Author's Notes:
I want to thank each and every one of you for your wonderful reviews. Almost everyone liked the father/daughter concept. Some were still a little hung up on SS/HG romantic only ships. It messes with their heads that she is young enough to be his daughter. I truly would love to see more stories with this scenario in them. I really liked the Severitus challenge stories and I think these could be just as good.
Warning, this chapter was beta'd by the extremely evil Nakhash Mekashefah. This story may now contain evil, antisocial, subliminal messages. She is trying to take over the world one reader at a time.
Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns Harry Potter and Co. I own nothing.
Lost Blood.
Chapter 02. My secret.
Elizabeth waited nervously in her flat for her daughter's return home. It had been two weeks since Severus had called her bluff. Tomorrow, Hermione would head back to Hogwarts for her sixth year. If she was going to tell Hermione the truth, it had to be tonight. She cursed Severus for putting her in this position. It was his idea to keep the truth from Hermione and he should be here to suffer the consequences right along with her.
"Mum, I'm home," Hermione announced, as she opened the front door.
"Honey, could you come into the study please?" Elizabeth asked.
"What's up?" Hermione cheerfully asked as she flopped down in a large chair opposite her mother.
"How did your shopping go?" Elizabeth asked nervously, not knowing where to begin.
"Fine, I just got a couple new jumpers, socks, and a few new undies," Hermione answered. "Oh mum, you would not believe what they had for sale at Harrods - New laptop computers that have 200-megabyte processors, CD-ROM, and 32 Megs of RAM in them. That's five times faster than the old 486 in my room. God, I wish Muggle technology would work at Hogwarts. I could get my school work done in a third of the time it normally takes me."
"We would get you a new computer, Hermione. But your father and I are afraid it will be outdated before it's even a year old," Liz told her daughter.
"Oh, come on, mum, that's ridiculous. A 200-megabyte computer will be state of the art for the next ten years," Hermione confidently informed her mother.
"Hermione, there's something very important I need to discuss with you before you head back to Hogwarts," Liz seriously said.
"What is it?" Hermione curiously asked.
"Hermione, I need to tell you something that I should have told you a long time ago," Elizabeth said as she began nervously rubbing her hands together. "Before you were born, I made a very big decision about your future. I still believe it was the right thing to do. But now that you're older and involved it the magical world, I think it's time you knew the whole truth."
"Mum, just what are you trying to say?" Hermione impatiently asked.
Still nervously rubbing her hands together, Elizabeth continued. "Hermione, you need to know that your father and I love you very much, we always have and that will never change. What I'm about to tell you is going to very difficult for you to hear, but you deserve to know the truth about your birth."
"Mum, are you going to tell me that dad isn't my biological father?" Hermione calmly asked her mother.
"Wa…Wa…Wa…What!" Elizabeth stuttered in complete shock. "You already know?"
"Yeah, ever since I was eight," Hermione coolly answered.
"How could you know?" Liz asked sounding very confused.
"Remember when you let me read some of your medical books for the first time? In one of them was a chapter on blood-typing. I asked you what blood type I was and what type you were. You said I was A-positive and that you were O-positive. What you didn't know was, I also asked dad his type. He told me he was B-positive. I knew from the book that an O-positive plus a B-positive doesn't equal an A-positive," Hermione told her mother.
"You've known for over seven years. Why haven't you said anything?" Liz asked her daughter, in a state of disbelief.
"Because I didn't care, Mum," Hermione firmly stated. "I knew you and Dad loved me, and that was all that really mattered. You're the greatest parents in the world, I couldn't ask for anything more."
"Haven't you been curious about your real father?" Liz asked.
"Dad is my real father, as for as I'm concerned. I don't care about some creep that never wanted me," Hermione angrily said. Elizabeth could tell by her daughter's expression that she had wondered about her real father. She wondered why he had rejected her. Elizabeth knew she had to tell Hermione the whole story.
"Hermione, your real father does love you. He has been a part of your life since you were three, you just haven't known about it. The truth is, I never told him I was pregnant. By the time he found out about you, I was already married to Jonathan," Liz told her.
"Why didn't you tell him? Was he that bad a boyfriend?" Hermione asked.
" I didn't tell he because I knew we could never be a family. He lived in a very different and dangerous world than me. I wanted to protect you from that. I had never planned to tell him you existed. He found out about you after the Ministry registered you as a Muggle-born witch. You started summoning toys off of store shelves when you were only three," Liz said to Hermione.
"OH MY GOD, MY FATHER IS A WIZARD!" Hermione shouted excitedly. "Who is he? How did you fall in love with a wizard?" Hermione anxiously asked her mother. Elizabeth thought it would be best to answer the easier question first.
"Do you remember what job I used to have when I was in college?" Liz asked her daughter.
"Sure, you worked nights at Scotland Yard's Medical Examiner's office," Hermione answered.
"That's right. I worked there to earn extra money for dental school. About a year before you were born, a strange case came into the Examiner's office. Three bodies were found in south London with very strange wounds on then. Two of the bodies had burn marks on them like nothing the coroner had ever seen before. The third body had no marks at all, it was as if he were scared to death," Liz said.
"That sounds like the Death Curse. They must have been wizards," Hermione said to her mother.
"Unfortunately, no one at the Examiner's office knew wizards existed. One night, about an hour after I had gotten off, I when back to the office to get some concert tickets I had accidentally left in my desk. When I got to the Examiner's office, both the security guards were missing. I heard voices coming from the morgue, so I went to investigate. Inside the morgue were two men dressed in black robes with silver masks on their faces. They were removing the three bodies from south London." Liz said.
