Chapter 25: Bibliophilia

"Oh my god. I think I'm in love."

Hermione never thought she'd say it, especially in the proximity of Severus Snape, but she couldn't help it.

He looked sharply at her, and she turned pink when she realized that she'd said it out loud, but it was too late to hold back her outburst. The library that spread out before her was impossibly large for the space and she knew it must be a beautiful sort of magic that she knew almost nothing about...yet. This gave her a secondary thrill- oh how she wanted to learn about how to do something like this in her own living quarters! Perhaps it was some kind of spell that was similar to an Undetectable Extension Charm. The bookshelves stretched up at least two floors above her head and there were several beautiful couches placed at regular intervals in the room as well as a cherrywood desk with a small lamp on it for studying and writing. Glass windows that she couldn't see poured a perpetual toasty afternoon light down into the room even as she tilted her head up until she thought she'd fall over trying to see them in vain.

"This is your personal library?" she asked, mouth still agape.

He nodded slightly and his mouth twitched upward in the corner for a moment at her unabashed excitement.

"This is amazing," she said, and she spun around lazily with her head inclined toward the ceiling and her hands out.

"That is quite enough," Snape said testily, "I brought you in here to talk, but if you'd prefer my potions storeroom with pickled things staring at you and the incredibly hard stools therein, I'll be happy to accommodate you there instead."

Hermione abruptly stopped and flopped herself on the nearest couch, looking up at him but trying to steal glances at the bookshelves when she thought he wasn't looking.

"Eyes, Granger," he said, his mouth a firm line.

She suddenly looked over to her left and smirked.

"Yeah, I know," she said lightly, and he knew that she was talking to….Lily.

It was still hard for him to believe, and considering the fact that he lived in a world of magic, that was saying something. Long a fan of critical thinking (with a focus on the critical part), Snape was not fond of flowery or superfluous explanations. He wanted to know facts.

She turned back to look at him, smiling a bit vaguely as though the books themselves were lightening her spirit.

Anything to stop thinking about how an increasingly large part of him was wishing he hadn't pushed Lily away when she had offered herself to him because this was a mess in every possible meaning of the word, and he knew that before this was over, there was very little chance he'd taste her lips or feel her body writhe against his ever again. Once again, he was reminded how every kindness in his life was always cruelly snatched away, either through some conscious or unconscious act on his part.

She started swinging her feet back and forth absently, and her eyes wandered, still wide and sparkling with awe at her surroundings.

Anything to stop thinking about how the young woman he was trying to intimidate by blasting out a withering sneer from under his hooked nose was now...involved.

She looked back at her left and murmured an affirmative to the invisible girl.

His back stiffened and a slight redness crawled up the back of his neck as he thought of his Polyjuice ritual. How much did she know? He would need to proceed with the utmost caution.

"So, let me get this straight," he said tiredly, using one hand to rub his eyes, "You consumed something strange?"

Hermione felt a bit suspicious about his unusually gentle tone, but she figured that it was better than the alternative and she nodded slightly in reply. Her face must have reflected her thoughts fairly clearly because he raised one eyebrow and snorted derisively.

"You would prefer that I start shouting at you?" his voice sounded distinctly amused, which, judging by Hermione's shocked look, seemed to be something that she was unaware he was capable of feeling.

"No, it's just…" she didn't have to finish the thought.

"Come on, Granger, I do have a heart, regardless what your little friends seem to think about the so-called Bat of the Dungeons. And yes, I do have ears. I'm not ignorant of the various terms used to describe me."

Ugh. He was rambling. He detested rambling.

She looked at him for a long moment, and when he met her gaze, he was unable to stop himself from flashing back to seeing her….without...any...he blinked slowly so that he wouldn't give away his thoughts. He'd never really seen her as more than a giant brown hedge of hair bobbing over a formless black robe, never complete without an annoying, skyward-pointed hand in class, so suddenly seeing her so vulnerable when he was least expecting it was shocking, and his mind kept sticking on it like a record needle skipping on a rough patch of vinyl. Somehow, the Granger girl….Hermione had developed an adult body, and it was affecting his ability to focus.

He looked away and gestured to her impatiently, "So? Care to elaborate?"

"Well, I saw Ron and Neville come into the common room, but they were acting...oddly…" she frowned, but it made her face appear more endearing, if anything, "So I went to investigate, and it seems that Ron left Harry a butterbeer on his nightstand with a note saying it was paying him back for the last Hogsmeade trip. I got so mad that that great red-haired oaf forgot that it was me who bought that butterbeer for him without even so much as a thanks that I...I just chugged the whole thing down in anger."

She had a look on her face that showed exactly how childish and petty she sounded, but he couldn't help but rub it in- it was such a habit by now.

