A/N: Hello my lovely readers, and welcome back to 'Accommodations'! Here it is - chapter ten, after ten weeks of waiting, published on 10/10/16. ;) Thank you so much for all your patience with me. These past ten weeks have been crazy, and I didn't manage to dedicate half as much time to writing as I'd intended. However, I am back now, and will resume regular updates on Mondays.

I'd also intended to pick up the pace a little within this story, but we're still at the snail's pace that I've been keeping up since chapter two. I hope you won't mind too much.

Many thanks go to my dear friend McGonagal'sCat who has encouraged me in my writing from the very start, and who has never ceased encouraging me throughout this hiatus. For those of you who are on Facebook, I have recently joined the groups The Death Eater Express and The Shrieking Shack Society, so feel free to find me there, as well as many other authors, and to join in on discussions on fics, writing, pairings, and to get exclusive previews, chapter-individual aesthetics and the like. :)

As any author, I'm a complete sucker for reviews, so please, do leave your opinion, if you like. I've never been one to beg for reviews before, and I truly appreciate all my silent readers out there who enjoy my stories without reviewing, but honestly, reviews are a large part of what keeps me going. Constructive criticism is always appreciated, as are heaps of love. ;) If you don't care for reviews, feel free to pop me a quick PM, I will always respond.

Tuesday, September 17th, 1995

On her way back to the Gryffindor common room on the seventh floor, Hermione pondered all that had happened in her private lesson that night. Professor Snape had worked her hard, having her seek out that little bit of Pure Black that she could manage and then delving in to destroy her attempts at Occlumency without much difficulty. It irked Hermione that it had taken him so little effort to tear down what little defences she managed to set up, and that it took her, on the other hand, so much power to build those thin walls around the borders of her mind in the first place.

As it was, Hermione felt drained. Drained of her magical powers that she'd assembled over the last four years of schooling, drained of her vitality that two consecutive nights of much needed sleep had brought her, and drained even of her blood, as her nose had begun to bleed quite excessively the more often Professor Snape plunged into her brain.

Tired as she was, Hermione hastened to her common room and subsequently her bed. In her hurry, she almost ran over her smallest professor.

Professor Flitwick's tall pointed hat hit her in the nose as she grasped the tiny man's upper arm to keep him from toppling over after she had so carelessly hastened past him and almost dragged him to the floor as she brushed his shoulder with her small, yet taller body.

"Miss Granger," the Charms teacher cheerfully greeted her once he had regained his footing with her help, as if it was no unusual occurrence to be run over by a student in the middle of a corridor, in the middle of the night, "what are you doing out and about at this hour?"

Hermione startled. In fact, she was unaware of the time. Each time the Potions Master had delved into her mind, it had felt like hours before he left again, but then again, she knew that time obeyed different laws when reviewing memories than when making them.

"I apologize, Professor," she said, more to excuse her running him over than her walking the halls at this time, "but I was with Professor Snape."

Hermione cringed at her wording. She had been unable to bring herself to actually speak the word 'detention', and that had resulted in this embarrassing sentence. She had not been with Professor Snape, surely. The closest she had been to being with him had been on top of the Astronomy tower last week, and that was not an experience she was keen to repeat anytime soon.

Or was she?

The wizard opposite her did not appear to notice her inner musings, of course.

"Ah, yes," he said as if coming to a big revelation, "your detention with Severus, I see."

Hermione blushed furiously. Really, she thought, she should hit Harry over the head with her biggest tome on Arithmantic equations for making her reveal her detentions with Professor Snape the way she had – shouting out the news in the Great Hall during lunch, for everybody present (which was pretty much everybody in the school) to hear.

"That is right, sir," Hermione bit out between her teeth, struggling for politeness for the tiny professor who had done nothing to deserve her anger that should actually be directed at her raven-haired best friend.

"Well, maybe I should have a word with him," Professor Flitwick continued, "he really shouldn't work you so late into the night. It is hardly conducive to your studies, I assume."

Hermione did her best not to outright snort at her Charms teacher's words. After all, there was no way for him to know that she was not, in fact, in detention with the feared Potions Master, but rather that he was giving her private lessons in defence against the enemy. And as it had been their first real lesson and she had yet much to learn, she would not complain against being worked until late into the night. Nor would it be conducive to her studies with Professor Snape if Professor Flitwick did any such complaining on her account.

