I own nothing you recognize. I simply play in JKR's universe for fun.
Here in the Northern Hemisphere, spring is coming. Thank you and bouquets of daffodils to Julia and Amrun for their help with this story.
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Hermione, 8/23/98
"Honestly, Hermione. We really, really love you," said George putting an arm around her waist and resting his chin on her shoulder.
Fred came up on the other side and put his arm around Hermione. His chin now occupied her other shoulder. "We really, really, really love you."
"I'm never going to live it down, am I?" asked Hermione, giving each a sisterly kiss on the cheek in turn.
"Not as long as we all shall live," said Fred solemnly.
"In fact, if we both weren't already taken, we'd probably be willing to really, really, love you," said George.
"We're not averse to sharing," teased Fred.
"We're actually in favor of sharing," added George.
"There's that Muggle saying," whispered Fred suggestively.
"Double your pleasure, double your fun," said George with a wicked grin.
"Honestly, you two need to stop it. Somebody might think you were serious."
"You'll never know for sure, will you?" leered George.
"You're working too much, Hermione. We just want you to have some fun," said Fred.
The twins released Hermione and sat down at the kitchen table. She bustled around the kitchen, using cooking charms to prepare eggs and toast. "I'm not working, I'm cooking. Your mother is teaching me cooking and housekeeping charms."
"And you'll make some lucky bloke a wonderful wife some day. Right now, we want you to go out on a triple date with us."
"That's right," said George, "We just want you to meet Brian."
"You'd have fun, Hermione," promised Fred. "He's a genius, just like you."
"You like Angelina and you've never met Krista," added George.
"Brian's a subcontractor for us, brilliant with potions," said Fred. "He's putting the whiz back into Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes."
"I've seen no sign that you two have lost your whizzes," teased Hermione.
"Now, Hermione you've never laid eyes on our whizzes." It was Fred's turn to leer.
"Nor shall I ever," decreed Hermione as she levitated a pitcher of pumpkin juice and several glasses to the table. Hermione was relieved when Arthur strolled into the kitchen. She didn't think the twins were serious about their proposed threesome, but she wasn't entirely comfortable joking about it. They had to be kidding. Harry and Ron would kill them if they were serious.
"I see you've got breakfast duty this morning, Hermione," said Arthur as he poured himself a cup of coffee from the pot on the cooker.
"I hope you like this. I brought this marvelous canned corned beef hash from America. It's one of the few things they can't screw up in the cafeteria at the college. So we've got scrambled eggs, toast, and hash. I'm using Molly's charms."
"Good morning, Dad," chimed the twins with perfect timing.
"Did you two practice that until you got it right?" asked Hermione, eyeing them suspiciously.
"We did not." Again, in perfect unison.
"You did, too," commented Arthur.
"Oh, Dad." Once again.
"They practiced that one too, Hermione," stated Arthur over his coffee cup. He picked up the Daily Prophet and sat down for a read.
'What passes for normal life in this household is amazing,' thought Hermione as she levitated platters of food to the table.
Molly walked into the kitchen and sat next to Arthur. She looked tousled and half asleep. Understanding the morning routine, Hermione went to the cooker and got Molly her coffee. She placed it in front of her. Molly waved her wand to do a cooling charm and then sipped her drink. Nobody talked until Mum got her coffee.
Eating proceeded in silence, which was a bit of a relief after the nonstop George and Fred show. Hermione sat down and addressed her own breakfast.
Molly finished her first cup of coffee. Hermione rose and got her a second cup. By this time, Ginny had joined the silent company. She took a plate and helped herself to breakfast. Halfway through the second cup of coffee, Molly took a piece of toast.
Like a dam bursting, conversation ensued.
"Good morning, everyone," said a bright and perky Ginny.
"Good morning, Ginny," said George and Fred, in what was by now exceedingly annoying unison.
Molly glared at them.
Hermione smiled and passed Ginny the platter of toast. Arthur raised his cup in salute and went back to reading his newspaper.