"Do you normally make a habit of going into boys' rooms and eating food that's been left out?" Snape was able to conceal any heady thoughts with his famous Voice of Ultimate Disdain, which also kept him from smiling at Hermione's impassioned description of the youngest Weasley boy.

Hermione turned scarlet and she shook her head, hiding behind her eyelashes.

"I won't say it's a good thing that you somehow found your way to me," he started, using a dismissive tone so that she wouldn't be able to see that, thanks to the sordid series of events, he'd finally experienced one entire day that didn't involve Voldemort, Dumbledore's word games or some kind of emotional, psychological or physical anguish. Actually, it was pretty much the opposite of basically every rotten, no-good, terrible day he'd had since he could remember.

Hermione's eyes widened until they were huge like an owl's, but she said nothing.

"But as you probably know, I was, until very recently, a potions professor," he continued, his voice softening, "And I daresay that I know quite a lot about various brewed substances and their...effects."

He gave her a pointed look, and for a second, he thought that he saw her eyes turn green, but on a second glance, they were the same deep honey-brown that they had always been, at least he guessed that was how they'd always been. He didn't consider himself the sort of person who made a habit of looking deeply into the eyes of his students.

When she said nothing but continued to stare wide-eyed at him as he paced slowly in front of her trying to focus, he continued, "So let me break down your main problem in two parts. First off, we need to figure out what you were drugged with because I can't imagine that it was some run-of-the-mill love potion. I am a very careful, private person. I do not leave the doors to my chambers open. Ever. Yet, somehow you got in, even though you were probably as high as a kite on this mystery potion. The fact that you somehow also manifested a second personality of someone who I only recently thought I had lost forever-"

He cut himself off mid-sentence when he realized with horror exactly what sentimental nonsense he was about to say, and for a moment, his carefully constructed facade of stoicism melted into a tired, sad look before he straightened up and pulled up his defenses again.

"I saw it, sir," Hermione said suddenly, "Lily showed me."

Snape looked flustered at the sound of her voice, then composed himself again. She smiled at him gently and he could have kicked himself.

Why is it so easy for her to knock me off balance?

"What, exactly?" his tone was somewhere between a statement and a question.

"The Anima Voti," she replied simply, and then she blushed, "And….the Polyjuice….thing…"

It was his turn to feel the blood rushing to his face. She saw...she knew...oh god, she must think he was some kind of horrible perverted creep.

Her hair. It was going red and wavy. But Lily had said earlier that it only did that when…..Oh.

"Be kind to her, Sev," Lily's voice said, "For all intents and purposes, we're the same person right now, even though I'm the one who technically gets to have all the fun, well, as long as certain tall, dark, brooding professors don't keep trying to play the ever-suffering martyr."

He was silent with fascination as he watched the girl transform back into her original form again.

"This leads me to our second biggest problem," Snape tried to regain his composure, keeping his voice dangerously even to the point that even he could hear how forced it sounded.

"I want to help Lily," Hermione wasn't stupid. She already knew what he was going to say, but she nodded silently at him, beckoning him to continue.

"I gathered as much, Granger. However, until you and Lily can be...separated safely...we need some kind of plan for keeping you from….well...we need to effectively figure out how to stop you from becoming sexually aroused, or things are going to get very messy very quickly," he finished finally, feeling incredibly uncomfortable with the detached clinical turn of phrase.

Sexually aroused doesn't even begin to describe how fantastic it feels.

A muscle in his jaw twitched involuntarily as he tried to pull his mind away from remembering how amazing it had been the night before, and the not-so-subtle irritation he was feeling for having ruined it all out of some ridiculous medieval idea of chivalry. His body seemed to agree quite pointedly with his hedonistic thoughts, and he shifted uncomfortably, rocking back slightly on his heels so that Hermione would not see how it had affected him.

She was looking. Her hair was going all coppery again, and he was losing his resolve. He wasn't sure he could push her away a second time.

Damn it all to hell. Why did she have to be so damn observant?

"Sev," Lily's voice was soft and close by and he realized that he'd closed his eyes without noticing.

He took a sharp intake of breath. She was so close. He was looking down at her wide, green eyes, and she wasn't yet touching him, but only just. Her pupils were dilated with desire and he could feel his own eyes change to mirror them. His hands ached to grab hold of her, but he stilled himself as she moistened her lips slightly to speak.

I'm falling, there's no help for it now.

"I think Hermione just figured out a way we might handle the arousal problem," she spoke breathily, and when her fingers lightly touched the cloth of his jacket, he felt as though he'd been zapped with a static shock.

I can't help myself. I'm not strong enough to resist this.

He breathed in her scent as she drew closer to him, one hand running down his abdomen to rest lightly over the dark bulge that he'd tried desperately to conceal.

I am lost. So good and lost.

When she kissed him at last, he thought he could hear the echo of a second voice moan lightly in pleasure even as he tasted Lily's distinct flavor on his tongue, and his resolve was no more.