A/N: Hi, it's me again. Guess I kinda went back on my word and continued writing. Did anyone miss me:P
Chapter 15: Awakenings
It was dark. Complete, pitch-black darkness, the kind that left one unable to see one's own hand before his or her face.
"Focus, Miss Granger," came the command, almost hypnotic in its timbre and cadence. "Concentrate."
Sighing very quietly, she closed her eyes and gave her attention to her remaining four senses, her hearing in particular. She knew he was somewhere in the training room, but with the total absence of light and the Silencing Charm on his boots, it was near impossible to figure out his exact location.
As though reading her thoughts—he probably had—he said with considerable rancour, "Nothing is impossible if you put your heart to it, girl. You, of all people, should know that well."
She stifled an inappropriate smile at the somewhat hackneyed phrase, tracking the progress of his voice. He appeared to be circling her, though how he could see through the impenetrable gloom was quite beyond her. Probably a visibility spell.
Shifting slightly, she balanced her weight on the balls of her feet, poised to react. Roughly gauging his position, she lunged in, sword positioned to pierce.
It sliced empty air.
"Close, girl, but not quite. You took too long to decide."
Scowling to herself, she returned to her previous position, listening intently
A barely audible hiss was the only precursory warning she received before the slightly curved blade came slicing at her. Turning the attack aside, she took one step forward and reached out upon instinct, wrapping her hand around a wrist and bringing her own weapon to bear on his neck.
"Lumos." The torches flared to life, the sudden illumination blinding her momentarily. "You can do better, Granger. Had I not attacked, you would not have been able to find me. That may cost you your life in a fight, when the adversary has no reservations about maiming or killing. In time, I expect you to be able to locate and disarm me in a matter of minutes."
"Yes sir." Blinking rapidly, she waited until the spots in her vision cleared before moving to the table where her folded robe lay.
"About the vampires we encountered in the Forbidden Forest last week, how do you think you performed?"
"Poorly, sir. I was not alert, and the vampires were evidently new and disoriented, which worked to our advantage. Moreover, none of them had any knowledge of martial arts, It was an unfair fight."
"A fight is never fair, Miss Granger. Bear that in mind." He conjured up a rag, which he ran along his sword before returning it to its leather sheath. "Explain how you concluded the vampires were newborns."
She straightened, clasping her hands together, the very picture of one possessing utmost confidence and certainty. "Their movements were uncoordinated, and they obviously were not very well acquainted with each other. In the case of a group familiar with one another, there would most likely be an orchestrated attack with a strategy and a prefixed mode of attack wherein this case, the individuals attacked as they would."
A quick sharp nod. "I assume you researched all this in the library?"
"Not all of it. Draco had some books pertaining to vampiric lore in his personal library. And I drew my own conclusions at some points"
"I see. And Mr Malfoy has no qualms about you invading his rooms?"
"None at all, sir."
"That will be all. The sword, if you please."
She relinquished it reluctantly, missing the warm comforting weight of it once he took it from her hand. It had made her feel powerful, as if she could do anything, even take on the entire legion of biased worms that had eliminated her parents.
They will pay. I will make them pay.
Gasping, she shook herself bodily. Where on earth had that come from? Retrieving her robe, she draped it around her shoulders, fastening the clasp before making her way out.
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Ron eyed the pile of textbooks which all but hid the Head Girl's lowered head from his view with ill-concealed distaste. "You know, Hermione, I, for the life of me, can't figure out you can juggle your dual roles."
"You mean triple roles," she corrected crisply, her bobbing quill never faltering in its dance across the surface of the parchment. "Besides doing my homework, studying for the NEWTs and training, I still have to badger you into laying a finger on your books outside situations of pure necessity."
"Oi! How come it's always me? What about Harry?"
"At least he has got round to browsing through his textbooks once in a blue moon. I would say he has come a long way since first year."
