good notes in DADA.
He remembered she could also hex like a bitch when properly provoked. And, according to Draco, she had a mean left hook in the bargain.
They turned the corner and saw at once that Son of Tom was not alone. He'd brought a welcoming committee with him. Dueling with Potter's Aurors and the Malfoys were four big, burly wizards who didn't look like they had much to lose. They were shabby and strong and incongruously out of place in the dainty drawing room. From where he stood, Severus realised the Aurors were struggling; they'd not anticipated this kind of resistance, and quite frankly, neither had he. Perhaps they'd all underestimated this so-called Son of Tom.
Severus quickly Disillusioned himself again and slipped into the room just as one of the henchmen got in a shot to Draco. The young man cried out and clutched his arm in pain, his face creased in agony. Distracted, Harry looked toward the falling man, and Severus cursed. Bloody Potter! "Watch your back!"
A barrage of hexes flew through the room, but Potter remained low, moving swiftly over to his fallen lover. Lucius, who had ever been a ruthless duelist, was holding his own, but he was tiring of simple stunning spells and Stupefys. Now that his son had been injured by these invaders, his patience and concern would soon collide. Severus knew once Lucius slipped the lead, he would start in on the hard stuff. Then Granger might just get that oily spot on the carpet she'd fretted about.
Son of Tom, a tall, dark-haired wizard with flashing, sapphire eyes, roared, "I warned you, Malfoy! You were supposed to be alone!"
"So were you, you toadying bastard of a reptile," Lucius hissed in return. "Wizards like you give Tom Riddle a bad name!"
Severus and Hermione had the advantage, and at his signal, they roared, "Stupefy!" in unison. Two of the accomplices were blown backward into a Louis XIV desk, reducing it to splinters. The resulting crash was deafening, and everyone in the room froze in complete, stunned silence.
"That was my mother's," Lucius announced with cold, incredulous accusation.
"I think the gloves are officially off now," Severus said quietly.
"Right," Hermione answered.
"In three, two..."
Severus' hex caught one of the henchmen, who went down screaming, clutching at his chest. Hermione's silent spell bound another in a giant, sticky web, which she hurled at the wall. The man struggled upside down in vain. A third was all but eviscerated by Lucius' Sectumsempra, and one of the Aurors managed to get to the fourth before Lucius' Crucio had any real time to bed into him properly. Even so, the man had already soiled himself and broken his wrist before it was cancelled.
Severus turned to Hermione, ostensibly to make sure she was not going to start berating Lucius, but his words died in his throat. Hermione wasn't looking at him at all. She was staring toward the ruined desk, her eyes wide and blank with fear. Severus turned and found himself face-to-face with the gloating, wild-eyed, partially decomposed, animated corpse of Bellatrix Lestrange.
The so-called Son of Tom screamed like a girly. "What is she doing here? She's supposed to be dead!" He grabbed Potter and tried to hide behind him. "Keep that crazy bitch away from me!"
In the pandemonium, Hermione stood stock-still, her face drained of colour, as Bellatrix stalked toward her with obvious glee. She was brandishing a knife, from which dark, brownish blood dripped. "Oooh, is the ickle Mudbwood all scared?" she cooed obscenely. Her tongue was like a serpent's, forked and flickering, scenting the air. Hermione made a whimpering noise in her throat as Bella advanced on her. "Perhaps I need to carve some more fun shapes into her ickle armikins!" The dead woman chortled, and her laughter made the temperature in the room drop ten degrees.
Son of Tom moaned, and clutched onto Potter. "You're supposed to protect us from maniacs like her!" he screamed, and it was then that Severus saw the dark stain spreading on the front of Son of Tom's robes.
"Oh, for fuck's sake!" Lucius spat, his arm around Draco. "It's a Boggart, you clod-hopping yokel! How on earth did you rub two brain cells together and actually break into this house?"
Malfoy bellowed a thunderous "STUPEFY!" just as Harry hit the man with a Petrificus Totalus, and Son of Tom dropped like a sack of shit. Harry and Lucius rushed to Draco and left Severus to his own devices.
Even though Severus knew Lucius was right, and the Boggart was feeding off Hermione's greatest fears, Bellatrix's maniacal laughter had the same paralysing affect on him as the others. He watched in a kind of sick trance as the long-dead witch stalked across the room toward Hermione, trailing mud and Merlin knew what else, her expression changing to something so repulsive as to be demonic. Hermione's wand dropped from her nerveless fingers. "Help me," she whispered, and her pitiful plea brought Severus to his senses.
"Shit!" Severus cursed. Pointing his wand at the leering Bellatrix, he bellowed, "Ridikkulus!" She shrieked in unholy fury, then shrunk down to a Lego figurine, waving around a plastic club. Furious, she ran screaming from the room, squeaking in a high-pitched voice.