Ginny looked at Hermione. "I'm going to the shop today to help Fred and George on some projects. Want to come with me?"
"Good idea," added Fred, the unison thing finally over. "We're deciding how we're going to package and market some of our new products. You can give us your opinion."
"And you can test out our new Halloween Horrors line," suggested George, "Just think, one bite into a pumpkin cream and your head looks like a quintaped."
"Eliminating the need for Halloween masks for all time," quipped Hermione as she finished off the last of her hash. "I really appreciate the offer, but I'm going back to headquarters to work on a project with Professor Snape,"
"You did that last time you were here," complained Ginny. "You're supposed to come home to have fun, not to work all the time."
"I'll be home for a full week in a little over two weeks and there'll be plenty of time then to do things just for fun, Ginny. Right now, if the Professor could use some help on a project, as an Order member I have an obligation."
"You'd have more fun with us," said Fred.
"I've already promised," said Hermione.
"I believe that settles it," said Arthur, around a mouthful of eggs.
Molly, under the influence of sufficient mood improving caffeine, was enjoying being waited on at breakfast. She took a second helping of the hash.
"Hermione, you must bring more of this with you next time you come home. This is excellent and I like that little pull-top ring that peels open the can. What a wonderful Muggle invention."
That got Arthur's attention and the next several minutes were spent examining the can, the lid, and the pull top ring. Arthur had completely disassembled the can opener Hermione gave him when they cleaned out her family home. His attempts to reassemble it made it look like Frankenstein's can opener with extra bolts sticking out of it. When it still worked at her parents' home, Arthur had opened a dozen cans of vegetables with it. He agreed that this peel-off top was more convenient.
Discussion ensued about why it might work with some products and not with others. George and Fred suggested that it would be too messy using that kind of top on a can of vegetables with the amount of water that might spill out of the can with the amount of force required to peel back the lid. They speculated how this might be used in a practical joke. By popular request, Hermione was to go back to the grocery store and see if she could find a variety of products with the pull top lid and bring them back to experiment with.
Hermione was grateful for the interruption in pressure for her to skive off her responsibilities and go and play at Fred and George's joke shop. Her friends would never understand how the concept of learning to make the Wolfsbane potion could possibly be more intriguing than playing with magical practical jokes that turn one's head into assorted monsters.
Molly and Arthur had plans to visit some friends in Hogsmeade and were getting ready to leave. Molly asked Fred to have a talk with the ghoul who lived in the attic about cleaning up after himself. Fred had the best relationship with the ghoul of anyone in the family and was most likely to get him to cooperate. By the time Fred came back downstairs; George and Ginny had grabbed their brooms and gone on ahead. Hermione had used the spells Molly taught her to clean the kitchen and was enjoying some peace and quiet with her cup of tea.
"Hey, Mione," said Fred, "What are you going to be working on today with Snape?"
"I can't tell you," answered Hermione.
"Secret Order business, eh?"
"Something like that."
"Are you going to be working with Snape a lot?"
"It looks that way."
"I guess that makes sense when you're studying Potions." Fred took a seat next to Hermione. "He's not so bad when you work with him one-to-one."
"When did you work with him that way?" asked Hermione.
"I had a few detentions over the years. Sometimes I'd ask his advice about a potion for one of our Wheezes and he'd make a suggestion or two."
"Professor Snape helped you to develop practical jokes?" Hermione was astonished.
"With the understanding we wouldn't use them at Hogwarts," answered Fred with a grin. "He was interested in making them safe. The Professor pounded it into both our heads that we'd better have an antidote worked out for everything we made before it left our lab."
"That does make sense," nodded Hermione, "With the number of times students have managed to blow up cauldrons or poison themselves in class, Professor Snape's always been safety conscious."
"All it would take is one product liability lawsuit to put us out of business," said Fred in all seriousness. "It's a secret so you can't tell anybody, but we've got him on retainer to review all of our products' ingredients and manufacturing methods before anything goes out the door. He's saved us a lot of problems and it's been worth every galleon we've paid him. George and I are available to him for developing weapons we could use against Voldemort."
