A/N: Holiday sweetener chapter. Enjoy! Reviews are much appreciated.

To say that they had been excused from Hogwarts to recover from their ordeal at Malfoy Manor was an understatement. Harry didn't particularly feel like recalling the conversation he'd had directly after the battle, but Dumbledore's words still rung disturbingly in his ears. His friends could have died. He could have been killed. Rushing in could have hastened Hermione's demise, rather than prevent it. And despite everything that had happened—everything Harry had said and seen—Dumbledore still trusted Snape.

Harry had left the office with a bubble of fury, relief, guilt, and shame roiling within him. He stopped to pay Neville and Luna a visit in the Hospital Wing, to thank them and apologize for dragging them along with him.

"'Dragged'? Harry, if you'd tried to go without me, I would have had to pay you back for that Petrificus Totalus from first year!" Neville had said fiercely. "There was no way you were leaving me behind."

"It was the right thing to do," Luna said simply, looking up from a copy of The Quibbler that someone had kindly fetched her. "That's what friends are for, isn't it?"

He had returned to Grimmauld Place, where Molly scolded and cried over him in equal turns. Sirius was awaiting a verdict on a possible pardon with a nervous, impatient sort of eagerness that was infectious and put Harry on edge. They were both desperately praying that the Ministry would finally—finally!—do something right this year. Ron and Ginny were recovering from minor injuries, and were passing the time with a game of Exploding Snap with Tonks and Remus.

Harry couldn't sit down and join them for long. He eventually found himself pacing the living room, unable to sit still until he could visit Hermione. He was still furious and confused—not with his godmother, because knowing Hermione, she would give them her reasons soon enough—but with Snape. He had betrayed her, taken her to Malfoy Manor, threatened to kill her, agreed to torture her… and yet, no one but he and Ron seemed to be the slightest bit disturbed by this. Ginny had told him how he had Apparated them both to Grimmauld Place—thankfully saving her from having to deal with the Aurors—and how he had carried Hermione from the room after she had collapsed, but Harry wasn't convinced. But no one would let him up. She, by all accounts, had sustained the worst injuries of the lot of them, and needed to be left alone.

Finally, he stood up from the couch for the umpteenth time, and headed for the stairs.

No one questioned where he was going—after all, he was staying on the next floor. But instead of going to his room, he instead went to Hermione's. He quietly walked down the darkened hallway, and was surprised to find a crack of light falling across the floor; the door to her room was slightly ajar. He hesitated, and then slowly crept forward, pushing the door open further ever so slightly.

What he saw made him go very still.

Snape was sitting by Hermione's bed. She was sitting up, but not of her own accord; the mass of curls pressed against Snape, and the slight lean to the side, meant that he was holding her. Her head was tucked just beneath his chin, his arms wrapped around her limp body. By the way Snape was sitting, Harry thought that for a wild moment, he might be asleep—but then his shoulders stiffened, his head lifted, and he slowly turned to look at him.

"Go away, Potter."

Harry inhaled sharply, about to speak, but something stopped him. He wanted to yell at Snape, to hex him, to tear into him for everything that he had done—by now, Harry had reached his breaking point with him—but the sight of Snape holding his godmother made him pause. His stance was so protective, as though he were not telling Harry to leave for himself, but for her.

And suddenly, it all made sense. The time he had seen Snape in his first year, from his obscure vantage in the trees, with his godmother and her son. The memory he had seen of her in the tunnel of the Shrieking Shack, saving Snape from Remus. The way they had interacted during his Occlumency lessons, the remark Professor McGonagall had made, the way they constantly snarked and antagonized each other without any real bite…

Without a word, Harry turned around and left.

He quietly walked down the hall and passed by the room with the tapestry, only to pause and step back a few paces as he saw Remus and Sirius standing there, hands behind their backs, observing the many names and charred marks on the family tree.

"They're married, aren't they?" he asked quietly.

Both men wheeled around to look at him, surprised by the intrusion.

"Who?" Sirius asked quickly.

"Hermione and Snape."

Sirius hesitated, but it was Remus who spoke first.

"Yes." He paused to do the calculation in his head, and then added blithely, "They've been married for nearly fourteen years."

"Tell me about Hermione," Harry said, stepping into the room. "Bellatrix said she went back in time, and you already told me she started Hogwarts in fifth year. What happened?"

"It's not our place to tell," Sirius started, but Remus shook his head.

