I gave Granger a long, assessing look when she finally turned up at my office door.

She looked back, frowning, and shifting from foot to foot in her discomfort. I wondered vaguely what had happened to her teeth. They seemed less aesthetically displeasing than I recalled. Although it was many years, of course, since I had actually looked at Granger, instead of simply registering her existence in my visual field.

"Sit," I said, pointing to the chair opposite my desk

She did so, clutching her hands nervously in her lap.

"I daresay you are wondering why I have sent for you," I said stiffly. From the expression on her face, that was possibly a tad of an understatement. I plunged on. "Well, Miss Granger. I find I have need of a research assistant."

She didn't say anything, but merely looked wary. I scowled. Blasted girl.

"I would like to offer you the position," I said finally, and a little more loudly, as the silence stretched on.

At last the girl spoke. "That's, that's very, kind of you, Professor Snape," she said carefully. "I'm – er – flattered. But I don't really want any extra responsibilities right at the moment."

My brows drew together. "Why not?" I demanded. "I am prepared to reimburse you!"

Hmm.Why not? When I considered the matter, I supposed it might not be entirely unrelated to the fact that I had taken every opportunity to cut her and her over-confident cronies back down to size over the past few years. But still. If I could manage to set aside my grudge at her for being an insufferable know-it-all, surely she too could attain to some slight grace, and lay aside these trivial differences.

"Well," the girl went on. "I'm Head Girl, you know, and this is our NEWT year. I really don't think I'm going to have time for anything else…"

I growled in my throat in exasperation. This was predictable, of course. I supposed I had realized all along that for this to work I was going to have to tell the girl the truth.

If I misjudged Granger and she went blabbing to Potter, Dumbledore would skin me alive, probably with one of my own splicing knives, and bottle me as potions ingredients.

I stood up, paced to the opposite side of the office, and began to re-arrange some of my pickle bottles.

"Would that be all, then, Professor?" Granger inquired eventually, in a please-God-say-yes tone of voice.

"No." I turned, and gave her a fierce look. "Miss Granger, I am about to tell you something, and you must promise you will never reveal this information."

She seemed startled, but cautious. "If this is something I think Professor Dumbledore should know…" she began.

"The Headmaster is well aware of it already," I interrupted. "It is your schoolfriends I am thinking of."

She processed this information, face screwed up in thought. "All right," she replied. "I promise." I had the reassuring feeling that for Granger, this was a measured decision by which she would stand, not just a glib phrase falling from her lips.

"It concerns Potter." I paused. "Has he ever mentioned to you a prophecy made about him before his birth?"

"Yes," Granger responded. "I was there with him at the battle in the Department of Mysteries, if you remember. And last year, Harry told us that the prophecy wasn't lost for good after all, because Dumbledore had heard it when it was first given..."

"And what did he tell you the prophecy said?"

"That he was supposed to be the one who had the power to kill the Dark Lord," the girl said softly, with a catch in her voice. "And that he had to either kill Voldemort, or be killed by him…"

"That is certainly the gist," I agreed. "But it was not the exact wording."

With my back to the girl, I repeated the prophecy as I heard it in own Potter's own memories. I heard her sharp intake of breath.

"But.."

"You understand?" Her quickness irritated and pleased me in roughly equal measure.

"The Lay of Halbert and Taveon!" she breathed. "I studied it on my own for extra practice when I was revising Ancient Runes. That was the wording of the curse the princes were under. But…doesn't that end…"

"Yes," I cut across her. "But both must die if the one is to perish. And that is just what happened in the poem, as you will doubtless recall. They both died."

"No….oh, no, Harry…."

"Pull yourself together, Granger," I growled. "That will not help."

I still had my back to her. I could hear her sniffling. Girls are so emotional, I thought despisingly, banging my bottles around with force and blinking rather rapidly from the fumes.

"Tonight," I went on, when she seemed to have composed herself a little. "I also had the – ah - pleasure of a visit from Sybill Trelawney. She had done a Tarot card reading and was convinced it was intended for me. It made me wonder… whether a different outcome to the prophecy was possible."

