The usual disclaimer applies. I own nothing and make nothing, and anything you recognise belongs to the talented J K Rowling.

I am so, so, sorry about the delay in getting this up. I had put this fic off for a little while, while I finished 'Prisoner 5273'. Once it was finished, this got postponed due to illness in my family and some medical tests that my daughter had to have (she is fine, though.) This is a bit longer of a chapter, as my apology to you for having to wait.

As always, a big thanks to Meladara for the beta. Any mistakes remaining are my own, probably due to me tweaking things and adding more after she returned this chapter to me.

Chapter 9

Hermione woke up quickly when she heard the babbling and cooing sounds coming from the cot beside the bed. Casting a quick Tempus charm, she bolted out of bed when she realised how late it was. Ares had never slept past seven-thirty, but it was now eight-thirty. She was supposed to meet Minerva in the Headmistress's office at ten.

As she walked towards the small kitchen to prepare Ares' bottle, her mood once again soured at the thought of the lack of communication from Ron. It had been well over a month since her disastrous meeting with him at the Three Broomsticks, and she had yet to hear from him. It was rather obvious to her as well that, even though she had been gone during her birthday, there was no gift waiting for her when she returned. He didn't even send a card. Even Harry and Neville had sent small token gifts, yet Ron didn't even bother with a note.

Hermione took a few deep breaths to calm herself as she sat down to give Ares his bottle. She did not want her mood to affect Ares and she desperately needed to regroup her emotions before her meeting with Minerva. Although the Headmistress didn't specify what the meeting was about, she was pretty sure it had something to do with the Halloween feast. Hermione shook her head slightly as she wondered what had possessed her to volunteer to decorate the Great Hall for the feast tonight.

-ooOOoo-

Hermione walked briskly towards her quarters following the meeting with Minerva. She honestly did not know how a meeting about decorations had so quickly turned into a debate over orange versus burnt sienna. Over two hours of her day was now gone, and, except for a slight change in the color scheme, it was going to be almost identical to the decorations that had been used since she was a first year. Hagrid was still going to bring in the giant pumpkins, and Minerva was still going to use transfigured bats. She shook her head in frustration as she realised that she could have spent the time with Ares instead of wasting her morning.

Hermione arrived at her quarters just in time for Ares to have his lunch, and she happily relieved the house elf of his childcare duty. Although she only had thirty minutes until she had to leave, Hermione thoroughly enjoyed feeding her baby brother his oatmeal. He had only been eating real food for about a week, but she enjoyed all the amusing expressions he would make as she put the spoon to his mouth. It was a messy affair, and she usually ended up with as much food on herself as she got into his mouth, nevertheless it was one of the highlights of her day.

After feeding Ares, she walked briskly towards the library to work. As Hermione approached the door to the library, her heart rate began to rush. This would be the first day she would be working by herself. Although Madame Pince was still head librarian, weekends would now be solely Hermione's job. They both had agreed before term started that she would learn more this way, but now that the time had arrived, she was quite nervous.

Hermione sat at the front desk and looked up at the clock, thankful that her nerves had finally calmed and that only four students had entered the library in the hour since she had arrived. She was very relieved that most of the students were gone due to it being a Hogsmeade weekend. Two young Ravenclaws sat down at a table to do school work, and only one of the remaining two had needed help finding a book. Since it was so slow and she had already shelved the displaced books, Hermione pulled a book out of the stack on advanced Arithmancy and began to read. She was leaned over engrossed in the text when the loud thump of a book being placed on the desk in front of her cut through her concentration, startling her.

"Is reading now part of your job description?"

She did not even have to look up to recognise the smooth, even baritone of Professor Snape. Hermione knew she had to be gaping like a fish, but he had surprised her. She never even saw him enter the library.

"I, um...err," she stuttered as she tried to form a coherent sentence.

He smirked at her slightly, and she noticed that he stared at her for several moments before speaking once again. If she hadn't known better, she'd have thought he was trying to hold back a smile as the corners of his mouth twitched slightly. "I will need this book for longer than the usual check out period, Miss Granger. There should be a form for me to sign in the top desk drawer."

Hermione fumbled through the top drawer, looking for the form, and was embarrassed when it took several moments to find the correct paperwork. As the hot flush of embarrassment rose on her cheeks, she finally put the sheet on the desk for him to fill out. She watched his hands as he filled out the paperwork, noticing the fine scars that adorned them.

Probably from preparing potions for so many years, she thought without moving her eyes from their study of his hands. He had very elegant hands with long fingers. A pianist's hands, she thought, an expression she had heard her mum use. The unmistakable sound of him clearing his throat cut through her contemplation, and as she abruptly looked up, her cheeks flushed once again. Much to her horror, she realised he had just caught her staring again.

"Thank you," he said cordially as she handed him the book. He turned sharply and started to head out of the library before he stopped and abruptly turned back towards her once again. "Oh, and Miss Granger?" He paused and raised an eyebrow slightly before speaking once again. "You have oatmeal in your hair."

Hermione could only manage to gape at him, mouth wide open, as he turned sharply and strode out the door with a sligh smile playing about his lips.

