FORTY-SIX
"Severus," Kingsley said, sitting down across the desk. Hermione looked up from her book in the corner; she'd only half been paying attention to the room around her but the arrival of the Minister for Magic (interim or not) was worth noticing.
"Shacklelbolt," Severus said without looking up. He was mapping out the changes he'd wanted to make at Hogwarts for years. He hadn't stopped talking about it since Harry's funeral. Second years would have a mandatory Muggle Studies class in place of History of Magic. History of Magic would be taught by a corporeal being who could actually control the classroom and would teach something beyond the goblin wars (Binns was free to continue lecturing to the desks as he had for decades; he would hardly notice if they were occupied or not.) There would be class periods set aside each semester to cover the crossover between classes, Potions to Herbology, Charms to Defense. It was brilliant.
"Hello, Kingsley," Hermione said pleasantly, because Severus was too distracted to be polite.
"Hermione," Kingsley said, smiling warmly at her. He looked between the two of them, curiosity in his eyes, but he didn't say anything. Hermione just smiled at him. Severus raised an eyebrow, then returned to his parchment. "I'm glad you're here. I have something for you as well."
"Shouldn't you be off running the world?" Severus asked. Hermione fought the inclination to get up and smack him.
"Be polite, Severus," Eileen said sharply from the sitting room. She glared through the doorway.
"I am here to deliver your Orders of Merlin," Kingsley said, pressing on. Severus's quill finally stopped moving.
"Orders of Merlin?" Eileen echoed from the sitting room.
"We were going to hold a proper ceremony," Kingsley said. "However, there have been too many attacks to risk it. You were attacked in Hogsmeade. And then the Bainbridge funeral…"
Hermione nodded. It had been a massacre. A funeral for the elderly Mr. Bainbridge, a death entirely unrelated to the war, had ended with the Dark Mark above the cemetery and a long day for the Obliviators.
Kingsley nodded solemnly and handed them each little velvet bags with heavy medallions inside. Hermione watched Severus open his first; he'd coveted the recognition inherent in the award for longer than she'd been alive.
His face was surprisingly blank. His left eyebrow twitched ever so slightly, but he was otherwise impassive.
"Order of Merlin, First Class," Kingsley said, smiling widely. "For both of you. You more than deserve it."
"Thank you," Hermione said.
"We are the ones who need to thank you, and this is the best way I'm able to do it."
"They're still likely to call for another trial," Severus said, but he didn't take his eyes off the Order of Merlin.
"They are calling for many trials," Kingsley said. "That's the other half of the reason for my visit. I'd like to ask you to sit on the Wizengamot."
"The Wizengamot," Eileen repeated from the sitting room. Kingsley ignored her.
"Most of the standing Wizengamot is in holding cells. We need… 'wizards of caliber' is the phrase Arcturus keeps throwing around," Kingsley said.
\\
Kingsley left an hour later, and the room was too quiet. Hermione knew what she'd say if they were alone, but they weren't. Eileen had watched the whole conversation from the doorway like it was a spectator sport. Her family had listened, too, though they'd been out of sight in Severus's sitting room.
"As if I don't have enough to do already," Severus said once Kingsley was gone.
"And yet you agreed," she said, smirking. He shrugged one shoulder.
"I know the witch doctor told us not to mention it, but—"
"Mum."
"What? She's a witch who's a doctor, isn't she?"
"I know you know she's a mediwitch. You're being deliberately rude."
"Hermione," Grandma said sharply.
Hermione frowned at her grandmother for a moment before she turned to her mother with a strained smile pulling at her lips. "What is it Poppy told you not to mention?"
"This," Mum said, gesturing back and forth between Hermione and Severus.
"What?" Hermione asked, looking to Severus. He raised an eyebrow at her like she was being particularly dense.
"She's wondering why you're casually flirting with the man twice your age whose mother has been telling horror stories about him for the past year," Severus said, eyes back on the parchments spread across his desk.
"No. That's because you're sleeping together," Mum said, voice flat.
"Poppy told you that?"
"She was quite touched with the story of it," Mum said.
"She likes you," Eileen said. "The both of you."
"That is the part I want explained," Mum said.
"Excuse me?" asked Severus.
"Why. You were his student, yet the staff of this school seem perfectly accepting of the relationship in spite of it!"
"Mrs. Granger—"
"No, no," Mum said, waving a hand like she was trying to clear the air. "Honestly, I can see past it too, alarming as that is."
"Mum…"
"It's this place. The magic. The… All of it. It's impossible."
Without actually moving, Castle sort of shifted around them. It almost seemed offended.
