II. Cut by Occam's Razor

By: Calliope Confetti

The morning light shined on the snow-whitened trees, revealing their iridescence as they stretched their skeletal limbs against a gray sky painted with wispy clouds. While the boys left the immediate vicinity to forage for food, Hermione remained at camp; she dressed in layers of winter-wear to guard against the cold before she exited the tent to take up her watch. A distinct lack of sleep had effectively bruised her eyes, leaving them aching in her skull and marked by dark circles. Sleep had evaded her with relative ease after both Severus and Ron reappeared in her life within the span of that same tumultuous night. This strange twist of fate also brought the existing dichotomy between the two of them to the forefront of her mind with a newfound clarity. Severus's brave actions had thrown Ron's cowardice into sharp relief, a realization which joined forces with her original anger over Ron's desertion to jointly fuel her explosion upon his return; even Ron's latent display of courage in his destruction of the locket failed to impress her.

Thoughts of Severus consumed her until he became the locus of her singularly-focused mind, and questions burgeoned in her brain as if she had cast the multiplication charm on her own thoughts. This deviation from the Horcrux hunt afforded her brain much-needed respite, although she'd begun to feel like Severus would also play a pivotal role in ending Voldermort's reign of terror, a variable she'd never anticipated and therefore never accounted for. She longed to speak with Severus face-to-face again; her one chance had been so fleeting and so surreal that she wondered if she had dreamt it all. Though, unlike her dreams, she could remember every detail of their conversation, as well as their strange dance of back and forth body-language, facial cues and all.

Severus had unknowingly resurrected the long-dormant part of her that loved occupying the role of "teacher's pet" and basking in the limelight of academia when he chose to reveal the truth of his allegiance to her and her alone. Unraveling the years of his seemingly ever-shifting loyalty in order to isolate the line of consistent behavior in furtherance to their cause proved all-consuming. Whereas she'd formerly been pouring over "The Tales of Beetle the Bard" and the strange symbol transcribed therein, she now cast it aside, leaving it neglected and unopened on her bunk, replaced in her lap by a new book—a journal.

She peered furtively over her shoulder. Although, she was writing in invisible ink between the lines of already inked entries, she feared this new obsession would draw the unwanted scrutiny of her friends. After she finished penning her last thought, she cast a revealing charm to look over all she had written. Dates and events and people and places formed a dizzying map of what she knew of Severus's life, but it all amounted to very little in the end—unsurprisingly, she would have to think in theoretical terms to pinpoint the crux of her research, his motivations.

Working tirelessly to identifying potential Horcruxes left her wary of thinking in the abstract, but as she studied her writings, the memories of her first year at Hogwarts drifted to mind. She had been enthralled by Snape's first lecture, and she considered pleasing and eventually impressing him a challenge with a prize to be won—that is, his rare to the point of being nearly non-existent compliments and admiration. When he first denied her, she sought to try even harder, incensed by his unfair treatment of her.

Originally, Hermione had seen past his billowing black robes and his unkempt appearance—she'd concluded, in spite of the claims of others, that although he looked the part of the villain, that wasn't the part he playing, nor was he really playing the hero. The truth fell somewhere in the middle. Conversely, her friends judged quickly on appearances, cementing those first impressions in their minds inexorably—Harry had inherited an old prejudice, just as Lupin had said. Regardless, she had quickly tired of taking up the position of devil's advocate, so she humored them to the point that their opinions seemed to sway her towards their side—to the belief that Snape was a dark and dangerous wizard.

Although her views had shifted to align with those harbored by her friends, Hermione felt somewhat vindicated when, in the years that followed, Snape validated her original assertion again and again—but she hated to be proven wrong even after being initially correct. Why had he so consistently been their savior? The malice he displayed towards Harry never lessened in intensity in the aftermath of those incidences. Until the murder of the headmaster, Hermione mostly refused to listen to them endlessly spout rumors or to entertain their usually baseless finger-pointing where Severus was concerned.

Typically, when Hermione set her mind to something, she hardly ever let up until she had accomplished said goal, but in the case of striving to impress Severus Snape, she had trouble staying the course—it seemed that, as a teacher, he had no "pets" only a few Slytherin students whom he seemed mildly fond of (or at least disliked a little less than the rest of them), but sometimes Hermione wondered if he only praised them to get to Harry, who was so easily riled up by such favoritism. Maybe Severus and Harry needed each other, like a pair of foil characters, both of whom only felt confident in themselves when staring at their negative, but that seemed equally unlikely to Hermione.

