I confess that this is a very short chapter and the reason it is very short is because I worked this out wrong in my head. If I ever get possessed of a demonic urge to edit this, I will fix it. 'Til then, enjoy this, because I'm proud of it. Oh, and you're all right about the box. Anything else you notice that was interesting?

I'll see you this evening with the epic concluding chapters of…

Touch the Air Softly

by Jessa L'Rynn

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best".

Chapter 19: The Stars From His Coat

"Hello, Professor," she said softly. He gaped at her as though she had fallen in from the sky, but she continued undeterred, smiling at him, trying to let him know everything with her eyes. "I have something for you."

He stepped back. "I'm on rounds," he growled. "And you should be in your tower."

She didn't understand why he was acting like this - like he always had. Hadn't they agreed to be friends? "I'll go with you. I'm Head Girl, I can do that."

"No."

"You weren't in your office earlier," she said, "so it'll have to be this way, I suppose." She caught her bag in her hand and followed after him. He seemed to disappear into the shadows, but Hermione was determined. She had always done everything she set her mind to do, so she set her mind to this as well.

She followed him around the castle for what felt like hours, but couldn't find him anywhere. Occasionally, she would catch a hint of a moving shadow or the click of a distant footfall but there was very little sign of the invisible Potions Master anywhere.

In the end, she came to rest on the astronomy tower, looking out at the grounds and wondering what was going wrong. Her head hurt, and right now she wondered what she was thinking following him all over the place like a lost puppy. So he was her friend, that didn't mean he was aware of the depth of her feeling for him. Where had all her logic, all her common sense, gone? So what if she loved him. That didn't mean he had to love her too.

She turned to walk away, to head back to her bed and sleep away what was left of the night. She thought she might go talk to Madam Pomfrey in the morning, since her stress level was obviously so high and so strained that she was making senseless trips after reluctant professors.

Turning away, she saw him, waiting there in the doorway, standing unmoved against the night breezes, watching her, apparently, and looking like he was in terrible pain. She couldn't resist it at all and moved toward him, her hand outstretched like a plaintive waif.

He stepped away again and the look of pain only deepened. "Hermione Granger," he pleaded, his voice desperate and hollow, "will you please stop haunting me?"

"Professor," she said, but stopped and started over. "Severus, I can't. I love you, Severus, and I want to be with you." His name felt delicious on her lips, like dark, raw honey, like fresh Holland chocolate, bittersweet and rich. She wanted to shout it, whisper it, say it first every day of her life, and when she repeated it, add words of love and solace to the mix. She waited breathlessly for him to shout at her, to tell her she was a silly child, or worse. She waited to be hurt, hoping because there was nothing else left, to be loved in return.

He lifted his dark, immutable gaze to her face, his eyes the same as she had come to know them, concerned but distant, with the faintest trace of confusion. And finally, finally, as she watched, the confusion broke, once and for all, and his face became flooded with emotions so myriad and strong that she wondered he could breathe for the raging tide of it. "Hermione," he whispered, a prayer, a sigh, and reached out to cup her chin, bent his head forward, touched her at last with fingers cold and roughened by work. At last she felt the brush of his hand against her skin, at last she felt his breath on her face.

At last she felt the touch of his lips.

It was as though he had flung the stars from his coat and created the heavens of the night just for her. The splendor, the marvel of it was as much visual as tactile, and as much smell and taste as the others. All her dreams, all her imaginings, became at once dim shades of the truth, and glorious possibilities. The flood in her breast of pain and of joy was so strong it transfigured her - she became a flame, burning bright and endless, burning just for him, for his love. It changed her life, her world, everything.

He lifted his head and gazed deep into her eyes, waiting to see the shock there, the horror, the confusion. He saw only pleasure, painted with longing, and dipped in the knowledge that this could be just the beginning. He had never imagined that it was not too late, had never thought, even once, that he might not have missed his chance. She smiled deep into his eyes and he brushed back her hair, longing to crush her to him, barely restraining the thought of sweeping her up and carrying her away from the castle, away from the war, away from the world altogether if he had to to find them a life they could share.

