A/N: Hello, hello, and a huge thank you for the overwhelming attention last week's update got! I hope some of my new readers will be back this week to read this, chapter eleven to 'Accommodations'. For those of you who are interested in reading more of my works, you might like to check out 'Don't Wanna Dance', a one-shot I wrote and published just this weekend. I'm happy to get to know your opinions to either of my stories.
But now, without much further ado, I'll just let you get to chapter eleven. Enjoy! :)
"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?"
Thursday, September 19th, 1995
Before Hermione knew how to answer his question, Lavender spoke.
"We did, sir," her roommate said. "We gifted her a makeover."
It seemed that Lavender was still so delighted by being allowed to treat Hermione as her own personal doll, she had forgotten that she wasn't supposed to have a spine, much less show it, in Potions class. Professor Snape, as always, was quick to remind her.
"Miss Brown," he seethed, "I do not recall asking for your opinion. Ten points from Gryffindor, and I better not see you open your mouth again today or you will regret it. Now," and he turned to Hermione once more, as the two girls scurried to take their seats, leaving her the only student standing, and dangerously close to their feared professor at that, "Miss Granger." The word was spat out with even more contempt than usual. "I suggest you sit."
Hermione went over to where Harry and Ron were sitting. Ron had dutifully paired up with Neville, unwilling to have Monday's disaster repeat itself and sacrificing his seat next to his best friend for Hermione's birthday. The seat to Harry's right was empty. When Hermione made to sit down there, however, the Potions Master's voice cut through the room.
"Not there, Miss Granger," he bellowed. "The last row should be perfect."
A collective gasp went through the class. Usually, when students attempted to sit in the last row (which was always free as there were too many desks in the classroom), they were reprimanded at once, sent to a seat in the centre of the front row, and their House experienced a severe loss of points. The reason for students trying to sit in the last row was always the same: escape the feared teacher's attention and thus, wrath, and hope for some peace and quiet. The manner in which Professor Snape's command was issued now, however, did nothing to promise Hermione a lot of peace, or any peace for that matter. In fact, she, along with everybody else, was quite certain that sending her to the very back of the room was supposed to be a punishment of some kind; though punishment for what, she did not know.
It appeared Hermione was so stuck in her shock that she did not move fast enough for the professor's liking, as he spoke again.
"We would not want you to harm another student, now, would we?" his silky voice mocked her.
"No, sir," Hermione was quick to agree, because it seemed the safest route for her to take, but also because she whole-heartedly agreed with him. Her stunt in the last lesson had been stupid, as she'd arrogantly assumed that it was alright for her to completely drop her concentration on the rather basic, though potentially toxic potion she and Neville had been working on.
Harry shot her a worried look, and the expression on Ron's face was downright panicked. Neville looked as if he was about to flagellate himself for getting her into trouble in their previous Potions lesson. Hermione graced the three boys with a smile that was supposed to assure Neville of his innocence, calm Ron, and tell Harry that she was alright. Only a very small part of the tension enveloping her friends visibly dissipated, but there was little more Hermione could do, before readjusting the strap of her book bag over her shoulder and making her way to the back of the room.
"The far corner," Professor Snape provided, and Hermione made her way to the left of the room, rather than to the right where she would be closer to the store room. It seemed she'd guessed correctly as there were no further commands – for the moment, at least.
When with a flick of his wand, Professor Snape had the instructions for today's concoction appear on the blackboard in his neat, though spidery handwriting. As always, Hermione was the fastest to grasp what ingredients she would need, and was out of her seat to collect them from the storeroom. The professor, however, had other plans for her.
"Sit, Miss Granger," he bellowed across the room once more, freezing Hermione in her tracks before turning back and dropping down into her seat once more. Not daring to move, and unwilling to disturb his class (she remembered her promise to treat him with respect, after all, and had come to realize that her constantly raising her hand was quite the disruption to his lessons), she remained silent and seated.