"Divination," Granger sniffed. Then she rushed on, earnestly. "I'd do anything to help Harry, you must know that, but, if that's what you want help with, I'm not the right person. I dropped it as soon as I could. There may be real prophecies, but as for the rest of it…"

"That is not what I require help with," I answered shortly. "Merely, the Tarot reading set me to thinking."

"Oh," Granger said. "Well…What was the reading?"

I told her. She pondered for a moment.

"That's exactly the way Trelaw – er, Professor Trelawney told it to you, is it?" she asked.

"Yes," I snapped. "I do still have all my cognitive faculties, you know."

Granger looked patient. She hung around with Weasley and Potter, so I supposed she had plenty of practice. "The order matters," she explained. "Where cards appear in a reading makes a difference. What sort of spread was it?"

I felt my brows drawing down. To be patronised by Granger was surely too high a price for the assistance I required… "She didn't say," I answered gruffly, just daring the girl to tell me I ought to have had the sense to ask.

"Then it was probably a straightforward seven-card horseshoe," she concluded. "Trelawney takes her layouts from Madame Miranda's Mystic Marvels. In that case...oh..!" She was staring at me, eyes wide, something that might have been awe or fear dilating her pupils. "Professor...Do you think...."

I was too proud to admit to her that I did not know what Madame Miranda's seven-card horseshoe comprised. I, too, had dropped Divination at the earliest opportunity.

"What?" I snapped.

"Oh, um, well, let's leave that bit aside for now," she said hurriedly, casting me a nervous look. "The outcome, the last card. That's what set you to thinking, isn't it? The Star…hope…"

"Yes," I grudgingly admitted.

"It's still…rather ambiguous, though, isn't it?" she said. "I mean…hope for whom, or what? For Harry.? Or you? Or all of us, once Voldemort is defeated…"

"Of course it's ambiguous," I snarled. "That is my point. That things can have different endings."

I hesitated. The idea I had seemed very far-fetched now I was trying to explain it to somebody else.

"Professor Snape," Hermione said finally. "What exactly is it you want me to do?"

I drummed my fingers on my desk. If the girl had the gall to laugh in my face… "The prophecy," I said abruptly. "It seems to take its form from the Lay of Halbert and Taveon, and the curse they were under, yes?"

"Yes," agreed Hermione. "It does seem like it."

"But…" I drummed my fingers some more. "I am nearly sure…I have a faint memory…that there is a different version of the poem. With a different ending….And it was that card reading that reminded me of it. I just..can't remember the details.."

Hermione, thank Merlin, seemed to be taking me seriously. "A variant tradition?" she said alertly. "Hmm…do you remember how it ended?"

"No," I rapped out, exasperated with myself. "I am, however, sure there is some obscure version in which Halbert did not, in the end, die along with Taveon…."

"So," Hermione concluded. "You want me to look in the old books in Runic and see if I can find any reference to a different version?"

"Yes."

"And from that…"

"Yes. To see how, in the story, they managed to avoid the curse. And to see if that gives us any clues as to we can manage to do it again…"

All right. It was a long shot. But it was certainly preferable to sitting around until such time we gave Potter a pat on the head and sent him merrily on his way to meet his doom.

Harry and Ron both looked curiously at Hermione when she returned to the Common Room. It was nearly a week since Snape had first summoned her, and as Ron put it: "Now she's always sloping off to go and see that greasy git!"

What was more, Hermione had been behaving oddly. Harry wondered if he was imagining it, but almost it seemed as though she was reluctant to look him in the eye. He was convinced she was hiding something. And as for Ron, she didn't get much opportunity even to try and look him in the eye; he was so annoyed with her for refusing to answer his questions satisfactorily, he tended to stomp off whenever she appeared. As far as Harry could tell, Ron had certainly not asked her to accompany him to the seventh year party.

Tonight, though, Ron seemed ready for another go at her. He and Harry were sitting in a quiet corner when Hermione came in. Ron was wiping the floor with Harry at wizarding chess. Rather hesitantly, as if unsure of her reception, she approached.

"So," muttered Ron, casting her a darkling glance. "You finally tore yourself away then?"

"I've been in the library most of the evening," Hermione said quietly.

"Right. Before you stopped off at Snape's private chambers, you mean."

"His office," Hermione corrected sharply. "I've never been in his private chambers."

Harry, who had been staring determinedly at the chess board, looked up quickly at this.