Harry beamed triumphantly at his friend, exactly a split second before Hermione deflated him as one does with a pin to a balloon with her next words. "There's still plenty of room for improvement, though. But seeing that the capacity for academia in the brains of adolescent males are equivalent to a peanut, I suppose I will have to settle for that at the moment."
"You do know that you are dragging me into your smear campaign, don't you?" Draco looked askance at her.
"Blame it on your misfortune to be born male then," came the unapologetic reply.
Harry chuckled at the look of wounded pride on his face. "If I didn't know better, Hermione, I'd say you've become a bra-burning feminist."
"Still in perpetual denial, I see."
"What exactly is a...'bra-burning feminist'?" inquired Draco, his brow furrowing. To Hermione, he asked, "You incinerate your undergarments?"
She snorted in amusement. "No Draco. It's a belief modern women hold that women should have equal rights as men, we call it feminism. Some of these feminists are more, shall we say, fiercely supportive than others of the concept. Not that I'm saying it's wrong to think so, but it's just the extensity of how you go about putting your convictions into actions. And trust me, some can get aggressive." Turning, she arched a brow at Harry. "Where did you get that anyway?"
He grinned back. "Dudley left one of his magazines lying around and I happened to be at a loose end."
Quirking a wry smile, she added to Draco, "That's one of the fundamental differences between the wizarding and the Muggle world. Keep that in mind."
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She bolted from bed, eyes darting around wildly for a threat that wasn't there, hands groping for the wand she always kept by her pillow when she slept.
Nothing leapt out at her, hell-bent on ripping her throat out. No flash of saliva-coated fangs, poised to tear her into bite-sized chunks.
Instead, glowing twin orbs glared at her reproachfully from the foot of her bed, evidently unhappy at her sudden return to wakefulness. It's just a dream, she told herself silently as she threw off the covers and went to the bathroom to splash water on her face. Just a bloody nightmare which had to deprive me of proper sleep.
She was on the way back to her bed when her door creaked open. "Hermione?"
She spun to find a half-awake Draco standing in the doorway in his pyjamas. "Yes?"
"Are you all right? I heard you screaming."
"I was?" She rubbed her face tiredly. "It's nothing, Draco. Go back to bed."
He nodded, looking unconvinced. "Ward your door. You are getting careless with security these days."
She snorted. "The only other person here is you, and I trust that you won't do something as heinous as murdering me in my sleep. Besides, Harry and Ron will have your hide."
A mischievous smirk twisted his lips. "How do you know I won't barge in while you are half-dressed or something?"
"Well, there's always a handy Memory Charm to take care of that," she replied dryly and shooed him out.
Returning to her bed, she sat on the edge and rubbed Crookshanks' fur, much too awake to go back to sleep. Bits and pieces of her dream came back to her, and she shuddered. She had been battling a...thing, she couldn't quite recall what, that part had been rather hazy, and it...Oh, she couldn't remember. Growling in frustration, she stood up and paced. That bit had been so close; she had been on the verge of recollection when it slithered out from her grasp like an eel. Why had she been battling that creature? Who was the other person fighting at her side? Definitely not Snape; the glimpse she had caught of her partner —she was pretty sure it was a 'he'—had told her it was not her Watcher. He was built differently from him, and appeared to be a handful of inches shorter than him.
Harry, perhaps? She shook her head at that. Harry's hair did not have blue overtones which were visible under sunlight.
Crookshanks meowed from his position on her coverlet, standing up and striding to the head of the bed, deliberately depositing himself on her pillow. She half-smiled. The view that animals had lower intelligence quotients than humankind had never been one she supported. In her opinion, they were just as, if not more than, smart as mankind in their own way, and her familiar had just demonstrated that fact by telling her not-so-subtly to make the most of the remaining hours before she had to get up for classes.
Pulling her covers to her chin, she shut her eyes. Lulled by the purring beside her ear, she slowly sank back into sleep.
When she awoke, she remembered nothing about it.
