A/N Hi everyone, I'm back again. Lots of emotion and discussion here once more, but keep an eye out for an action-packed next chapter! I won't say "coming soon," because I've been notoriously bad at keeping those sorts of promises, but it will be coming! Hope you enjoy this chapter, and thank you so much to those of you have been reviewing, you absolutely make my day!
Chapter Thirty-Seven
They made their way upstairs, and at Severus's inquiring eyebrow Hermione led him into her room, deciding that she wanted the reassurance of familiarity for what was to come. They lay on the bed, and spent a moment just looking at each other. Severus moved closer, snaking one arm under her neck and placing another on her waist, under her jumper, making small, maddening circles with his fingertips on bare skin.
"I'm not having sex with you," Hermione blurted out. She flinched, not having intended to phrase the thought quite so bluntly. She could feel heat rising in her face, and could imagine how red it was becoming. Severus chuckled, and pulled her closer, moving his hand up her back as he drew her in for a tight embrace. He withdrew after a moment and regarded her with a small smile playing on his lips, looking the most relaxed she had seen him in a long time.
"I'm not having sex with you," he told her, still smiling.
"Oh," she said inanely, still flustered. "Well, good." At this, he burst out laughing. Hermione drew back, irrationally hurt.
"It's not that I don't want to have sex with you," she told him firmly, her face still flushing, "it's just that it's too soon and I'm not ready and you're older and I really don't know what I'm doing and I'm not sure what'll happen and the idea…"
He silenced her with a kiss, and she responded, for a moment, before withdrawing.
"I want to take things slowly," he told her, before she could speak. "I have no intention of rushing into anything with you, and I want to make certain than neither of us has regrets. No recriminations."
She sighed. "Good. So now what?"
***
She awoke the next morning still fully clothed. Severus had pulled away during the night, and was sleeping peacefully beside her. She stretched languidly, and then moved to place her lips on his. She kissed him once, then twice, and on the third his eyes opened, the hint of a smile playing around their sleep-filled edges.
"I could become used to waking like this," he warned her, before moving towards her, deepening the kiss. His hands had found their way under her jumper again, and were once more playing up and down her back. He withdrew, and smiled. She didn't think she had ever seen him smile as much as he had in the previous twelve hours.
"Good morning," she said.
"Good morning to you, too. How does breakfast in bed sound?"
"Sounds good, so long as you're making it and I'm staying in bed!" she replied with a grin.
He chuckled once more, and nodded his acquiescence. "I'll be back in moment," he promised, and disappeared off to the kitchen. Hermione lay back, stretched, and sighed, a silly smile quickly plastering itself across her face.
True to his word, Severus returned within five minutes, carrying a tray filled with toast, juice, and an assortment of jams. "Magic," he replied, in response to her enquiring look, and proceeded to join her for breakfast in bed.
"So what now?" she asked, licking a drop of jam from her fingers; a show of poor table manners that would have made her parents groan in exasperation. But, she figured, table manners were for tables, not beds.
"Well, traditionally we get out of bed, shower, dress, and be about our day. Of course, if you have other plans…" he smirked at her, and didn't bother to shift out of the way as she half-heartedly smacked him with the back of her hand.
"I don't mean this morning, as you well know."
His face sobered. "We'll go to Lucius's dinner party the day after tomorrow. Then we'll go to Dumbledore as we discussed, fill him in on the international dimension of Voldemort's plans. He can tell us more about the Order's situation, and we'll go from there."
Hermione sighed, and burrowed her face in Severus's shoulder.
"You know," she said, her voice muffled, "I wish this were all over. This war feels like it's been going on forever. And we've been so removed from it all."
Hermione could feel Severus's sigh. "I know. Maybe our information will bring an end to it all, finally."
"You know what I'd really like? To wake up tomorrow morning, check the Prophet, and find out that it's all over, that it's finally finished."
"Well," Severus said slowly, "that was Dumbledore's plan. That we hide out here until it's all over. And we can still do that, if you want. Just wait out the end of the war."
"It would be sort of nice, wouldn't it? Getting on with our life here. Reading. Researching." She sighed and moved in closer, tucking her head more firmly into his shoulder. "It would drive me crazy, wouldn't it? And you too, at that."
"Probably," he agreed. "Come on, let's get on with the day. We probably need to discuss Jennifer and Simon some more. And whether I agree to help Lucius with my 'contacts.' I don't have any, of course. Perhaps Dumbledore would help with that…" he mused.
***
As they wandered into the potions lab that afternoon, Hermione asked, "So what are you working on in here? Any chance you'll tell me now?"
He laughed. "I could have told you before, it wasn't an issue of trust. I enjoyed how irritated you so clearly were with not knowing!"
"Wow, thanks," she said, sticking out her tongue. He made a grab for it, and missed.
