Once again- MournfulSeverity stands as the source of inspiration. In her very first review of the first chapter of "Love Empowered Empathy- Prologue," she had mentioned the word "Obscurial". That got me researching like a mad hare. Thoughts of "venom" and some sequel of "Spiderman" flooded my mind. And with the emotionally loaded "Mute" and the huge fantastic tale weaving in the backdrop of "Love Empowered Empathy"- Baby's Breath was quietly born in one of my sleepless nights. I hope against hope I shall not disappoint my readers.


Disclaimer: I own nothing, but my thoughts of AU and OC, the rest all belong to J K Rowling. This mind lives in the Harry Potter fanfiction world though this body is still thankfully anchored in the monotonous reality of existence. The stories I write can indirectly influenced by many of the brilliant fanfiction writers on this site. And I humbly bow to such creative genius who give me much needed literary pleasures to see through the toils of mundane life. Lastly, I don't have a beta, so please be merciful. Reviews would encourage this introvert writer to peep out of her literary closet. My very first attempt at writing a Snape and Hermione and Dramione fanfiction ever.


Chapter 19

The Hogwarts library was quiet but for the shuffling of pages and occasional whispering. Though Madam Pince had allowed the two unnatural pair to stay back, but their previous classmates would have fainted to see Blaise Zabini a consummated Slytherin and Seamus Finnigan, a staunch Gryffindor, reading scrolls, tomes, and manuscripts, exchanging notations on parchments, and sharing a single table, sitting by the elbows, and not reducing to fistfights even after hours of being locked up in one place.

Heaving a sigh, Seamus had pushed off his scrolls and had buried his head at the crook of his folded elbows. Bringing his head up slightly, he had peered at Zabini, who was still deep in reading the tome open in front of him. It was the same one, Draco had been reading before been summoned by Headmaster Snape.

Without even looking at the former Gryffindor, the Italian had drawled, "You are staring…why are you staring?"

Shrugging his shoulders, Finnigan had observed, "You know, Granger would be proud. Proud that we are studying like mad. Proud that we actually have spent a better half of the day just doing…" throwing his hands about, pointing at the books still laying haphazardly.

"Was she that intense?"

"She had her essays done days before they needed to be submitted. She would finish off the bulk of the syllabus, by the first half of the year…Could you imagine that?"

"Well! Beats me! Though Draco was a ferocious reader…but then he was competing with Miss You know who," he had winked at Seamus, who in return had rolled his eyes.

Harry Potter had walked in and had dropped into one of the empty chairs. The other two occupants of the table had sat up straighter, looking at the newcomer with interest.

Looking between Seamus and Zabini, he had shrugged, raffled his own hair, and had cited, "She responds to Snape. She nearly blasts Bill off, she leaves behind letters with Bill for me and Malfoy, but she attacks me at the drop of a hat. She is possessed, perhaps…I really don't know, can't think…"

"Possessed you say…"

Zabini had immediately started flipped through pages of the very tome he had been studying intently.

But they had to drop it, Madam Pince had joined the men and she had literally thrown them out and in terse words had relayed the Deputy Headmistresses orders, "They are to go to the guest quarters and rest a bit, eat the food brought by the elves and join the headmaster post-dinner."

The Hogwarts guest quarters were much like perfect rooms, but with a lesser number of beds and a small sitting area added to it.

They had quietly sat down to eat a hearty dinner spread when they were joined by Neville and Luna.

Grabbing on to some food, Luna had provided the others with additional information she had gathered.

Seamus was in awe, "Hermione had been suffering for so long…Harry, did she…?"

"No, she didn't! Hell, Seamus, we all were suffering, each one of us, couldn't make head or tail of most of the things happening to us. George was drowning himself in barrels of firewhiskey, that man had punched at every mirror he could lay his eyes on. And Ron," sneering in disgust, "Ron was fucking around, like that was the only thing he could do."

Placing his arm around, Harry, Neville had pacified his friend, "We all had been hurting, and we hardly knew Harry, whom to turn to."

"I know, Hermione had been trying, trying to reach out, but, I was not really looking out for her was I. I never wrote back to her as often as I should have. I plunged myself into Auror training, married Ginny, but she was my friend. More like a sister I never…" choking over his words, he had hung his head in despair.

