A/N I know I said I would only be posting one chapter every Friday, but I couldn't help myself. I'm sure no one will mind ; ) Thanks again for all the great reviews!! Its amazing how motivating a few nice words can be : )
Chapter Three
Severus Snape sat waiting for his Thursday morning Double Potions students to show up. He ran over the events of the last two days, in his mind. For the most part they were just like any other day, except for one thing. Miss Hermione Granger had been acting, shall we say....strange, during the last few mealtimes. It seems to have started Tuesday morning when he spotted her at breakfast. They had developed somewhat of an understanding over the last few years, and he found himself being rather civil with her, after a time. So, when he spotted her in the Great Hall that morning, giving her a courteous smile and nod, she literally bolted from the hall. It was quite perplexing, really.
The next incident happened that same day, at lunch. He sat down and started scooping peas onto his plate when he got the eerie sensation that someone was watching him. As luck would have it, it happened to be the first person he glanced toward among the student tables. It seemed that Miss Granger was ...well... checking him out, for lack of a better phrase. He continued to watch her perusal of him when she finally made contact with his eyes. Realizing what she had been doing she quickly looked away as if nothing had happened. But Severus knew that all was not right in the world. People just didn't 'check him out'. He was Professor Snape, the Greasy Git...or Slimy Git, depending on you preferred insult. He was a Bat, he was evil. To his students he was all those things, and more. Yes, Hermione wasn't just a typical student. In fact, he had grown quite fond of her over the years. She was a formidable verbal sparring partner, in times when they had to wait for a particular potion to brew. She was definitely the most gifted potions student he ever worked with. She had certainly grown out of her 'know-it-all' stage years ago. And she had grown quite beautiful over the years.
Beautiful? When did I notice she was beautiful? Well, it was probably the first time he had to work closely with her in his lab, while preparing potions that would be needed for the inevitable war. She was only 16 at the time..well, closer to 17, realistically. Her year spent using the time turner had put a considerable difference between her chronological age and her biological age, according to the Headmaster. But at that time he did notice that she was becoming quite beautiful. It wasn't a typical kind of beautiful. It was something more subtle. Something that is very rare indeed. Her hands were nearly as precise as his, when it came to preparing potions, and his were only slightly more precise given benefit of experience. With proper training and experience, she could become a Potions Master in her own right. Master? What would one call a female potions expert? There has never really been one that I can recall. He rolled his eyes slightly to himself. The things you think about, Severus. Now, where were you? Oh yes...beautiful.
Yes, she was certainly beautiful, but that wasn't what he found most attractive about her. Attractive? Really, Severus. He scoffed silently for letting himself fall into an unwelcome train of thought yet again. Well, there isn't a man alive that could consider her unattractive, so I'm just being fair. He tried to rationalize his thoughts. But it wasn't her outward beauty that he was so drawn to. It was everything else about her that was so intriguing. Even little things like the way she tucked her hair behind her ear before leaning over a cauldron. Like the way she got a tiny little wrinkle between her eyebrows when she was deep in concentration. He also loved her passion for books, which rivaled his own. Love? Yes, yes...just an expression really. 'Love' is used far to freely. Maybe there was a more appropriate word. Respect. Yes, that was acceptable. He respected her passion for books.
As the months progressed, he had actually found himself looking forward to her company, which was something he couldn't really say about anyone else. When they would be working together in his lab, he noticed that he would sometimes get a little flustered when they were working particularly close together. He mentally dismissed this as just lack of regular human interaction, particularly with the opposite sex. He rarely was in the company of a woman, particularly one as beautiful as Hermione. Hermione? When did I start calling her Hermione? Although...it does have a sort of...sensual ring to it. He frowned to himself. Severus! Stop that line of thinking this instant!!
Toward the end of the war, he had found himself becoming very protective of her, not that he would let anyone else know that. For some reason the thought of losing her to the hands of Death Eaters was...unbearable. Of course, it would be horrible to lose anyone to Voldemort's followers, but losing Hermione would feel like a personal loss. He started coming up with more and more assignments for her, just so he could keep her under his watchful eye. And during the times where he would need to be 'in the field', so to speak, he would give her a particularly long list of things to attend to in his lab, so he would be assured that she was safely tucked away somewhere, and out of danger. He always put extra wards around his lab when he left, even though the Headmaster assured him that she was quite safe. Being muggleborn, she was bound to be a target. Not only was she muggleborn, she was a smarter and more talented witch than any Death Eater he knew and he was quite sure that Voldemort and his cronies found that quite irksome.
So, he was quite relieved when Hermione came through the war completely unscathed. He had to admit, he missed their captivating conversations. He missed watching her brew particularly hard potions. She put herself completely into her work, not unlike himself and he found it rather enchanting.
The Potions Master was drawn out of is reverie by the sound of students filtering into his classroom; Double Potions with his 7th year Slytherins and Gryffindors. Over the years Hermione had come to be quite versed in potions and he could rely on her to be prepared for class when no one else was. In the beginning he would deliberately not ask her to answer any of his questions, even though he knew she was the most likely student to have the proper grasp of the subject. But after years of, frankly, being disgusted at his other pupils' lack of initiative in researching upcoming topics, he finally relented at some point and allowed her to answer his questions from time to time. No doubt she had picked up on his allusion that they would be discussing Scoprire Occultare today.
"Scoprire Occultare. Can anyone enlighten the class as to the particular nuances of this substance?" He scanned the room thinking that maybe just once someone would surprise him and actually come to class prepared. No one budged. He sighed, and pinched the area between his eyebrows, trying to will away the headache that was sure to plague him for the rest of the day. He waved his hand in Hermione's general direction and muttered, "Go ahead".