Severus belonged to Slytherin, so she suspected that the bravery she perceived and nobility she ascribed to him were secondary or even inconsequential to his end; his motives, deep-down, must be self-serving, she thought. But what desire could hold such powerful allure, keeping him steadfastly dedicated to the Order in spite of the endless obstacles they had thrown up to thwart him and near-constant resistance?

Hermione thought about comparison and its usefulness in such cases. She thought about the things she desired or loved the most—she had desired Ron, but now she felt unsure, with her mind refusing to dwell on the subject. The things she loved the most were easy to name, because she so often reminded herself of them to keep her going, to keep her resolutely fighting in the war—her friends, her family, Crookshanks, books, and learning. She knew Severus likewise valued the latter two, but to her knowledge, although he had remained friendly (or as friendly as Severus could be, anyway) with his coworkers until Dumbledore's murder, none could be counted among his friends.

Harry had told her in confidence about his brief intrusion into Snape's memory, so she surmised that the cowering little boy had grown into a man with little regard for the family that disregarded him so fully and so easily. Only one thing remained—romantic love, but Severus never spoke of a lover or a spouse—although he rarely spoke of his private life—nor did the other members of the faculty; even the students never speculated. They all just assumed that he loved nothing and no one, but Hermione knew better.

A faint image of his patronus leapt through her head as a theory whispered across her mind, but at first she ignored and dismissed it. Then, she remembered how Tonk's patronus had changed into a wolf when she fell in love with Lupin, and her internal narration grew louder, more insistent. What if Severus loved Lily—then it all makes sense? The story of Snape's worst memory catapulted to the forefront of her mind, and it all seemed so simple now, so that she couldn't believe she hadn't deduced it already—Occam's Razor even seemed to suggest it. The realization floored her, so much so that she could barely think of anything else, and as snippets of Snape's peculiar behavior over the years presented themselves to her in a flurry of thoughts, she began to sob uncontrollably.

Thankfully, Ron and Harry had not yet returned, so she allowed herself to cry with the torrent of emotion overwhelming her—although she doubted she could dam her tears even if she tried in her inconsolable state. Some details were still fuzzy, incomplete, or unexplained, but even the abstract picture it all created left her reeling with sadness. If Severus had truly overheard the prophesy that night in the tavern and delivered it to the Dark Lord, he had essentially signed the death warrant of his beloved without realizing it. She imagined that Snape had issued a last minute retraction that went unheeded and turned back to the Order in desperation, but in spite of his remorse, Lily had been killed, along with her husband.

She imagined Severus's heart leaping for just one beat at learning of the death of his nemesis before being overcome with guilt again, punishing himself harsher for even having the thought. She imagined her unsatisfying relationship with Ron ending in a row, and she wondered if her memories and the love they contained could keep her going for nearly two decades, and she saw herself rationalizing that correlation does not equal causation, and while Severus played a role in Lily's death, Voldermort cast the fatal curse, the death blow—so, in similar circumstances, she thought she might attempt to rationalize her own guilt away.

Hermione's tears dripped on the pages of her book with a pitter-patter like rain, soaking and wrinkling the pages. Although Snape had been a wholly convincing spy, she doubted that his vehement dislike of Harry could be faked for so long—when he spat insults he spat venom, too. The previous night in the forest had changed Hermione, leading her to look at Severus differently. Tonight, however, her previous thoughts disappeared as if they never existed at all, replaced with an incomplete picture of a complex man whom she empathized with and admired; this led her to think over the other qualities she'd always admired about him but only begrudgingly acknowledged at the time—his logic (a rarity in the wizarding world), his intelligence and intellect, his immense ability, even at times, his ruthlessness—like the kind she had exercised in her revenge on Rita Skeeter. She resolved to find a way to speak with him again, determined to receive definitive answers to the questions that continued to belabor her the whole day long.


As he climbed the series of shifting staircases that would lead him to Dumbledore's lofty former perch, the strange stirrings he'd experienced in the forest returned, with a globular energy gathering in his core, pulsing at regular intervals; the first made his stomach clench against the nerves firing within, which contributed to him feeling out-of-sorts, then that warm weighty sensation settled in his lower belly again with twinges of feeling, flutters of that sensation he still couldn't place.

