A/N Honestly, I had thought that it wouldn't take me another month to update, I really did... and then here we are. So sorry. I'll stop making promises now. If you're curious, though, I have A's in all but one of my classes here at good old college!

Remus looked at Severus as they sat in the Headmistress' office, feeling grim and rather helpless. There was no sign of poor Marcus Black, and they'd alerted the boy's father only a few moments prior. They were worried, that was for sure, and Severus would have had to bet on Remus' being the one to suffer the most seeing as the boy was practically his nephew. Also, Regulus was a strict man when it came to his son, so Merlin help them when the floo opened up to him.

"Why do you think they took him, Severus?" McGonagall asked the imposing potions master frightfully. Never in her years had a student been taken much less harmed under her watchful eye as Headmistress. Sure, Quidditch accidents happened as they will, but with ill intentions? This was new to her.

"I cannot be sure, Minerva. I'll have to check with James or Harry… maybe one of them will know in lieu of their investigations?" He offered.

Remus hummed in discontent, but it wasn't as if any of them liked that answer.

Suddenly, however, realization hit him.

"You don't think, Severus…" Remus trailed off on the thought for a moment, hoping he was very wrong.

"Think what?"

"It's not possibly… Peter?"

"Pettigrew?" Minerva gasped in horror. "I thought his problem was with the Minister?"

"Not entirely," Remus filled in, "It's with the lot of us. He attacked James because it got him the most attention, I reckon."

"Regardless, we can't be sure. We must get into contact with James or his son immediately."

"Can't you ask Madame Snape?" McGonagall wondered wearily, her eyes narrowed suspiciously at the professor.

It seemed luck was on Severus' side, though as the fireplace roared to life and Regulus popped through, his wife as well, both in tears and looking awfully upset.

"Where is my son?" The beautiful woman on Regulus' arm wondered immediately upon arrival, her blonde hair astray, blue eyes watering.

"We aren't sure, quite yet," McGonagall tried to soothe, going over to the woman and placing a matronly hand on her shoulder.

"My poor Marcus-"

"It was Peter, wasn't it?" Regulus seemed much more aware than his wife as he looked to the faces of his brother's closest friends.

He was a tall and proper wizard, one that any would be proud to know, let alone be married to, and his wife was just as dignified: usually. It was odd to see them both out of sorts, and while the outside mask Regulus carried wasn't much to go on, his eyes moved furtively as if on the watch for the boy he held so very dear.

"We think so," Remus answered straight, seeing as he was practically family to this man.

"I want Harry here, I know he's the best Auror for the job, and I want anyone he trusts as well on this. I need him found, and I need Pettigrew in jail."

Severus gulped. They'd ask him to do reach Potter, and if he knew his Hermione at all, Grimmauld Place is exactly where she resided in that moment.

"I'll go get him," Lupin seemed to see Severus' distress, and the relief that came with the offer. He was his usual, humble self, hands in pockets and smile adjusted to make everyone feel comfortable.

"He'll have to forgive his weekend, unfortunately, there is much to be done in this investigation. James will have to be opening up the records again, trying to find out why this happened if we can't find Pettigrew within a reasonable time."

Everyone agreed, and Remus seemed to be preparing himself with nothing but his wand as he headed over to the fireplace.

He was stopped by the sniffling voice of Mrs. Black, "Will Harry be able to find him, Remus?"

"He is your son's best hope, Madame."

She nodded, reaching for Regulus as the Defense teacher exited the castle in a wave of green flames.

Severus felt utterly uneasy about the whole of the situation, especially after his domestic with Hermione. While still boiling mad, he cared for her. The only problem with his concern was the wave of nausea he had for their situation, knowing she thought of him as a double-crosser, a slick and despicable man that was thoroughly not him. Mixed emotions had been plaguing him for a very long while now, and while the long while was mere hours in real time, mere hours in a row with Hermione felt like years, more like.

He had to remain resilient, however… she saw him as less… and she'd lied. That would take awhile for him to get over. They had Marcus to worry over as of now.

