Spoilers: Order of the Phoenix
Alright, I think it's canon with Order of the Phoenix. As for spoilers, I think there will be only one, and nothing that big. So it should be safe for pretty much everybody to read.
Thank you for your reviews!
Delphi: I hope you will find a bit more details in this chapter... :)
Severus made his way to the paddock where the unicorn foals were kept. He scowled at the thought that most of his students would wonder at seeing him outside during the day. The old tale of him being a vampire – probably due to his habit of lurking in the dark – wouldn't survive if they were to see him under the sun. Odd they had never realised that he had refereed a Quidditch game during the day and had not dropped dead in the middle of it.
Hermione was in the middle in the paddock, one foal gazing adoringly at her, the other one with its head on her lap. Her fingers were tangled in its mane while she was talking to them softly – in the same way she was talking to that horrible cat of hers? He leaned on the fence.
"Hagrid told me you're the only seventh year who can take care of the unicorns," he said casually, lying with the ease brought by the years of practice.
"He had to tell you that, didn't he?" she replied tartly, not looking up.
"It's dangerous if it's known and if Hagrid knows it, everybody knows it. The Dark Lord would love to get his hands on a young witch like you."
She stood up after a last caress to the unicorns and closed the fence behind her.
"Like me? A Mudblood?"
Her laugh was bitter. He seized her by the shoulders and enounced it clearly:
"A young, bright, virgin witch."
"And what do you propose? To remedy to my condition?" she retorted scornfully.
He released her and looked at her coldly.
"If that's what you want, yes. But I would think you have more… suitable candidates for the task."
Fury flared in her eyes.
"There is no candidate, suitable or not, and anyway, this is not your problem!"
"I would have thought Krum was–"
"Ah, Professor Krum! The very reason why I have the best grades in Defence Against the Dark Arts!" she said, her voice full of spite. "Isn't it what everybody thinks? Professor Krum is a friend and shall remain as such, like Harry and Ron. Understood?"
"Ten points from Gryffindor for talking with disrespect to a teacher, Miss Granger."
"Fine! May I ask Professor McGonagall to take points from Slytherin because you pried into my private life?"
"No, Miss Granger. As a teacher, I'm entitled to pry into anybody's life," he said with a smirk.
She looked at him wordlessly for a moment.
"Would you be kind enough to leave me alone?" she asked, her voice toneless.
Whatever he was expecting, it was certainly not that.
"I'm afraid I still have questions to ask you."
She sighed.
"Get over with them then."
"And you will address me as 'Professor Snape' or 'sir'," he added stiffly.
"Yes, sir," she replied docilely.
"Do you know to play flute?"
"No, sir."
"Do you know how to lure a unicorn to you?"
"Yes, sir. You have to–"
"Can you do so?"
"I told you I didn't know to play flute. Sir."
Her tone was hostile and he had a small smile. She was still angry with him because of his remark about Viktor.
"Then I suggest that we go to see Professor Vector."
Puzzled, Hermione followed him, wondering what could be the link between Professor Vector and unicorns – or flutes.
"Callie? Are you here?" he called, knocking at Professor Vector's door.
Now Hermione was sure her pumpkin juice at lunch had been spiked. She just couldn't have heard Professor Snape call Professor Vector 'Callie'.
Callisto Vector opened the door and smiled.
"Severus," she greeted him. "And… Miss Granger?"
"Miss Granger needs lessons in flute," Severus said, pushing her forward.
Callisto raised her eyebrows.
"Those lessons? For a seventh year?"
Hermione crossed her arms on her chest.
"Why does everybody seem to have a problem with this?" she asked tartly.
"I don't have a problem with this, Miss Granger. It's just that you're probably the only one."
"And what if I am?"
"Can you teach her, Cal?"
"How do the unicorns behave with her?"
"Oh, they adore her. As soon as she arrives, they are all over her, fighting for being the one she pets. They're in ecstasy if they can have their head in her lap. Hagrid doesn't have half her success with them."
Callisto smiled at the disgust in Severus's voice.
"Yes, I can teach her. When do you need her to be ready?"
"Next week. Miss Granger, you'll practice intensively. For this purpose alone, you have been granted one extra week to turn in your homework, but you are not to go to Hogsmeade this weekend."
"As if I was going to Hogsmeade anyway," she muttered darkly.
Severus stared at her and suddenly, he wondered why he had found her with the unicorns, without her friends. Usually, if her friends weren't around, she was in the library, not with the unicorns.
"Miss Granger, no matter what I said about prying into your life earlier, it does not apply to you telling me your petty problems."
She had a mirthless laugh.
"Not that I would have dreamed to tell you, sir."