"Oh no, sir, please, don't," she hastened to beg, "I don't think Professor Snape would appreciate that at all, and I wouldn't want you to strike up a discussion that has little to no chance for ending in your favour."

"Or in yours, in this case," Professor Flitwick winked. Then, with a sigh, he said, "But I believe you are right, Miss Granger. Severus rarely approves of advice for his classes, as he still sees it as being berated by his teachers. Once a student, always a student, I'm afraid – both in his eyes and ours, much as we endeavour to treat him as the equal that he is."

Hermione was stunned at the professor's frank admission. Of course, it supported what the Headmaster had told her early in the summer, that Professor Snape had no peers even among his colleagues, but to hear it from one of said colleagues himself added a new sense of fact to what had before been merely hearsay for her. Surprised and more than a little taken aback, Hermione did not know how to respond to that.

"But say, Miss Granger," Professor Flitwick saved her from the embarrassment of not knowing an answer, "how many more nights will you be spending with Severus?"

Inwardly, Hermione groaned. If she could help it she wouldn't be spending any nights with Severus, or with anybody else for that matter, and certainly not anytime soon.

"I still have two more Monday evenings of detention to serve with Professor Snape," she replied instead. "As of yet," she added on an afterthought, "after all, he might find some reason or other to extend that to the end of term."

Professor Flitwick nodded, his pointed hat bobbling vigorously with the movement.

"I see," he said. "Well, Miss Granger, if there is no use in talking to Severus, I will be speaking with Minerva instead." At Hermione's confused expression, he elaborated, "Minerva takes care of the teachers' patrol rotas, Miss Granger." Still sensing no understanding in his student's face, he spelled it out for her. "There will certainly be a way to keep some of my colleagues out of Monday patrols," he promised. "I don't think there will be any need to punish you for being out of bed after curfew when a punishment of detention is the reason for that, wouldn't you agree?"

And with a benevolent wink, he was off on his way.

Finally understanding, a warm fuzzy feeling of relief spread through Hermione's chest. She knew that there was little love for Umbridge among the teachers, but to have her Charms professor tell her almost straight out that he and her Head of House would do their best to keep the Ministry toad out of her – Hermione's – hair was more than she would ever have expected. Determined to get Professor Flitwick some liquorice wands on her next trip to Hogsmeade, Hermione continued her path to the Gryffindor tower without further disturbance.

Harry was still awake when Hermione entered the common room, though very sleepily slouched in his armchair by the dying fire. He perked up, though, at the sound of the portrait closing.

"Hey," he greeted, yawning and stretching his limbs as he shook off as much of the remaining sleepiness as he could manage.

"Hey," Hermione replied in a soft voice. "Where is Ron?"

"Bed," came the short reply. "I sent him off to sleep as he had stayed up for me every night last week," Harry explained. At Hermione's expression he hastened to add, "As did you, when you could."

Hermione merely waved him off, bringing some semblance of control into her facial muscles and working them into a smile. She went over to her best friend and sunk into the armchair next to him with a relieved sigh, closing her eyes in pleasure at the much longed-for comfort.

"What did Snape have you do?" Harry asked when her eyes opened again.

Luckily, Professor Snape had provided her with an answer for that particular question, as Hermione was far too tired to quickly think of one, and a believable one at that, herself.

"Professor Snape," she said with much less admonition in her voice than had she been less sleepy, "had me grind kneazle claws into fine powder."

Harry chuckled, but so darkly that it could hardly be called that. The sound wasn't quite what Hermione had expected, and it must have shown on her face, as Harry made to explain.

"Did you ever notice," he said, "that Snape makes Gryffindors process ingredients that belonged to the same animal as their familiars?" At Hermione's incredulous expression, he continued, "It's true! Neville had to gut a barrel of horned toads last year, Ron and I had to pickle rat brains, and now you had to grind kneazle claws. That's too many incidents to be a mere coincidence, don't you think?"

Hermione was more than a little stunned. Now that she thought about it, Harry appeared to be absolutely right. She even remembered the evil little grin that had almost shown on Professor Snape's face (not that the Potions Master did evil little grins; he would probably prefer it if she called it a nasty sneer) when he'd told her what to say when asked about the content of their detention that night.

Of course, her actual time with the Potions Master had held no sign of kneazle claws or any other kneazle parts, for that matter. For obvious reasons, though, there was no way she would tell Harry about what had actually happened in her 'detention'. And even if she'd wanted to, she couldn't. Professor Snape had made her take a wand's oath to make certain of that.