"You're getting old and out of shape, old man," Severus muttered to himself. He turned to Hermione. With a rueful laugh, he said, "Merlin, you'd never know I was a Death Eater sometimes. It's just a Boggart, Grang—" He stopped, and something inside him quaked. Hermione was on her knees, whimpering, rocking back and forth. Blood was seeping from a wound on her inner arm, which she cradled to her chest. Her wand lay forgotten on the floor beside her.
"Oh, Gods, please don't, not again," she whispered, tears streaming down her cheeks. "Please, don't, please—"
Severus knelt beside her, and put a hand on her shoulder. He could feel her trembling like an aspen. Close to her ear, he said quietly, "Granger, it's not real."
She nodded frantically. "I know, I know!" She shook her head so vehemently her tears splashed onto Severus' cheek. She took a deep breath, rolling her eyes. "Oh, great, this is great! Making a fool out of myself in front of you and Malfoy and the ferret—"
"Steady on, Granger. It's my arm that's out of commission, not my ears," Draco shot back, and thankfully Hermione laughed, albeit shakily.
She glanced at Severus. "I really made a fool of myself, didn't I?"
Severus sighed and pulled at his ear. Shrugging, he answered, "As someone who's made a career out of making a fool of himself, I can assure you that you will survive it, Hermione."
She looked at him in surprise, and he thought it might be the first time he'd actually ever called her by her given name. Softly, she babbled, "You've never looked foolish. At least, I've never seen you look foolish. You're a hero. Look at all you've done! Remember at the Whomping Willow, in our third year? You were so brave—"
Severus snorted. "Oh, yes, very brave. I was almost too unnerved to use Riddikulus. At least you had the excuse that it was feeding from your worst fear. I merely detested the crazy bitch."
Instead of laughing, or looking shocked at his crude language, she replied, in a voice to small he could barely hear her, "She tortured me in this room," and pulled back her bloody sleeve. It took all his discipline not to recoil in horror at the word "Mudblood" crudely carved across her inner arm. A drop of dark blood oozed from the 'd.' "It still bleeds when I'm really upset."
Severus casually placed his own arm over hers to conceal it from the other men, who were starting to throw curious glances their way. He gently rubbed her shoulder to get her attention. "Look, Granger, I could really use a cup of tea. Why don't we let the professionals clean this up? My treat." he peered closer to make sure she was listening. "You will not fall apart on me here, Granger. Are you or are you not a Gryffindor, witch?"
"Yes. Yes, I am," she answered, with growing conviction. He patted her hand and unobtrusively rolled down her sleeve.
"Good girl. Now pull yourself together and we'll get out of here." He rose and walked over to Lucius, who was helping Harry pull Draco to his feet.
"I think we'll be off, unless you require further assistance," he said, and noted with some small satisfaction the perspiration dampening the older man's hairline. He could never recall having seen Lucius break a sweat before.
His practiced nonchalance, however, was still firmly in place. "I'm sure we'll manage, old man, but thank you. It's been quite entertaining—"
From behind, they heard a scuffle and a yelp of surprised anger. While that idiot Potter had been canoodling with his new amour, he accidentally allowed Son of Tom to struggle free from the Petrificus. The intruder seized his opportunity, grabbed Hermione's wand, and yanked her to her feet by her hair. She cried out in alarm and pain as the man throttled her, forcing her to become a human shield for him.
He began backing out of the room. "Now I'm going to walk out of here, and you're going to let me."
White with anger, Potter advanced toward him. "You know I can't do that, you little piece of—"
Son of Tom jabbed Hermione in the throat with her own wand. "You will unless you want her dead, Potter," he growled, his voice menacing and low.
"Leave her here, " Harry Potter said, sounding calm and reasonable. "Don't make things worse by taking a hostage—"
"Hostage? Grand idea, Auror! Now, why didn't I think of that?" His lips curled into a sneer, showing a flash of white teeth. "Perhaps this little lady and I can have a bit of fun while you sit around trying to figure out how badly you screwed this up, Potter!"
To make his point, he yanked on Hermione's hair, causing her to cry out. He took another step back toward the exit, forcing Hermione to stagger back with him. She grappled with his arm to prevent him from choking her further.
A sick feeling of panic caught Severus in his gut, and for a moment, he thought he might throw up. The other men in the room froze, uncertain. He saw Lucius reach for Draco, his face grave. He turned and watched as the Aurors trained their wands on the four henchmen. Potter was ahead and to the left of him; he could not see the man's expression, but he knew it mirrored his own.
At that moment, Hermione lifted her gaze to Severus'. The paralysis she'd suffered from the Boggart had dissipated, and Severus felt a chill run down his spine.
Whatever she had needed to snap herself out of her panic, she had most certainly found it.
Even as she was being forced to walk backward, she looked straight at Severus and mouthed: Get Ready! Just as Son of Tom reached the door, Hermione jumped, using his arm as a lever, and came down on his foot with all the force in her body. There was a sickening crunch, and Son of Tom bellowed in pain and surprise. He staggered back, his hold still on her neck, and lost his balance. The two of them fell backward with a crash, knocking them both breathless.