For a moment, he wondered if he'd overworked and overextended himself to the point of illness, but he didn't feel nauseous, although suffering the mental lag made him consider whether he had a fever, but his forehead felt cool to the touch. Puzzling indeed, he acknowledged as he reached the stone eagle, where he hesitated—the last person he wished to speak to at that time of night was Albus Dumbledore, knowing the headmaster would be waiting on tenterhooks to grill him over the details of his forest journey, details Severus hadn't fully processed himself let alone wished to divulge.

Now, he felt a little ill, the unpalatable prospect of a lengthy interrogation enough to turn his stomach. Indecision left him staring at the eagle, summoning the courage to just get it over with, although his own self-interests bade him to proceed with caution and refuse to honor Dumbledore's request until he allowed himself a hot meal and a few hours tossing and turning in the comfort of his bed, a compromise he hoped the headmaster would be amenable to. As he took a deep breath, something caught his attention—that feeling that had crept into his abdomen had him rocking on his heels to its perplexing rhythm, a move that seemed out of character for him, but he put it out of his mind and stepped under the eagle's wing before it made its circling ascent. He stopped at the last barrier, the last protection he had against Albus's infernal line of questioning, his persistence to the point of obnoxiousness and authoritative bullying.

It pained him to push the heavy oak door aside and reveal himself, but he commanded his brain to put one foot after the other. He cast a glance at the portraits scaling high above him, so still and quiet they could pass for ordinary paintings. Silently invoking the mercy of the universe, he hoped Dumbledore had likewise fallen asleep, but he knew better, he conceded with an eye-roll. As he approached his desk, his stomach sank in defeat when he saw Albus behaving as predicted, pacing and furiously polishing his already spotless spectacles.

"Severus!" He gathered himself and flew to the foreground of his portrait, waiting on baited breath for Severus to return with good news. When Severus silently began removing his cloak and gloves, Albus looked as if he would burst if he didn't soon say something. "So?" he guided him into joining the conversation, and Severus relented, realizing Dumbledore would likely resort to shouting through his bedroom door the whole night through until Severus gave him the answers he demanded.

With another weary sigh, he slowly turned toward the portrait above his desk, giving him his undivided attention, as he would settle for nothing less. "Albus, listen to me, I will answer your questions," but he added a caveat, "A reasonable number of questions. And I will give you my personal debriefing, only because it contains the word, "brief," as brevity is something I require if I am going to partake in this tonight, when it could reasonably wait until morning."

Albus seemed to draw some comfort from his prelude, since he delivered it in his usual way, in a careful tone with plenty of snark, which revealed that nothing of importance had occurred, nothing had gone awry, without him even having to communicate it, which seemed to calm his nerves significantly, as he sighed in relief, "So nothing went wrong, I take it?"

"Nothing of any interest to you," he replied, with a twitched of a smirk, remembering his encounter with Hermione, the initial volatility she displayed to him before she heard him out.

His elusive tone intrigued Albus, "Shouldn't I have the ability to decide what is of interest to me and what is not?" he posed, and Severus suddenly felt like he'd stepped back a year, where he was being reprimanded, slumped in the chair across from his boss, pleading his case.

Severus sat atop the desk and attempted to divert the conversation, "Delivering the sword to the boy proved quite easy, just as we had planned. The journey was a definitive success, as now Potter possesses the sword, the legitimate relic, for whatever mysterious purposes you believe it will be of use to him. I'm still a bit unclear on the details, and you seem to think, in my case, those reasons must remain murky."

"Thank Merlin," he breathed, "I can tell you're a tad displeased that there are aspects of this mission I've refrained from divulging to anyone, including you, even though you played a vital part in it, but I want you to know you've done your part masterfully, the sword is invaluable to Potter's survival and crucial to the Dark Lord's downfall, a move you've helped orchestrate. Perhaps, content yourself on that knowledge and praise for now. In time, my reasons for remaining mum will make sense to you, and I think you'll understand my modus operandi."

"Thank you," Severus begrudgingly accepted and thanked him for his praise, although his nagging curiosity kept pestering him for answers, and his indignance over being excluded prickled at his every elusive word.

"What about Miss Granger?" he inquired, with an expression of amusement and cat-ate-the-canary eyes.