Her night had consisted of repeated endeavours into her mind, as the Potions Master pried her most embarrassing bouts of uncontrolled magic from her childhood memories. And thus they had watched vases shatter without falling, mobiles move in the absolute absence of wind, dolls walk about when there was nobody moving them, and dummies return to her mouth after having fallen down without anybody picking them up. And those were merely her early memories.

They had moved on from that. Front doors unlocking when she wanted to play on the lawn, puddles appearing in the driest of summers for her to jump in, TV channels switching when she really had no desire to watch soccer. Professor Snape had stopped at preschool, smiling nastily as he informed her that he couldn't very well watch all her memories in one night, when there was still so much for her to learn. Then he had told her to clean her face. Hermione had not even noticed that with her strains at attempting Occlumency, her nose had started to bleed.

Almost as if he could read her mind – because really, it felt to Hermione that anybody could right now – Harry spoke up.

"Hermione," he began hesitantly, "why is there dried blood on your nose?"

Hermione cursed inwardly. A Scourgify was not really meant for cleaning sensitive surfaces. It had hurt enough when she'd performed it on her outer facial skin; she had not wanted to experience the pain that would inevitably come with Scourgifying her mucosa. It seemed that some blood was still stuck on the inside of her nose that was visible to her friend.

"Oh, that," she said, aiming for a generous hint of carelessness in her voice, "I had a sudden bout of migraine halfway through the detention, and a particularly nasty one at that. In fact, it was so bad that it made my nose bleed. Professor Snape had me clean every single one of the kneazle claws that I'd accidentally dropped blood on before I could stop the bleed."

"Bastard," Harry pressed out, and ignored Hermione's sharp admonishment. "Did you visit Madam Pomphrey, at least?"

"Of course not," Hermione said. "I would never hear the end of it if I visited the hospital wing twice in one day. Besides, it's not as if both Professor Snape and me combined were unable to heal a little nose bleed."

Harry did not seem convinced, so Hermione chose to redirect the conversation as smoothly as possible. A giant yawn coming up helped her in that, as did the fact that Harry's yawn mirrored hers.

"Now, thanks for waiting up, Harry," Hermione said, truly grateful, "but if you don't mind, I think we should both head to bed now, wouldn't you say?"

Harry nodded vigorously. "Oh yes," he agreed, "it's almost three in the morning, after all."

"It's almost what?" Hermione shrieked, and apologized as she saw Harry wince.

"It's almost three," Harry repeated cautiously. "Didn't you know?"

"No," Hermione replied, biting back the 'obviously not' that had been on the tip of her tongue. Truly, she had spent far too much time in the Potions Master's presence already. "I thought that it must be well past midnight, but I had no idea that it was this late. Oh Harry," she then realized, "I'd never meant to keep you up for so long!"

"Oh, never mind about me," Harry said. "After all, it was you who had to sit detention with the giant bat. Let's get you to bed now, why don't we?"

And with a whispered 'good night', now that she realized what time it was, Hermione parted ways with her best friend at the stairs, made her way up into her dorm room, and fell into bed.

Wednesday, September 18th, 1995

The next two school days found Hermione constantly practicing her breathing and muscular relaxation. Of course, she wouldn't do so too much during the lessons, as already she found her notes lacking, but interwove her study time with regular breaks for her Occlumency practice. Luckily, the boys noticed little, though Harry would shoot her confused and sometimes worried looks when he found her quill still for too long.

Her exercises had a very positive side effect, Hermione soon found. On Tuesday night, she lay in her bed schooling her breathing, lengthening the periods of Pure Black as best she could. She had decided to practice emptying her mind first, and add the constant awareness later on. After she'd managed to envision a blackness so void of light it seemed to suck all colour from her imagination itself, and had held that image for fourty-five seconds (her goal for the week, signalled by her wand buzzing), her heart rate had slowed down to a degree that had her whole body calm and relaxed. That and the fact that she had reached her self-set goal until Monday next on Tuesday night already made her content as she'd rarely been. She'd never slept so well in her entire time at Hogwarts.

Wednesday evening, however, had her out to finish her homework assignment set by Professor Snape for their private lessons. He had tasked her with practicing to hold the Pure Black while cutting off her potential air supply. Essentially, she'd need to hold her breath under a condition where it was physically impossible for her to draw breath in the first place. That, and empty her mind at the same time, of course.