From her new desk, she had a very good view of her classmates trudging to the storeroom and back, and she had more than one opportunity to shake her head in disbelief as some of her peers grabbed the wrong quantities, or the wrong ingredients even. As engrossed as she was in watching her classmates, she almost missed Professor Snape stalking up to her. His hand coming down to the top of her desk right in front of her eyes, however, quickly had her attention.
"Miss Granger," the Potions Master's voice was so silky it almost caressed her name, and Hermione had to suppress the pleasant shudder running through her from becoming too obvious. "How many glamours exactly are you wearing?"
The question hit her like the insult it was quite assuredly supposed to be. Affronted, she was daunting enough to meet his eyes.
"Excuse me?"
"It is a simple question, Miss Granger," came the reply. "How many? Or have you once more forgotten how to count? Should I reacquaint you with numbers? At least those from one to twelve, what would you say?"
His voice carried the promise of repeating the centre piece of the Astronomy Tower Incident, and Hermione had no desire to see that particular history repeat itself.
Are you quite sure about that?
And back was the niggling voice.
Desperate to shut the voice down before it reclaimed the position at the front of her mind that it was used to occupying, Hermione elected to answer her professor instead.
"That won't be necessary, sir," she said coolly. "As it is, I am well able to count, and as to the number of glamours surrounding me, there are none."
Obviously dissatisfied with her answer, Hermione found the professor's wand pointed at her nose. It drew generous circles around her head and all around her body in a manner that Hermione was inclined to call lazy, though she knew Professor Snape was never one to do anything lazily, even if it was only a matter of drawing circles with his wand.
You seem to be thinking an awful lot about what he is doing with his wand.
No, I'm not, Hermione shot back in her mind, unwilling to follow the inappropriate paths that the little voice was desperate to lead her down.
"Well, well, well," Professor Snape drawled, "it seems that for once, Miss Know-It-All appears to be correct."
The look Hermione shot him at his assessment would have Harry and Ron cower in fear of her wrath, but had little effect on the dour Potions Master. In fact, his eyes held an expression that Hermione could not name, but that had her avert her eyes within the second she met his.
"Now, Miss Granger," he caught her attention again, though it had never really been lost, "I have prepared a draught that needs stirring. As you have done precious little of that in my last lesson, you will take over that task now, instead of brewing the potion that I set for today. Do you think you will be able to manage that?"
"Yes, sir," Hermione ground out between her teeth.
It wasn't as if she expected special treatment from the Potions Master, and certainly not special to the positive. But she thought that since he'd opened up to her a few times – the Astronomy Tower Incident came to mind, when he'd lost his usually impeccable self-control, or this Monday, when he'd asked her why she trusted him – he might not try quite so hard to rile her up. Alas, she found, maybe it was too easy to rile her up anyway. After all, the boys did it all the time.
Hermione had to giggle inwardly, despite how angry she'd been before at the professor's treatment of her. After all, there was quite some amusement to be gained from comparing the dour thirty-something teacher to some fifteen-year-old boys.
In her humour, Hermione again almost missed that Professor Snape had come back. She was instantly pulled from her thoughts when the cauldron was set down in front of her.
"This one won't stifle or poison you," he explained, "at least not through its gases. I trust you won't be stupid enough to taste it?"
Hermione was quick to shake her head in the negative.
"Very well, Miss Granger," Professor Snape surmised. "Do try not to be distracted from stirring by staring at the draught's colour."
His voice took a tone that, if it were eyes, might have been described as a wink. Could a voice wink, Hermione wondered? Of course it could, she found, not that there was anything Professor Snape's voice couldn't do.
Like wet your knickers? her very own annoying voice in the back of her mind little helpfully supplied.
Oh, shut it, you, Hermione tried to drown it out once more. So engrossed was she in her mental banter that she almost missed the professor's next words. Honestly, she mentally admonished herself, annoyed with her inattention. This business of becoming distracted and consequently being surprised by Professor Snape's presence every other minute was a nuisance, and a habit that Hermione better get rid of, and soon.