"It's long past time," the werewolf said with a weary sigh.

"That's not up to us," Sirius insisted, and Harry understood that he was steadfastly trying to adhere to Hermione's wishes.

"I—it's okay," he muttered. "I'll wait—"

"No." Remus straightened. "Harry has waited long enough, Sirius. It's time to stop keeping him in the dark."

Sirius looked like he was about to protest, but then Harry saw his shoulders slump in capitulation.

"Your godmother," Remus began, turning his attention back to gazing at the tapestry, "arrived in the year of 1977. Her name was Hermione Granger—your best friend—and none of us knew who she was, or where she had come from. She was simply placed into Gryffindor—a girl of about sixteen, as alone and distraught as you can possibly imagine—and told to make a new life for herself."

"We didn't get along at first," Sirius said, and Harry saw the faintest trace of a smile on his lips. "Thankfully, Remus was the responsible and compassionate one in the group, and she found a place with us." The smile quickly faded as he added, "We got along rather stiffly at first, but it wasn't until after I nearly killed Snape—that incident you saw in the pensieve—that we finally got along."

"Why?"

"I was an arrogant and immature prat, and Hermione didn't know how to put up with it," Sirius said bluntly. "We warmed up a bit after I had the summer to think about what I'd done, and things got better from there."

"That's the summer she spent training with Kingsley and Mad-Eye," Remus said, glancing over at Harry over his shoulder. "I think she spent some time with Flitwick, too. She worked part-time down at The Three Broomsticks while undergoing the sort of training that would put Auror recruits to shame. I'm not certain all of it was exactly legal, mind, but it was necessary.

"It set the stage for later on," the werewolf continued, "when Hermione started having more run-ins with the Slytherins."

"She'd already had a few," Sirius reminded him, taking a seat in the single, worn old armchair in the room. "She got in a fight with some Slytherins her second day there, remember? That's how she ended up in detention with Snape."

"Why was Snape giving detention?" Harry asked, trying to calculate how old his Potions professor must have been.

"He wasn't," Sirius said with a laugh. "He was in detention, too."

"Regardless," Remus said, drawing the conversation back on track, "the Dark Lord was growing more influential, and Hermione was an unknown—but very powerful—quality. She was exceptionally bright and notably skilled with a wand, both in the classes and out in the halls, and many of his future supporters were eager to take her down a notch."

Sirius let out a bark of laughter. "They never did. She always sent them to the hospital wing for their trouble."

Harry's jaw opened, and then shut. "That's—that doesn't sound like the Hermione I know. I've never seen—she never hexed anyone unless she could help it—"

"It was a different time," Sirius acknowledged. "A different and dangerous world. Hermione adjusted to it rather admirably."

"She was also in a rather tenuous situation," Remus stated. "She was close to Severus, but she was also a Gryffindor, and a member of the Marauders. They had a falling-out more than once," he recalled, "their positions were so different, it was inevitable. But it never lasted for long. They would eventually end up back in the library together, studying or getting into all kinds of trouble—"

"Like what?" Harry asked, trying to imagine Hermione willingly running off into trouble without a very good reason. A save-the-world-from-Dark-Lords reason.

"Fighting in the corridors after hours, squabbling too loudly in the library for Madam Pince's liking, sneaking out to Diagon Alley—"

"What?"

"How long were they in detention for that?" Sirius asked brightly. "A month, wasn't it?"

"And a hundred points from both their houses," Remus said grimly. "I'd never seen McGonagall so furious."

Harry's mind was reeling as he tried to take this information in. The Hermione he knew was cautious when it came to rule-breaking, disliked violence, considered the library a place of sacrosanct silence, and would have been horrified to have a single detention on her record, much less a month-long string of them. It was mind-boggling to him.

There was a moment of silence, both men seemingly considering what part of the tale to tell next, and the Sirius said, "And then we graduated."

"And James and Lily got married," Remus said, with a nod. "Hermione was there for that. And then—er—"

"What you have to understand, Harry, is that she wasn't a member of the Order yet," Sirius interjected quickly. "Dumbledore was probably waiting for her to graduate. But then…"

He broke off. Remus picked up the tale.

"I haven't been made aware of the details," he said heavily, "but Snape turned spy for the Order around that time, and Dumbledore assigned Hermione as his handler."

"His what?" Harry asked, not familiar with the terminology.