Hermione had rarely indulged in the benefits her new position as prefect allowed her, but for tonight, she'd visit the prefect's bathroom. She had heard Harry's tales of the niceties provided for prefects, after he'd taken Cedric's hint and bathed with the egg last schoolyear, but she was astonished when she entered the bathroom.

A pool-sized tub was sunk into the ground, a hundred bejewelled golden taps lined along the rim. Opposite the bath, there was a row of toilet cabins. Not wishing to stare upon those during her bath, Hermione erected a screen, though with the stability and opaqueness of a wall, to separate the two sections of the room. Satisfied with her wand work, she went to explore the giant pool.

Looking up and down the rows of taps that lined the huge tub, Hermione settled for a few that appeared promising. She had chosen well, she found, when the tub filled with slightly green tinged water of a comforting emerald which emitted the gentle smell of sandalwood and pine. Sinking into the water, she sighed as the warm liquid enveloped her body. The velvety feel of the wet heat around her caressed her skin, and caused a very pleasant, tingling sensation behind her navel. Hermione lingered for a minute, simply enjoying the feeling of being held by the water, for that was how the bath felt to her, before she took a few turns around the tub, swimming in long, smooth motions, concentrating on stretching her arms and legs as she fully lay into every movement.

Before long, she settled back into a corner where she could both easily see the makeshift-corridor to the tub room, created by her conjured screen, and was slightly hidden from sight herself. It was highly improbable that a student would manage to break through the wards that she'd erected when she'd first entered the room, but one could never be too careful. There she washed, relieving her body of all the sweat that had collected since her morning shower, and of part of the tension that had been pooling ever since her meeting with the mountain troll in her first year.

When she'd thoroughly washed, she decided it was time to do her homework. Inwardly, she giggled, and repeated the sound out loud when she realized that she was all alone for once. The thought that she'd never expected to do her homework naked in a bathtub was cause for much amusement to her.

After a minute, she calmed down from the humorous notion and concentrated on her breathing. Filling her lungs to the brim with the moist, heavy and pleasantly scented air, she collected her thoughts. Then, as she exhaled gradually, she discarded each and every one of those thoughts from her mind. When there was no more air to be found in her lungs, and her mind had taken on a gentle anthracite colour, she slowly let herself sink under the water. Her hands held on to the brim of the tub, both to hold herself down and to be able to easily yet gently lift herself from the water again. There, ensconced in the velvet liquid, she sought that eerily enjoyable blackness that was supposed to fill her mind. However, with the pressure from the water around her, she found that she was unable to reach that certain degree of darkness, that extreme that had come to her surprisingly easily these past two days.

Confused as she was that the Pure Black would not come, Hermione lost her concentration and her goal eluded her ever more. Not content to settle with that, she tried to force her mind to dismiss any thought process, but the effort used on that mission counteracted any possibility she had of completing it. Her stubbornness held her under water for longer than was sensible, and when her lungs screamed with a desperation that made the pain from the oxygen loss almost audible in her throbbing ears, she pulled herself up and drew several much needed breaths in quick succession. Needing to catch her breath in the first place had made her lose her calm breathing rhythm, of course, and so it was that Hermione took longer than usually necessary to start all over again, though maybe her frustration with needing to do so at all had quite a bit to do with that as well.

It took her a few more tries to realize that maybe she would not find her Pure Black that night, or not under water as she was supposed to do. Giving up with a great deal of reluctance, as giving up was something she rarely did, Hermione had to admit that her endeavours would not be successful this night, not in the state her mind was in right now. Thus, she gave thought to what other tasks the Potions Master had set her.

Get used to the idea of being viewed as a woman.

His exact words.

He wanted her to shorten her skirt by half an inch every Potions lesson. And as well as she knew him, she could be certain that he'd check that she was following his instructions.

And what more had he said? Ah yes, she remembered, she was to work on her appearance. And to get Lavender and Parvati to help her with that. He'd never used their names, of course, rather electing to call them 'those dunderheaded chits she lived with', and really, wasn't he quite right in that assessment? It wasn't that those two girls weren't nice people, or at least not that she knew them not to be. No, it was merely that she had nothing in common with them, and – if she allowed herself to think so – she was quite a way out of their league.