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He hissed under his breath at the burn on his forearm and cursed the timing of the summons. Of all the times Voldemort had to call him, it had to be in the middle of dinner at the Head Table. In particular, a dinner which included lasagna. And he loved Hogwarts' lasagna. What had possessed him to join his ranks in the first place?
Oh right, said a wry voice in his head. I believed it was something about power and glory. Snorting at that self-deprecating reminder, he exchanged a meaningful glance with Dumbledore and departed in his customary robe-swishing manner.
Throwing the door to his classroom open, he stopped short. His charge had hung up a target board, and was hurling throwing knives at it with a fierce look of concentration on her young face. She turned at his abrupt entrance."Professor?"
"Not now, girl," he snapped. "I'm being Summoned."
"Oh."
She followed him into his office, watching from the doorway as he pulled out his heavy black cloak and mask from a drawer. He had taken to leaving them in his office since the Dark Lord's resurrection, so that he would not waste time rushing to his quarters to retrieve them before answering the call.
She was silent, for which he found rather disconcerting. He wasn't used to having anyone around when he got ready to face the Dark Lord. It seemed too intimate, too private a thing for him. After all, he had been alone almost all his life, and had become used to his own company, with the occasional (but usually welcome) intrusion of Albus Dumbledore. "Cat got your tongue, Miss Granger?" he asked harshly.
"You've said that to me before, sir." He turned, astounded to find a slight smile playing about her lips. "Did you expect me to run screaming out of the dungeons at the first sight of you dressed as a Death Eater?"
"Five points from Gryffindor, for sheer cheek," he shot back, secretly amused at her reaction.
She merely inclined her head. "Be careful, sir." Surmising that his cutting tongue no longer had an effect on her, he nodded shortly and laid his hand on a doorknob which had materialised at a flick of his hand. "Do go up to dinner, Miss Granger. I have no wish to find you unconscious on the floor one day."
The wind chime-like sound of her laughter followed him out the door.
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Remind me again why we are here? The inner critic was back again, with enough sarcasm to drown an elephant.
He looked around at the dilapidated state of his surroundings and curled his lip in disgust. A lone rat squeaked and scurried past, and he stopped himself from blasting it into oblivion, The Dark Lord would be most displeased if he deprived Nagini of her main source of food. He can lose a battalion of followers and not bat an eyelid, but Gods forbid if his snake is ill.
He told his shrewd critic to sod off none too politely and willed all errant thoughts from his mind. Just as he had accomplished this, a small noise reached his trained ears, and he spun on his heel, wand poised to cast.
"It's..m-me," stammered the rat-like fellow cowering behind him.
On seeing the telltale glimmer of his magickal hand, Severus lowered his wand. He did not relax, could not relax. This luxury could never be indulged in the presence of the Dark Lord.
"T-this way, please." The undersized man turned and shuffled off, and Severus followed him, hearing the constant squeaks and pattering of little rodent feet in the walls his shadows flitted over.
He winced as his feet mounted the rickety, worm-eaten steps to the second level of the gods-forsaken house, thinking the Dark Lord's inclination for dramatic effect had been a little overdone. He personally didn't mind living alone in a large house, but having rats and other kinds of vermin share that space was a little overboard. Imagine having to contend with the furry pests for the food on your plate. He suppressed a shudder as his guide halted before a battered door, and knocked, announcing in a quivery voice, "My Lord, Professor Snape has arrived."
"Show him in." The cold sibilant voice made him flinch inwardly, as he did every time he heard it.
Entering the threshold of the room, he dropped to one knee. "My Lord, you called for me?"
"Indeed. Get up, my boy, sit with me."
Resolutely ignoring the gorge that rose at the command, he stood and made his way to the empty armchair that was set beside the one Voldemort occupied, facing the gentle warmth of the fire.
Neither spoke for a while, and Severus knew better than to hurry him.
At length, the semblance of a human mouth spoke. "You must be wondering why I summoned you alone."