When Harry came through the floo, looking completely uneased, he didn't even bother to acknowledge Severus. Shouldn't it be the other way around, he wondered to himself. He was lied to after all, none of them. He was the one who was thought of as the slick git they imagined him.

The sound of Mary Black made him cringe, however. As a professor, Severus very much liked Marcus, and this would have been a tragedy whether he liked the boy or not. It simply was more impactful him being a younger student and more favorable.

"Where was he seen last?" Harry asked, switching into full Auror mode, his jaw set tight after speaking.

"Just near the exit, he was talking with a few fellow housemates, and when they got back to the dorms they hadn't seen him since," McGonagall told him dutifully, her distress seeming to have minimized seeing as Mary Black had taken over the task.

"Alright… and your guesses so far are mostly Pettigrew?"

"Harry, I think that's your best bet right now. He did attack your father, and he's been more violent recently, gathering followers…" Regulus told the Auror stoically. He seemed to have been keeping up on the Daily Prophet's news, as had most every wizard as of late, apparently.

"Alright. If that's all I have to go on, I want to talk to the children and see what he was wearing, then I'll gather up a team, and get to it," Harry determined powerfully, tossing a glance at Severus before looking at McGonagall.

She looked about the scene with a lot of scrutiny in her judgmental eyes, and no one dared to defy her when a command came from the Headmistress.

"Remus, show Auror Potter to the Slytherin Common room and find Besnin and Hart for him, everyone else could you please give myself and Severus a moment to discuss what to do next."

As Deputy Headmaster, it made sense he was staying to chat, but as Head of Slytherin house, it didn't make any sense to not be showing Harry down to the dungeons.

The room quieted quickly, and McGonagall's gaze turned to the knowing one that had always gotten Severus when he was under it in his school years.

"She didn't tell you, did she? About her and Harry's affliction?" Minerva questioned immediately.

His black eyes narrowed as the Headmistress asked him such a question. Did she know that Hermione and Harry were not themselves as they should be? Had she been privy before even he, her husband?

"You mean to say that you knew, however? You knew that she wasn't who I married, and yet I stayed in the dark for much longer than is acceptable?"

Minerva didn't seem to offended by his accusing tone, which made him quite the more upset than before.

"Severus," she said haughtily, "I've known before it happened. Dumbledore knew."

"Of course," he snapped, "Everyone but her husband. A murderer, but not the bloody wizard she's married to. The one whose child she is having."

Minerva rolled her eyes quite thoroughly at his antics.

"You are being ridiculous, Professor Snape! But thank you for answering my prior question, she never told you… until now that obviously is. You seem upset."

It was his turn to roll his black eyes.

"I am royally pissed. I wouldn't have been upset, but her mind is clouded by judgment of her previous knowledge of me, and it's all bloody wrong! I am not the man she knew, but now I will never be anything more," he hissed, his pain showing through the scratch in his fluid voice.

"And now you're hiding here? I'm as sure as you are she ended up at the Potter's residence, why not work things out?"

Severus snarled at the thought right in the moment. Carrying his child or not, he was blatantly upset with Hermione and her lies, and there was nothing to make him feel any less angry over it.

"It's the first weekend of term, I figured you could use the help," Severus retorted much more acidically than he intended for it to sound.

Minerva looked like she had been accosted, but her words remained firm.

"Maybe you shouldn't be around anyone the way you are, I know I don't wish to suffer your presence right now."

Snape groaned at how dramatic McGonagall could be.

"Fine then. I'll alert Sirius that his nephew is missing, someone should," he said with a flare and then left because he knew she was right about being insufferable in the moment.

No one would put themselves in his presence now that he knew all he did. She'd lied yet again to him, even after telling him as much as she did. Who really knew her secret memory, who really knew what was going on? Would she ever be able to build back the trust he had in her before all this? Sure, it wasn't exactly his Hermione, but she took on what she did claiming to not have lost a single memory at all, allowing herself to fully be his wife.