Callisto grinned impishly and ushered Severus to the door.
"Severus, no need to upset her. She won't be able to concentrate if you do."
"Don't worry for me, Professor Vector, after all, I've already spent six years making potions in his class. I'm used to the pressure," Hermione's cold voice said from behind the Arithmancy teacher.
Severus scowled and Callisto swallowed her laugh.
"We have to work, Severus," she said gently before closing the door.
But not fast enough that the irritated Potions Master didn't hear her laugh.
Strangely enough, though Hermione was even more conspicuous by her absence, nobody seemed to really care. Harry and Ron continued their discussions about Quidditch as if they hadn't even noticed their best friend wasn't with them. Even the staff apparently didn't care. Considering that Callisto was rarely seen also, Severus guessed that she had told everybody she was given lessons to Hermione.
Two days after – the Saturday of the Hogsmeade weekend – as he was passing near Callisto's quarters – as he was now managing to do every two hours – he was surprised not to hear the sound of flute. He resisted the urge to knock at the door and enquire about Hermione – even if Albus had asked him to watch over her, he didn't need to have everybody know about it. The girl probably needed a break. One could play flute without stopping only for a time.
Pleased with his explanation, he continued his stroll and glanced through the window at the end of the corridor out of habitude. He froze when he saw a silhouette sitting among the unicorns. He swore and headed for the paddock.
As he came near, he could hear the sounds of the flute. So she was practising, after all.
"Miss Granger, I would appreciate if you were not to leave Hogwarts without warning me."
She looked up at him, surprised, the last notes dying in the air.
"I'm still on the school grounds, sir," she replied, faintly puzzled.
"Do not pass any outside door on any pretext without telling me," he growled.
"Am I a prisoner, then, Professor Snape?"
"You're not as long as I am with you."
"Am I to sit at Quidditch games with you also?"
"As long as you refrain to cheer for Gryffindor, I don't see why you couldn't."
"Maybe you want to use manacles too? Or a collar and a leash?"
"Not really, but a gag sounds quite appealing right now."
"If you do, I won't be able to play flute anymore."
He smirked, pleased by her answer, and leaned against the fence.
"I'm listening," he said simply.
Taking her cue, she resumed her melody. Vaguely, he recognised it as something that Callisto had called the song to the foals. Indeed the two young unicorns seemed attracted to her, but it wasn't different from what happened usually.
There were only three days left in the week he had given her to learn flute and he was quite worried. If she knew only to play the song to the foals, it wouldn't help her. During dinner, he sat next to Callisto, who seemed in a hurry, and asked her his question. She seemed surprised.
"Oh no, she knows the other melodies too, but she's rather insecure about them. She prefers to practice on the song of the foals, she says it soothes her."
"I don't care about soothing music or whatever rubbish she says. She has to learn the song to the unicorn."
Callisto sighed, spearing a piece of pie.
"Give her time. She knows the melody, she truly does, she can play it but she stumbles still a bit on some notes. Given the proper motivation, she will play it perfectly."
"I can't let it to chance, Callie. It's important."
Callisto smiled and rose from her seat.
"I have no doubt it's important, Severus. But it won't make me change my way of teaching her. You asked me to teach her, so now, you have to cope with my teaching habits."
She grinned and left the Great Hall. Severus found he had lost his appetite.
He charmed a wall in his dungeons to be a window giving on the unicorns' paddock. He often saw Hagrid, to his displeasure, and always enjoyed when the foals ran away from him, only to frolic joyfully around Hermione as soon as she opened the gate. The three evenings left of her training, she spent them with the foals, playing their song, and Severus spelled his window to bring him the sounds as well, so he could work while listening to the music.
The third evening, after the sixth rendition of the piece, he stood up, leaving his papers to grade behind him, and went straight to the paddock. She was seating on a rock – which she probably had transfigured from something else, since Hagrid was careful not to let rocks in the foals' paddock – her head against the fence, her eyes closed and she was playing as if it could save her life. Well, maybe it can, thought Severus as he watched her. The foals were at her feet, their nostrils gently pressed against her knees, looking at her with awe in their liquid eyes.
She let the last note die and lowered her flute. Absently, she caressed each foal in turn, merely brushing her fingers against their soft nose. Then she looked down at them and her lips twisted oddly.
"I know another song that I like very much. Professor Vector calls it the song of birth. I guess I'm not supposed to play it when there's no newborn unicorn," she added sheepishly, "but after all, I wasn't there at your birth. So allow me now…"
Once again, the flute was at her lips and very soft notes rose in the air. It was like a lullaby before exploding gently into a song of praise and wonder. The foals' ears pricked forward, intent on each note, and their attention encouraged Hermione to a new rendition, even more heartfelt.