"A word of advice," he began. "Keep your eyes open, but don't forget to blink. Make your mind impenetrable, but don't completely blend out your surroundings. Make this draught's colour your aim, but don't concentrate on it specifically. Do you understand?"
"I – I believe so, sir," Hermione said, taken aback that he'd offer her any advice at all.
"Don't 'believe so', Miss Granger," Professor Snape shot back, though without his usual malice. His tone could almost be called benevolent. "Know so."
"Yes, sir."
"Slow clockwise stirs in a steady rhythm of four seconds per circle, Miss Granger," the Potions Master's voice returned to its usual commanding tone that brook no argument. Then, his expression softened ever so slightly. "It's quite cooled down, so there's no danger of burning."
Hermione still needed a moment to collect herself. A glass stirring rod was set down on the table before her, and Professor Snape had already turned away to stalk to the front of the class once more when she remembered to softly call, "Thank you, sir."
His step did not visibly falter, yet Hermione could almost believe that it had. He made no move to answer her in words or perceivably acknowledge her thanks at all, but his head turned to the side ever so marginally, and she caught the movement. To her, it might have been a nod.
Severus wanted to turn around and shake the girl by the shoulders. Why by Merlin did she always have to thank him when he had done nothing to earn her gratitude?
Or maybe he had, he thought. When had he ever given her pointers before, really? Oh yes, he had informed her during her attention that Monday that further help would be provided to her should she need it, so his advice should not have come as a surprise to her, but it seemed she had not truly believed him to follow up on his word, either.
Oh, well, he thought, at least he could still surprise the girl.
It appeared that she'd taken up stirring, and she'd seemingly understood his task for her to practice her breathing exercises with her eyes wide open. The draught he had her stir was of a deep black colour that was darker than anything he would ever let a student attempt to brew, but it would be turning a gentle pale lilac over time.
Yes, Severus surmised as he checked the time, in fact it should be at a midnight blue right now.
He glanced at the girl. Her gaze was fixed in the direction of the potion, but not on the potion itself. Clever girl, he thought, though he would never mutter those words out loud, much less with the appreciative tone that his thought carried. She had apparently understood what he'd been telling her, or at least found out that the draught changed its colour on her own.
Her stirring appeared steady, as did her breathing. Severus shot a look at her chest. Yes, her ribcage was nicely visible through her now fitted shirt. So was her cleavage, with one more button undone than was strictly allowed by the school dress code, though she was still more covered up than the chits who had dressed her. The new style suited her very well, Severus found, as it showed off her slim figure and allowed an impression of her perfectly symmetrical assets, but she was still covered up to a degree that did not exactly go against her nature.
It had shaken him to the core, seeing her walk in all done up and mature in looks as well as in mind. Her heels a good inch higher, her skirt half an inch shorter, her shirt a slight deal more see-through, her collar opened for his perusal.
No, Severus reprimanded himself, not his perusal in particular, of course, and much less his specifically. It was neither for him to watch her breasts nor for her to want him to watch them. Yet he had to, professorially speaking, to check her breathing on her otherwise perfectly still body.
As it was, her soft mounds rose in perfect unison, steadily and slowly, before equally slowly returning to their natural position where they rested as the girl's vision turned a Pure shade of Black.
A lock of her hair fell into her face, and her left hand came up to tuck it behind her ear where it belonged without the right faltering in its motion, nor her breathing in its regularity. Severus took the opportunity to peruse her soft curls that had before been a furious mane but had now been turned into silky tresses. For a short moment he wondered how it might feel to sink his hands into her curls, to tug at the short locks that sat at the nape of her neck, to entangle his fingers in her longer strands and follow their length to the tip where his fingers would drag free from her silken hair, only to return to her nape and repeat the motion.
Severus groaned inwardly. His cock had already sprung to attention at the sight of her enhanced beauty entering his classroom, but now it hardened even more at the image of entangling his hands in her hair and holding her head. His thoughts returned to his earlier discussion with the girl, when he'd wanted little more than to shut her up in the most delicious of ways.