Severus was fuming, and so when he got to his office in the dungeons, rooms stale and unused for so long, the first thing he did was not write that letter to Sirius, for it would have been full of much unneeded malice, all considering. The poor man's nephew was missing, he did not need hostility, so he waited. Snape cooled down, then wrote the letter, even keeping out their usual banter for the sake of it all. He knew Remus wouldn't be able to handle the task, Remus loved his should-be nephew-in-law, and it would toll on him as much as Regulus and Mary themselves.

Severus Snape sighed, his life seeming to be falling apart at the seams. Everything all at once always happened to go wrong when it came to him… high or low, there never seemed to be a happy medium in which he could settle into.

Closing his eyes, he spent time breathing before pulling out parchment and a quill, heavier than they usually felt.

The letter was the hardest thing he'd written in years, and honestly Severus couldn't remember the words not so smoothly coming forward before. It had been so easy on papers to correct what was blatantly wrong, and in composing owls, they'd only been correspondence, something he was rather good at. This letter however, this devastation of one's night wasn't something he was entirely ready to take on.

Regardless, he finished as quickly as the slow words placed themselves and then sent away the disconcerting news he had to offer. Sirius would take it in stride, of course he would being a Black, but there would hide within him melancholy, and he'd be here faster than one could say Quidditch.

Minerva's stern voice fell in the back of his head to simply work it out with Hermione, and while he felt all the more upset with her than when he'd fled to Hogwarts, it seemed that his subconscious was highly supportive of the idea as it floated through all of his thoughts in a simultaneous manner.

Not entirely sure how Draco would react, nor his wife herself, Severus nearly talked himself out of it… just nearly.

"Bloody woman," he swore at the Headmistress, regardless of her lack of presence as he took the floo to the Potter residence.

Voices were halted the moment he stepped in, and then the rush of chairs and scrapes of the floor preceded Draco and his wife's arrival to where he stood.

"Harry?" The blonde asked before clearing the doorway, not exactly accurate seeing as the rooms of Grimmauld had always been dark like they were then.

"No," he said stoutly, "It's me."

He felt ridiculous already, anger and fear boiling in the very core of himself. The contrast in Severus Snape was never true to him, for he'd always been straightforward, especially in the case of his beloved wife.

"You," Draco looked furious, his wand pulled in a single breath.

Severus couldn't concentrate on the flaming wizard just then, he was more certainly looking at the pregnant woman behind him, cheeks puffy, and eyes red from obvious tears. He'd done that… but she'd done worse.

His conscience really couldn't handle the battle in him as he felt Hawthorn press into his neck.

"I wanted to speak with my wife, if you would please lower your wand, Potter." Snape figured dominance was the assured way to preside over the situation which he'd beg control over. There wasn't a way this would not be led by his direction.

"Right, you make her miserable and to think you may simply pull yourself back here, the next day, like you just can because you're her husband-"

"He is, Draco," Hermione whispered, tugging gently on her friend's shoulder, "Though you're right, grant him his speech, we both have wronged."

"Are you sure?" Draco turned, wand forgotten, hands on Hermione's, worrying over her like a father would.

He and Harry had been talking about adopting soon… it seemed those plans were most likely postponed, Severus felt.

"I'm sure," Hermione nodded, moving past him and shakily approaching him, looking at him the way he supposed she looked at the Severus Snape she had known before.

They sat, in a silence that hadn't ever presided over them before seeing as she was usually wonderfully chatty and full of whatever it was came to mind. Hermione had never let him live a dull moment, even in her drones of Ruins or Magical Creatures.

"I found that even McGonagall seems to be in the know while I suffer through this hell you're putting me through now."

"Sev, I didn't mean to cause this-"

"I don't want to hear it, Hermione. I am your husband, I can take anything you throw my way, yet it seems you think I am not worthy of such important information that even a murderer knows." He tried very hard to convey the contempt in which he held for Dumbledore, a contempt shared by many in the wizarding world.

"I had no choice in knowing that, we didn't control the fact that Harry's autobiography landed in his hands! It could have been in any variable amount of more terrible hands than that of a wizard who saved hundreds of lives in the riddance of one," she defended the old coot quite fiercely, and Severus recoiled slightly. He hadn't heard her like this before, it was disconcerting.

"A child?"