"Are you having it off with Snape?" Ron demanded baldly.

Hermione looked at Ron and Harry, her mouth dropping open. Fury suffused her features; she turned bright red.

"No, I most certainly am not!" she hissed. "I told you, he's asked me to be his research assistant."

"Yeah," said Ron, in no way mollified. The tips of his own ears, and his long nose, were also red. "Just what you need, on top of being Head Girl, and you so worried about your NEWTs. So what, exactly, are you researching for him, Hermione?"

Hermione fastened her lips firmly together. "Some stuff in ancient runes," she said finally, in an imperious tone. "You wouldn't understand. Not that it's any of your business, anyway. And, for the record, I went to see Professor McGonagall today. I've resigned as Head Girl. You're right: I have too much else to do."

And with that, she turned on her heel and marched to the stairway to the girls' dormitories, bushy head held high.

Ron and Harry stared after her.

"She's resigned as Head Girl!" Ron said at last, scandalized. "What the hell is she doing with Snape, to think that's more important?"

"It's your go," Harry said tonelessly. He didn't want to think about Snape, or Hermione and Snape, or himself and Snape: or anything much at all, really.

Not to think was exactly the state he was still aiming for some hours later, as he lay restlessly in his bed. The dormitory seemed to close in around him. He could hear everybody else's breathing. It didn't comfort him; it seemed to fill his brain with other people's heavy demands and expectations and whispered accusations. Try as he might, he could not clear his mind in the way Occlumency had taught him.

Exasperated, he slid out of bed and pulled on his dressing gown. He would get into trouble if anyone found him, but perhaps a walk would help. A walk in the dungeons…Harry had learned from Snape that stones could be soothing, and were a good focal point for mind-clearing exercises.

The Fat Lady was dozing, and snorted a little in her sleep as Harry pushed aside the portrait and stepped out of the Gryffindor common room. Harry ghosted along the corridors. He should, he supposed, have brought his invisibility cloak….he was just asking to be caught, without it….

At last he was in the familiar territory of the dungeons. Snape's chambers were just around the corner. He was not going there, of course, Harry reminded himself. He just wanted to breathe in the heavy stillness and peace of the place…

There was a short flight of stairs ahead. Harry sat down on a step, leaning his face against the cold, rough wall. He pulled his dressing gown more closely around him. It was chilly down here.

Now he could practice his Occlumency…try to disentangle that painful mass of emotions that writhed inside and dragged him down…Harry closed his fingers around his left arm, and shut his eyes with a groan. The Occlumency simply wasn't working tonight…He bit down, hard, upon a sudden urge to slam his fist into the wall to relieve his frustration and misery.

Harry was so pre-occupied with his internal struggles, he did not notice the gliding approach of a tall figure.

Potter.

Potter in my dungeons in the middle of the night, and looking quite distraught.

I watched him in silence for long moments. Finally, he seemed to register that he was not alone. His eyes snapped open.

"Professor Snape…." he murmured.

My initial thought was to blast him to smithereens for wandering the corridors alone at night. That was expressly forbidden to all students, but should especially be heeded by Potter. Still, when had he ever paid any regard to the rules designed for his personal safety? Stupid boy.

The look on his face, though, gave me pause. I did not like it….I would go for the pastoral approach, I concluded.

"So, Potter," I said silkily. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"I couldn't sleep," he murmured. "I couldn't clear my mind…I thought it might help, to be here, where it's so cold and quiet…"

I could hardly fault his logic. That was exactly why I preferred the dungeons myself.

He was shivering, I noticed. It was nearly winter. The dungeons of a Scottish castle are not precisely warm.

I opened my mouth to instruct him to return to Gryffindor tower at once, when I noticed that he was unthinkingly stroking his left arm, over and over.

Damn the boy.

"Get up, Potter," I said abruptly. "You will contract hypothermia sitting there. I will give you a hot drink before you return to your common room. I have many things on my conscience and I do not wish to add to this your frozen corpse. "

He stood, what seemed to be surprise and pleasure flitting across his face.

"You needn't think you are making a habit of this," I said darkly as he curled up familiarly on my couch, sipping at the cocoa I had made him.