He really needed to get some grip.
Luckily – for him, at least, and rather unfortunately for the idiot in question – one of his dunderheads managed to explode his concoction just then.
"Mr Finnigan," Severus bellowed, and strode across the classroom towards the poor bastards desk.
Hermione was rapidly drawn from her thoughts as Professor Snape's voice cut through the classroom. As indicated by the smoke cloud collecting over his desk, it seemed that Seamus had managed to blow up his cauldron once more.
Seeing that Professor Snape had the situation well – or rather, terribly, as was his wont – in hand, Hermione returned to the draught before her, her right hand still rhythmically stirring. She was surprised to see that it had turned a lovely purple shade.
After Professor Snape's initial words of advice, she had attempted to follow his instructions as best she could, keeping her body's attention on the draught and her mind's attention on her breathing. She had not managed to reach the Pure Black today, what with circular motions and errant curls that demanded at least parts of her attention. What she had reached, though, was a shade of dark silver. In the beginning, it had swirled and twirled, brightly gleaming streaks creating patterns in the darker colour, but they had gradually faded until she had an even tone of grey that emitted a slight glimmer that betrayed the silvery aspect of that particular shade.
As it was, Hermione thought she could be quite satisfied with herself. The question was whether Professor Snape would agree on that.
Absorbed in her musings, Hermione was surprised when Professor Snape suddenly dismissed the class. Not daring to stop her stirring before he explicitly told her to do so, Hermione remained at her desk.
It seemed to be the right choice.
"Stay after class, Miss Granger," the professor's voice easily carried to the back of the room.
Harry and Ron shot her worried looks once more, but otherwise could do little to stop Professor Snape from keeping her in the dungeons. She waved them off with her left hand, mouthing that she'd see them later, and they left.
When the room had been cleared of everybody but the two of them, Professor Snape magically waved the door shut and strode to her desk. Hermione was certain that he knew her concentration to be broken by now anyway and did not even attempt to clear her mind and steady her breathing once more. She had another class to attend after this, and he would not be able to keep her forever.
"You can stop stirring now, Miss Granger," Professor Snape said after assessing the draught and finding it sufficient. Or at least, that was what Hermione hoped for.
She extracted the stirring rod and held the fragile glass instrument in her hand so that any drops would fall into the cauldron rather than on the table.
"Set it down, Miss Granger," the Potions Master commanded when he saw that she made no move to release the rod from her hand, "the draught will neither eat into the wood of the table nor into the glass itself."
"Should I not clean it, sir?"
A wave of her teacher's hand had the rod clean.
"There, Miss Granger," he said with a hint of annoyance to his voice, though Hermione might have caught a flicker of appreciation at her careful thinking in his eyes, "though it wouldn't have left any spots worse than anything other students have already inflicted on this classroom."
Hermione shot a look at Seamus's desk that still clearly showed the scorch mark of his overheated cauldron. Then her eyes focussed back on the man in front of her, though she was clever enough not to meet his gaze. It would not do to offer him her innermost thoughts on a platter, when he could so easily access them without her facilitating his penetration of her mind.
Speaking of penetrating…
Hermione was quick to cut off whatever sentence her inner voice was about to put into words by breaking the silence between her and the professor.
"Was there anything you needed, professor?" she asked. She could feel the dark look he shot her at what he was certain to find a most impertinent question. "I only ask because I really need to be going to Arithmancy now, sir."
"I'm certain Professor Vector will excuse your tardiness, Miss Granger," Professor Snape replied in an icy tone, "especially today, of all days."
"Excuse me, sir?" Hermione asked, confused.
"In case you forgot, Miss Granger," Professor Snape elaborated, enunciating every syllable very clearly, "I believe it is your birthday today."
"Oh," she said, a little flustered that he would know about that, let alone acknowledge it, "yes, I guess technically it is."
As soon as the words had left her mouth, she found the Potions Master's eyes narrow in suspicion for a second before relaxing to their usual size.
"Elaborate," he commanded. Hermione did not need to ask which part exactly.
