A/N: Hey guys! Me again =) Here's the second installment of A Love Most Difficult. I got an awesome response in all those who favored and alerted my story, and I thank you all =D I hope I get even more, and I wish for you guys to review! Reviews are better than Snanger love...and we all know how much we love that!
P.S.- Sorry for the delay...I was getting that weird 'error' thing-y...
Disclaimer: I don't own anything but a laptop and a pretty prom dress =)
"These are my rooms." Snape motioned to a wall in the dungeons, and Hermione was confused.
"Excuse me?"
"These are my rooms. I did not think you were deaf Miss Granger." Upon seeing the still-there confusion on her face, he sighed. "The password is 'Death Garden'. You speak directly to the wall. Death Garden." A portion of the wall moved and twisted, not unlike the wall in the back of the Leaky Cauldron, showing another doorway. Snape turned the handle, and the two entered a large, warm common area. Warm tans, browns and other earth tones adorned the walls, a large Oriental area rug before the hearth. Hermione was quite surprised. She had expected greens and blacks and silvers, very cold and Slytherin.
Snape kept walking, looking back and expecting Hermione to follow, not allowing her to stand and marvel at the room. He traveled down a hall and gestured to a doorway on is left.
"This is the private kitchen. When you have not seen me at meals, this is where I am. Quite often when I am working on a volatile potion, I do not travel to the Great Hall for meals. You will be expected to do the same. Come, come" He continued down showing her the bathroom, a small library, and the door into his, their private labs. Then, he got to two doors at the end of the hall.
"This is my room." He said pointing to the door on the left. "It is private, my door will stay closed and warded. I will know, no matter where I am in the castle, or outside of it, if those wards have been broken. Simply put, you may not enter, under any condition, life threatening or not."
Hermione squeaked a yes and nodded vigorously.
"Now-" Severus spoke while pointing to the door on the right. "This is your room. You also have a private bath for your use, and a door straight into the labs. That door will be warded against me, so you have no worries about me coming in. However, in dire circumstances, the wards will automatically go down on their own so that I can get in if need be. Why do I not have that on my room? Because I am the master, and you are the apprentice. Do not ask me again, and do not ask if you can have either stipulation removed, my answer will be no. Understood Miss Granger?"
Hermione once again nodded, not quite sure what she should do now, speak, or keep silent, go into her new rooms and unpack, or simply stay standing there until either dismissed or given direction.
"You may go now Miss Granger. Feel free to unpack. You may explore the rest of the common areas as well. Lunch will be served in the kitchen at exactly noon. Do not be late, it is only 3 doors down, you have no reason not to be on time. Good day Miss Granger." And with that he turned on his heel, and went into his own rooms.
'Well 'Mione, might as well go unpack.'
Or you could go knock on his door and ask him to ravish you until you both die a blissful and fulfilled death in bed.
'You again? Really? And I don't want him to ravish me! Besides, it has been made very clear that once he is in his own room, I don't disturb him.'
Oh, so if it wasn't forbidden, you would do it?
'Ye-NO! No no no no no! That's not what I meant at all!'
Of course not. After all, you are Hermione Granger, war hero, Gryffindor Princess, resident know-it-all, and ideal student. You would never have improper thoughts of a teacher would you?
'Right! And those thoughts would be improper, and just wrong. No, I don't have them, I've never even thought of having them. So, so-leave me alone!'
Hermione waited for a witty retort from the voice in her head. When she did not receive one, she sighed, contented.
'Well, at least I can focus on unpacking now'
In the room across the hall, one Severus Snape was having the same sorts of thoughts and arguments with himself. He knew that it was wrong to even look at Hermione in that light. Normally, he would not have been as harsh with the girl as he had been during their quarter tour. However, he had to keep those feelings in check some way, right?
He looked at the mantel clock to the left of him and shuddered. It was 15 to noon. He opened his door, and upon seeing that Hermione's door was still closed, and glowing (representing that she was still present in there) he walked down the corridor to the kitchen area. Taking out his wand, he enlarged the table to fit another person and their food items comfortably, and sat down. And waited. And waited. And waited. He looked at the clock placed on the wall, and grumbled. Here he thought that she was impossibly late. In reality? It had only been 5 minutes. She still had plenty of time.
This was gong to be a very long 10 minutes if he was going to be this worried about her getting out there. Maybe she would be the typical Hermione that he had gotten to know as a student over the past 7 years and be early. One could only hope.
However, he was pulled out of his wishful thinking when a knock came on the door. Minerva wouldn't be down at this hour, the Hogwarts Express would be leaving shortly, she would be at the station in Hogsmeade. And...no, it couldn't be. He got up out of his chair and went to the door. It was indeed.
"Draco, to what do I owe this pleasure. And Mr. Potter, how delightful. Aren't you two supposed to be on the train back to London?"
"We can apparate out of Hogsmeade back to Grimmauld Place. We wanted to come down and say hi to Mya if we could Sev. See how she's adjusting to being down here."
"She is a tower girl after all." Harry piped in behind his boyfriend. "Not used to being down in the cold. Come to think of it though, it's not that cold down here. Always seemed like it back during classes..." Harry trailed off, leaving Draco to look at him with amusement.
"Babe, the dungeons aren't always cold. Really, only the classroom was. Our rooms were always quite warm."
"Oh."
"Well, as touching as this all is, Miss Granger is in her room, and as she has wards up-"
"I came out so that you wouldn't have t leave without saying goodbye to me. Hi guys."
"Hi Hermione!" The boys spoke in unison, leaving them both with grins, and a hand hold.