Hermione stood up, purposefully avoiding the Professor's eyes. "Scorprire Occultare is a crystalline substance comprised of several rare ingredients and is particularly difficult to make. Slivered, frozen Ashwinder eggs, added at the precise time and potion temperature, turns the mixture instantly to powdered form." She dared a look up to her Professor to see if he wanted her to continue. He gave her a slight nod with an uncharacteristically gentle look on his face. Fortunately, the class was focused on Hermione and didn't notice his slip. She continued, "Generally, the powder is added to ink while an incantation is spoken, in order to send classified correspondence. If someone were to receive such correspondence, they would be able to read the original intent of the note. However, if an unintended viewer were to try to read it, it would merely look like a shopping list or a bread recipe." There was much more that could be said of Scoprire Occultare but she figured that was sufficient.
"Very good, Miss Granger. You may be seated." He nodded his head toward her as she sat down. He was aware that she was avoiding looking into his eyes, but considering her behavior at mealtimes over the last couple days, he wasn't surprised. Not that people much liked making eye contact with him anyway. Most people avoided it at all costs. Miss Granger was different though. Up until the last couple of days, she had no qualms with looking at him directly. In a way it was a good thing that she was avoiding eye contact, because he found his gaze wandering to her quite often today, and if she were to catch -him- staring...
"Scoprire Occultare can be used in its crystalline form, as well. It can be sprinkled over small objects to make them appear to be something completely different to a Muggle onlooker. For instance, should someone want to be able to travel among Muggles while holding their wand, their wand would appear to be nothing more than a pen or pencil. For those of you unfamiliar with Muggle objects, a pen is a Muggle writing instrument." He scanned his class and from the looks on their faces, most of them indeed knew what a pen was. The more puzzled expressions came from his Slytherin students, not surprisingly. He continued, "It can also be sprinkled over a blank parchment and is very handy in this capacity. With the proper incantation, the parchment would then show the viewer what they -need- to see. Consider you are walking through a wizarding town that is unfamiliar to you. You may be in need of finding an inn. You would pull out the parchment, and upon viewing it a map of the town with directions to the inn would immediately be visible. However, this isn't always reliable because what you think you need and what you truly need at any given time may be two completely different things."
He informed his class that they would, in fact, be brewing this complicated mixture and he would be putting them in pairs of his own selection for the project. He began running through is prepared list of lab partners, beginning with, "Zambini and Weasley, Malfoy and Potter, Crabb and Thomas, Goyle and Finnigan, Granger and Longbottom..." He continued on until finally, "Parkinson and Bulstrode." He had tried to keep to strictly Slytherin/Gryffindor matches, but considering the rarity of most of the ingredients, he didn't want to risk a ruined potion due to Mr. Longbottom's knack for melting his cauldron. The students quickly arranged themselves into their assigned pairs and started gathering the ingredients for the potion. Hermione opened her bag to get out more parchment for taking notes, but when she pulled out the roll of paper, a pure white scroll tied with a delicate black silk ribbon spilled out and rolled along the tabletop, bound for the floor. Hermione's eyes widened. She was sure she had left that under her pillow this morning, and she certainly didn't put it in her bag. Before she could reflect more on the matter, she watched it roll quickly along the tabletop, right into the hands of.... Professor Snape.
Severus was walking along the desks, eyeing each of the students' ingredient preparations, when he saw Miss Granger lose control of a rolled parchment. He quickly grabbed it before it fell to the floor and handed it back to her. "You'd do well to take better care of your things, Miss Granger", and with that he continued on to the rest of the tables. Hermione thought her heart might leap out of her chest when she saw Snape grab her parchment. If he knew it was the same note that he sent to her, he made no indication, and she quickly recovered herself enough to continue on with her assignment.
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Dinner had been particularly difficult for Severus Snape that evening. He kept finding himself watching Hermione intently, and more often than not, she would catch him staring before he had sense enough to pay attention to his meal. When he was actually able to focus on the plate before him, he would merely stab the food lying there. Severus was not one to be unable to keep his emotions in check. In fact, he was an expert at keeping them in check, considering his previous line of work. Being a spy among Death Eaters, one must have total control over themselves lest they give themselves away. But he was out of his element, and he found himself longing to be in the company of Miss Granger once again, for one of their entrancing conversations.
He stalked through the hallways of the dungeons and approached his chambers. He whispered, "Nobody ever goes in, and nobody ever comes out", and the door swung open. He briefly wondered what Lucius Malfoy would think if he found out that Severus' password was a line from a Muggle movie, but then he grinned. He probably doesn't think about much, being surrounded by Dementors in Azkaban.
His office was pretty much what people would expect from their Potions Master. He didn't particularly like visitors, and put great effort into making it as unwelcoming as possible. Should anyone venture farther into his quarters they would probably be quite surprised. The study, which was the first room beyond his office, was rather warm and comforting. It had a large fireplace, which the house elves had taken care to light before he returned from dinner, two comfortable but stately armchairs, and nearly every wall was lined with shelves of books from floor to ceiling. In addition there was a black walnut desk with a burgundy leather reading chair, where he spent most of his time in the evenings.
He walked over to one of the lower shelves that opened up to several bottles of various Muggle whiskeys. He poured himself a small glass of Macallan 10 Year Old Malt, and took a sip of the amber liquid. Wizards certainly have nothing over Muggles when it comes to -this-. He made his way over to his desk, and sat down. The first thing he noticed was a crisp white parchment tied with a thin black silk ribbon. Strange. I'm sure this isn't something I left here. He vaguely remembered seeing Miss Granger with such a scroll in Potions class today, but he was unsure of how it could have ended up in his study. He decided to read it before coming to any further conclusions and untied the little ribbon, flattening the parchment out before him on his desk.
Dearest Severus,