Rubbing his eyes furiously at his sleeves, he had managed not to cry in front of his former classmates.

"Now, now, the only thing I have of her, is this, " bring out the letter Bill had given him," she wants me to know about, meet, I don't know, someone called," looking around at the others, "did we have anyone studying here by that name?"

The others had shrugged but Luna had been staring intently at the parchment held within Harry's fingers.

Extending her hand, she had asked, "Harry, may I have a look?"

Sighing in defeat, he had let her see it.

"S. Sassoon…"

"Moon, was he a Ravenclaw?" Neville had whispered.

"Moon…" Seamus had the gale to poke at his fellow housemate.

Kneeing him below the table, Neville had still managed to shut the Irishman's humorous comebacks.

Looking up from the parchment Luna had launched into a full-fledged speech that could even appease the Headmaster himself.

"I came across that name while studying how the war had affected the Muggles. Well, the Muggles did have some pretty ghastly wars of their own and there had been quite a lot of causalities. Though in the recent past, there had been two major wars. Major, yes, and that was why they called it World Wars 1 and 2. It was a clash of interests, beliefs, blood purity and whatnot. And almost every able person was encouraged to fight for the interest of their country. People were joining forces from all works of life. And believe me, not every one of them had the nerve to live through its horrible consequences. Like us, many had returned from the fronts, 'shell shocked" and with traumas, they could not explain, apart from physical disabilities."

Taking a sip on her pumpkin juice, she had continued, "Sassoon or Siegfried Sassoon was a poet, who had served during World War I, he had written several war-based poems, and here Hermione also mentions of J. Masefield, that I am certain would be John Masefield, another poet of that time. They had served in the First War and had come back with terrible memories, and that was what made them write about them…tell people through poetry the true nature of war…Harry, if not anything, these would be references to poets and to some specific poems Hermione, would want you to read…"

Thoroughly confused, Neville, still had thought aloud, "Umm, Harry, it might sound long stretched, by look, mate, its Hermione, and this might really be something she wants you to look on to."

Blaise had been thinking and had finally added, "Can be Potter, she was reading poems, I did see some books of that on her work desk."

"I guess so, we better hurry though, Professor Lupin and Flitwick wanted to join us at the library, we can still manage soon more of reading before the Headmaster summons us. I overheard…," stopping mid-way, Harry had looked at Zabini.

"Go on Potter, I know who is coming, the goblins, right? And, my guess is, they wish to meet with Snape, before they can strike a deal with the Ministry and the school of Hogwarts," Chuckling at the god smacked look on the faces of the three Gryffindors, the Slytherin had got up and had walked up to the door. Opening it, he had turned and addressed his next words to the Boy-Who-Lived-Twice.

"If there is anything more dangerous than evil lords with their twisted minds, dark magic and werewolves without conscience, it will be the goblins. I wonder, what kind of hold they had on Hermione Granger?"


Throughout the quiet dinner, Narcissa Malfoy had been watching her only son, methodically cutting down his meal into precise bite pieces and eating them one by one. And she knew her son well. As a child, Draco was quite an attention seeker. Though Lucius never cared much. She knew her boy had been starving for his father's affection.

Making Severus Snape, his godfather was Narcissa's idea, though the reason she had given to Lucius was a different one. Her husband wanted power, wanted wealth and fame, but his mind was perverse enough to make the waters of the Thames river bleed red. And Narcissa had tried hard to give her only son a version of a fatherly figure. Even the dour miserable potions master of Hogwarts could have managed to be one for her sulking son.

The Malfoy matriarch broke her silence while dessert was getting served.

"The Minister's Head Auror, Kingsley Shacklebolt came by, while you were away."

Putting in cutlery down, wiping his lips, Draco had looked up with interest.

"The ministry has reduced the period of my house arrest. They have considered my philanthropic gestures, regarding the orphans of war and have pardoned me. But they have assigned me with a project, whose details they are going to send me in two days' time. Though unofficially, Kingsley had been kind enough to abreast me with the information that I was to help Severus, your godfather in his forthcoming activities."

Nodding his acknowledgment, he had gone back to eating his meal.