"Death Eaters," Hermione restlessly stated. "What did you do?" Hermione asked, trying to spur her mother into continuing the story.
"I turned and ran is what I did. But I didn't even reach the door before I was hit with what felt like a bolt of lightning," Liz answered.
"That had to be the Stupefying Charm. It's a Stunner and really packs a punch," Hermione informed her mother.
"Well, I woke about twenty minutes later with a young man standing over me. My blouse had been torn open and someone had tried to remove my skirt. At first I was afraid he was with the other two men, because he was dressed in similar robes. Then I saw the other two lying on the floor next to me. They were both dead. The young man had a very bad burn wound on his left upper chest, just like the ones on the bodies. He was having a hard time breathing. Before I could ask who he was, he pointed his wand at me. The next thing I knew, I was waking up in my own bed. All my memories of the previous night were gone, I had even forgotten about the concert tickets," Liz told Hermione.
"He Obliviated your memories. How did you remember?" Hermione asked.
"About two weeks later, I saw the same man on the street outside a small pub. As soon as I saw him, all the memories of that night in the Examiner's office came crashing back into my head," Liz answered.
"He must have been really weak when he tried to Obliviated your memories. That's why it wore off when you saw him," Hermione explained.
"You're just full of answers today, aren't you? Maybe you would like to finish the story while I listen," Liz suggested, giving her daughter an annoyed look.
"Sorry Mum, please continue," Hermione sheepishly said.
"I saw him go into the pub. The strange thing was I had never seen this pub before, even though I passed it everyday when I went to school. I followed him inside. It was the strangest place I had ever seen before. Everybody inside the pub was wearing robes. A dishrag was moving by itself, cleaning the top of the bar. I spotted the man sitting at a table with two older men in dark robes. I was only in the pub for a minute when he spotted me. As soon as he got out of his seat, I ran out the door. I saw him follow me outside just as I got into a taxi.
"I thought I had lost him; but that night, when I got home, I found him waiting for me in my flat. I told him it was no use in trying hypnotize me again or killing me to shut me up, because I had already written down and recorded what I saw that night in the morgue, on a cassette tape. I told him if I disappeared or was found dead, Scotland Yard would get the letter and the tape," Liz told Hermione.
"What did he do?" Hermione nervously asked.
"He was furious about the letter and tape. He told me that it was a very stupid thing to do and that I was going to get myself killed. He then left, but not before telling me never to follow him or go into that pub again. What he didn't know was, I was making the whole letter and cassette thing up," Liz coyly said.
"Did you follow him again?" Hermione asked.
"No, I didn't have to. I kept spotting him spying on me. He did it on and off for the next two weeks. Finally, I decided to trick him into having dinner to find out what he was up to," Liz answered.
"How did you trick him?"
"It was easy. I made my mother's famous beef and chicken casserole. When the meal was ready, I threw the circuit breaker, shutting off all the lights. I then screamed at the top of my lungs and broke a glass bottle on the floor. Five seconds, later he burst through the front door with his wand in his hand. It took a little coaxing but I got him to stay for dinner," Elizabeth explained to her daughter.
"Mum if you were a witch, I'm sure you would have been a Slytherin," Hermione said with a smile. "What happened at the dinner?"
"We talked. I found out that he was a wizard and that there were many witches and wizards all over the world. He was also very interested in science. He said magic was not very well understood, not even by wizards. He wouldn't talk about what happened in the morgue. He would just say that there were some very bad wizards on the loose. I also found out that he was my age and was very lonely. It wasn't hard to get him to come back for another dinner. He was kind of attractive in a scruffy sort of way," Liz told her.
"How long before you two got serious about each other?" Hermione asked.
"About a month. Then we were together for the next three," Liz answered.
"What happened? Why did you two break up?" Hermione apprehensively asked.
"One night, he told me that it was too dangerous for me to see him anymore. He said that he was working with other witches and wizards to get rid of the Dark wizards. He said if any Dark wizards found out that we were seeing each other, I could be killed. He made me promise to never seek him out or to have anything more to do with the Wizarding world. Even though he had broken my heart, I agreed," Liz said sadly. "I met your father two months later and the rest is history."
"He was in the Order wasn't he?" Hermione anxiously asked.
"Yes, he was," Elizabeth nervously answered, as she began to rub her hands together again.
"It's Remus Lupin isn't it?" Hermione excitedly shouted. "I should have known. He has always had a great intellectual mind; I wonder if my hair is so messed up because he's a werewolf?"
"You have my mother's hair and it's very beautiful," Liz forcefully told her daughter. "And no, Remus Lupin isn't your father."
"Sirius Black?" Hermione asked with a puzzled look on her face.
"No, not Sirius Black," Elizabeth flatly told her.
"But Remus and Sirius are the only Order members your age that were in the Order and were still alive when I was three," Hermione said, sounding very confused.
"You're forgetting one," Liz told her daughter.
"Who?"
"Severus Snape," Elizabeth announced. Liz watched as a look of shock appeared on her daughter's face. A second later, Hermione's eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed to the floor.
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Next chapter coming soon.
Please review and let me know what you think about the story so far.
Here's a quick question for my readers. Should Hermione tell Harry and Ron about her father or should she try to keep it a secret?