"Yes, my Lord?"
"How goes your progress with the girl?"
"Fairly well, my Lord. She has mastered the most of the basic Dark spells, and is inquiring much after the intricacies of our...organisation."
"Good, good." he trailed off, and coughed into a closed fist.
As much as it repulsed him, he pulled out a handkerchief and offered it to the older wizard, who waved it away. "Is my Lord unwell?"
Another dismissive wave. "You and I both know that this body disintegrates with every spell I utter, Severus. The process is speeding up, and I plan to make use of the Potter boy's body after I have bested him. It is wonderful irony, is it not, to have one's form possessed by your worst enemy?" He chuckled hoarsely. "Poetic justice, indeed."
He remained silent, partly because he had no idea how to respond to that, and partly because his insides were churning so badly with revulsion he was afraid he would throw up the minute he opened his mouth. The Dark Lord was a very, very twisted thing.
"The deterioration is speeding up faster than your initial calculations have indicated, my boy. I am hard-pressed to carry the attack on Hogwarts forward before my physical form crumbles completely."
Here, he paused, and Severus pricked his ears expectantly, hoping against hope that he might drop a hint, a remark, anything which can point the Order of the Phoenix to a specific date. It was too much to think that Voldemort would just come out and state it. He was quite the drama queen, after all, and had an abominable liking for suspense.
None of the anticipated was forthcoming, and he forced a faint twinge of disappointment down. Aloud, he said, "Perhaps there could be a potion to delay or even forestall the decay of your body, my Lord. If I may..."
A third wave, much less vigourous than the previous two. "You and I have been poring over my ancestor's journal for ages, my boy. If there is any, we would most certainly have come across it by now."
He glimpsed the opening that had inadvertently been left behind and grasped it with both hands. "If I may be so bold, my Lord, I would like to request permission to bring the journal back to my dungeons. The recipe for a possible cure may not be in those pages, but I believe some experimenting may turn up hopeful results." He waited with bated breath, praying that he would not be suspicious.
The Dark Lord chuckled raspily. "If it were anyone else, Severus, I would have killed them for suggesting it." He gestured to the aged bookshelf against the wall. "The book is yours. You may go and play with your ingredients and formulae, and we shall see what you can come up with. I trust you will not take the opportunity to poison me and usurp my place."
He rose from his seat and bowed in gratitude. "I'm honoured by the trust you place in me, my Lord."
The other wizard leant back in his armchair. "You have proven yourself enough times to earn it. Take the journal with you. If the old Muggle-loving fool asks you for your whereabouts, tell him you were out for a drink."
"As you wish, my Lord." Bowing again, he retreated from the room, tossing a glare at Nagini as the snake hissed peevishly at him.
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Dumbledore regarded the journal gravely over his half-moon spectacles, the twinkle in his eyes dimmed. "Salazar Slytherin's journal was with Tom all along?"
He nodded. "I brought it away the first chance I got. It's a pity I couldn't do that sooner without calling attention to myself, otherwise..."
"Nonsense. You did what you had to do." The Headmaster eyed the dog-eared tome for a little longer before sighing. "I think you have done an excellent job this time. It's late, and I suppose you are yearning for a rest."
Recognising a dismissal, he got up and pocketed the book. "Good night, sir."
"Sleep well, my boy."
Shuddering at Dumbledore's use of the same endearment—if it can be called that—as Voldemort did, he went off to his chambers.
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He pushed open the classroom door and froze at the sight of his Slayer with her head pillowed on her forearms at a desk. No training equipment or weapon was in sight, so he guessed that she had trained on her own and put away everything before exhaustion overtook her.
Making his way across the stained flagstone, he took the folded house robe from another desktop and covered her with it, tucking the corners in so that it would not fall off when she stirred. A corner of his mind questioned this gesture of his, but he ignored it. Dumbledore would have his hide if Wonder-Boy Potter's best friend froze to death in his classroom, he told himself.