"Don't take it personally," Severus said, looking at the wall next to him. "It's strange to me and I'm Master of the Castle."
"I didn't—" Mum started, but Hermione waved her off.
"He was talking to Castle."
"He what?"
"Castle," Severus said. "The castle."
"You were talking to the castle."
"Yes." Severus turned his attention back to his parchments.
"You aren't helping," Hermione told him.
"There is nothing to be said," he said. "She is uncomfortable with magic; most parents of Muggle-born student are. Nothing I would say might change her mind. She is uncomfortable with Castle; I cannot change how it works. She is uncomfortable with you and me; I don't blame her, but I also don't plan to make any changes."
"Severus," Eileen said, chastising. He raised an eyebrow in her direction.
"Dad," Hermione said, trying to interrupt the battle of surly looks. "What do you think?"
"About which part?"
"Any of it."
"Magic is both fascinating and impossible," he said diplomatically. "And, as I said before, the professor has been growing on me."
"I've asked you to call me Severus," Severus said.
"Severus," Dad echoed, smiling a bit.
"Is the fight over, then?" Grandpa asked, interrupting the growing tension.
"Excuse me?" Severus asked.
"The fight," Grandpa said. "The war."
"Hard to say," Severus replied.
"There's no more leadership," Hermione said thoughtfully, "but so far that's just made the Death Eaters who are left more violent."
"Getting their kicks while they can," Severus said bitterly. He tapped his fingers on his stacked parchments and they rolled into a neat scroll. "They expect to be caught. They plan to go down fighting."
"The worst sort of men," Eileen said darkly. Severus looked at her, and Hermione almost thought he was resisting the inclination to put on a guilty face and let her paint him with the rest of them.
"And they're wizards," Mum said.
"These sorts of men are everywhere," Grandpa said. "Wizard or not. People are people, and not all of them are particularly good."
"Our part in the fighting is over," Hermione said. "We have things to do here. The Aurors will take care of the rest."
Classes resumed on the first of February. Many students didn't return. Some students who hadn't been to Hogwarts since Dumbledore's funeral were back, though. Severus added his name to the list of professors who were willing to tutor O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. students in their subjects over the summer free of charge so that they could keep up with their studies despite the horrible year.
Hermione had opted to study for her N.E.W.T.s independently. She'd cut out a corner for herself in his office and spent her evenings studying; she slept in his bed.
The trials were ongoing. It was strange to be a part of them, sitting among venerable wizards and speaking to the crimes presented before them. He couldn't decide if it was stranger to return from the Ministry to relieve Minerva from proctoring his class, or to go to the Ministry as a member of the Wizengamot in the first place.
Hermione's grandparents had gone back to their lives, wherever that meant. There had been hugs and handshakes. The grandparents liked him, which was absurd. He'd never been the sort of man other peoples' relatives liked.
Her parents had gone back to London, staying in a hotel and looking for a new house. The Ministry had rebuilt the old one (erasing all traces of magical damage in keeping with the Statute of Secrecy), but they hadn't thought it was a good place to go back to. Hermione visited them, tried to help, but she usually returned to Hogwarts grouchy. Her dad liked him, thought he was "a decent enough bloke," though he also seemed to think Severus was a phase Hermione might get over. Her mum did not like him, and, really, Severus was more comfortable with it that way. (Truthfully, her discomfort probably stemmed from his being a wizard more than anything else.)
Both her parents and her grandparents had a Hit Wizard as a guard, though neither couple knew it.
"I'm going to throw up."
"Don't be ridiculous."
"No, I really might," she said. He rolled his eyes at her, but she ignored him.
"Hermione," he said, the tolerant patience in his voice grating on her nerves, "you are being absurd."
"I can't help it."
Hermione got up and dumped her tea. Even the smell of it turned her stomach.
Her N.E.W.T. scores would arrive any minute. Even after fighting a war, it seemed like everything hung on those results. Her entire future. She supposed she could take Filch's position, as was almost traditional for the Warden, but she'd hoped to… Well. She didn't want to hope too hard before she knew one way or the other.
"Are you sure you don't want to visit your parents today?" he asked, trying to distract her. All the idea did was make her stomach turn all over again.
Bringing her family to Hogwarts hadn't gone particularly well. She'd hoped—expected—they'd be as in awe of it as she had been the first time she'd been to the castle. She'd thought it would make magic real for them in a way that it never had been before. She'd been right, and she'd been wrong.
She didn't know how to talk to them about any of it.
Instead of facing the problem—problems—they'd pretended it hadn't existed and gotten on with life. Her parents had rented a flat for the time being, and begun preparing to reopen their practice. Her grandparents had gone home.
