January came and February passed by, and against all odds, Hermione found her lessons with Snape more and more intriguing.
Of course, she couldn't tell Harry or Ron, who were wrapped up in prejudice about their Potions Master. Worse, Harrys mental condition rather fainted than gained some strength, she frequently overheard them discussing Harry ever returning nightmare of closed doors in dark corridors. In order to get it off her chest, she began to express herself in a diary, though out of exaggerated caution, decided to go for separate rolls of parchments at first and tie them together later. Sending an owl to a Muggle shop asking for a simple notebook might provoke Umbridge to enforce a decree according to which all personal notes must be approved by the Inquisitor, she joked with Ginny at a merry Saturday evening, and placing and order at Flourish & Blotts, one never knew what kind of book she would finally end up with. Ron once watched her scribbling about an introspective task Snape had given her, but did not inquire further when she lied to him that she was writing to Krum.
If it hadn't been for the DA meetings, she mused, Harry would have rather stayed at Grimmauld place with Sirius than attending school. After his two months with Snape, she became seriously worry about her friend. Not only did he seems more tired, unfocused and thinner than ever, but in his mimic he displayed hints of emotions that were, he had told Ron, probably not his own. He held it together during those mood swings. Yet a small, reasonable part of her considered it a bold, if not reckless decision from Dumbledore to leave him beneath Umbridge's lash and at Snape's mercy, who, she was certain, treated Harry with much less caution than her. Snape's loathing against Harry's father proved an insurmountable obstacle to Snape, blinding him against Harrys limits. During their encounters, the Potions master hardly ever crossed a line with her. For now, her lessons with him – she caught herself thinking of them rather as appointments -, had an upsetting effect on her, but in a productive way. She wondered, however, what Snape perceived he gained from it – then asked herself how she had come to think of him as a man who expected something in return for his teachings at all.
"Professor", she raised her voice after their usual calming exercise at the beginning of each meeting, "Will it be easier to clear my mind off things regardless of the emotion?"
"No", Snape replied.
It had become something of a habit for them to be seated near the fireplace, with a stack of woods just high enough that it burned down just in time for Hermione to leave. His office was kept in the dark, except for some smoothly illuminated vials on each cupboard. They weren't covered in as much dust anymore.
"Miss Granger, can you think of a feeling that, at first, transcends all rational processing?"
"Feeling suggesting that it's a superficial perception? Superficial to the psyche?"
"Yet encompassing and, sometimes, overwhelming. Yes."
"Pain", she guessed, and to her great relief, he nodded.
"What else? In contrast to that?"
"Pleasure." Mind racing, she caught herself thinking if he would illustrate these topics to her like all others so far. And how.
"When it comes to pain", he said, "most human beings find themselves able to distinguish different forms and degrees concerning intensity. Up to a certain point, at least. Beyond that, pain -", quite a heavy pause here, "will be experienced as a state of mind. The identity remains intact, at first at least, but there's a dispute among researchers that the core elements of personality start... moving. One might compare it to seismic activity, effecting an individual, transforming it."
"It's represented in language as well, then?", she added. "To be in pain?"
"So to speak, yes. When a person has reached that point, even the most accomplished Occlumens won't unravel their mind from pain's entwinement."
"I see how it works with pain", she agreed, "but does that apply for pleasure as well?"
He took a deep breath, and, quite unusual, broke eye contact. Touching his temples with thumb on one and finger on the other, he tried hard not to frown upon her statement. After a very thin crease between the brows had disappeared, he placed the chin on it and turned to her again, back bowed slightly and his arm resting on his knees.
"I see you have been honest with me." Somehow, 'Miss Granger' got stuck in his throat underway.
"Er – concerning what?"
"Concerning the nature of your relationship with Mr Krum."
"Why should I – oh." The scale of her revelation hit her like a Stunning Spell.
They kept a long silence, with intermitting cracks between them.
"Since we can not built on your experience of encompassing pleasure", he finally stirred them out of these depths, "We'll take a detour."
Hermione felt utterly grateful that a heat, completely unrelated to the fire, began to vanish from her face. "A detour?"