Severus knew, just as surely as he knew that Dumbledore was kind, that Hermione would not go away with him. He wouldn't really want to - she had friends and he had responsibilities, and they all owed their allegiance to the gentle old man who held the darkness at bay. Easier to run, but to hear that she loved him gave him all the strength he would ever need to face what was coming.

"I have something for you," she said, again.

"What is it?" he asked, and marveled that the voice speaking was his own. When had it become kitten soft and gentle?

"The ring my Aunt Gretchen gave me. It was her husband's. They lived together in love for fifty-five years. I want you to have it."

"Me?" he said. "I don't deserve this."

"Of course you do. It's yours, Severus, no matter what, so I will always be with you, just a little, to remind you that I love you. Just say my name and you'll be with me." She held it out to him and, amazed, he took it from her, studying the stone in perplexity. It was a narrow silver band with six tiny stones on it, mismatched, unfaceted, unpolished, beautiful in their natural state. He solemnly slipped it on his right hand and then took her hand in his. "I can't tell you what this means to me, Hermione, to have you tell me this, and share these things with me." He bent his head again, to taste those moon-etched lips, and was rendered completely breathless when they parted beneath his assault.

More time passed before he remembered something much more important. "We need to leave, Hermione. This was really a very bad idea."

She laughed. "I think it was a marvelous idea, but perhaps there would be problems..."

"Your Gryffindor friends are REALLY not going to like this one."

Again that merry twinkle, and she took his arm as though he were her escort to a ball. "My Gryffindor friends love me enough to want me to be happy, Severus, and I think they're brave enough to learn to live with it as long as I am happy."

"Don't expect me to be nice to them."

"Haven't you noticed that any time you try, someone pulls a wand on you?"

He nodded and charmed the door at the bottom of the tower to fling itself open with an almighty thud. Since no one screamed and fled, he knew it was safe for them to proceed.

"You are a Slytherin to the core, Severus," she said admiringly and stood on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek.

"Thank you," he said and a small tickle of pride rolled over him. She was so good for his ego. They walked slowly toward Gryffindor tower, conversing lightly about the weather or fairies in the corridor, or the best places to find students out of bounds. He would never remember that, but he did remember how light-hearted and happy it felt. It was as though all the evil his life was paying for had finally taken a rest.

"I have a headache," Hermione said, as she stood before the portrait a large woman in a loudly pink dress.

And so the pendulum swung the other way.

"Can't I just go with you?"

All the breath escaped his lungs and his heart began to race like a new Nimbus. There were three hundred answers to that question, and 299 of them were absolutely inappropriate, even though he was screaming inside to just agree with her and die happy when whatever better person than he arrived and killed him for it. He forced himself to take several slow, deep breaths, then a few more, then looked down to study her very carefully.

She tipped her delicate face up to him, her eyes batting closed, her lips curved in charming invitation, her eyelashes delicate against her softly blushing face. Before he could even stop himself, he had bent to brush those perfect lips lightly with his own, feeling the entire world collapse and fall away the moment they met. He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her to him, just as she entwined her arms behind his head, pulling him deeper into the spiraling descent of the their kiss. The insistence as she pressed herself to him would have been alarming had he not been completely intoxicated with the taste of her, the smell of her. Having been alone for so long made her all the more addictive, and it was all he could do to gently disengage from her and stand there panting in the hall, watching her warily as she stood there gasping and blushing and swaying on the spot.

He groaned and leaned his head back against the wall, desperately afraid of how desperately happy he was.

She looked up and smiled at him, her blue eyes twinkling softly in the torchlight of the corridor, bright and vivid even by those pale standards. And his newfound heart shattered into a million pieces. So blue, they were, so beautiful, so ethereal and so utterly, unspeakably wrong.

Even as everything turned chiaroscuro and cold again around him, everything also clicked. Everything. "Come with me, Miss Granger," he said, and he knew his voice was thick with unshed tears. "I'm sorry, we have to go see Professor Dumbledore."