"Well, Draco, Potter, Miss Granger and I were just about to sit down for lunch. Perhaps-"
"We'd love to join you!" Draco cried out, and taking Harry in hand, pushed pass both potions professor and student, into the apartment.
"I shall have the house elves bring two more plates of food then."
"No need Sev. I can cook, you know that."
"Dra-"
"Nonsense. I know where the kitchen is. What would everyone like?" Draco spoke as he walked back to the kitchen, and began to pull things out of cabinets, and drawers. Harry smiled, and ushered Snape and Hermione to sit down.
"We all know how he can get. I suggest we all stay out of his way. Professor do you have anything to drink?"
"Yes Baby, he does. Sev?" Draco called from the kitchen. "But before he gets you one, could you come in here and help me?"
"Well...sure I guess." Harry was unsure, but had a feeling that it had something to do with his plan from breakfast.
Getting up, he walked into the kitchen, leaving Hermione and Snape alone in the living room.
"So Sir-"
"Miss Granger, you may call me Severus in the private rooms and the lab."
"Well then Severus, you may call me Hermione."
"Very good then. Now what do you suppose your best friend and my godson are cooking for us?"
"Probably something insane. One night during break at Harry's place, Draco tried to make muggle cheeseburgers for Harry and I. We ended up ordering muggle pizza."
"Perhaps we should not trust the boy then. Shall we go in and make sure that they have not burned down my kitchen yet?"
"I suppose we shall."
Snape stood up, and waited for Hermione to as well. Both walked into the kitchen, just in time to see Draco pour something into a pot on the stove. Neither knew what it was, but it had a puff of pink smoke appear after pouring. Hermione racked her brain for what gave off a pink puff cloud, and couldn't think of something. Snape thought of similar things, and could not figure out for the life of him. However, perhaps it was some sort of ingredient that mixed differently with other things in the pot. Cooking things, not potions. Hermione nor Snape were the worlds best cooks.
Leaving it, they made the presence announced to the boys. Draco turned around, and turned a bit red. "Well hello. I thought you both would be staying in the living room. Well, oh well. This just has to simmer for exactly 7 minutes, and then we can eat. Babe, you want to set the table?"
"Sure."
"Sev, Mya, you guys can sit down. I'll bring this out."
Severus. weary about what exactly dinner was, was slow leaving the kitchen, whereas Hermione left straight away to help Harry.
"Draco, you haven't done anything...odd...to our dinner tonight, have you?"
"Why Severus Snape! Why would I do such a thing? No, I haven't done anything. It's only stew, nothing bad, I swear."
Severus nodded and walked out of the kitchen. Draco smirked behind him, and began to ladle two bowlfuls out of the pot on the stove. His and Harry's. However, there were still a few moments left before he could bring Snape's and Mya's out.
Finally they were done. Dipping the ladle back into the pot, he served 2 more bowls and placed them on the tray. Making sure he knew which ones were which, he picked up the tray and carried it over to the table set up in the living room, big enough for the four of them. Draco smiled, hoping that after tonight, this would be a regular occurrence, the four of them, as couples, eating meals together and chatting. Maybe one day even having kids running around while their parents sat on the couches and drank wine, Draco in Harry's lap, and Hermione in Severus's.
"Dray, hun? You okay?"
Draco blinked at the sound of Harry's voice. He hadn't realized that he stopped in the middle of the room and was just staring into the fire with an odd expression on his face.
"Oh, yeah I am. Sorry. Here's lunch!" Placing the tray down on the table, Hermione reached over to pass out the bowls. Draco slapped her hand away with a squeak. "No! I mean, Hermione, sit back, I'm serving today too. You don't have to."
"Oooohhhh-kayyy." Hermione gave him a puzzled look, but withdrew her hand from the table.
Draco was meticulous about passing out the bowls of stew, making sure that both Hermione and Snape got the 'special' bowls that he made. After, he gave Harry his bowl, then put his own in front of his place. Sending the tray away with a wave of his hand and a silent spell, he too sat down at the table.
The four people were silent as they ate their meals. After minutes of slurping and clacking of spoons on bowls, they all sat back and admired their empty dishes.
"My, that was-delicious-Draco. Thank you very much." Hermione smiled.
"Yes, that was quite pleasant Draco. Thank you."
"You're very welcome Mya, Severus. Now, Harry and I must be going. Mother will be expecting us at the manor before we head home ourselves. I assume the house elves can clean all of this up?"
"Yes yes. You boys get going. Tell your mother I said hi Draco, and tell her that she still has yet to send me those books from your father's library. Goodbye Harry, remember to write. And do have fun and be careful at training. I shall miss you both." Hermione stood up, as did the boys and they made their way to the door. All exchanging hugs, tears were shed from Draco and Hermione. Harry tried his best to not cry, though was quite close.
"Good bye Professor, Hermione. I'll try to write, and I'll be careful."
Hermione nodded and wiped her face, as Snape just gave one short nod in recognition that he had been spoken to. Harry opened the door, and taking his boyfriend by the waist, stepped into the corridor. Arriving at the front entrance of the school, the boys opened the door and proceeded to Hogsmeade.
About halfway to the small town, Harry turned to Draco, and spoke.
"Drake? Do you think that the potion will have worked on them?"
"Of course. They'll be in bed together by midnight, and hopefully have professed their undying love for one another by morning. We shall have to tell Mother to get ready for another wedding at Malfoy Manor."
"Another?" Harry was puzzled.
"Why of course! We're getting married there as well. Aren't we?"
Harry's face glowed, yet was surprised. Draco simply laughed.