"Seeing that I cannot subject my student to overwhelming - pain", he pointed out in a very strange voice, "I would like to offer you some artificial experience."
"That would hardly be -"
"Not substitute, Miss Granger", he anticipated her reproach, "Artificial."
"What are you suggesting?"
"I will invite you", he said, "To my mind." He looked perfectly serious, but her breath had not quite steadied itself. She kept glaring at him. It left him unimpressed.
"We're beyond that. I know you trust me."
"Do I?"
"Or else you'd have left minutes ago."
Their surroundings became familiarly blurred. His eyes grew larger, swallowing all sound, light and shadows.
Reshaping again, Hermione felt relieves that she recognized the room immediately. The familiarity came with a disappointment: Half-heartedly, she had hoped to see a more personal part of her teacher, but those were the dungeons, with a dull potions lesson taking place.
"... see the change in colour in the various samples?", a grey-haired, slim man in an unfittingly fine robe elaborated, pointing to a series of vials with ingredients each lighter than the next in line, "You can tell a potions maturity by different features, depending on ..."
"Guess you can tell the purity of his blood by its colour as well", snapped a dark-haired witch next to the huge brawny prefect next to her, but quietly enough only the surrounding Slytherins could hear her. She burst into a high-pitched, cold giggle. Giving him a shove, she turned halfway to the young man, revealing a flawless face with high cheekbones and deep, dark eyes. Hermione recoiled in shock. "We should ambush him when term's finished do some empirical research", she egged him on.
"I do realize", hissed a boy who was as bony as the prefect had built his statue, "that you have private business not only after term, but mind you allow me to lis-"
"Uuuuuh, Snivellus got distracted from his favorite subject", young Bellatrix teased him, loud enough now to make a few Ravenclaw turn and frown upon them, "If you're so good at potions, why can't you brow yourself a decent shampoo?"
Young Snape did not blush, but Hermione, having no body to hit the wood with, walked through it and saw him clenching a fist beneath the desk.
"No one minds you two both perfectly pure-blooded and promising students getting laid, or is that the three of you?", Snape shot back, "But some of us-"
"Mind your attitude, half-blood", the huge bloke grumbled, drawing his wand under his cloak.
"While you're at it, don't leave it at shampoo, prepare an Amortentia as well", snarled another Slytherin next to the bloke. His shoulders were as high as the prefect's and they shared the same hawkish-looking nose, "So you don't have to leave for summer holidays as a virgin again."
Bellatrix gave him a glowing, appreciating smile. Now that she had his attention, she fully came down at Snape, "Indeed, Snivellus... might save you the shampoo after all, if you don't do your hair with one hand in your -"
"I said, gather round", their teacher interrupted a dangerously good mood of her. Unwilling to openly disrespect him, Bellatrix followed the bloke suit, who had risen in a surprisingly swift movement, considering he was probably twice her weight.
Hermione kept an eye on young Severus, who had now blushed after all and turned down to an old, run-down notebook.
"Hasn't changed much, has she?", Hermione commented dryly, the corner of her mouth twitching.
Snape, breathing unnaturally deeply, refused to answer. Hermione reminded herself that they both, nowadays, met each other regularly if Voldemort commanded them to.
"Do you recognize her playmates, Miss Granger?"
"The Lestrange brothers? Rudolphus and ..."
"Rabastan", he added.
"So the slimmer one is Rudolphus? She obviously has a crush on him."
"No", Snape replied, an odd sparkle in his eye, "That's Rabastan. He had as much brains as his brother had brawns."
He did not delineate any further, so Hermione focused on what might post as a clue. Young Severus had stayed behind his classmates, scribbling hastily onto the sheets. Their teacher let him remain seated, either out of habit or to ease the tension. Judging from the few minutes she had been watching him, Hermione could not tell how sensitive he was regarding such among his students. Severus, however, showed no sign of anger any more when they returned. Bellatrix, on the other hand, kept her temper in check or reduced it to shoving and poking Rudolphus, who seemed to understand it as an odd expression of affection. That provided Hermione with enough time to read Severus' notes.