"I had no idea you two were working with him."
"We know about his spying. He didn't outright tell us, we guessed. He didn't exactly admit to it, but didn't deny it either. I can't imagine what his life is like. He's got so many lies he has to keep track of to keep Voldemort from know what he's doing. I'd be barmy if my life was that complicated."
"I guess that's one of the reasons we ended up in Gryffindor and he's Head of Slytherin. He's been doing this since before we were born," observed Hermione, shaking her head in amazement.
"The man's always had a difficult life, what with the thing with his parents and all. I guess it toughens you up having that kind of childhood."
"What do you mean the thing with his parents?" asked Hermione, her curiosity piqued.
"You don't know about Snape's parents?" asked Fred, one eyebrow quirked up in a surprisingly Snape-like manner. "Well, I guess being a Muggleborn you wouldn't know about it. Growing up in wizarding society like we did, you just take it for granted everybody knows."
"What happened?"
"From what I've heard, it happened when Snape was a First or Second Year at Hogwarts. His father caught his mother fooling around on him. She was going to leave him for this other bloke so he killed her and then offed himself."
"That's horrible." Hermione was shocked. It was terrible enough dealing with the loss of her parents at the age of eighteen. It had to have been worse for him dealing with it at twelve, especially a murder and suicide. No wonder he'd been sympathetic to her situation when they talked that night at Astronomy Tower. He really did understand what she'd been going through. Hermione was stunned at this revelation. She looked back up at Fred. "How did he live when he wasn't at Hogwarts?"
"You know that rotter Lucius Malfoy and Professor Snape are distant cousins?"
Hermione nodded.
"Even though there's two or three years in between them, they got to be friends at Hogwarts. At the time, Malfoy's father was still alive and in charge. I guess Lucius Malfoy talked his father into taking some interest. Snape wasn't good enough to live at Malfoy Manor, but the old man made certain he got to stay with some of the other relatives during the summer."
"I guess it makes more sense now about why Professor Snape is the way he is, why he doesn't seem to trust anybody," replied Hermione, thoughtfully.
"He wouldn't have much reason to trust anybody," speculated Fred. "But like I said before, when you work with him one-to-one, he's not bad. I mean he's sarcastic and all, but he doesn't give you hell just for the sake of giving you hell when there isn't an audience around that might report back to Voldemort. I got the impression a few times that he was having fun working with George and me on some of our products. Even heard him laugh once or twice.
"I've noticed that, too," confided Hermione. "He teased me yesterday when I was cooking at headquarters and even thanked me for work I've done for him. He'd never do anything like that at Hogwarts."
"Nope, he probably wouldn't," remarked Fred. "Well, I'd better get going if I'm going to catch up with George and Ginny. Brian will be by the shop later if you get free earlier than you think."
"I'll probably be busy until about suppertime. Then it'll be time to come back here, collect Crookshanks, and portkey back to Chicago. I probably won't get a chance to see you guys again before I leave."
"You'll be back in about two weeks, so that's not bad. If you're about ready to leave for headquarters, why don't you get your stuff and I'll lock and ward everything here and walk you back to the garden."
Hermione went upstairs and got her backpack. Her weekender bag was already packed and Crookshanks' empty cat carrier was sitting beside it. She was on her way to see Professor Snape to learn how to make Wolfsbane. If anyone had told her a year ago, she would begin to view him as anything other than the chronically unfair, and generally unpleasant bastard he portrayed himself to be at Hogwarts, she'd have called them nuts.
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"The base for Wolfsbane is complex to make, but has a four month shelf-life. We will begin there." Professor Snape handed Hermione a list of the ingredients. "I realize you have had no opportunity to study this in advance, but I would like you to explain to me the purpose of the Wolfsbane potion and why each ingredient was selected for the base."
'He's making this a challenge right from the start,' thought Hermione. Taking a deep breath, she began.