"His handler," Sirius repeated. "Snape didn't report to Dumbledore—at the time, he wouldn't have had a good excuse to contact the Headmaster frequently enough to give reports, but he would have had a perfectly good excuse to visit his girlfriend." He and Harry shared a grimace at this, and then he finished, "So Dumbledore made her in charge. Snape would report to her, and she would report to Dumbledore."

"None of us knew this at the time, of course," Remus added. "This was all kept very secret. Both of their lives would have been forfeit if anyone had found out."

There was a moment of painful silence, as they exchanged glances, and then Remus reluctantly added, "That's why Malfoy Manor happened, Harry. Hermione knew what she was getting into, when she agreed to be Snape's handler all those years ago—that sometimes she would have to play a part, that Snape might have to make a show of having her under his control, of demonstrating to You-Know-Who that he was willing to make her expendable to him to show his loyalty." Remus paused, and then added roughly, "I don't think Hermione expected to survive Malfoy Manor. She probably thought your Occlumency was too good to keep You-Know-Who out, and I believe she considered the situation her fault—after all, if Lucius Malfoy hadn't seen her at the Ministry, he wouldn't have linked her to the Prophecy's disappearance."

"That's not true," Harry interrupted fiercely. "Someone would have had to take me to the Ministry to get the Prophecy."

"He does have a point," Remus acknowledged reluctantly, looking at Sirius. "It could have been anyone."

"Doubtful," Sirius snorted. "She has too much of a history. They would have turned to her first."

"It's possible, but that's neither here nor there at this point," Remus said. "Hermione went willingly, because part of her job is to ensure Snape's cover remains intact."

"That's all there is, really," Sirius said, and there was an edge of bitterness to his tone. "They worked together until You-Know-Who fell—"

"Wait," Harry interjected. "Hermione knew Voldemort would try to kill my parents. Why didn't she stop them?"

Remus and Sirius shared an uneasy grimace.

"That would have changed the timeline irreparably," Remus began, finally meeting Harry's eyes. "If she had stopped You-Know-Who, he would have simply tried again and again..."

"And Lily might not have been able to sacrifice herself for you that time," Sirius said woodenly. "And even if they did survive, the future would have changed drastically. Hermione might not have had the accident that caused her to go back in time in the first place, if she mucked around with the past too much."

Harry felt something painful and bitter slide down his throat. He knew they were right, but still—still—there was a chance that his parents could have been saved, that he could have been spared being an orphan living in the cupboard under the Dursleys' stairs, and yet…

"I think she considered stopping it, at the last minute," Sirius said suddenly, looking up from the floor. "I found her there, the night they died—she looked as though she'd been in a hurry. But she was too late."

Harry felt the block in his throat ease slightly. So Hermione has still felt guilty about letting it happened, had perhaps even tried to step in. That was slightly more like the person he knew. It made him feel a bit better, though the thought that he had come so close to the possibility of living with his parents still made his chest constrict painfully.

"Hermione fell apart after that," Remus said, turning to Sirius. "You were locked up in Azkaban then, so you wouldn't know, but she finally cracked. She'd run herself into the ground working for the Order, and as soon as You-Know-Who was gone, on top of James and Lily's deaths… I half thought she'd lost the will to live, she didn't want to see or speak to anyone. I didn't see her until their funeral, and later, Mad-Eye told me he'd had to fetch her—she was a mess."

"Where was Snape in all of this?" Harry wondered.

"I don't know," Remus answered honestly. "They had another falling out, right after the war ended. They were overworked and under enormous pressure—they both needed the time off, I think."

"Hermione was already married to him when she finally broke me out of Azkaban," Sirius said, lost in thought. He scratched a nail against the armchair idly. "She was teaching at Hogwarts then, until she got pregnant—"

He suddenly broke off, and Harry watched the blood drain from his face. "I shouldn't have said that."

"I already know she has a kid," Harry said, trying not to show discomfort at the fact that this kid, whoever he was, wasn't just Hermione's, but Snape's. He was still trying to reconcile himself with what he'd seen nearly half an hour ago, in Hermione's room. "What did she teach?"

"Defense Against the Dark Arts," Sirius said, immensely relieved that Harry had changed the subject. "She was damn good at it, too."

"But the job," Harry said, uncomprehendingly. "The job's jinxed…"

"She found a way around it," Sirius said proudly. "Of course, she didn't remove the jinx, because she needed it to stay in place for when she finally quit."