Apparently he had copied pages of a potions book she had not heard of, the narrow but proper text at left hand side of the parchment contained part of a recipe for a potion ridiculously complicated. Quite in contrast to the neat part Severus had added various comments, not all appreciative of the authors: 'WAY to much dragon blood, ruins storability', 'cutting them to slices instead relieves juice much quicker', 'hastens increase in viscosity, better use squid than Grindylow'. She wondered whether he simply wrote down results of experiments or made those alterations up entirely.
When the bell rang, the Slytherins quickly stuffed their bags, complaining about yesterdays's lunch, obviously that was their way of expressing acknowledging lunch break. Severus fell behind (with Hermione having a distant feeling he made a fuzz of checking his cauldron for leaks), so no one noticed him not heading for the Great Hall, but to seventh floor and a familiar, apparently empty corridor. After he had walked by the wall three times, muttering something she could not understand, an iron-wrought handle peeled off the stone, followed suit by a light wooden door. Severus did not bother to look whether anyone saw him enter the Room of Requirement, so Hermione and Snape had to quicken their pace if the Room wouldn't let them enter in a memory.
Snape knew his way around its interiors, of course, and swept through between the seasoned, yet precious oak banks with several experimental arrangements, sparkling and blubbering merrily in their containers. He automatically avoided the low-dangling lanterns, casting an even and soft light over the workplace, and placed himself in a weathered leather chair. It looked quite comfortable but had a stiff back, as if to prevent its occupant from relaxing too much, but was clearly crafted for long hours of studying. She recognized the desk in front of it: It was the little less weathered dark and heavy table in Snape's office nowadays. Snape flipped through the pages of a book probably from the middle ages, judging from its cover, then fidgeted to the front of his seat, placed the chin on his elbow and kept watching his younger self.
"Let's see, Miss Granger, if you figure out a way to help yourself to an artificial experience of pleasure."
She felt puzzled, and a little impatient. "How am I-"
"If you watch closely, the opportunity will reveal itself to you", he replied cryptically.
"You can't hear us?", she inquired, nodding at Severus, who had helped himself to a dry snack from a box in his bag and headed to an old, damaged yet clean sink, rolled up his sleeves and started to wash his hands thoroughly. He reminded her of a surgeon, preparing for a difficult procedure.
"No. But please note that all substance matters in here, so whatever you hit or walk into is solid", he informed her. "And if you recall your instructions on the use of a time turner, the normal mind usually tolerates very little irritation in their perception of laws of nature."
"Ok."
Young Severus had finished his ablution and turned to one of the cauldrons. While he sternly gazed at the steaming liquid in it, stirring regularly and adjusting the temperature, Hermione took a closer look at the arranged vials. Twelve out of fifteen were filled with a dark, red, thick substance, about an inch high. Next to the old wooden test tube rack stood a tiny bottle, labelled barely legible with 'Essence of Dittany'. Three of them at the right end had a label on them, reading 'w.', another three 'c'.
Three vials next to each other were empty.
"Is that -"
"Blood, yes".
"And what is supposed to be in -"
Severus was provided her with an answer instantly: He had withdrawn his attention from the cauldron, facing Hermione if he had been able to see her. He quickly uncorked the Dittany. Fetching a clean knife from the desk, he held his right hand over the empty vials, and cut himself deeply between thumb and index finger.
"There's a Conservation Charm on each vial, I suppose?", Hermione spoke rather to distract herself from the young man, who coolly watched his blood drip and fill the empty vials. When they were filled with the same amount of blood as the others – and Hermione had no doubt that Severus had been counting the drops silently – Severus poured some Dittany over the wound, which sealed itself in a matter of seconds.
"Of course. One can hardly compare a fresh sample to an old one."
She struggled to keep herself shivering in disgust. He seemed to notice nonetheless.
"You'll see what it was good for." She couldn't determine whether his tone was meant to calm her down, but it made her feel patronized.
