Chapter 23: The hate of love.
O
I can't believe myself for being so evil. I'm so sorry! I even forgot the whole storyline and then I read through the outline I created so very long ago and my heart melted at the thought of the last two chapters (that's the next two). Whether that's a good or bad thing I mustn't say… damnit… and I want to so much! smiles smugly.
IM BACK! Ooo yea…… feels so good…. deep inhale and exhale. Well I won't go into details about why exactly I suddenly felt back to normal and ready to tackle anything, followed by a powerful urge to write which I haven't had since before... I promised not to go into that. Anyway... thank you a million times for reviews - :) – they are ALWAYS appreciated. (no I haven't been to an AFI concert – but I'm dying to and its on my list of "Things To Do Before I Die") (And true love isn't bliss when it's unrequited – to a guy that is emotionally detached and refuses to believe anyone can care for him).
The keyboard looks so beautiful... (haha). Eventually (cough cough - already) u see I can be irritating when not writing fiction. Maybe I'm not irritating... just... odd... nope, its irritating.
Enjoy your FULL cookie!
O
It struck a chill to his marrow. His whole flesh was consumed by shivers of nonexistent pain. He had never been stung by an insult but her voice did strange things to him.
He could not move, despite the overwhelming urge to step forward and either shake her violently by the shoulders or kiss her. Could the woman not see how she had burned him? He knew that wasn't the correct order of things, he had burned her and suffered for it but humored his temper with lies.
"...what are you doing here?" she continued when he made no move to speak.
The confrontation between the stranger and Snape made several heads turn in curiosity. Severus spared them a few dark glances which sent them scuttling off to the great hall.
"I do believe I work here..." he said it and then it was too late to take it back. He was giving her the tone he would give a misbehaving student. This did more damage than he liked to consider. Hermione flushed angrily. This had confirmed her suspicions of how little she had meant to him that he could just dismiss her like anyone with his snide retorts.
"You belong in Azkaban with all your friends, or..." she stopped herself before she outright wished him dead.
"Hermione-" he began, attempting an apology for his comment to appease her. He took a step closer to her but she took one sharply backwards and cut him off loudly.
"Don't you ever refer to me by my first name ever again!" she spat, temper rising along with her voice. A few people began to stop and stare in blatant nosiness. She had a fiery rage smoldering in her pained eyes and Severus felt it prudent to back away slightly for both the stares and her possible actions which he had misjudged terribly before.
"Perhaps," he said in a soft calm voice that held enough edge to it for appearances sake, "we should go to my quarters to discuss things. If there is to be a confrontation, here is the worst of places-"
"Ha!" Hermione burst out in a sarcastic hysteria. There was a collecting crowd now, that were failing to look as though they were just moving very slowly to the Great Hall. As she laughed, her hood slipped back off of her head and curls.
Following the sight of her face, there were a few loud gasps from the older students.
"I don't know why you try to defend your reputation, Severus," she snapped spitefully, feeling the deepest of revolting twisting inside her. She was furious with herself for letting his brooding menacing sight get to her. "It was never the most wonderful of reputations..."
Severus tried to force a stern glare onto his features under their watching eyes. "That was uncalled for," he began icily but as Hermione began to swell indignantly he continued in softer tones, "and I deserve far worse..." There was a small moment, affected by his gentler voice, where they locked eyes and all retorts and hatred deserted her.
"Hermione Granger!" gasped a rather impudent and obtuse Dennis Creevey. It was enough to bring her back to earth.
She looked around at the faces – there were so many. She hadn't seen more than five at a time for the past two years and their attention was slightly intimidating.
She turned back to Severus, looked him hard in the eyes, less openly than a moment before, and lifted her chin.
"Maybe your quarters would be preferable for a conversation of this sort..." she said frostily and brushed past him towards the dungeon. He cast a dark glower over the sea of peering faces which had given up pretences. He then swept after her, close on her heel and heart pounding deep within his chest.
O
"Did Miss Granger arrive safely?" Minerva McGonagall was in a fluster and had asked that question repeatedly in the past ten minutes of the welcome feast's start. She leaned over her food to get a better look at the open doors into the empty Grand Entrance. All students had been seated, all words had been said, minus an introduction of Hermione, and the food had appeared before them.
And their returning student had not shown her face.
Dumbledore had a deep-seated unease that he knew exactly where she was and didn't want to consider the difficulties that would result amongst certain members of staff this year.
He turned to McGonagall with a benevolence and weariness in his tone.
"Minerva, my dear, have you taken a look at our staff table?" this was the most information she had been able to extract from him all evening. She blinked behind her square spectacles and shook her head.
Dumbledore closed his eyes and swept out a weathered hand slowly to imply she should do so.