"Well, professor, you see," she began, trying to find a way to talk around her slip, "for me, every day throughout the week is first and foremost a school day. Any special occasions that befall such days are a rather minor issue to me, sir."
Even though his face gave nothing away, Hermione was quite certain that she had not convinced him. Damn her, almost giving away her secret about the Time Turner. 'Technically', honestly? She snorted inwardly at her own carelessness. How stupid could she be?
"Not much one for presents then, Miss Granger?" Professor Snape drew her from her thoughts.
Hermione started. Surely he didn't mean to –?
"On the contrary, sir," she answered truthfully, "little as I value the amassing of material goods, I love presents – on the condition that the giver has given them careful thought, which is rather rarely the case among many people. But yes, I confess that I did use this birthday as an excuse to have my roommates gift me the makeover that you suggested; though admittedly," she added on an afterthought, "it did take little persuasion to have them agree to that."
If Severus were a man to allow himself smiles in the presence of students from a House other than Slytherin, he would have smiled then. As it was, he wasn't, and he didn't. Instead, he took the opportunity that her words had granted him to take in her appearance once more, and in full.
His eyes started at her reasonable shoes that had suddenly developed slight heels and were overall slimmer, making her foot appear as delicate as it probably was. His gaze travelled up her calves that had shed the plaid knee-highs and were instead clad in an unobtrusive sheen that spoke of the softest silk stockings that were likely to end in a lace top somewhere underneath her skirt. Her fitted button-up shirt showed off her flat stomach and her small, but pert breasts. Her face, framed by her now silken curls, had been freed of any impurities and featured pink, glossy lips that were begging to be kissed, and eyes that had been discreetly lined with kohl, accentuating their size and the molten chocolate that lay within.
In a word, the girl was stunning.
So why was she looking so insecure?
Yes, few could withstand his concentrated perusal of their person, and that a teenage girl was unable to keep herself from fidgeting was no big surprise. But wasn't the girl aware of how utterly beguiling she looked?
"Sir?" she asked, her self-consciousness as clearly audible in her voice as it was visible on her face. "Do I not meet your approval?"
Oh fuck, Severus cursed inwardly, and his cock whole-heartedly agreed to that notion. So willing was she in seeking his approval, it took him more control than usual to not physically demonstrate to her how much exactly he approved of her new look.
"You are said to be of above average intellect, Miss Granger," he replied instead, outwardly his usual snarky self, "yet it is obvious that you completely failed to either notice or interpret the looks every student in this class has been giving you. As it is apparent that you will not get to the answer to your own, let me spell it out for you…"
Severus leaned in to add even more emphasis to his next words. The strong whiff of her new perfume he got threw him a little off track, but only for a second.
"You managed to properly sexualize yourself. Congratulations."
The girl sank back into herself, and more than a little. In fact, she looked utterly destroyed.
"Thank you, sir," she managed to say. And damn the girl for thanking him for every bloody thing, no matter whether it deserved her thanks or not. This certainly didn't.
In his need to end that particular conversation, Severus decided to change the topic.
"How is your homework coming along, Miss Granger?"
"Oh," she said, confused at the quick change in topic. "Yes, well, not so well, sir. I went to the bathroom for practice the other night but didn't even get remotely close to the Pure Black underneath the water. But I will practice more until Monday night, and I'm sure with time I will be able to –"
"Did you breathe, Miss Granger?" Severus interrupted.
"Well, yes, sir," she replied, obviously more than a little confused at the question. "Of course. When I ran out of air, I resurfaced and breathed, though by then I had lost my rhythm and had to start anew. So –"
"That's not what I meant," he cut her off again. "Did you breathe under water?"
The girl looked as if she wanted to laugh out at his question, but the expression died as soon as she saw his inquiring look.
"No, sir," she answered. "I thought you meant for me to hold my breath under water, without being able to breathe. I apologize for the misunderstanding. Had I known that you meant for me to cast a bubble-head charm, I would have –"
"No, Miss Granger, that is not what I meant either."