Severus felt as if he had truly seen a unicorn brought to the world in front of him. There was nothing that could be compared to this marvel he had just witnessed. Then he shook his head; it was only due to the magic contained in the music. He knew about it. Callisto had explained it to him the first time he had wondered about the power of the flute over the unicorns. He still remembered her gentle laugh and the sentence that had opened his eyes on this form of magic.
"The same you can brew magic with your potions, the same I can play magic with mere notes."
She had showed him how the enchainment of specific notes could affect the whole spell, how changing a quaver into a crotchet could make the spell go awry. In some ways, it was as precise as potions and he felt a grudging admiration for Callisto. He had never really understood why she had abandoned it all to become an Arithmancy teacher. Maybe it had something to do with her late husband, Julius Vector, who had been literally possessed with the power in Arithmancy. One of his calculations had gone wrong and he had never come back to his wife. Since then, she hadn't touched a flute on her own will, though Severus was sure she missed it.
He shook himself out of his daydream. Hermione was playing another song and he had no idea which one it was – except that he knew it wasn't the one he wanted her to know, the song to the unicorn. He had heard it only once but had been unable to forget the longing and haunting that had come with it.
At the end of her melody, she put her flute away and looked toward Hogwarts.
"Do you think he knows I'm here? Maybe he will come for me, telling me it's time for me to go back to Gryffindor Tower. I wish he would forget about me, just this once, so I could stay with you. You would keep me warm, wouldn't you?"
One of the foals nudged her with his nose and she emitted a strange noise, halfway between laugh and sob.
"Thank you for accepting me," she said fiercely, circling his neck with her arms and burying her face in the soft welcoming mane.
Severus was ready to move when she let go the foal.
"One last song, if you have the time. But for this one… I need to cast a spell, for we are too close to the Forbidden Forest."
She took her wand and, just in case, Severus readied his. To his surprise, it was only a Silencing Charm cast on the paddock. Deftly, he extended it to his hidden place so he was part of the silence bubble. Hermione looked oddly toward where he was but didn't move to check what had modified her spell. He shook his head grimly. The girl was too trusting, even for a Gryffindor. Her behaviour was worthy of a Hufflepuff.
Her last melody was the one he had been waiting for. Her rendition was not as bad as he feared, but it didn't give him the same feeling as he had had when he had heard it played by Callisto. He could hear her insecurity in each note. She bravely finished it, though she was shaking her head in despair.
"Pitiful," she muttered. "This is pitiful. A unicorn is more likely to kill me than to be mesmerised by this!"
Severus chuckled and waited for her to banish her Silencing Spell before coming to tell her it was time for her to go back to Gryffindor Tower. She didn't protest but he could see the look of longing in her eyes as she said goodbye to the foals.
Discreetly, during breakfast the following morning, he made Callisto understand that he wouldn't mind if she continued Hermione's education until the weekend. Callisto smiled knowingly and made as if it had been planned this way since the beginning. At the look Hermione gave him when Callisto told her, he knew she wondered about his decision. He scowled at her across the Great Hall and left.
He used only his window for the two following days, tweaking the sound charm on it so it would be included in the Silencing Spell were she to cast it again. He heard a rendition of the song to the unicorn each evening and winced at the worst moments – one of them being the insults she hurled at herself for being such a lousy player.
Then came the Sunday, the real last day of Hermione's education.
"Severus!" called Callisto's voice from the fireplace.
A still sleepy Severus showed up, his hair sleep-tousled; he had gone to bed late the previous night, thanks to his spying activities, and would have appreciated if nobody had disturbed him that morning. He scowled when seeing Callisto and Hermione's face in the fireplace but then he saw the small smile playing on the girl's lips. Had it been a smile full of mirth, he would have taken points. As it was, it had some tenderness in it and he straightened up self-consciously, suddenly aware how much younger and relaxed he looked just after waking up. A distant part of his mind noticed it had been her first smile in a long time.
He schooled his features back into his usual mask and scowled at the fireplace. Callisto grinned.
"Good morning, Severus. Sorry to wake you up. I just wanted to tell you that Miss Granger's apprenticeship with me is officially over."
"And it couldn't wait until breakfast or lunch to tell me," he snarled.
Callisto chuckled.
"But it's so much more amusing to see you first thing in the morning…"
He growled and Callisto grinned even more. Hermione looked as if she was itching to set his hair in place and he decided it was time for him to go back into his bedroom before she decided to step into the fireplace and run her fingers in his hair. Even if he looked almost nice in the mornings, there were still some things he didn't stand, Hermione Granger's concern for him being one of them.