She followed the direction of his fingertips, past to familiar colleagues and then her eyes fell on an empty chair. And it was not that of any ordinary staff member either. Severus Snape had not shown up for the welcome dinner... and neither had Hermione... and it clicked smartly into place.
"Oh! My god, Albus! This isn't good!" she panicked and in a flustered movement, forgot composure and her food entirely, pushing herself back from the table to stand.
Dumbledore laid a hand on her arm quickly and she hesitated long enough to fall prey to his penetrating blue stare. Using unspoken words McGonagall was made to calm down and settle herself in her seat again, but her eyes flickered uneasily around the room.
"Hermione can take care of herself, Minerva. This has been held back long enough..." McGonagall didn't answer but bitterly stabbed her chops with a fork.
O
She felt him behind her, brooding and menacing close over her shoulder and scowled as hard as she could, trying to force bitterness and ignore him as a presence. Her hands were shaking as balled fists and she kept them hidden in the long sleeves of her robes and concentrated on breathing normally and trying to slow her heart rate.
The two of them rigidly walked down the torch-lit corridor. The tension in the fine cool air thickened and pulsated.
Seeing the leather couch still there by the fire, never transfigured back into the original two winged high backed armchairs, made it impossible to look away. No specific memories leapt out at her but her mind fogged in a smudge of emotions and multiple colorful images.
She realized she had stopped moving when a pair of hands rested lightly on her shoulders from behind.
She quickly moved away from the touch but there was something in her that regretted the action. She couldn't turn around to look at him, couldn't find the strength in her to yell, so she weakly moved over to couch and smoothly sat herself in the corner of it, with her chin in her palm. Her heart wouldn't stop pounding.
Two years! And not even a warning of this happening. He was supposed to be dead... Her heart gave her a painful sting in reply to that thought. Ok... at least in Azkaban... Her heart only gave a weak squeeze of protest and she satisfied herself with that.
The crackling fire cast a dancing glow across their drawn faces. Severus stayed back, silently, observing like a still shadow as Hermione watched the flames with glazed eyes and tried to collect her thoughts and logic.
The silence was not uncomfortable, but heavy and seemed to last a second when in reality it spanned out to about 25 minutes of pure silence and held poise.
He was waiting for her to scream and yell at him. She was waiting for him to coolly tell her that she would have to pull herself together if they were to work together and they were never to bring up anything that had happened: they had never spoken out of the classroom.
He watched the side of her face, half obscured by her hand, with a piercing gaze. He could not read her. She seemed sad, but otherwise unfazed – or she was frozen in fear and struggling for thought – or she was stewing and stirring her anger with every second silence and nursing her hatred for him.
Maybe all three. And there was nothing but the flickering... She looked so much older... his fault.
Suddenly Hermione seemed to snap and cave internally. She curled herself up into a small ball in the corner of the couch, pulling her knees up to cover her face and hugging them furiously. She didn't appear to be crying though.
Within her, her heart was doing back-flips and she felt the world close in from all sides.
"I can't get it to stop... make it stop..." she mumbled to her knees so softly that Severus could distinguish no more than a few sounds.
She closed her eyes, more aware than ever of her eyelashes and the sore stinging behind her lids. She took three slow long breaths to ease herself and, with a sigh, uncurled herself from the corner...
Severus knew the silence had to be broken.
"How do you propose on staying here three years in my presence and not expect to cross ways?" he asked softly yet darkly. Hermione felt a flicker of bitterness.
"As much as I can wish for it, that appears to be out of the question," she retorted snidely, not taking her eyes away from the fire. "So..." she paused, "I suggest we clear things out of the way, leaving no unspoken tension..." Severus stiffened.
"I see..." he muttered, averting his gaze away from her. "In that case I would like to make certain that you are aware of a few things..."
"Such as?"
"Such as I never intended for you to be dragged into the dark sides' dealings or to be made one of the circle..." Hermione snorted thickly, still refusing to pay him a glance. Her heart betrayed her and raced wildly. She had never considered she would hear this argument. She assumed he wouldn't deny his intentions.
"I don't buy your bullshit," she spat with finality.
"It is not "bullshit"," he growled in frustration, taking a step closer. "And I resent that no one ever told you otherwise seeing as Dumbledore himself was aware of my plan before I took you to the Dark Lord-" Hermione forgot how fascinating the fire was and jerked around, dropping the hand that supported her chin.
"Dumbledore knew what you were going to do!"
"He may not have liked the idea but he concluded that there was no other way..."
Hermione shook her head and tore her eyes away from his again and returned the fire, giving him the shoulder. "I don't believe you."