"The whole point of the Wolfsbane potion is to enable the lycanthrope to maintain awareness of the human self during the change and increase mental alertness while providing a calming effect. This will diminish aggression, reducing the danger to the general population and the lycanthrope," explained Hermione carefully.
"Why would increasing mental alertness be a desirable affect? Would not an overall calming be preferable?"
"Mental alertness is essential to maintaining awareness of the human self and controlling the more animalistic impulses. Wolfsbane is not self-discipline in a bottle. The lycanthrope must make a mental effort and make choices about his or her own behavior when transformed."
"Very good, Miss Granger. Now, if you will address the reason for the ingredients."
"The first ingredient is distilled water with a new moon charge," she continued. "Distilled water is necessary because of the sensitivity of the other ingredients. The minerals in straight tap water could interfere with the active ingredients in the ginseng and damson fly wings in the first stage and bitterroot in the second. The new moon charge is needed to provide balance to the power of the full moon, dampening some of the aggressive impulses."
"How can the new moon charge counteract the extreme effect of the full moon?" asked Professor Snape.
"It cannot counteract it, only dampen it. I believe there was a study to this effect in the 1960's. I don't remember the exact citation, but I think it was published in Ars Alchemica. The study was conducted in Germany where a family of lycanthropes was incarcerated during the full moon period. One month, the family was given uncharged distilled water and the next given new moon charged distilled water to drink. This was repeated over a year. A count was kept of all aggressive acts the subjects engaged in while transformed. There were fewer and less severe acts of aggression when they were given the new moon charged water. The difference was at a statistically significant level."
Professor Snape nodded. "You may go onto the next ingredient."
"Korean enchanted ginseng is standard ginseng, cultivated with charms to enhance effectiveness of the active ingredients, allowing it to be used for treating magical maladies. The RG1 ginsenosides found in Korean ginseng are more stimulating and mentally rousing than the RB1 ginsenosides found in American ginseng, which tend to have a sedative effect. I believe you chose this ingredient to enhance alertness and focus."
"Correct. In addition, the RG1 Ginsenosides are not metabolized as quickly as the RB1 ginsenosides. This results in a more sustained level of alertness."
Hermione wrote that down into her notes.
"Professor, the RG1 ginsenosides enhance Yang, rather than Yin energy. Wouldn't this be a down side to selecting the Korean enchanted ginseng?"
"It would," replied Professor Snape, "Except that the valerian enhances the Yin energy, which balances the effect of the RG1 ginsenosides. What is the effect of the kava kava?"
"Kava kava is a relaxant, able to induce strong calmative feelings while improving mental function and sharpening the senses. The calming effect is the result of selective neurotropic action on higher brain centers, which suppress and regulate the autonomic nervous system."
And so they continued.
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Hermione poured the cooled potion base into four jars and sealed the lids. She applied the labels she had prepared onto the containers and put them in the cool storage cabinet. She looked at Professor Snape who was writing in a notebook at the lab table. They'd just spent the best part of five hours in companionable conversation and comfortable silences. It was the most enjoyable educational experience Hermione could ever remember.
Professor Snape had guided her through the creation of the Wolfsbane base by asking her questions. Skillful questions, probing what she knew and what she understood about the ingredients and the processes that went into the very creation of the potion. The man who invented Wolfsbane took Hermione through the paths his own mind had taken in the process of developing one of the most important potions of the twentieth century.
He actually let Hermione ask questions. In class, he'd taken away House points or told her she was annoying him. In the cellar potions lab with no audience, he'd answered every question she had, told her where she could research the answer, or quizzed her until she figured out the solution.
Hermione smiled and nodded to herself. 'Professor Snape is brilliant and this is wonderful.'
Hermione walked over to the lab table and checked her list of questions to research. The Wolfsbane potion was the most complex she'd ever studied. The potion used magical and non-magical ingredients. The preparation of each ingredient required exacting precision. The vervain had to be dried and ground with a marble pestle and mortar to a fine powder. The kava kava root had to be fresh and sliced into slivers with a stainless steel blade on an oak board. The enchanted ginseng had to be cut with an obsidian knife in order to preserve the magical qualities of the root.
