Chapter Forty-Eight: Clouds Gather

From the tacky yellow legal pad of Bellatrix Lestrange:

            My Master will reward me above all.
            Gods, I hate this music.
            That werewolf is (expletives deleted.)
            My Master will reward my tenacity.
            I think I'm going to go deaf. That'll show her.
            Remember to find out what a motorcycle is. Did Sirius have one?
            Find out what a yellow submarine is.
            My Master would…probably like this song.
            Find out where the Hotel California is, and why they stab it with their steely knives, and what 'it' is. Sounds like fun.
            Bebe Lestrange? Muggles wrote a song about me? …Find out who 'Heart' is.
            My Master would not be pleased by my reaction to this.
            This one reminds me of Andromeda, marrying someone her family despised. The guitars are cool.
            Did I just use the word 'cool'? Shit.
            What's a jukebox and what are dimes? This kind of music must be rock n' roll.
            This song is about masochism! Hit me, baby, one more time? Good lord. The Muggles are more interesting than I thought.
            If that goddamn song about someone letting the dogs out plays again, I will kill myself, and the same for Mambo #5. Evil Yank.
            'Dude Looks Like a Lady' is about a cross-dresser! …I miss my husband.
            'Riders on the storm/riders on the storm/into this world we're born/into this world we're thrown/riders on the storm.' I like that one.

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Cass paced nervously about the staffroom, as did Severus. Professor McGonagall knitted like a woman possessed, and Sprout thumbed away at a Game Boy as if life, the universe and everything depended on this game of Tetris. Occasionally the beeping would annoy one of the Slytherin professors and Severus would threaten to flay Cass for introducing the toy to her. Cass would then threaten to personally eat Rosie's supply of houndsnip next full moon unless she turned the volume down. It usually took Professor McGonagall's threats of Nifflers in the classrooms to shut the pair of them up.

Professors were always ticky while their students took the N.E.W.T.s.

"Suppose Goyle's going to flunk?" Cass wondered.

"Yours or mine?" Severus finally sat down, wearied with pacing.

"Either."

"Well, he'll definitely flunk yours. Mine he's been studying for."

"Le'me guess –his dad leaned on him about his grades?"

"Exactly. How do you suppose Longbottom's doing?"

"Probably acing mine and Rosie's before graying his hair on yours."

"He'll ace yours?"

"Sevvy, didn't you see his thesis on the Civil War? Longstreet couldn't have written it better."

"I only saw his Antipedius Potion."

"Ah, that. I've been using it for rubber cement."

"It's supposed to be a cure for athlete's foot."

"I needed the sticky more."

"That's because you wear …those." Severus gestured to Cass's sandals, which looked as though she'd borrowed them from a Roman hoplite and not her brother-in-law. "Doesn't it bother you that any man with a foot fetish could get off on your mere presence?"

"So you can see my ankles. Call a priest." Cass glanced down at Severus' own footwear and had to stifle a squeak. "What the sod are those?"

"Boots."

"And what are the metal things?"

"Spurs."

"Er…why?"

"For riding."

"Only spurs I've seen went like this," Cass gestured at her own foot.

"You're a Yank. These are English spurs."

"Which still begs the question, why?"

"I intend to go riding this afternoon."

"On…?"

"A horse, you silly American. What do you expect, a thestral?"

"A winged horse?"

"No, just an ordinary horse. Four legs."

"What color?"

"Brown, with a white blaze down his nose and tan footlocks."

"Not …black?" Cass raised an eyebrow.

"Blackie can't carry two."

"Blackie?" The American tried in vain to stifle giggles. "You've got a horse called Blackie?"

"What's so odd? He is."

"I'd expect you to call him, like, Darkness or Ebony…or at least Midnight."

"My cat was called Midnight. And I was only ten when I named him."

"So, what's the brown one with the white nose called?"

"Lord Matthew Morganstern."

"Erm…"

"Morgan for short."

"…Okay…what sort of horse is he?"

"Half Clydesdale."

"A mixed-breed horse?"

"Sort of accidental, yes. He's an excellent mount, though. Strong enough to carry three and gentle as a puffskein."

"I didn't know you were the equestrian sort."

"Most people don't. Do you ride?"

"Apart from a carousel, no." Cass grinned. "Can you ride a bike?"

"A what?"

"Didn't think so."

There was a silence, broken only by Professor Sprout's gloating about the third level or something. Finally, Severus asked the question he'd been wondering about.

"Does…you-know-whom ride?"

"No idea. Maybe you could …teach them, though, hint hint?"