That done, he strode to his office, shedding the cloak and mask. He was tucking them into a drawer when her sleepy voice drifted in through the open door. "Professor? Is that you?"
"No one besides me can enter my office any time I please without receiving a nasty shock from the wards, Miss Granger."
He heard her getting up and pushing the chair back, then her measured footfalls coming to the doorway. Pushing back a lock of unruly hair from her face, she looked him up and down, as though he was a specimen of some sort. "I'm glad you're all right. What did he say?"
"Nothing of immediate importance to you. He inquired after your progress with your supposed 'extracurricular lessons' and mentioned that he would be carrying the attack forward due to the accelerated deterioration his body is undergoing."
She took that in, and to his surprise, did not seem perturbed. "Well, that ties in with my theory, doesn't it?" Off his questioning look, she elaborated, "It got me thinking after Harry told Ron and me about the potion that made him a body, and hypothesised that with the amount of Dark Magic he uses, the body will decay progressively every time it serves as a conduit. I haven't found any books with anything talking about such a phenomenon, so it's basically guesswork."
"And you are backing that theory up with...?"
She chewed her bottom lip for a beat. "Well, his current physical form is a mere shadow of a normal human body, isn't it? And with it being a thing of magical creation, it would be logical to conclude that with the power needed for the hexes, curses and Unforgivables he favours sp coursing through the semblance of flesh, it would unravel the magic holding it together, a little like a Muggle electric circuit tripping when an uncommonly large amount of electricity courses through the fuse."
Smart, his inner critic commented, and he felt a corner of his mouth curl in an involuntary smile. This seventh-year student had summarised the same information he had painstakingly scraped together after the Dark Lord had summoned him ten days after his return to corporeal form, livid with panicked rage and ready to hex him into oblivion if he could not explain why the leathery skin was peeling away in great strips so soon after its formation.
Every single waking moment of the following week saw him immersed in stacks and stacks of dusty ancient texts, as Albus had granted him reprieve from his classes to pursue the research. He had to; it was either that or losing their only spy. What Miss Granger had rattled off from the top of her head had been the result of such gruelling study, pieced together like a puzzle from bits and drabbles culled from the aforementioned books. "An admittedly astute hypothesis, Miss Granger, and completely correct.
"Am I?" Her lips parted in a pleased grin. "I really must tell Harry. That, coupled with the mental image of You-Know-Who literally falling to pieces, will give him a good laugh. Heaven knows how much he needs one."
In spite of himself, he tilted his head and asked, "Is he unwell?"
"I suppose it would be rather disappointing for you to hear this, but he is rather hale and hearty. The pressure of his destiny just gets to him, and more than once, he had to go to the Room of Requirement just to work off the tension with a punching bag. The friendly spars I have with him help too."
"You duel with him?"
"Once in a while. I assumed it would be useful for him to pick up some tricks in case he drops his wand, and I didn't think you would be thrilled if I invited him to join us."
Cheeky. He fought a full-blown smile. "Be sure not to injure him too much. The Headmaster would be after my hide, seeing that I am the one who taught you all those... 'tricks'."
She looked startled, then laughed aloud. "Whatever you say, sir."
The utilitarian sound of the clock striking eleven cut through the lighthearted atmosphere between them, and he felt himself returning to his carefully maintained icy persona. "It's late, Miss Granger. Your friends may be worried."
Bowing her head in acquiescence, she turned to leave, but could not resist having the parting shot, "Why Professor, I never knew you cared."
Later, he would recall the easy banter and wonder if he had accepted the girl's presence in his routine and hence his life not just as a protege, but as a contemporary, or Gods forbid, a friend. Her clever little supposition, gathered from the skeletal facts available to her, more than qualified her for the last position, but a part of his mind shied away from attaching that particular tag to her.
His association with her had been, up till then, largely superficial, centring on training and almost nothing else. But someday, he thought as he turned down the covers and crawled into his bed, one day, perhaps he would finally come to fully accept her as an equal, and hopefully a friend.