"I'd rather visit your mum."
Severus sighed, frowning at her. (He thought it was odd how easily she'd got on with his mother.)
Before they could get into another argument about their struggles with their families, her scores arrived. Severus took one look at her and snatched the parchment from the owl, which nipped at him but missed. Severus ignored it until it (huffily) flew off, then opened the envelope.
"Well?" she asked, dreading the answer. She'd been on the run for almost a full year before she'd taken the tests. She'd missed so much in-class practice time. She'd barely gotten any studying done, what with the funerals and the arguing with her mother and the nights spent sitting in the dark simply grieving for it all. It had been so stupid of her to think she could take it on. Neville had opted to wait, to study independently, to take a few of the summer courses the professors were putting on, and then take the exams in August.
Severus hummed, eyes darting across the page. He didn't say anything.
"Well?"
They'd had a plan. He had all the paperwork ready for her apprenticeship in Potions, but she had to have N.E.W.T. results before they could move forward with it. If she didn't receive at least an Exceeds Expectations in Potions and an Acceptable in Arithmancy, she wouldn't be able to continue her studies.
If she didn't do well, the entire plan went to pot. If the plan went to pot, the whole idea of the future she'd been hoping for vanished.
"Hermione, you did well," Severus said. He was right in front of her. His eyes, dark and blank before, were molten and gentle.
"I—what?"
"You did well. Of course you did well."
"Of course," she repeated, barely a whisper.
"Ridiculous woman," he said, kissing her forehead and turning the parchment so she could see her results.
Outstandings in everything. Even Defense.
"I… I did it."
"Of course you did."
"I did it."
He kissed her.
EPILOGUE
Hermione put on her best Angry Potions Mistress face and strode down the street toward Wheezes. A few students saw her and took an involuntary step back; she had to keep herself from smiling.
"George!" she said, jerking the door closed behind her. "Fred!"
"Ah, Professor Granger," Fred said, a smile stretching across his freckled face.
"Term's only been out, what, four days?" George said. "You're early this year."
"I'd like a word," Hermione said, doing her best impression of Severus.
They bowed like some high court gentlemen and gestured her up the stairs.
"Well?" Fred asked eagerly once they were in private.
"I think I've sorted out the anemia issue with the Nose-Bleed Nougat," she said.
\\
Severus's raven Patronus arrived just after dark. The three of them had takeout boxes from Fred's favorite Thai place spread around them, and she and George had been arguing potion interaction. The raven flew through the window, and they'd all flinched like they'd expected the glass to shatter.
"Come back. Now."
"Bossy wanker," Fred said, scooping up the spilled food and making a face at the sauce smudged on the parchment beneath.
"He can't last four hours without you?" George said, rolling his eyes.
"What, did you leave him with the baby?"
"You're the one with the toddler at home, not me," Hermione said, grinning. "My children left four days ago."
"What's he freaking out about, then?"
"The baby," Hermione said, laughing when they both looked at her askance.
"Baby?" they said at once, not quite in sync so that it sounded like an echo.
"Castle."
"The castle?"
"Castle is a big, stone baby."
"You're talking about Hogwarts castle?"
"It mopes after the children leave. Sulks. Broods." Hermione smirked. "I thought Severus was a brooder, but… Merlin. Last year, it decided it was going to stop all the pipes. No water whatsoever. It wasn't funny, Fred. Aguamenti wouldn't even work."
"That's hilarious," George said.
"It isn't even that it wants the children to come back. It knows how summer works. It just… gets sad."
"Right now, Hermione," Severus's second Patronus said. It was odd to hear a raven growl.
"Do you think it stopped the water again?" Fred asked, entirely failing to repress his smile.
"No."
"No?" George asked. "Why not? That's the perfect prank."
"The castle has stood for eons. It doesn't repeat things." Then she remembered. "No. That's not true. It likes to lock me in the library. That trick got old before my apprenticeship was over, I'll tell you that much."
"You are kinda synonymous with the library, Hermione."
"That's not… That's not why…" She sighed. "It's a long story."
The twins' grins were almost predatory. Hermione raised her eyebrows at them, and then let Castle pull her back.
Severus stood in the entrance hall. His hair was back in its usual knot, but that was the only normal thing about his appearance. He leaned forward, arms crossed on the hilt of an enormous broadsword. He wore the centerpiece suit of armor from the Warden's Armory, golden shoulder pieces gleaming in the candlelight. And a long black cape.
He looked brilliantly, casually dramatic.
And also ridiculous.
