Beth Ann - Evil cliffhanger? Me? (looks innocent)

clarity, Mara456 - Thanks for liking the last chapter!

Firesblood - I guess you want more, huh? Well, I try and update each week.

Saavik - No, you didn't scare me with your last review g

Tegan - As always I appreciate your nice, detailed review for each chapter. Hope you like this one.

Snapefan51, Zoe - Sev still has a long way to go at the moment..

Part 9

Hermione couldn't believe what she had heard. It had been bad enough to know that Clara had betrayed Professor Snape, but to discover it had all been part of a revenge planned by Voldemort was shocking. She grimly thought it was just as well that Voldemort was dead.

Thinking back, Hermione remembered that Professor Snape had grimly insisted on hunting down many of the Deatheaters himself in the aftermath of the Dark Wizard War, and she shuddered. Heartbroken and furious, he would have obviously not rested until he had caught up with Clara...no wonder that he hadn't allowed himself to love anyone since then. There would still be desire for women, but that would be all. Sirius had tried to warn her but she hadn't listened, finding out the truth the hard way.

But had she ruined him too - were his thoughts of her now edged with malevolence and wounded pride? It would be futile though to go back to him and try to explain, Hermione knew, a sinking feeling inside her.

"I feel sorry for him," she said softly. There was still a part of her that cared for him.

Sirius sighed. "You've got a kind heart, Hermione. Perhaps too kind, and you thought you could do something for that greasy-haired git. But his misery didn't stop him from chewing you up and then spitting you out, did it?"

After a silent moment, Hermione nodded bleakly.

Sirius wondered what he could do to cheer her up, and then his face brightened. He rummaged through one of his voluminous pockets. "Have you seen the latest photos of my babies?"

Days passed. Hermione received welcome word from her parents that they had recovered from their illness, which cheered her to some extent. Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall returned from their excursion with Dumbledore taking back the reins of Headmaster from Professor Snape, unaware of the drama that had happened in his absence.

Hermione doubted that Professor Snape would tell him anything, for on the few occasions these days that he ventured outside of his dungeons he presented a hard, icy face to the world. On the rare occasions that he looked Hermione's way at dinner, his dark eyes passed over her as though she wasn't there, which hurt her, though she took care not to show it.

For his part, Professor Snape's mood was one of bitterness, his heart like a wasteland. He should have known that there was another reason as to why Hermione had given him the cake, he coldly told himself as he immersed himself in magical research in his dungeons. How dare she feel sorry for him? He told himself that she would have been too sentimental to be his mistress anyway, though at times late at night he had the vague feeling he had lost something of a greater value than he had thought.

Sirius kept an unobtrusive eye on Hermione, grimly noting the times when her face looked dejected.

The worst of the winter passed by, and there were signs of thawing at last. Booming sounds were heard periodically from the lake as its sheets of ice started to melt and shatter. The Christmas decorations were taken down and carefully packed away until next year. There was more warmth in the sun now, with daffodils raising their yellow heads warily out of the ground.

With the official arrival of spring, the rest of the students returned to Hogwarts for the new term in cheerful, yelling crowds as they milled through the corridors in clean (for now) uniforms. Friends were reunited and Christmas presents were displayed and boasted about.

When Hermione greeted Harry and Ron in the in the entrance hall she found she had missed them a great deal. Harry, tall and handsome, enfolded her in an affectionate hug, then it was Ron's turn.

"Hermione! You look, uh, wow..."

The eyes of the stout, red-haired Weasley goggled appreciatively at her as though he was seeing her for the first time, and his hug had a clumsy eagerness to it. "I missed you, Hermione," he said earnestly as he gazed into her eyes.

He had a crush on her, Hermione thought in sudden insight, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. In her early years at Hogwarts there were times she would have longed for Ron to notice her this way. But she did not object when Ron hesitantly looped his arm with hers as they went to the Gryffindor Tower, an amused Harry following.

In the shadows, Sirius watched the departing Gryffindors approvingly. Good for you, Hermione, he thought. Be with Ron. Laugh with him, get that smile back on your face for you'll be safe with him.

Hermione spent the rest of the day catching up with her friends. After having the common room to herself for so long she felt unnerved at first seeing it full of laughing, jostling Gryffindors, but then she found herself welcoming the change. It meant she wasn't alone with her thoughts anymore.

Harry smiled at her from the comfort of a soft chair. "I'm glad to hear your parents are better," he said quietly. "So, what did you do here by yourself - anything interesting?"

Images flashed through Hermione's head - the three-way snowfight, soft kisses from Professor Snape as they lay entwined on the snow. His harsh words when he had turned on her. The innocent, broken dreams she had had of something special between them.

"Nothing worth talking about," she said quietly in reply.

The school slowly eased into its new term, timetables were assigned and grumbled over, with heavy textbooks for the classes eyed warily.

On Ron's part, the vague sense of something not quite right with Hermione he attributed to the worry she had gone through worrying about her parents. Some of those Muggle diseases were lethal, he knew and he cheerfully resolved to make her smile. By some strange alchemy the status of Hermione had changed in his mind from that of trusted friend to that of a new, mysterious and intriguing Other.

He told her stories of mummy-dodging from his holidays in Egypt, jokes and the latest antics of his brothers with their joke shop. Hermione noted all of his efforts with detachment, laughing when it seemed appropriate, a sober star orbited by a cheerful comet.

After a while her laughter started to become genuine.



A/N: Will Hermione decide that she's better off with 'safe' Ron? Will Sev notice, or even care? Tune in next week on the same Sev time, same Sev channel!