Shutting her up with his interruption really became a habit that Severus found he could not dislike.
"Gillyweed, then, sir, but –"
"Miss Granger," Severus thundered, effectively shutting her up, "did you or did you not attempt to breathe under water without the explicit use of magic?"
Her forehead was littered in deep furrows as she frowned.
"No, sir."
Severus wanted to laugh at how short she now kept her answer, but didn't, for obvious reasons.
"I suggest you try that the next time you practice."
The girl shuffled her feet, obviously uncomfortable in her failure, before asking her question.
"How do I do that, professor?"
Severus sighed. Once more it was strikingly obvious to him in what many ways Hogwarts failed to educate its students.
"How do you work magic, Miss Granger?"
The girl seemed confused.
"But, professor," she said, "I thought you said to breathe without the explicit use of magic?"
"Answer the question, girl," Severus thundered.
Worrying her lip, the girl pondered his question.
"Well," she began, "one needs two things. For one, a wand. Second, …"
"Wrong, Miss Granger," Severus cut her off, "or can you hand any muggle a wand and suddenly they perform magic?"
She seemed honestly surprised at that, but the notion must have stricken her as reasonable, for she did not disagree with him.
"Do proceed in your answer, Miss Granger," Severus prompted when the girl did not make to resume her reply from before.
"S-second," the girl was quite insecure in her knowledge now, Severus saw, "the correct spell."
"Wrong again," Severus countered. "Or have you never seen somebody perform magic without an incantation?"
"I know about wordless magic, sir," the girl replied, now a little more confident in countering him, "but to my knowledge, the correct spell still needs to be in the wizard's mind to work the desired outcome."
"Have you ever entertained the notion that perhaps your knowledge is not quite as far reaching as you like to make it out to be, Miss Granger?" Severus said.
The girl twitched at the scathing tone of his voice. That would not do, Severus decided, as he needed her to be receptive to his teaching.
"You are correct when talking about unspoken magic, Miss Granger," he attempted to placate the girl. "When working unspoken magic, the words still need to exist, being channelled into the spell by the wizard's – or witch's – concentration. Wordless magic, however, is exactly that – wordless. No prewritten incantation, be it in Ancient Greek or modern Latin, nothing. You will agree with me, Miss Granger, when you think about accidental bouts of magic that magical children issue before coming to Hogwarts. I believe we watched quite a bit of your personal experiences in that area last Monday, now, didn't we?"
The girl blushed as she remembered how he had revisited and dissected all of her, partly embarrassing, early childhood memories of inexplicable things happening around her. Obviously desperate for him to move on from that, she nodded. Severus narrowed his eyes but allowed her the slip where before he would have admonished her for not answering him in words. After all, they were discussing the power of the absence of words at the moment.
"As it is," he continued, "one does in fact need two things to work magic. First, magical blood, as no muggle could ever perform magic, no matter how hard they tried or how many tools they were given to assist them. Secondly, intention.
"You will come to find, Miss Granger, that intention is a powerful thing, the most important thing, one might say, there is to magic. Without intention, it is impossible to perform magic. A wand, a spell, they will get you nowhere if you are not intent on reaching whatever goal you want to reach.
"Nowadays, wizardom is much too dependent on the many tools that facilitate magic. It is true that wands help to channel one's magic more easily than wandless magic does, but one should not allow oneself to be incapacitated without that piece of wood. The same goes for spells; they help envision in the mind what one attempts to achieve, but one should not let oneself be limited in one's goal simply because one does not know the textbook words to achieve it. Now tell me, Miss Granger, what other tools can you think of that magic does not need?"
Hermione's mind whirred. Now that the professor had spelled it out to her, it seemed obvious that wands and words were merely aids, not essentials, for magical people. She thought hard to answer his question.
"Brooms, sir?" she hesitantly suggested. At the professor's curt nod, she beamed, and continued. "And perhaps – crystal balls? For divination?"