"I worry that the teaching in the relationship is unbalanced."

"Well, you can't ride a bike and she can. Borrow the tandem in the Shack's garage and don't forget the helmets. There you go."

"Who's the girl, Severus?" Flitwick inquired. "Teaching her to…ride?"

"Filius, you smutty fellow!" Cass exclaimed, arching her eyebrow as well. "She'll have to teach him, too." The shorter wizard went scarlet.

"That isn't what I meant!"

"Mental pictures, eh?" The American yawned. "Teach you to ask questions."

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Draco thought hard before answering the third question on the test, 'Why do American Muggles eat chips with ketchup on them?' Just as he was writing down 'Because they put ketchup on everything,' he stopped. He crossed it out. It was a trick question. Americans didn't put ketchup on chips, because to them 'chips' meant 'crisps'! Noone could be that disgusting! He wrote down 'Trick question. Americans eat chips with French onion dip on them,' before drawing a little smiley face with it's tongue sticking out, as if to say 'Caught that!'

Drat it all, why was every third question about food? Had Professor Cass been starving when she set the exam? Draco had been too nervous about Potions, which he had first, to eat breakfast, and it was catching up with him. 'What are the chief uses of the Internet, to Muggles?' Draco put down 'checking email, finding directions, answering silly questions that come up in bars, and looking for smut.' The next question dealt with the most acceptable condiments for buffalo wings. Draco knew one was bleu cheese dressing, but the other…Wait! Buffaloes lived on ranches now! Ranch dressing!

Whoever said Muggles weren't sophisticated, confusing people was full of shit.

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Hermione felt light as a feather, but without any of the nasty avian mites that had quarantined the owlery for most of last month until Hagrid could give them all powder. Drat Crabbe and Goyle sending off for full-color bondage porn from Knockturn Alley with school owls. Some people were so inconsiderate. At least N.E.W.T.s were over and she was free to duck out and see Hagrid about Crookshanks' birthday present –an extra-tall scratching post with little magically flying fake moths that circled the top realistically. He was certain to love it.

Actually, Crookshanks had been something of a naughty cat last night. The memory was enough to send her into a convulsive fit of giggling.

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Crookshanks had watched his human and her professor as they calmly worked on six cauldrons of Wolfsbane potion at once –an easy feat only for them. Within moments of completion, Lupin and the five Tylers stepped out of the fireplace and smapled the contents. After a few conversational moments, during which nearly all of the werewolves petted him and remarked on what a pretty cat he was, Crookshanks watched them all depart.

His human put away the ingredients while the professor human cleaned and put away the cauldrons and equipment. That was usual. His human took off her robes, revealing a particularly silky shirt and a tasteful skirt. Also usual, except that tonight there were no cat hairs on either blouse or skirt. Crookshanks hadn't had a chance to sleep in her drawer this week. The professor human's eyebrows raised in surprise as Crookshanks' pet human literally swept him off his feet.

That was unusual.

The humans kissed and pawed at each other for some minutes, the professor having neatly landed in his leather desk chair and the student having neatly straddled him. Crookshanks watched with some amusement as the humans struggled with buttons and clasps. Couldn't the silly things learn to grow fur? They seemed to have entirely forgotten he was there, but as the professor human kicked open the door to his chambers, Crookshanks managed to follow them to wherever they were going. This was bound to be more fascinating than Norrie's whining about her pet human's Kwikspell course not going well. The door had scarcely closed behind the lovers and their unnoticed observer before all sense of propriety went straight out the fireplace. Crookshanks watched, amused.

Heavens, his human looked cold that way. Good thing the professor human –oh, yes, that looked much more comfortable.

Why did humans insist on sleeping under the blankety parts of beds? Surely it was more comfortable to curl up on top and –oh, nevermind. These two weren't going to sleep.

Good heavens. Humans were learning to grow fur. Doing a rather pathetic job of it, by the looks of things, but they were trying…

'No,' Crookshanks tried to tell them. 'You've got it entirely backwards…you're not even licking first…' He decided to demonstrate the proper method to the poor humans.

"Meow!"

"Gaaah!"

"Crookshanks!"

"How the fuck did he get in here?"

"You naughty creature, get off the bed!"

"Mrrroww!"

There was a long silence.

"I don't suppose he's going to tell anyone, m'love."

"He'd better not." Hermione frowned at her familiar. "One 'mew' and its generic kibble for you, mister."

Another silence.

"Is he growling?"

"Severus, haven't you ever heard a cat purr before?"