"I won't," he said softly. He stretched out a hand to move some papers strewn on the coffee table next to him; I leaped up and removed them sharply from his grasp. They were some of Granger's research notes. I frowned, and wondered if he had seen what they were.

If he had, he made no sign. I sat in my armchair across from him, reading. I looked up from time to time. I watched his face begin to relax, and the pinched horror to recede. As his features slackened into sleep, I rose and draped a blanket over him.

I sat back down and fingered the papers I had removed from his reach.

The top page of Granger's notes, at which he had glanced, contained a number of indecipherable comments and runic marks. Well: indecipherable to me, anyway. I supposed they might have made some sort of sense to Granger. Amongst all this was one legible line of writing:

'Taveon. Runic origin of name means 'twin'. Same root origin as Thomas.'

Taveon, Tom, twin. I brooded, yet again, on the connection.

I had asked Granger, out of interest, what the runic origin of the name 'Halbert' was. She had considered me for a long moment before answering.

"Bright hero," she had told me, biting her lip and peering inscrutably at me through her lashes.

Bright hero. My lip curled. Bright hero...Wasn't that bloody typical, I thought. My eyes went to Potter, snoozing on my couch with his mouth slightly open – and – no, not drool…not on my cushions!

I shook my head. I had long thought that if the Fates existed, they had a most peculiar sense of humour. And an especial dislike for one Severus Snape.

Events of the next few days were only to confirm me in this opinion.

MPS – Thanks! Lol, well I do have an idea where I am going with this…honest…by winding ways……

Lychee2 – /me hands you a box of chocolates.

Gorman99 – Thank you…the prophecy thing will deliver a surprise or two yet I hope…

lucidity – Sybill, as ever, does not even know when she has said something worth saying, or what it is! Thanks as ever for review.

Denise ) – TY. There's still a fair bit of this one to go…

Vyxagallanxchi – yes, I thought it was time to inject a bit of positive energy!! Poor Sevy, yes, he had a rotten time at school. /me growls at James and co. And yes, there is always fanfiction thank goodness!! I wonder if you would like Part 1 of a Sirius returning story, In Search of Sirius, under my PG-fic name JinnyJ?

Anoni- yes, I rather liked the concept….brewed properly, might be rather fun!

Sakia Ishida – thanks….

Jaws - Lol, I promise, Snape hurt/Harry comfort does happen at some point!!! – but not for a little while. That was what you asked for earlier, wasn't it?!

crookshanks87 – ty…

ShadowedHand – yes, much as he wishes to Snape can't get that Potter boy out of his head…

Royal Midnight ) - hehehe, I owe that one to my RP group and have no absolutely no idea who said it…so an anonymous acknowledgement there. Hmm, another tarot reader? Snape doesn't know what the cards mean, but Hermione has an idea. I wonder whether your reading follows the one as set down by Madame Miranda (whose book naturally Hermione had already three times before dumping Divination)?

tomfeltatonofme - hehe, yes Harry is jealous…

TammySlark – ah, what a beautiful thought.

Oya – what the cards mean…well Hermione guesses..Snape's ignoring them all except the last one…

Beth5572 – thanks!

ahappyjtm – yummy, popcorn with caramel. How delicious.

athenakitty – well he's better at Occlumency than he was…and it's Snape he wants to talk to….

Read300300 – shows he's desperate, don't you think?!

cadpig – thanks! Glad you're enjoying it…Harry is indeed having an angsty patch…poor petal…maybe Snape will help him get over it…?? I'm glad Severus comes over as sexy!!

mysticalpanther – well, Hermione will find out some interesting facts, and….

Silverthreads - /me hands over a box of chocolates. Yes, it does, but Snape is so dismissive of Divination he doesn't pay much attention. Hermione has noticed though.

rosiegirl – glad you are still enjoying it!

Wanamaker – thanks!

cdkobasiuk – hehe, I've never written Sybill before, she is quite fun..

NitaPotter – thanks a lot. I have gone for the 'slow build' so I'm pleased people are liking that because a lot of the chapters it seems as if nothing much has actually happened!!!

BeldaranCara - /me sweeps a bow and blushes. Thank you.

Alynna Lis Eachann – lol, I think the odds are that Harry will find out, he always does seem to, doesn't he?