"As always, dealing with Miss Granger proved a bit more challenging and did not initially proceed as planned," Severus cleared his throat, searching for the right words to relay his encounter to the headmaster.

Dumbledore gave a hearty chuckle, "She's a bit of a spitfire, that Miss Granger. She kept you on your toes, I'm sure," he observed.

Severus put his arm behind his neck and paused for a moment, "That, sir, is an understatement. For a moment, I thought perhaps you'd knowingly sent me into the Lion's den," he admitted with a rare laugh of his own.

"I trusted that you could enter, earn their trust, and make it out alive and unscathed, to your credit."

"For a moment, I think we both wondered if the other was the prey or the predator," Severus recalled, "I approached her and made my presence known before dropping my wand in attempt to show her I meant no harm, a gesture she considered for only a moment before she lunged at me in attack. I managed to subdue her and keep her contained until she listened to what I had to say, which I…I admittedly crossed a line, and apologized, and we were finally able to have a proper conversation, where I delivered her the phoenix tears; they are now in her possession, and she promised to keep my journey a secret from Potter, so, while it began a little rocky, I'd also call our meeting a success. I believe she will keep her word."

Albus grinned, "Miss Granger is loyal to a fault. If she gave you her word, she will abide by it. I'm impressed, Severus, that you were resourceful enough to successfully earn her trust and appeal to her reasoning skills, as well as successfully ensuring that vial ended up in her hands."

Severus nodded, the mention of her hands reminding him of the moment he'd placed the vial in her hands, how he closed his hands over hers, the warmth of her skin, the sensation touching her evoked, a pang of warmth in his chest, the smallest jolt of electricity, so small he wondered if he'd imagined it or caught static, so when a second opportunity arrived, his desire to validate his earlier experience, to feel the flutter of elation as his hands made contact with hers, and this time, when his hands closed over hers more firmly than the first time, the jolt sparked instantaneously, a burst of giddy euphoria that glowed in the air around them until Potter's approach forced him to let go and disappear into the night, out of her life as quickly as he'd re-entered it, a dull world where he'd never experienced such a splendid and elusive thing in the presence of any other woman. "Is it alright if we have a more in-depth conversation in the morning?" He asked, hoping Dumbledore's praise for him meant he'd be more willing to honor his request.

"Of course, Severus, off to bed with you. I imagine you're a bit peckish, I'll journey down to the kitchens and have them deliver your evening meal to your quarters."

A bit taken aback by Dumbledore's fatherly turn, he thanked him for his spell of kindness nonetheless, the sound of a meal being brought to him did sound inviting, anyway. Severus ate his supper and changed into his nightclothes, before lying down in bed, his arms behind his head as he stared at the cloth hanging down the middle of the four-poster bed; although the bed was not to his taste, and a little flamboyant, he couldn't summon the will or effort to have another brought up to replace it.

For a moment, he'd thought he'd found the culprit, hunger pangs, but even after he'd eaten his fill, that dull, persistent ache settled in his abdomen, the ever-present ache that made it difficult to focus on anything that required a modicum of contemplation. After a turn, his sporadic thoughts returned to the action of the day, his trek through the forest, but mostly centered on his encounter with Hermione. The way she'd taken the time to actually listen to his explanation, the way she'd re-assessed her earlier opinions and came to his side after a bit of intelligent discourse, a rare display of rationality and reason in action.

Perhaps, he'd underestimated her, not her ability, because he always begrudgingly admitted to himself that her talent was undeniable and showed brilliant promise, but he wondered if he should re-examine her character—before he'd considered her a know-it-all with a bit of a flippant streak when challenged, an aptitude for potions that had already mastered the essentials, afraid to venture into new territory, her ingenuity stifled by her fear of failure, brilliance thwarted by pride. The history of their classroom interactions revealed a long-held disdain on his part, the origins of which even he couldn't place. When he honestly re-evaluated those instances between them, he saw an angry, embittered man eager to cut her down at the vaguest opportunity, even before she'd given him a reason too.

That first day, when he burst through the door reciting the same show-stopping lecture he gave every year, he took special care to act it out for Potter, his malice towards the boy and his father desperate to make an appearance. He'd worked himself up before he even crossed the threshold to the classroom, and he'd entered a man on a mission, to humiliate Potter and relish in the attempt. The idea of anyone in that classroom taking an actual interest in his prepared speech was a hope he'd abandoned long ago, so he'd willfully missed the way Hermione teetered on the edge of her chair, eyes wide with academic excitement, hanging on his every word, furiously transcribing it verbatim for later admiration.