"A mass murderer who stole the lives and goodness from a plethora of people. Too many lost in the two wars that came directly by way of Tom Riddle. We sacrificed a lot to kill him, and poor Harry had to do it his seventh year." Hermione's emphasis was not lost on him, but they'd spent too long in this world for him to care about what hadn't happened to him.

This was now, that timeline hadn't existed as far as he cared to invest his thoughts.

"It doesn't matter anymore, this is here. Hermione, I love you… and with this mental lapse you're suffering from your journey, I doubt that you can fully say the same back… possibly ever. I think I afforded to know that."

"I didn't think I was punishable by your leaving, however," she snapped, hand on her stomach protectively.

"Really? Would you rather I stew silently in your presence? Look at you and think what I'm thinking now?"

Her eyes hardened, though hardly threateningly with the red and puffiness making it look juvenile.

"You know Harry told me something ridiculously interesting that Draco discovered for him recently, something I worked out a bit on my own," Hermione changed the subject abruptly, as she was wont to do when she'd fancied it. Though this had been endearing to Severus before, now it annoyed him as he continued to look at her accusingly. "He told me that my emotions… what I am feeling in this time are genuine, they're molding to what I should be feeling for those around me. There is a seed of affection for people who hadn't existed before growing in me, there is a niggle of laughter at the sight of those who were once the signal of darkness, and there is most certainly genuine love grasping my heartstrings that are assuredly sewn to your own. They get stronger by the day."

Severus Snape felt his anger melt away and remorse tug at him this time, one finally winning over the other as they sat on two differing pieces of furniture. He was sitting tall, back straight and hands on his knees, and his witch sported her whole body curled into the couch, legs tucked below. The walls of animosity were breaking.

Until, that is, she decided to continue her heartfelt monologue, "I am most definitely attached very much to the idea of our daughter."

He couldn't have been happier to have a child with Hermione, that was to say the least, but in that also lied a new spur for argument.

She'd discovered the gender? Surely, if Draco or anyone had told her anything it was that they both agreed to wait until the child's birth to discover the gender of the child Hermione was currently sheltering. Of course, he didn't know what he expected seeing as she'd defiled pretty much all other agreements on their marriage bonds. This was just another reason for his now outweighing animosity, remorse be gone! She may as well have gone and torn apart the scroll itself.

"And here I thought I'd almost shoved down my reasons to be upset, yet you tell me this now. You went and found the gender when I'm sure sometime in the past while you must have been told at least once we wanted the surprise?" He spoke clearly in case the look of betrayal and his body leaned forward weren't enough of their own indications.

The brunette recoiled, pulling herself in with her arms, swallowing in a guilt that Severus easily let her feel. There was no query to him that she should be shouldering this new reasoning for their row.

"I hadn't been here long enough, Severus-"

"Don't bother," he interjected, feeling their combined magic swell at the emotions swelling and bursting between them, harsh and flooding.

"I had been here merely hours," Hermione insisted he listen as he stood, pulling his cloak closed, but he gripped his wand and fiercely and turned back to growl lowly.

"But you knew… I could tell you know that I hadn't wanted that… that we didn't want that, yet you went on with it anyways! At least have some respect for yourself and for me! It's not that much to ask!"

He felt the cold mask he'd been holding slip, and Severus tried hard to reign it back, to not let his soft side win out, the one his wife had fallen in love with. He wasn't Severus Snape the so called Death Eater as she put it, no. He was Severus Snape, Deputy Headmaster, a good man and even better wizard who loved his wife and not-yet-born child.

"Don't go, please… I'm sorry," his wife begged through quivering lips, her hands reaching for his, but he was quick to turn again and step just from her reach.

"And what will that fix? I need time," he told her, much more bluntly than before. However true it was, he still didn't want to be away from her… just the real her he craved more than this… version. This Hermione lied to him, repeatedly, and betrayed their own wishes.

"Right," she conceded, and he was thankful for that because he could tell she was crying now, and despite the fact he was pissed beyond belief, he also wanted to hold her and make sure she never shed another tear.

That wasn't the time, and Severus reminded himself of that as the flames whisked him away, thoughts utterly mixed and head throbbing.