"You found the locket?" Hermione repeated numbly.

"Come and see!" Ron beckoned.

Hermione and Remus looked at each other, took hands, and stepped into the Floo.

Arriving on the other end, Hermione was grateful for her grip on the older man, for without it she would have immediately stumbled over the brightly-colored objects rolling around the floor of the Burrow. They appeared to be a cross between toy snowmen and rogue bludgers; figures made out of balls that bounced and slammed against each other while they wobbled erratically around the room. One of them was engaged in furious battle with a foot belonging to Ginny, who was sitting at the table and kicking the toy. There hardly seemed enough room for them to roll around with all the people crammed into the room - the Delacours were nowhere in evidence but there were still a number of Weasleys. The noise, the motion, the crowding... it was all a bit much for Hermione. Apparently it bothered Lupin as well, for once she had steadied herself, he let go and slipped around the edges of the group to reach the next room - close enough to hear without being in the thick of things.

In the center of the throng, faces aglow, were Harry and Ron, neatly flanked by Fred and George. Harry was holding up a glittering, swinging object which she recognised as the object of their quest.

"The locket," Hermione confirmed. "Where did you get it?"

"Well," Fred began. "You mentioned Rebekah Burke - "

"- a charming and sophisticated woman - " George cut in.

"- who it happens that we met when we were making business arrangements." Fred continued. "Looking for advice on running a shop, and things like that."

"Which she was only too happy to provide over dinner with two such handsome gentlemen."

"George!" Molly scolded. "She's twice your age!"

"But there's two of us, Mum, so it evens out."

"Anyway," Harry continued for Ron and Hermione while the family chattered in the background. "The twins took us to meet her and explained that we were looking for the locket. It turns out she ran into Mundungus that day before he got to the store. She remembered the locket and bought it from him in memory of her father. Once she heard that I needed it to destroy her father's murderer," he smiled coldly, "she was happy to let me have it."

"So that's it, then," Hermione said. All that worry about how impossible it would be to find the thing and now here it was, showing up when her back was turned. "You went after it without me?"

"We called for you," Ron explained. "But you had already gone out."

"You shouldn't have gone out alone!"

"They weren't alone - " the twins started, but they didn't get very far.

Harry's eyes glittered as he tilted his head towards Hermione. His fist clenched around the locket's golden chain. "You. Are not. My mother."

"What?"

"You think I'm stupid, don't you?" Unusually for Harry, he was not screaming. "Stupid Harry, always trying to be a hero. Can't do anything without you to hold my hand."

"Of course I don't think that!"

"Here, lay off, mate," Ron murmured. "She's just surprised."

"Surprised that we did something without her and it worked," Harry snapped.

"Harry, I'm sorry..." Hermione started. She could feel her eyes starting to sting, and then Molly Weasley's warm hands were on her shoulders. But why wasn't Molly saying anything? Why wasn't anyone standing up for her? "I didn't mean to sound... I'm glad you got it!" She swallowed, forced a smiled onto her face. "Can I see it? I can start looking for spells to destroy..."

"I don't need your help! I can do it on my own!"

"Ron," Molly said firmly. "Why don't you and Harry go and have some tea with Remus?"

"Yes, mum," Ron replied dutifully. Harry glared briefly in Hermione's direction, but allowed himself to be led away.

Molly ran a hand soothingly over Hermione's hair. "Have a seat, dear. I'll get you some biscuits."

Feeling weak in the knees, Hermione took a place at the table next to Ginny. "What's going on?" she asked quietly. "Why is Harry being so... nasty?"

"It's all part of growing up," Molly sighed. "He's a young man now, almost an adult. He'll be of age at the end of the month. Some boys get carried away at times like this with the need to prove how manly they are," she shot a glance at the twins, who just smirked. "Teenagers often rebel against their parents, but poor Harry doesn't have any parents to rebel against. And now he's lost Albus as well. He's very angry and he doesn't have a good way to direct that anger."

"If he weren't dating our sister, I'd say he needed to get la-"

"Fred!" Molly rapped him gently on the head with a wooden spoon.

"Ha ha," Ginny rolled her eyes and swallowed her bite of biscuit. "Like I'd want to, anyway. Not with the way he's acting lately."

"You see, Hermione," George said, taking her hand in his, "you do sort of act like a parent to the boys sometimes. You remind them to do their homework, wash behind their ears, and try not to get themselves killed." He flashed her a sparkling smile. "You're very good at it, too. Ron's probably got the fewest hours logged in the infirmary of any Weasley!"

"Ahem?" Ginny pointed out.

"Any Weasley boy," Fred corrected. "Ginny has far too much sense. She'd stun the billisuggs before trying to reach into their hole. Where's the fun in that?"