"But so loudly…you voyeuristic little fuzzball, get your paws off of her!" Crookshanks looked up from where he had been nuzzling his keeper's cheek and let out a querying meow. "Randy beast."

"Darling, ignore the cat." Hermione resumed what Crookshanks thought was a hopelessly backward approach to the business at hand. She was clearly hopeless, but perhaps he could demonstrate proper technique to the male…

"Get off me, cat!"

Crookshanks remembered too late the aversion some humans had to being climbed on. As his claws unsheathed into the professor human's shoulders, the pair spun wildly around the room. "Get off!"

Hermione, for all her usual sobriety, was nearly convulsed by the sight of Severus running around the dungeon room with a mewwing, yowling orange cat on his back. The fact that the cat, with his Chudley Cannons collar from Ron, was wearing more than her lover did not help matters. Finally she, too, leapt from the bed, captured her pet, and released him out the door.

"Darling, are you alright?"

"Yes." Severus felt his shoulders and frowned at the blood on his fingertips. Hermione retrieved her wand and mended the wounds, but not before Severus caught sight of her.

"What are you wearing?"

"A bedsheet, why?"

"It looks nice on you." The Slytherin had a decidedly mischievous grin. "How do you look on it?"

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Hermione managed to stop giggling as her Yankish professor and Ginny rounded the corner, but just barely. Crookshanks was such a mischievous cat sometimes.

"Keep that orange ball of fluff in your room next time, please, 'Mione?" Cass pulled the collar of her t-shirt askew, revealing scratches to rival Severus' from the inquisitive and ever-helpful tabby's claws. "He seemed to think John and I were…well, he offered advice, if you take my meaning." The youngest Weasley was more blunt:

"I catch him trying to teach Harry an' I again and I'll neuter him."

"I honestly don't know what got into him," Hermione apologized. "You know how cats are…"

"I know how cats are," Professor McGonagall observed, appearing with a stern look on her face. "Exactly what is the matter here?"

The two students hemmed and hawed for a second before Cass, with American lying ability, came to the rescue.

"Remember Crookshanks, Hermione's cat? He got into my rooms last night and was all purry and pawwy –at a completely inopportune time, you see. Hermione'd been …trying to fix our Wolfsbane potions with Sevvy, and he kept interfering there, and then after John and I locked him out, he went after Harry and Ginny."

"We were studying," Ginny explained artlessly.

"Cats can be so dratted curious," Cass remarked. "We were just telling 'Mione off for letting the furball out."

"Well," the stern deputy Headmistress intoned, "that cat also got into my rooms last night."

Cass had what was either a very small seizure or a very dire attack of the mental pictures at that moment.

"The poor thing only wanted some tuna fish," Minerva explained. "In the future, I have instructed the house-elves to keep a dish of it outside your door, Hermione. That should forestall any further …interferences." The professor then gave them such a knowing look as she left that the poor American nearly died of the squickies.

"Remind me to get some drops for my mind's eye," she gasped.

"My diary's going to have a nice chapter," Ginny remarked sarcastically. "Ecch."

"Maybe I should keep him in my room after all."

"Please!"

"It's one thing to have the foremost sexual experts of the decade for professors, 'Mione, but not if a cat still thinks he knows better." Ginny frowned.

"He's a fodging cat! They think they know better than everyone!"

"And he did have some clever ideas for the third edition," Cass added, to her companions' horror. "Cats are sensuous creatures."

"Spare me," Ginny replied. "How did N.E.W.T.s go?"

"I think I did alright," Hermione frowned. "I do think I got Jim Morrison and Van Morrison confused on the Yankish test."

"Hey, a student whose name I will not mention confused Katherine and Audrey Hepburn," Cass announced with a look of abject disgust. "I wonder why I try to teach these dunderheads anything."

"What a very Severusian remark, m'love," John observed, coming up behind his wife and kissing her on the neck. "I like it when you're snarky."

"Erm…I have to –er…go and grade tests now," Cass explained, going scarlet. "Oh, and Hagrid wanted a word with you, 'Mione. Something about publishing that report you did on avian mite extermination?"

"I promised to meet Harry …for studying," Ginny added.

"Well, I'll see you both later," Hermione waved, understanding full well that spring was in the air at Hogwarts. It was nice to not be the only one with someone to …meet.

As she headed for the side door, she ran into Severus, who was just deducting house points from some little Ravenclaws. After a whispered promise to meet each other later, the pair parted, for longer than they would ever know.

Hermione never made it to Hagrid's that day.

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