"Draco, I know, I have known for quite a long time, that you have feelings for Miss Granger…A mother knows son. And I, deep down, never thought against it, by our beliefs stood in the way. I know how acutely you love her, and I am proud of you for that. Because you might have the chance to get something, I could never get. The world will call you both star-crossed lovers if she reciprocates your feelings. And I have seen them myself, and Draco, not all lovers are doomed, but beliefs have stood on their way…give yourself a chance to redeem, if you truly love her, be there for her, she is a powerful witch, and all she might need is someone to show her, she is loved and wanted for, you just have to believe in that each time you question your affection- 'How do I love Thee…?" the answer lies in "If thou must love me'."

"Mother!"

"What…"

In two steps, he had crossed the table and was sitting at the foot of his mother, "What, how... where did you come across that… Mother, please, tell me, this is important for me to know. Please, mother…"

Fumbling into his robes, he had brought out the letter and holding the parchment open in front of his mother he had pleaded, "Mother, please, these lines, you just said these lines, Hermione…she had left this for me, I got them today…mother please…if these are clues she has left behind, which I can understand and maybe eventually help her…Mother, where…where are you going…"

Narcissa was astounded, It's the same letter, but in different penmanship.

She had left the room in a hurry with Draco chasing after her. She had gone into her bedroom. Panting and unsure of his mother's frantic behavior, he had decided to wait at the threshold. She was desperately looking for something in the concealed partition of her dresser, and after an uncharacteristic huff, she had brought forth an aged parchment with a white ribbon tied around it.

Her hand shook as she had brought it close to the magically burning candles on the dresser. She had turned to her son and had signaled him to come into the room.

"Mother…what is…?"

Shaking her head, swallowing a couple of times, woman had simply handed over the ribbon tied parchment to him.

"Open it."

Uncertain and curious, Draco had opened it. He was thoroughly shocked to see the same lines written over, but the handwriting was different. And a sage leaf was drawn on top of it and a lilac flower below it.

"What a shame! Potter's mother, your father was obsessed with her. He wanted to enslave her, mug…muggleborn and brightest," then pointing at the letter she had continued, "I had found him stroking that letter, smelling it…disgusting…I couldn't let him continue, I don't know from where he had found it…but I had heard him whisper her name again and again, while he held that letter to his chest."

"When I was pregnant you, I already had three miscarriages, I couldn't let him continue, had stolen it from his study. I wanted to burn it, but thought better I guess, instead, I had locked it. Away, "smiling to herself, "Sage and Lilac, why did it never occur to me…it was all before my very eyes. Both of them. They were friends from the very start. Why did it never cross my mind, that they could never stick to being friends, one day they would cross that threshold and mean more to each other."

The young man had kept staring at his now weeping mother. Her eyes still gazing at the flickering candle flames.

She had whispered, "Oh! Such love, such pure love! Such unending love. All this time, only her, always her. The subtle brushes of fingers, the soft whispers when they would cross each other in between the library bookshelves… They had given each other nicknames, Sage and Lilac."

Draco was desperate. he could not have let his mother sound so dazed, like a woman losing her mind. He had yelled at her, "WHO, WHO! WHOSE LOVE?!"

Jolted out of her reveries, she had turned to her son, overwhelmed, "Why Severus's and of course Lily's. Sev was lily's Sage and Lily was Sev's lilac. I had heard them whisper these two words to each other often…soft and tender…James Potter could never have loved her; the way Snape has."

Her son had dumbly flopped down on her bed. The ribbon and the letter held in his hand. His eye roving, his jaws clicking. Then he had stood up at once… His eyes were burning with renewed purpose and determination. As if he had finally come up to the epiphany, "And...she wanted me to become his ideal godson and I know Mother I truly can be one!"

Narcissa still overwhelmed had wondered, "Who wanted you…?"

But the new Malfoy head of the family could hardly wait. He had already made out of the room, but had turned back at the edge of the threshold and had triumphantly declared, "Miss Hermione Granger."


A/N: Next chapter- the BIG BANG REVEAL. The bane of my waking hours. I have lost sleep over it. URGH! And I always thought, people who handled the money flow, were sharper than they would let the world believe.