Even as Hermione struggled from her upturned-turtle position, she was fighting like the lioness she was. She wriggled out of his grasp, and spun round, throwing a punch with the added leverage. Every man in the room winced and hissed as her fist made solid, pinpoint-accurate contact with Son's bollocks. He screamed like a banshee.
The room exploded into action, but Son of Tom was too busy clutching his crushed testicles and howling to really notice anything. Blindly, he kicked out, catching Hermione on the side of the head with a glancing blow. She slumped to the ground as Severus shouted, "Accio Hermione!"
Years later, he would still marvel at the sight of a face full of Hermione Granger barreling at him at top speed, and the skill and deftness with which she landed in his arms. Pulling her behind the destroyed table, amidst the flying hexes, curses and jinxes, he cried, "Are you injured?"
She shook her head, still dazed but otherwise lucid. "I don't think so, but I—"
"Hold that thought!" he answered, just as Son of Tom, outmanoevered and outnumbered, decided to cut his losses and Apparate.
A volley of spells and hexes roared from several male throats, nearly reducing the room to ruins. Potter's Incarcerous was the final deciding factor. As black, snake-like ropes flew from his wand and bound the large wizard, Severus caught him with a Reducto which knocked Son off balance. He crashed unceremoniously to the ground for what Severus was determined would be the final time, and as he fell, the air moved around him unnaturally.
Potter glanced around as if confirming he wasn't the only one who had noticed the shimmer. "What do we think, people? Glamour?" he asked.
"I think so," Severus replied, and Lucius, Draco and Hermione all nodded in unison.
Pointing at the thief's face, Harry intoned, "Finite Incantatem!"
The shimmering features of Son of Tom swirled away like smoke. When it cleared, the tall wizard with the brilliant blue eyes was gone, and in his place wallowed a squirrely little oik with thinning, pinkish-brown hair and watery grey eyes. He sat up, blinking owlishly at the group surrounding him.
Lucius grunted. "Cousin Brambleby?"
"Cousin Brambleby? This dicksplash is your cousin?" Hermione demanded. When no one answered, she looked at Severus and pursed her lips together, her eyes snapping with suppressed laughter.
"Brambleby?" Severus sneered, pronouncing each syllable like a Bludger to the head. "Aren't you the little scrote whose head was flushed down the loo by his housemates so many times, Moaning Myrtle filed a complaint with Mr. Filch?"
Hermione's eyes widened, and her control slipped a little further. With sickening Gryffindor earnestness, she replied, "Oh, now that you mention it, I do believe it is, Mr. Snape! I'm sure I read about that incident in Hogwarts: A History—"
"You never!" Brambleby, who reminded Severus uncomfortably of Wormtail at his most unctuously despicable, squawked in protest.
"They named you heir to the Throne of Slytherin, and don't deny it, you little cockroach—"
"But why would you—" Hermione stopped, and shook her head. She looked first at Harry, then at Severus, then threw up her hands in defeat. "You know, I really don't need to know why you blackmailed your own relatives, Mr. Brambleby. The fact is, I think the surreal factor has just tipped from questionable to full-on tasteless. I have run out of shit to give in any official capacity."
"I agree." Severus had had about as much melodrama as he was prepared to suffer sober. Besides, he really, really wanted a chance to talk to Hermione Granger. Alone. He turned to Lucius. "I think you and Mr. Potter can take that—" He sneered in the direction of Malfoy's cousin— "from here. I am going to escort Secretary Granger somewhere she and I can get a cup of tea. Oh, stop looking like your pet pygmy puff just died, Potter! She'll file her report in triplicate tomorrow," he added stormily, as Potter opened his mouth to protest.
Smirking, Severus turned back to Hermione, and offered his arm. "I happen to know the perfect place. A bit of a dive, but the liquid refreshment is second to none."
A tiny, pleased smile prinked the corners of her mouth as she drew close and she folded her hands over his arm. He studied her hands for a moment. They were tiny and warm, and looked at home on his sleeve. Before he could stop himself, he added, "You just beat the shite out of a wizard twice your size with your bare hands, you little brawler. Remind me never to get on your bad side."
Her eyes flew open wide, and the smile threatened to take over her face completely. Severus suddenly felt absurdly proud of her; checking his internal monitor, he realised he was a bit pleased with himself as well.
Lucius, who had been watching their little exchange, gave Severus a smug look that set his teeth on edge. "Quite. In fact, Severus, I suggest you start currying favour with Miss Granger as quickly as possible." He cocked a superior eyebrow from Severus to Hermione, and she blushed. Severus gave him a warning look, which he shrugged away with Gallic, angelic insouciance.
His embarrassment rising, Severus looked down at his soon-to-be drinking companion. "Shall we, Miss Granger?"
She gave his arm a conspiratorial squeeze. "I'll be in touch, Harry," she said over her shoulder, and they were gone.