But what they didn't have in common with her was exactly what she needed right now (at least in Professor Snape's opinion, and she had signed up to trust that opinion) – their interest and expertise in fashion and the like. They had often asked her whether she might allow them to suggest another top with that skirt, or whether they might rearrange her scarf around her neck, or whether they might demonstrate to her what other hairstyle would benefit her features more? She had always declined, of course, and the more often they asked, the harsher her answer came to be, until one blessed day, they had eventually stopped asking.

That, of course, was quite the drawback right now.

Hermione did not want to imagine how the two girls might react if she were to approach them now. Would they sneer and reject her plea, much as she had always rejected their offers? Or would they go completely over the top in joy to finally be allowed to treat her as the live doll that they'd always wanted?

Well, Hermione thought, there was no way around it. And as it was, Professor Snape had chosen the perfect week to set her that particular assignment. It was, after all, her birthday tomorrow. And Lavender and Parvati wouldn't deny her a birthday wish – or would they?

Severus strode through the castle. Since Monday night, a particular kind of restlessness had taken hold of him that he simply could not explain nor reason away. He surmised it must have to do with the girl, though how it had come to be nor why the girl should affect him so, he could not say. Had it been her confession that she trusted him to be a good man, deep down? Severus scoffed at the notion. Had it been her surprisingly good grasp of Occlumency, and the revelation that not only was her mind quite impressive for a female her age, but that so was her control of it? Maybe, but why would that cause him restlessness? Shouldn't that calm his nerves, that he would be forced to spend much less time in her presence than formerly expected?

Whatever it was, Severus had felt trapped in his chambers and had elected to get some fresh air both literally in his lungs and figuratively in his mind. When he found himself on top of the Astronomy tower, he realized his mistake. He would not, however, have his feet lead him up those many stairs without at least taking in the view and a few much needed breaths of clean air, he decided, and stayed. When his lungs filled with the precious purity that was the air up here, so did his mind fill with images of their meeting here, almost a week ago. Had so little time passed since then, Severus wondered, but chose not to linger on the memory any longer than necessary. That it came to him was a miracle in and of itself, and a very much unwanted and alarming one, as he had extracted his memory of that night so as not to have anybody – the Dark Lord or the Light one – stumble on it.

That the girl should be able to disrupt his normalcy thus irritated Severus. To nip thoughts of her in the bud, at least for tonight, he descended the many stairs and strode through the corridors of the Castle instead. When he found himself on the fifth floor, he started when a soft sensation indicating wards made his skin tingle.

When he'd first come to Hogwarts, his sensitivity to heavy magic had almost driven him mad those first few weeks, especially that he was apparently the only one to feel it. Over the months, he had become both used and a little desensitized to the wards and spells that surrounded Hogwarts, and he had learned to consciously dismiss his sensitivity to certain enchantments. These wards now, however, were none of those built into the very stones that the Castle consisted of. No, these had been erected by a student, and there was only one that he knew to possess such skill and power.

Severus sighed. Much as he longed to escape the girl, she had a certain way of wriggling back into his every waking moment. Damn her.

He could not help but be more than a little impressed at her work on what he now found to be the entrance to the prefect's bathroom. It certainly surpassed the knowledge one might expect of a fifth year student, though that alone should cease to be a surprise to him. No, what he had not expected was the layers that she'd woven, interweaving locking wards with alarm triggers and the like. In fact, if Severus was not mistaken, had the girl actually taken his advice to heart and decided to follow his task of ridding herself of her –?

A quick Homenum revelio proved Severus wrong, and he sighed a breath of relief. Why that was, he could not say. It should matter little to him in what manner the girl decided to lose her virginity, though maybe he was glad to have her above the cliché of schoolgirls having sex in a bathroom. Besides lacking class – though could there be anything less classy than rutting like, well, teenagers, in a broom cabinet? –, it was also quite unhygienic.

Though really, what did he care?

Severus did not know. And if he hated something, it was not knowing the answer to something, anything really.

With a sigh, Severus continued on his way, only now realizing that he'd stopped for longer than he cared to admit. Really, there was little sense in pondering the many questions that surrounded him in relation to the girl, much less the question why there were so many of those questions in the first place. Instead, he reminded himself that there was a nice bottle of Old Odgen's waiting for him in his quarters that would certainly help lift his spirits. The bottle, and a stack of seventh years' essays.