Severus stirred the liquid, now issuing silver clouds of thick smoke, then extinguished the fire beneath it. Pulling a thin drawer she had not noticed, Hermione discovered that Severus kept his instruments neatly arranged. He took several ladles and weighed them in his hands, inspecting its capacity, then decided to use a common long-handled very small spoon. Taking the whole cauldron from its mounting, he filled a simple jar with thin, silver liquid.
From somewhere distant, the school bell echoed through the castle. Severus did not flinch, he either had a free period now or did not care for the upcoming lesson. Yet he apparently perceived the sound as signal: With skill and ease, he put the exact same amount of potion into each vial.
First nine of them turned pitch black and those with 'c' on them turned transparent, which was commented by Severus only with a frown. The blood in last three vials labelled with 'w.' shrivelled and shrunk, until it looked like an overly long dried chili.
He pulled it from the rack, waving a non-existent scent toward his nose.
"Hm."
He shook the vial, which made the chili collapse to dust.
Severus stuffed it back into the racked, allowing himself a sigh of frustration.
"What were you trying to prove?", Hermione inquired.
Snape had been watching the scene with his usual flat expression. "Can you tell me what potion you're looking at?"
"Well, as a student I can hardly identify a potion that was not brewed correctly."
"The potion's fine", Snape said, unmoved by her provocation.
"Then I'd say..." She quickly recalled the few steps she had watched, colour, shape and amount of the steam, its thicker smoke than actual viscosity... "Sorry, I do not recognize it."
"Tell me what it was tested against."
"Blood of – of a half-blood? Your blood?"
Snape nodded.
"And a pure-blood wizard?"
Another nod.
"So the third sample is from someone who was muggle-born?"
"Exactly." For the first time, he looked slightly uncomfortable. "Slytherin House always held the … genealogic approach in high regards."
"Without any reason, for that matter."
Severus had withdrawn from the desk in the meantime, rolled back his sleeves to their full length and begun to scribble fast on the notes she had been reading during his potions class.
"So who else -" She actually bend forward to double-check the inscription. The letters stubbornly refused to give away their meaning. "- might have had an interest -", she sternly gazed at the remaining light silver liquid in the jar, "- to let themselves be cut and drained by you?"
She thought of the ancient Slytherin, who must have infiltrated the minds of so many young people, barely conscious of this social incendiary, and people like Lucius Malfoy taking pride in their ancestry generations later, a hubris warranted by nothing, no achievements, no exceptional skill whatsoever... yet once established as hegemonic group, certain wizards obviously couldn't resist but to assume one being to be worthier than another, like they suppressed house-elves and goblins and disregarded people they considered less human -
"Those are sample's from half-blood's as well, aren't they?", she inquired, "A werewolve's?"
"Precisely", Snape commented. He showed no obvious sign of satisfaction, but Hermione could tell she had achieved some recognition.
"Lupin's blood?"
"Yes."
"And this?", she pointed to the vial labelled 'c.', now containing transparent mixture,"Was this a centaur's blood?"
"That would be correct as well."
Soon as her excitement faded slightly, more questions popped up in her mind. "How on earth did you convince Lupin to give you -"
"It would seem, Miss Granger", Snape replied, tilting his head slightly, "That you chosen friend has given you some kind of narrow perspective."
He rose just in time to make way for his younger self to drop himself into the chair: Severus roughly pulled out the large, deep drawer from the desk he still kept, threw in his notes and slammed it back shut, obviously frustrated.
"He gave it to you? Voluntarily?"
"I told him I was interested in the potion", Snape answered, deliberately avoiding to look at her. "Which is true. Unfortunately, I have to admit, I did not succeed in producing a decent amount – or any amount - of the Wolfsbane Potion that could be used safely, at least not any time before my N.E.W.T.s."
They remained silent for a while, watching Severus recovering from his disappointment and pulling out his notes again.
"But we haven't dealt with our original task yet", he finally said. "Come over here."
He stood in front of an old, heavy, dusty cupboard, which she instantly recognized as nowadays standing in his office, too. Just as in the present, it was filled with glowing, transparent, thick and all sorts of potions, much less in quantity, but neatly arranged and labelled as she was accustomed to.