"I'm not sure what happened after that," Remus said, eyeing Sirius askance. "She was there when I was teaching, but she mostly remained out of sight." A pause, and Harry saw him frown, as though trying to recall a fuzzy memory. "After our confrontation with Pettigrew, when I—when I transformed, she's the one who distracted me from going after you," he said slowly. "I remember chasing her. She lured me into the Forbidden Forest, and then Petrified me. She saved all your lives, that night."

"She also kept me fed and informed about the castle," Sirius said mildly. "She helped me buy your Firebolt, since I couldn't very well go down and fill it out, myself."

"She also helped you sneak into the castle," Remus said, with bite to his admonishment, "while convincing me not to tell the Headmaster that you were an Animagus."

"I'm not sure what else she could have done," Sirius said, with a wry smile. "Would it have helped if she tried to appeal my case with you?"

"Probably not," Remus admitted with a sigh.

"Last year was difficult for her," Sirius said, turning to Harry, his expression drawn. "When she was dealing with Barty Crouch, Jr. while he was impersonating Mad-Eye. They never got along in school, and he was always a cagey bugger. She was constantly on edge, doing whatever she could to make sure he thought Severus was a loyal Death Eater with his wife under his thumb, while also trying to keep you safe—"

"She was at Hogwarts for that?" Harry blurted.

"She's been at Hogwarts the entire time," Remus informed him. "Always invisible, sneaking around, keeping one eye on you and the other on the timeline…"

"She helped Crouch," Sirius said. "Made sure to give him ideas that would help you get through the tasks without showing his hand, or harming the other Champions in the process—at least, until the final task. That's when all hell broke loose."

Harry folded his arms, considering this. "She was there, that night Crouch broke into Snape's office, wasn't she?" he asked slowly. "When Crouch confronted Snape about being a Death Eater—that conversation I told you about, when we visited you outside Hogsmeade…"

"She told me everything," Sirius said bluntly. "She also followed you back to the common room to make sure Crouch didn't try something while you were alone in a corridor with him at night. She was always looking after your safety."

"Yeah," Harry said quietly. "He could have tried something… she really was watching over me, after all…"

"She was also there when Crouch finally tried to kill you," Sirius said, getting to his feet, looking agitated. "She was the one who alerted Dumbledore to the fact that you were missing. If she hadn't…"

He trailed off, his expression stricken.

"If she hadn't, I'd be dead," Harry said blankly. "Crouch would have killed me before anyone realized something was wrong."

They lapsed into silence, each of them lost in their own train of thought, until Sirius finally spoke.

"I may not like Snape, but I accept the role he and Hermione play in this war," he said carefully. "I understand that what they do may not always be black and white, and that I'm most likely not aware of even half of what they actually do. I'm not in any position to judge their relationship, but she's always managed to keep him in line," he added, his tone darkly humorous, "and they've already been through a war together. What they have isn't trivial, Harry. The Hermione you see now is a far cry from the Hermione you knew, and if you want to have a good relationship with your godmother, you're going to have to accept that."

"I don't have to get along with Snape to understand that he's—well, an important part of her life," Harry said, meeting both Sirius and Remus's eyes. "You don't like him, and neither do I, but I won't—I won't let that interfere. Hermione's still my best friend, and my godmother."

He smiled.

"And I'm glad to have her back."

~o~O~o~

"You're 'the Boy Who Lived' again," Ron said thickly through a bite of buttered toast a week later, dropping a new edition of the Sunday Prophet on the table for Harry to see. "Not such a show-off maniac anymore, eh?"

"They don't seem to mention anywhere that they were the ones accusing me of being a show-off," Harry remarked, helping himself to a slice of breakfast toast. "Still, it's a nice change for once."

"Ah well, we can't all be perfect like you, Harry," Ron said with a grin.

"Lucius Malfoy's been sent to Azkaban," Arthur remarked, looking up from the previous day's Prophet. "Most of the Death Eaters that were at the manor are already there."

"I'm surprised the Ministry didn't try to cover this up, though," Harry said. "I mean, it was just a couple of Aurors who saw him—who said the Ministry had to believe them?"

"It was nearly a dozen Aurors unaffiliated with the Order," Remus reminded them, as he entered the kitchen. "In addition to the Death Eaters they brought in, that would have been pretty hard evidence to push aside."

"I don't see the difference," Harry said peevishly.