Severus smirked.

Nothing better to cheer him up than degrading a couple of students mere months before their final exams.

Thursday, September 19th, 1995

The twin squeals of joy that had answered Hermione's question on the morning of her birthday were enough to make her ears ring. Though she knew that she should feel relief at the fact that Lavender and Parvati were willing to help her out after she'd rejected them for so long, and so callously at times as well, Hermione could not help the feeling of dread at what might expect her creep down her spine.

As it was, she stood in front of her dorm room, more than a little afraid to enter. The girls had whispered among themselves that morning, and had told her to meet them back at their room during lunch break, when they would take the best of care of her before going to Potions together.

Maybe that was what Hermione dreaded the most, she though – Professor Snape being the first who saw her new look. What if the girls screwed up, making her a dressed up tart? Or maybe even worse – what if she looked pretty for once? Would he pounce on her again, like he had a week ago on top of the Astronomy tower?

But now it was too late for second thoughts. She had already agreed to her roommates' plan, and she'd already told Harry and Ron to have lunch without her. There was no way around it now. She would have to go through with this.

Summoning all her supposed Gryffindor courage, Hermione opened the door –

– and felt her heart skip a beat. The space in the middle of the room was covered in blankets and pillows, and a vanilla scented candles floated around the room, bathing everything in a warm, soft glow. Next to the blankets, there were tablets of hors d'oeuvres and a carafe of pumpkin juice with three golden goblets. A generous measure of guilt riddled Hermione at how wonderful everything looked, contrary to her worst fears.

"Lavender," she softly spoke, "Parvati – thank you, so much. This is amazing."

The girls giggled and waved her off, though they looked more than pleased at the compliment.

"Oh, it's nothing, Hermione," Parvati said.

"Yet," Lavender added, with a conspiratorial wink. "You can thank us after we're done with you."

And with that, Hermione was pulled fully into the room and seated in the middle of the blankets, a goblet of pumpkin juice in one hand and a plate of nibbles close to the other, handing herself over to the girls for the next hour.

When it was over, Hermione owned quite the extensive list of beauty charms, with descriptions of what exactly they were supposed to do, prescriptions of what time of the day or for what occasion to use them, and notes on how they reacted with other beauty charms, in which order to apply them, and how often to renew them.

The lunch hour had passed in a blur, it almost seemed to Hermione, as she could remember few details of the constant chatter, frequent giggles, and many wand movements that had cocooned her. When the girls helped her rise and Lavender opened one more button on Hermione's blouse – for that was essentially what most boys were after in the end, Parvati explained – they stood her in front of a mirror.

Hermione gasped.

That was how they expected her to go to Potions, of all classes?

But there was nothing to help it now. The girls appeared very pleased with the result they had charmed out of the bookish wallflower and dragged her off to the dungeons. On the way down the seven floors, the three of them drew many looks – or at least Hermione told herself that it was the three of them, until Parvati leaned over and whispered, "See them looking? That's all you!"

While the hour of being pampered by the two girls had filled her with a fuzzy warm feeling that could only be described as more girlish than anything Hermione had ever felt before – except maybe pretty much every moment of the Yule Ball she spent in Viktor's presence – the feeling of dread that had predominated this morning now returned in full force. Every step she took towards the dungeons had the heavy lump that had started out in her throat sink lower until it weighed down her stomach so much that Hermione wondered how she managed to move one foot in front of the other.

Eventually, the three girls reached the door to their dungeon classroom.

"Showtime," Lavender stage-whispered, and pushed open the door.

They were among the last to arrive. In fact, they were so late, that Professor Snape was already striding in through the door from his office before they'd made their way to their respective seats. All faces had turned to Hermione's changed appearance, and she felt, more than saw, the Potions Master's gaze follow her classmates'.

"Miss Granger," he thundered, when he had apparently taken in her changed looks.

It seemed that it had been too much to hope that their unspoken agreement to treat each other to as much silence as possible in class might override his shock at her makeover. Reluctantly, Hermione turned around.

"Yes, Professor?" she asked nimbly.

For a moment, it seemed as if the Potions Master might be lost for words, though it was over in the blink of an eye. Hermione was almost certain that she'd been the only one to sense his hesitation.

"What, in Merlin's name, happened to you?"

Coming up: Chapter eleven, wherein an unexpected present is gifted, and the winning line to my little holiday-country-guessing-competition.