"We will wait for me to go to the bathroom, which should happen any minute now", he instructed her, "And then you take this small, oval flacon from my cupboard."
"What's in it?"
"A premature, light version of Amortentia. Not half as strong as a fully matured version, and it wears off after ninety minutes. You are familiar with its effect, I presume?"
"Actually, no."
"In layman's terms", he sighed, preparing himself for the storm, "This is a love potion."
She blushed, after all.
"Amortentia in its mature form causes strong obsession, not actual love", he explained, before she regained her countenance, "This one, however, will induce only common arousal. Now quick. It has to be you who takes it, otherwise you cannot withdraw it from my memory."
Hermione found he head to be unusually fuzzy and messy, so when she saw Severus vanish in the cabin behind the sink, she just did as Snape had told her to: The cupboard's door was not sealed, and the small bottle vanished completely in her robes.
"Won't you discover it to be missing?", she voiced her first clear thought.
"It's in the shelf in my memory", he said, "So if we leave before I notice it to be gone we should be fine."
"Pretty much like using a time turner", she agreed. "So how do we figure our when to leave?"
"I'll be back in a minute", Snape answered, "Then I'll clean up and leave. When we exit the Room, it should be save to return."
"Should be?"
"This is my mind we're messing with", he reminded her, "So please calm down, Miss Granger."
Severus had already emerged from the cabin, and, quite as Snape remembered, started to tidy up his workplace.
"What will happen if we break the connection before we leave the Room?"
"I do not wish to find out", he admitted, a very serious look on his face now. "This is very ancient magic we're relying upon now ..."
They closely watched Severus Vanish the rest of his potion, bottling up the jar's content for some later analysis, and heading toward the dusty cupboard.
It was way too late when she discovered her mistake.
Hermione, in her hurry, had left it open half an inch, despite it being tightly closed before.
Then, several things happened at once.
Snape gave a muffled sigh of pain, clutching his temples, sinking to his knees. The Room shook heavily, dust falling down like dirty snow upon them. Severus threw in the bottle carelessly and slammed the door shut, breaking a tile. Hermione quickly pulled fragments out of her hair, cutting her fingertips, Snape still crouching next to her. Severus decided for a quick getaway, summoned his bag and headed for the door.
"Get up!", she hissed at Snape, who did not budge. "Locomotor!"
The spell lifted him in his huddled position. Wand drawn, careful not to touch anything, Hermione hurried to follow Severus, Snape hovering behind her, inches above the ground.
They barely reached the door in time. Half-pulling, half-shoving floating Snape through the frame, Hermione noticed with a shock, that where she had touched the handle, spots of blood from her fingertips remained visible. Yet Severus had broken into a run in the corridor, and did no look back when he cast the Closing spell over his shoulder, and never noticed.
"Let's not mess with my memories again", Snape gave a muffled sound, "If you mind?"
She lifted the enchantment. Soon after his feet hit solid ground, Snape stood back up, with his stern and stiff expression back in check.
He waited until the sound of Severus steps had subsided in the empty corridor, then turned to Hermione.
"I recall telling you not to bewitch me", he said, "But since this was a completely adequate application of a Hover Charm, I suggest we see eye to eye on the matter."
His face seemed to draw closer, larger, threatening to swallow her. Their surroundings began to loose contrast, became a blur, with two round dark circles in it... and then, his eyes in the centre of it all, present Snape's office manifested itself around them.
The fire had almost burned down. A dim, warm light barely reached to the cupboard present Hermione felt she had stolen from just a second ago.
"Now that you're equipped with all access to an encompassing experience", he concluded, "I suggest we put our lessons to a hold until you've had time to -", a very thick pause, "Complete your range of experience and emotion."
Her mouth felt oddly dry. It had been a long evening.
"Good night, Professor."
"Good night, Miss Granger."
Hermione hurried to the dormitory almost as quick as she had fled from the Room of Requirement. It seemed ironic to her that Snape had experienced the effects of a shaken mindset, and recovered so quickly, for as she lay wide awake for hours, brooding that her bad impression of him might not be an accurate recollection just as well.