"I do." All heads whipped around, and Remus quickly pulled out a chair as Hermione slowly descended the stairs into the kitchen. Her gait was slow, and she looked weary, but otherwise looked alright as she took the proffered seat and served herself toast with jam. "Thank you, Remus. Yes, Harry, there's still a difference between what happened last year, when you returned with Cedric Diggory's dead body, and when Aurors answer a call to a residence and find a dozen Death Eaters and a Dark Lord clearly attempting to murder five schoolchildren."

"Well, when you put it that way…" Ron said, setting down his toast. "Yeah, that makes sense. How are you feeling?"

"A bit tired. I'm not as young as I used to be," she said, with a wry smile. "Hard duels and knocks to the head with chunks of marble don't heal so quickly."

"Sirius and I already told Harry about most of your background," Remus said suddenly, with the air of someone trying to get through something painful as quickly as possible. "Ron knows, too."

"I appreciate that," Hermione said, before taking a moment to help herself to a bite of toast. She swallowed, and then added, "It saves me the trouble of having to do it myself, and right now, I'm not quite feeling up to it."

"Perfectly understandable," Remus said, looking immensely relieved at her response.

"What I'm curious to know," Hermione said, pouring herself a glass of pumpkin juice, "is how the two of you managed to get past Umbridge to rescue me."

Ron choked on his toast, and Harry suddenly found his fingernails to be very interesting. Arthur slowly lowered his paper to look at them, and Remus eyed them expectantly.

"Well—"

"She caught us trying to Floo out of her office," Harry began, glancing over at Ron, who hesitated.

"Tell me about it," Hermione said, and to both boys' shock, she was grinning. "I have a feeling this is going to be delightful."

"Hermione, your dark side is showing," Arthur remarked casually, looking back at his paper.

"I don't know why that'd bother me, Arthur," Hermione said cheerfully, leaning back in her chair. "Go on, you two. Tell me how you did it."

Harry and Ron exchanged looks.

"You—er—you're not mad at us?" Harry asked hopefully.

"Oh, no," Hermione said, taking a sip of pumpkin juice. "I'm absolutely furious. But that can wait."

Ron's eyes widened at this, and then a grin spread across his face.

"So, she caught us trying to leave," he said, "and Harry tried to get to the Floo powder, but she summoned it before he could, so we were stuck."

"She started interrogating us," Harry continued, picking up where he had left off earlier. "She thought we were trying to contact Dumbledore, or Sirius, or even you. And when we wouldn't tell her, she threatened to torture me."

Hermione paused mid-sip to raise an eyebrow at him. Arthur was staring at Harry and Ron as though he had not quite heard them properly.

"Unforgivable?" she guessed casually.

"Cruciatus," Ron answered bluntly. "She was going to use it on Harry, and that set Neville off. He started shouting at her, about how it was illegal, and—well—unforgivable." He looked at Harry proudly. "Beautiful rant. I'll never underestimate him again."

"That's when Umbridge said that what Fudge didn't know wouldn't hurt him," Harry said flatly. "She was the one who sent the Dementors after me, last summer."

The paper slid out of Arthur's hands and hit the floor. Remus, who had been enjoying this tale, suddenly went very still. Hermione casually took a bite of toast, and waited.

"And then Ginny lost her nut, and Neville lost his patience." Ron made a wild gesture with his toast. "Bat-Boogies everywhere, same time as when I got her with a Slug-Vomiting Curse, and Neville caught her with a Confundus Charm. Harry summoned the Floo powder back from her, and Luna had the bright idea to hit her with an Obliviate. Good thing too, because there was no way I was going to let her remember that Ginny had hexed her. Mum would have killed me if I let her get expelled. Or me, for that matter."

"Boys…" Arthur began.

"So that's how we got past her to get to you," Harry finished, with a strained sort of smile.

"She's in the hospital wing now," Ron remarked. "Woke up from the Obliviate in a room full of giant slugs and angry bat-boogies, couldn't figure out how to end either hex. She fell down a couple flights of stairs trying to get away from them. Apparently," Ron said, with a snigger, "Confundus and Obliviate don't mix very well, together."

Hermione slowly began to clap. "Bravo. You attacked a teacher, probably scrambled her brains—not that she didn't deserve it—and then went charging off to save me."

"Pretty much," Harry said.

There was a pause from Arthur's end of the table as they all turned to look at him.

"I don't think I'll be mentioning this to your mother," he muttered.