Arithmancy required ingredients be added in a specific order with charms applied at different stages of the brewing to continually bring the numerological totals to the prime number of seven. Seven was critical because it could go four times into twenty-eight, the number of days in the moon cycle. Crystals were added at different stages and removed to bring the vibrational levels back to seven when a new ingredient would otherwise throw it off.
'This is amazing and Professor Snape is bloody brilliant,' she thought.
The man who invented this incredible potion allowed her to walk with him step-by-step through the process, through his thinking, and allowed her to help.
"Miss Granger, the potion must be finished on September 3rd since the three days of the full moon begin on the 5th. Your term does not end until September 3rd, so I will finish it this time. According to the lunar calendar the full moon arrives on a weekend in October. If you can return on October 3rd, I can take you through the second stage of preparation." Professor Snape looked at Hermione expectantly.
Hermione pulled out a day planner and entered the notation on the calendar. "It's on my calendar, sir." Hermione looked up at the Professor. "It's going to be a while before there's any possibility of preparing Wolfsbane on my own. This is so complicated, it makes my head spin."
Snape quirked the barest hint of a smile. "I was four years a Potions Master before I began working on developing Wolfsbane. I was nine years a Potions Master before I achieved a potion that worked. It is a Master level potion, but I believe you will be able to learn to prepare it within a few repetitions."
"Was today what an apprenticeship is like?" asked Hermione, looking at him quizzingly.
"Yes. It is very like what my apprenticeship was like," answered Snape.
"I am missing something by virtue of going to college instead of having an apprenticeship," said Hermione emphatically.
"Yes, but you also gain something. When you return to England after completing your training, you will know more about Muggle science than any Potions Master in the country. We cannot predict how valuable it will be, but I suspect it will be very useful. The training I provide will supplement it and in many ways will be an informal apprenticeship. You may very well have the best of both worlds."
"I really enjoyed today, sir. Thank you."
"You are welcome, Miss Granger. Lupin will get the potion he requires, I saved a good deal of time by having you prepare some of the ingredients for the base, and you gave the cauldron a good cleaning. I believe you call it a win-win situation."
"I certainly do."
"In that case, I will expect your services when you return for the week between the end of your computer class and the beginning of the new term. I will need several cauldrons of Pepper-Up and Dreamless Sleep for the school. While you are preparing those, it will free me to do research. I did warn you that there is menial work involved."
Hermione laughed. "I'll take the menial work. The payoff has been pretty good so far."
"In that case, I suggest you return to the Burrow so you may see your adopted family before returning to the campus. By the way, how do you adapt to the time change?"
"I stay up until about 8:30 Chicago time and practice relaxation techniques to help me fall asleep," answered Hermione, "It takes two days for my body to adjust."
"Good plan," said Severus, "It is wise to leave sleep potions alone if you possibly can. I am confident the rest of your class shall go well. I expect to see you in a few weeks."
Hermione started up the stairs. She turned back for a moment.
"Please be careful, sir."
"I am always careful, Miss Granger."
'He really does have gorgeous hands,' she thought, smiling softly, 'Tall isn't bad either."
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Author's notes
By the way, the RG1 ginsenosides in Korean ginseng and RB1 ginsenosides in American ginseng referred to in the story are real. They do have the properties described, but unfortunately the enchanted versions are not available to those of us without access to wizarding apothecaries or health food stores. I fear these will not actually address anyone's lycanthropy issues nearly as well as they do in the story.
Many thanks for the encouragement and lively discussions I have had with Looking for Magic's reviewers. They are: Karen Detroit, Joani-the-unique-being, JenMart01, Severus Fan, Ccrawley10, Duj, Megan Conseor, Raven2K4, Siren34, Droxy, Latinachikita, Evil Mastermind 666, Snapedreamer, SiriuslyBlack04, Lady Rhian, Vennela, Rinny08, and Aldara.