"I'll catch it, one of these days, and then what will you do?"
"Thpeak like thith," she told him glibly. "So what is it?"
"Maybe I should just keep you in the dark," he mused, and winced exaggeratedly when she elbowed him in the ribs. "Just a variant on certain empowering potions. Most of the current potions allow you to increase your power temporarily by borrowing on your core magic… so you're left magically drained, sometimes even incapacitated, for days afterwards."
"Yes, yes," Hermione said impatiently, "do you mean you could create an empowerment variation that wouldn't leave you drained?"
"That's the general idea. Of course, you need certain amplifying agents-"
"-which could cause you to explode into tiny pieces," Hermione finished, a gleam in her eyes. "And you didn't tell me this before?" Her voice suddenly had an angry quality.
"Well, we weren't really friends before. And my research is a very private thing," he defended himself. "And then, well… we've been preoccupied. Secrecy is a force of habit."
Hermione took a few deep calming breaths. "You had me chopping ingredients." She felt her temper flare up, and took a few more deep breaths. Severus eyed her, somewhat nervously.
"I'm okay. Furious." She glared at him. "But okay. I suppose we haven't really been close all that long."
Severus opened his mouth, but at her look, closed it again.
"You'd better not keep anything this exciting from me again. Understand?"
"Yes, dear," he said, with quiet sarcasm. She glared again, but then couldn't help but let the anger slip away with the knowledge that she would be working on a project of such complexity and importance. She broke into a grin, and Severus breathed a silent sigh of relief.
***
The following few days were largely spent in the potions lab, debating potions modifications and possible solutions to the problem. Hermione might have been the brightest and most knowledgeable witch of her age, but Severus had a twenty year advantage that Hermione did not. She did, however, bring fresh ideas to the project, and even without the sheer quantity of knowledge that he possessed, her ideas, while relatively simple, were often some that he had overlooked.
In their excitement – Hermione's at having a fascinating new challenge in front of her, and Severus's in having somebody appreciate his work so much – they let Lucius and their upcoming meeting fall to the back of their minds, only really discussing it after dinner in the evenings, sitting in front of the fire snuggling on the couch with a glass of wine (which had quickly become an evening ritual). They prepared greater depth and fluency in their fictional backgrounds, trying to cover any eventuality so that they wouldn't be caught out if they were asked questions when separated.
Hermione also charmed an additional couple of features into their wedding rings so that, with a subtle tap by one's wand, the other would burn fiery-hot for a brief moment to indicate that they needed to escape the Malfoys as soon as possible. This was only to be used in the worst-case scenario, Severus assured her. The rings would also flash icy cold in a less extreme case, to advise the other to tread carefully. Hermione had decided that this could be useful, especially in conversation where they would both be present, and she likely to be caught out on some pureblood custom or other.
So the evening of the dinner party arrived, and this time Hermione didn't have the prospect of work to distract her from the upcoming dinner. Three times she came so close to ruining a buffering potion she was brewing to test the reaction of two unlikely ingredients that Severus had to stop her from destroying their lab, and eventually he called an end to their work for the day and brought her back to the living room, joining her on the couch and taking her into his arms.
"What's going on?" he asked gently, real concern in his voice. "You were absolutely fine last time. You carried it off with such poise and focus!"
"I'm sure I will when I get there," she murmured absentmindedly, staring into the flames. "The adrenaline will kick in." Pulling her attention away from the fire and towards him, she said, "it's just that there's so much that could go wrong, so many things that I could do that could ruin it for both of us!"
"But you did perfectly well last time!" he pointed out reasonably.
"I know that! I do know that! But what if I don't this time?"
"But you will. It will all go smoothly."
"You can't know that!" she exploded. "What if I mess it up?"
"What if the world explodes tomorrow? What if the muggles destroy the world with their wars and nuclear bombs? What if magic disappears overnight? Stop worrying. You'll be fine." He began a light massage of one of her shoulders, and she turned to let him do it properly. After a moment, she turned back to him, smirking.
"You're not very good at that, you know."
"At distracting you?" he asked, sounding a little wounded.
"Oh no, great distraction. But you're not so good at the massaging. I think you might have given me a bruise."
He glared at her. "It's not exactly something I've had a lot of practice with."
Hermione giggled. "I'm sorry," she said, a small smile playing on her lips. "I didn't mean to offend you. Feel free to practise on me as much as you'd like."
He pretended to consider. "I don't know. I think the problem is the bulky sweater. Definitely difficult to massage through."
"You'd do better if I wasn't wearing it?" she asked, arching an eyebrow.
"Mm, I think so. Better take off your shirt, too, just in case."
Much laughter and massage-learning followed, and Hermione found herself quite distracted. Which had, after all, been the goal.