"So, the post is empty again," Ron said casually, taking a stab his plate of bacon. "New teacher, new year, eh?"

~o~O~o~

Harry hadn't seen Snape since he had walked in on him in Hermione's room, but since Hermione had awakened, Harry noticed she had been slightly on edge for the next two days. She would chew on her lower lip for no apparent reason, drum her fingers against any surface, and be lost in thought and distracted if anyone tried to talk to her.

Harry didn't fully understand why until, late one night, he was roused from his bed by the sound of someone coming in from the kitchen. The house creaked as he descended the stairs, thinking that maybe Remus and Sirius were cooking a late-night snack, and he might as well join them, seeing how he couldn't sleep either. He still had too much on his mind.

He paused at the foot of the stairs and was about to open the door when he heard Hermione's voice.

"Don't move…"

Slowly, Harry inched open the door and peered through the crack. Hermione was supporting Snape, who barely seemed lucid enough to stand, and was half-dragging him over to the table. Snape slumped into one of the chairs facing away from the door, giving Harry a good view of the shredded back of his robes, before Hermione began tearing them off of him.

"What happened?" her voice was barely above a whisper, but he could hear it. "How angry was he?"

Snape didn't answer for a moment, and Harry thought that perhaps he was unconscious; and then he spoke, his voice ragged and harsh.

"He… was furious that he failed to get the—the Prophecy…"

The robes were finally torn away, and Harry's breath caught as he was treated to the sight of Snape's bruised and bleeding back. Welts had been raised, covering old scars, and where something had apparently cut into him twice, it had sunk in deep enough to cause blood to trickle down. A moment later, a tiny jar of thin, brown liquid was set down on the table, and he watched Hermione dab a wet cloth to the topmost whip-marks before applying the paste with her fingers. The skin began to heal immediately, fresh pink covering the reddened sores, and Harry vaguely recognized the potion being used as Essence of Dittany.

"S-said that I'd failed… that we all—that we all failed him…"

Harry watched Hermione put down the cloth to take his hand in hers, giving it a gentle squeeze, even as she continued to apply the Dittany. They had obviously done this before. "What else?"

So this was what it meant for Hermione to be Snape's handler, Harry realized. She was the one who cleaned him up after Voldemort took out his fury on his followers, who made him talk even when he looked close to collapsing. Who forced a report out of a man who had scarcely returned from being beaten. For a moment, Harry found himself pitying Snape, almost as much as he had when he saw his father hang him upside down by the lake.

"Everyone… who wasn't captured… was punished," Snape bit out quietly. "He said…" he broke off.

"He said what?" Hermione pressed.

A shudder ran down Snape's back as her touch lightly skimmed over one of the welts that ran horizontally across his spine, and then he said raggedly, "He said that if Dumbledore still hadn't believed I was loyal—that if I'd been caught by the Aurors—I'd be of no use for him. That he would have killed me."

Harry felt his back stiffen at this admission, and for a moment, he felt as though someone had struck him with something very heavy. What shocked him even more was the fact that Hermione's face was still imperturbably calm.

"But… because I managed to—to maintain my position, he said… I was still useful." Snape's neck snapped back, and Harry saw him grimace in pain as Hermione took care of a particularly angry-looking cut along his side. "His patience is running thin, Hermione. He… he always took failure badly, but he—he never killed loyal Death Eaters…"

"This is new for him," Harry heard Hermione whisper. "This is significant. Did he kill anyone yet?"

Snape shook his head, and let out a low hiss as Hermione started again on a new welt. "No. Only threats."

"But he doesn't threaten lightly," Hermione said quietly. "Yes, I know. We'll find a way for you to earn you place back, somehow. Most of his followers are in Azkaban right now. He might be willing to kill, if thwarted often enough, but he won't kill one of the few Death Eaters who have—until now—rarely failed him."

"Small comfort," Snape whispered, but there was a certain resigned, sardonicism to his tone.

Harry saw Hermione shake his shoulder slightly, through with healing his back, to nudge him to his feet. "Let's go up to bed," she said softly. "You need rest, and I need to write up the report for Dumbledore."

There was a scraping sound as Snape's chair was pushed back, and Harry quickly wheeled around and darted up the stairs as quietly as possible. He made it up to the second landing when the door to the kitchen opened, and he glanced down in time to see Hermione slip into the hall, followed by Snape. Harry crept back into his own room, and shut the door.

Please review!

~Anubis