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The boys were in the common room, as was the norm. It never failed to produce a warm bubble of happiness in her chest to see how far Draco had come from the beginning of the year, finally seeing past the ideals his father had drummed into him and following his own judgement.
At present, the Head Boy was sprawled on the carpet before the fireplace, arguing avidly with Harry over a Transfiguration essay. Ron just sat with his back propped against the coffee table, watching them with an amused expression on his face.
When she entered, both broke away to look at her. "Hermione, we've got a little problem here. Remember the class today when we had to turn hamsters into multi-coloured balls? What was the wand movement?"
"Flick and a stab."
Harry grinned at Draco. "I told—"
"Don't say it," the other boy warned, withdrawing his wand. "Or I'll have to turn you into a multi-coloured ball, consequences be damned."
She had to laugh. "Stop it, you two. I'll have to deduct points from Slytherin for that, and please bear in mind that my Watcher is your Head of House."
Draco looked chagrined. "Oh, right. Pity."
She winked at him, and clapped her hands briskly. "All right, boys, it's getting late and the Head Girl needs her beauty sleep. Scat!"
Grumbling good-naturedly about her bossiness, the boys gathered up their books and headed for their respective dormitories.
Shaking her head, she banished the crumbs from their study snacks and set the furniture to rights with a wave of her wand before sweeping her gaze over the room, checking for anything out of place.
"Um, Hermione?"
She turned to see him standing behind her, in a posture which looked both odd and familiar on him. She smothered a smile, recognising it as the stance he took when he was embarrassed, shy, or otherwise feeling entirely out of his element. "Yes?"
He held out a royal blue velvet box. "I saw this in Hogsmeade the other day...and I thought it suited you. I wanted to get you something for your birthday, see, and I didn't want to get you a present that was run-of-the-mill."
She took it and looked it over. "At least the box isn't green or something," she teased him gently, trying to take the edge off his nervousness. "May I open it?"
At his vague gesture of affirmation, she took the lid off the box and caught her breath. Draco, who watched her expression as intently as one does with a new experiment, silently congratulated himself on a good guess. "Do you like it?"
"Draco," she breathed, lifting out the bracelet. "It's beautiful. Where did you buy it?"
"A little establishment tucked away between two shops."
Tiger's eye gems and diamonds glittered brilliantly as she held it up to the light. "Why tiger's eye?"
He smiled sheepishly and scuffed the floor with his toe. "The streaks of black and brown reminded me of you, in a way, and I wasn't about to get anything with rubies."
She chuckled. "Was it expensive?"
He shrugged. "Not really." Expecting her protest, he added, "I have Galleons to burn, and it's a lot more satisfying to spend it on something for a friend than buying sweets or new robes."
She placed the trinket back into the box reverently, and without warning, stood on tiptoe and kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you. It's really lovely."
"Er...welcome."
With a smile with radiance intense enough to rival the sun, she disappeared into her room. He remained where he was for a long time, hand pressed to the spot where her lips had brushed his cheek, feeling the beginnings of a fierce heat stir to life within him.
Acknowledgements:
SUmmer: Well, since you asked so nicely, here's your chapter. Hope you like!
Lena Le2006: Weehee, another new reviewer! Thanks for reading, and hope you enjoy the new chapter!
rcaqua: here you go, amigo. Thank for reviewing!
montequilladecacahuate: Thanks! Btw, cool name. Are you a fan of Aztec culture? Because I am, and I find your name reminiscient oftheir language.
FanFictionDreamer: Thank you for your support! Here's your new chapter!
P.S. Some scenes may appear redundant to the fic at the moment, but I intend to bring them into play in the larer parts. As soon as I am done with this, I will come back and re-edit everything, just to make sureno loose ends are left and everything falls nicely into place. As you see, I am quite the control freak :P But until the next chapter, ciao!