Her face must have shown her distaste for the notion of something like divination being possible, for Professor Snape's eyes widened the fraction of an inch, for the fraction of a second. Yes, Hermione thought, quite the surprise to find the school's resident know-it-all not believe in any one subject of study.
"Quite correct on both counts, Miss Granger," came what to her was very high praise. "Now that you are aware of these limitations that those tools have mostly become, I trust you will take care in not allowing their absence to incapacitate you."
Hermione was taken aback. Of course, she would endeavour to learn more about doing wandless and wordless magic, but to actually achieve both all by herself?
"Yes, sir," she replied, "I will do my best to do so, though I would very much appreciate your assistance should I fail to progress in that endeavour."
Professor Snape's eyes fixed onto her face. Though she did not look up to meet his gaze, she could feel his cold stare on her skin, growing ever so hot under his attention.
"You may choose one endeavour that you would otherwise achieve with the help of a tool," the Potions Master spoke, "and I will teach you in that. You may take that as a birthday present."
Surprised, Hermione looked up into his eyes.
The girl's eyes met his. The shock Severus could see there mirrored the shock he felt. Had he really just offered the girl a birthday present? Severus wasn't one to do such a thing. He simply did not do birthdays, nor birthday presents for that matter. What the hell had prompted him to offer her one just now?
"Thank you, sir," the girl replied, her honest gratitude painfully obvious in her eyes that were still trained on his, stupid Gryffindor that she was.
Without meaning to – or did he? – Severus slipped into her mind.
The girl's memories surrounded him, in bright, stark colours, as her mind had been thoroughly unguarded. Her numerous thought flurried around him, and he grabbed onto one that seemed to be of earlier that day.
The girl sat in what appeared to be her dorm room, seated on a pile of blankets, surrounded by nibbles and goblets and two yammering chits, one working on her hair, the other going through her drawers.
"Honestly, Hermione," the Patil girl said, "is all underwear you have here white, loose, and made of cotton? Don't you have anything fancier?"
The girl blushed profusely and made to answer, but the Brown girl cut her off, attempting to tame her wild mane into more manageable curls the whole time.
"What fancier did you expect than sensible white cotton knickers, Parvati?" she giggled. "Whitey tighties?"
The Gryffindor half of the Patil twins joined in the giggle for a minute, but without the glee of the other chit. Instead, she took out her wand.
"Now, Hermione," she said, "I want you to watch and listen very carefully here. This won't hold forever, but it will get you through a couple of hours, and then you need to rework it, both on material and colour, alright? Now look –"
Severus's eyes took a second to refocus on the dark, dank dungeon that he and the girl were in, so engrossed had he been in watching her memory. Surprised he found that she had managed to kick him out of her mind. Her eyes, interestingly, were still trained on his, but he could see the granite wall behind them, barring him from re-entering her mind.
"Congratulations, Miss Granger," Severus scathingly remarked, "it appears my tutelage has not completely failed to leave an impression on you. Now, would you mind telling me what colour –"
A blackness of silken quality collected behind her eyes, strewn with neat little cloth-covered buttons. For a moment Severus almost thought it to be the mirrored image of the front of his robes, then understanding dawned on him.
"I see," he said. "Quite the impressive transfigurational work, Miss Granger. Or was this Miss Patil's work?"
"No," the girl spat out from between gritted teeth, her usually so polite façade failing her, "this is all me. Now, if you will excuse me, sir, I really must get going to my next class."
"Certainly, Miss Granger," Severus allowed her to leave. When she had almost made it to the door, he called her back.
"Miss Granger," he got her attention, "do remember to practice your underwater breathing. It would not do to fail on your first homework, now would it?"
"Yes, sir," she said, then added with a mischievously sweet smile, "and thank you again for my birthday present. I will think on it and get back to you. Good day."
And with a flurry of her robes that was almost as impressive as Severus's usual billow, she was gone from the classroom.
Severus sighed.
How had he gotten himself in so deep?
Coming up: chapter twelve, wherein hair, hem, and house mice are examined.