-ooOOoo-

Hermione approached the large doors of the Great Hall, and wiped the sweat from her brow before pulling the door open to head back towards her quarters. Although most of the decorating had been done by spell, charm, or transfiguration, there was still enough manual labor for her to get a workout. She only had a couple of hours to get ready before the Halloween feast, and she wanted to spend some time with Ares as well.

After giving Ares his bottle, she headed to the bedroom to find an appropriate set of dress robes for the feast. Although she usually wore teaching-style robes like the rest of the staff, Minerva had insisted on proper dress robes since this was one of the few themed dinners during the year. She pulled open the wardrobe and began perusing the small number of dress robes that she had. Stopping her search when she reached a beautiful set of rust colored robes, Hermione pulled them out and looked them over. She had owned them for over two years, but had never worn them. They were the last pair of robes that her parents had purchased prior to her erasing their memories and sending them to Australia.

It was bittersweet to look at them, but as she thought more about it, they would be very appropriate to wear to the feast tonight. The color would coordinate nicely with the décor in the Great Hall, and the cut was not only elegant, it would highlight some of her best features as well.

She put on the dress robes and then walked into the bathroom to try and tame her hair. It was slightly frizzy from all the work she had done earlier, but she'd not been Lavender Brown's roommate for all those years for nothing. Casting a charm on her hair, Hermione watched the frizz slowly tame itself into soft curls. Pulling and twisting the curls into a soft chignon, she clasped it back and let a few tendrils fall into her face before charming it to stay in place. Adding just a touch of makeup to her face, she headed out to the sitting area.

After giving the house elf some last minute instructions, she kissed Ares on the top of his head and headed towards the Great Hall.

As Hermione entered the hall, she smiled at the sight of the decorations that she had helped with earlier in the day. She normally walked to the dais from the staff entrance, but since it was early and the students had yet to arrive, she had entered from the back in order to take in the full effect of the decorations and atmosphere. So engrossed was she in her observations that she had failed to notice the pitch black eyes staring at her from the staff table. And when she finally turned her gaze towards the dais and her eyes met those of the normally dour potions master, she let out a gasp.

He was not wearing his usual black robes but instead a very dark green. As she walked closer, she realised that the sleeves had elegant black embroidery and were of a highly attractive cut. Feeling his eyes upon her and unable to miss the questioning quirking of his brow, Hermione felt her cheeks begin to burn. Then, she turned to step up onto the dais and she froze. The only open chair was the one directly next to him.

Hermione sat in her seat and avoided his gaze for several seconds, trying to rid herself of the nausea she was now feeling. She turned slightly towards him and quickly spoke a somewhat curt "Professor" before sipping on her glass of pumpkin juice. Taking deep breaths to steady her nerves, she fumbled with the napkin in front of her, barely catching his "Miss Granger" as she placed the napkin in her lap.

As Hermione watched the students enter the hall, her heart had finally quit racing. She had managed to steal glances at him several times during the Headmistress's speech, and each time, she felt her heart flutter and her cheeks flush brilliantly. It was only when her eyes locked with his and she felt the flush go all the way down to her toes, that she finally came to the conclusion that she found him attractive.

-ooOOoo-

Severus had arrived early to the Halloween feast, much to his chagrin. Not only did he dislike having to be amongst the students for such an amount of time, he was irate that Minerva had insisted that he wear dress robes to dinner. 'And definitely not black,' she had added before their conversation had ended.

He had just taken a sip of wine when he noticed Miss Granger enter the hall. For some reason she had come through the back doors where the students usually entered, but he had almost choked on his wine when he was able to get a good look at her.

She was wearing a very elegant set of rust colored robes, and he couldn't help but let his eyes roam down her figure. He was still looking when her eyes suddenly looked up at him. Although he knew that he had been caught, he was too intrigued by the blush growing across her cheeks to really care. Interesting, he thought to himself as he picked up his wine and took another sip.

As he listened to Minerva's speech, he could sense her watching him. He was pretty sure that she thought she had been stealthy, but he had not been a spy for over twenty years for nothing. If he hadn't have known better he would have almost thought that she was...what was that Muggle term...checking him out?

For the most part, Severus had ignored the looks and sly glances that Miss Granger had been focusing in his direction. But as Minerva stepped down from the dais, his eyes met hers once again, and he couldn't help but be mesmorized by the blush that not only was present on her face, but went down into the top of her dress robes. I wonder how far down that blush actually goes? He pushed his legs together quickly, trying to discourage the reaction that her flush was doing to parts of his anatomy.

Severus had never been more thankful for the quickness of the house elves than he was at that moment. As the food appeared on the table, he managed to eat fairly quickly without getting involved in any of the conversations at the staff table. He noticed that Miss Granger had immediately tucked into her dinner, only pausing briefly to talk to Flitwick once the pudding had appeared. It was during her distraction that Severus had quickly risen from the table and strode off towards the staff exit in the Great Hall. As he exited the door, he readjusted his now too-tight trousers, and thanked several deities for the looseness of wizarding robes.

A/N...Many of Ares antics come from real life experiences with my kids. Yes, I did go out in public, and it was pointed out to me that I had baby food in my hair. Even worse than oatmeal, it was carrots...nice, bright orange, carrots.

Okay, we finally have mutual attraction...let's see how they both deal with it...

As always...please review! I won't hold any chapters at bay waiting for reviews, but the Muse does get excited to receive them!