"It's not a question of belief..." he said calmly, continuing to approach her at a tedious rate. Slowly advancing silently on her, he stopped over her shoulder, trying to catch her forestalled gaze. Still careful not to touch her he leant close to her ear. Hermione's free hand slipped into her inner pocket. "Don't think there hasn't been a moment when I haven't wanted to kill myself for what I put you through? A moment when I haven't ached in a way I would normally have despised to admit? A moment where I didn't realize what I had thrown away-"
It happened too quickly. Hermione had ripped out her wand in a flash but Severus' reflexes were intact and in the span of half a second she had her wrist held above her head in a pincer-like grip with her wand in her fist. There were angry tears budding in her eyes and her teeth were gritted to hold back a wince at the bite of his fingers.
She hesitated only a moment avoiding his eyes before she struggled to pull herself free of his grasp. He let her go almost at once for fear of bruising her and she withdrew roughly.
Kneeling on the sofa, she looked a perfect wild mess in his eyes, of beauty battered.
"You bastard!" she shrieked. "I didn't come here to have you try and ensnare me again in your poisonous traps!" She aimed her wand at him and stumbled off the couch flawlessly. He simply stood his ground, watching her through an unreadable look while she retreated hurriedly. He knew better than to follow her… he had learnt his lesson by now about hysteria.
So he just watched her leave, heart consumed with pain.
But it was just emotional pain. He had gotten used to it by now. He could live like it wasn't there.
Tomorrow... he would give her time to cool and then... and then he didn't know...
O
Hermione broke out into a run as soon as she cleared the dungeons, streaking right past the Great Hall with a sudden loss of appetite. Her heart was racing at a hundred miles an hour and the wound stung like a dried flesh wound that had been rashly split open, oozing vile putrid juices and burning like acid.
She fled down past the kitchens in the direction of the Hufflepuff house and begun to slow as she realized she didn't know where she would be sleeping.
She snuffled quite pathetically and wiped a couple of unwelcome tears roughly away.
Stopping completely, she felt so lost and helpless that she felt no shame in sinking to the floor and hugging her knees once more as though they would save her. Mentally she cursed herself for her lack of strength and vengefully started to fabricate fantasies of what she could have said that may have been more suitable.
"Miss is lost?"
Hermione started nearly out of her skin in surprise, having depended on the fact she was alone.
She looked up hurriedly and laid eyes on a curious looking house-elf whose bulbous eyes were round with worry.
"How come Miss is not up enjoying the feast?" she prodded squeakily. Noticing the startled expression the elf proclaimed smartly "I is Wigma the house-elf, I is. I heard someone walking and wondered why they was not at the feast. They must be lost, says I." Her ears pricked up and she smiled proudly in her little toga-robes.
"Oh, Wigma..." Hermione said, relieved and seeing her chance. "It's a good thing you came. I'm not hungry, but I would like to find my chambers… but I do not know where they are..."
Wigma's eyes bulged.
"Ooh! Ooh!" she squealed, gesturing at Hermione's countenance and hair, "You is Miss Granger!" Hermione nodded and felt grateful for the recognition. "We house elves is hearing many things about you!" Hermione's heart sank again, reflecting on moments before. "I knows where your chambers is."
Hermione felt a slight feather of relief lighten her heart.
She eyed the elf with shinning eyes of gratitude then did something that would horrify Wigma and that she would never speak of to another soul. Hermione reached for her and gave her a thankful squeeze of a hug.
O
In her new chambers, Hermione had thanked a stunned Wigma and sent her back to her kitchen where she was meant to be helping with the feast but she refused to watch Hermione go hungry and promised to return with a tray of food she would leave at her desk.
Her room was not particularly large, being just the right amount of cozy without being cramped. It was perfectly square with a door to the bathroom. One corner was home to a massive oak wardrobe with drawers beneath. The wall beside it revealed a large window between it and the bed, a traditional princess' dream with pulled back drapes. The other wall was covered from top to bottom with books. She suspected Dumbledore had had a hand in it. The final corner adjacent to the door held a fair-sized desk perfect for long nights with a quill.
What caught her eye was something shaking on the bed.
The luggage she had sent ahead was waiting for her on the bed and one wicker basket was quivering.
Hermione shed her traveling robes and threw them over the chair at her desk before hurrying over to let her furry familiar loose.
She did the clasps and Crookshanks leapt out. She scooped him up for comfort.
"Crookshanks!" she exclaimed and he good-naturedly put up with her embraces which he would normally wriggle free from, for he had missed her too.
She lay back with him on the bed, abruptly overcome with a wave of exhaustion and Crookshanks settled on her stomach under her arms, purring loudly. Under the moonlight, she fell into an uneasy slumber.
Her reveries were invaded by a raven blackness.
O
TWO LEFT! Well... I used to judge when it was time to end a chapter depending on it's size but for these last chapters... I don't expect them to be much more than this length at most.
I'm so excited! The end is near and this time I really mean it! Now off I go to write the next chapter!
Love any of you who are still interested (and if you can still remember the plot 'cause I didn't... blush),
Snakecharmer