The respect and esteem he'd always hoped to inspire in the classroom faded when he'd realized the futile reality of education from the teaching side, but Hermione venerated him the moment he walked through that door, having acquainted herself with the impressive curriculum vitae so obscure he thoroughly wondered how she even got her hands on it to memorize it. His accomplishments had earned her respect outright, and she held him in the highest esteem, exhilarated and jumping at the chance to learn from him, but because of her association with Potter, he lumped her right into the festering mess of hatred and disdain evoked at the sight of the product of Lily's and James' desire strutting into the great hall. Sadly, he'd mistaken her earnestness as a bid for favorable treatment, something he despised and eschewed at all costs, but when he learned her merit, she'd bested him again, and the scope of her prodigious talent surpassed that of any of her peers or predecessors at Hogwart's.

In his observations, he studied her, the way she so confidently raised her hand and made assertions, the way she touted her knowledge hinted at a budding ego, which made him feel dismissively toward her, but even his keen eyes failed to see the fledgling underneath, hiding her self-consciousness of her looks beneath her vast and impressive span of knowledge. While she watched other girls parlay their beauty into special treatment and advancement, she rested on her laurels, rising above the rest on sheer will and merit. With chagrin, he reviewed a memory he hadn't thought of in years, when she came to him for help after Malfoy had cast an engorgement charm on her teeth and his cuttingly cruel response that sent her crying to the hospital wing begging for a minimizing charm to fix her prominent teeth.

Looking back, her hysterical response slayed him and made him feel like a poor excuse for a man, but at the time, the mark had begun to burn and darken, and the magnitude of his betrayal grew abundantly clear, with consequences steadily closing in, but with no knowledge of the moment his master would return to hunt him down to the ends of the earth and go forth with an execution long in the waiting; the day she'd come to him for help, he hadn't slept in days, Dumbledore hounded him constantly to ensure he wouldn't stray, with Igor constantly haranguing him with the same questions Severus struggled to answer himself. Potter's recklessness ensured that protecting him required a level of difficulty and duty that Severus didn't' feel he could maintain as his world spiraled out of control. Hermione knew nothing of his degrading mental state, his downward spiral and pervasive fear, so when he unleashed the full force of his raging venomous tongue at her expense, she assumed the hatred was organic, spurred by her, deserved in some way.

Yes, when he made a non-biased assessment of Hermione Granger, he saw a prodigiously talented girl forced to grow up before her time, a girl who hid behind her brilliance, so no one could see through to the self-conscious fledgling within, who would rather look into a book than into a mirror, so she wouldn't have to confront the reality she perceived. He saw a girl who fiercely protected those she cared about, who protected those more vulnerable or susceptible to bullying than her, she was the girl we encourage our daughters to be. She was the co-conspirator who managed to evade the most powerful wizard alive for several months, a feat to almost her sole credit. When he framed it like that, he realized that he'd been patently unfair to Hermione Granger, and he felt the strong urge to offer her an apology, an urge seldom felt or entertained.

Without the implications of Harry Potter arriving at Hogwart's that fateful day, he could see how their relationship could have progressed quite differently, with him taking her under his wing to show her the full extent of her capabilities. And he strangely mourned the loss, for reasons he couldn't articulate. On the whole, he found her quite captivating, a curiosity out of reach, a force of nature with an old soul and an understanding that far surpassed her tender years.

In his mind's eye, he focused on her face the moment she first confidently said his name, her eyes bright and beaming with questions, brown eyes sparking in the firelight, the cold rendering porcelain skin nearly free of color, the way she slipped her bottom lip between her teeth when she considered his reply, and the moment she tucked her chin and regarded him with skepticism as she peered up through her lashes, a look that affected him in a strange way, a feeling of tenderness left unexpressed, a look that made his pulse race and committed itself to memory for further reflection. Processing these feelings he'd experienced over the course of their encounter left him more confused and troubled in the end, hitting a wall where trying to make sense of anything only made things less clear, so he rolled onto his side and tried to sleep, ignoring the ache in his stomach that only sleep could fully mute, and only temporarily.