Hermione had a quick mental image of Fred lying face down in the mud, arm stuck down a slimy 'sugg burrow, and managed to smile. "What about Percy?" she teased.

"Spent a whole summer down with the Purple Pestilence," George confided. "Nasty stuff. Spots and snot out of control, and all bright purple."

Molly took her own place at the table. "So you see, dear, why Harry has trouble dealing with you right now."

Hermione sighed. "I'm sorry he's upset, but we don't have time for this! Can't you just tell him to let me have the locket so I can start working on it?"

Molly smiled. "It's better if I don't tell him anything. Harry has to make his own decisions. Let him come to you when he needs you. Don't force him. You'll both be happier that way."

"Agh!" Hermione growled. "I don't want to sit around and wait until Harry decides I'm allowed to help him!"

"Every mother bird has to let her babies out of the nest sometime," Molly sighed, with a wistful look at the twins. "No matter how much you want..."

"I'm NOT his mother!" Hermione snapped. "I'm his friend! I'm not going to sit at home knitting just because Harry needs a parent to blame for everything!"

"Careful," Fred said mildly. "He'll hear you."

Hermione stood, nearly knocking over her chair. "Thank you for the tea and biscuits," she managed stiffly. "I think I'll be leaving now. I see there's no place for me here."

And she made her way to the Floo, followed quickly by Ginny.

---

"Marry," Draco repeated. So that's who I'll need to keep secrets from, he thought. My wife. "How? Where? We can't have a proper ceremony - the Ministry would incarcerate everyone who attended. And where will I keep her? We're supposed to be in hiding."

"Separate apartments," Narcissa Malfoy explained. "A place will be arranged for your bride to live, where you can make regular visits. We will file the papers discreetly, and no one will notice. By the time the baby is due, hopefully matters will have settled and we will be able to return to our family estate with your young bride." She petted him absently. "This isn't what I would have wanted for my only son's wedding, but sometimes we must make sacrifices for the good of the family. You understand that, don't you, Draco?"

"Of course," he replied. Isn't that all I've been doing, Mother? Trying to take care of my family? "What does Pansy think?"

"Not Pansy," she said absently.

Not Pansy? But she liked Pansy. Everyone had always assumed that the two of them... Hadn't she been talking about marrying him to Pansy just the past week? "Why not?"

"Pansy Parkinson would have been an acceptable bride," Narcissa allowed. "She made a good match for you. Clever but not too clever, a good face except for that nose, a bit of spirit - and that was where we ran into problems. Violet Parkinson - whose hair color is not at all natural, you realise - would not hear of her daughter being involved in such a clandestine relationship."

Well, no, hiding out alone and waiting for the occasional visit from her husband the spy would not have appealed to Pansy. Nor could she keep a secret. Everyone in the Wizarding World would have heard her complaining about her living conditions before long. "Who, then? Not Millicent. Please."

"Of course not," Narcissa dismissed that name immediately. "What you need is a biddable wife. Someone who can take direction. Someone who will be grateful for a better marriage than she could have arranged otherwise, with her family's standing."

Poor but Pure, in other words. "Who have you selected?"

"Daphne Greengrass."

"Daphne? The mouse?" He could barely summon a mental image of the girl - hunched in a corner with light brown hair hanging over her face.

"You need a quiet girl now," Narcissa scolded. "The family is Irish and stretches back to some prominent druids, even if they have fallen on misfortune lately. Her grades are excellent, and her complexion is admirable. You represent a good opportunity for her." She took a few steps, her hands still folded together in front of her. "Please appreciate the work that everyone has done for you. This arrangement is complicated, but it is best for everyone."

"Of course, Mother." That was the thing about trying to restrain your emotions, Draco mused, it became difficult to argue with anything. Daphne Greengrass! You didn't even notice if she was in the room! Nothing at all like bold, sassy Pansy. And when Pansy teased him, it had always been with the knowledge that he would have her sooner or later. They had always been meant for each other. Now, so soon - how soon? "When were you planning to formalise this?"

"Three days from now should be enough to get everything in place."

In three days he would be a married man? "Will I see her before then?"

Narcissa fluttered a hand as if such details were entirely unimportant. "Speak to Severus if you wish. I don't know if you will have time. The fertility spells will be set at the ceremony, so there's no purpose in wasting your energy before that."

Draco couldn't help it - the corner of his mouth quirked just a little. Actually speaking to a girl he barely knew and hadn't seen since Snape dragged him away from the Tower that night - well, that would be a waste of energy, if her only purpose was to become the broodmare for a new Malfoy heir. Any further discussion with his mother would be an equal waste - she'd told him what part he had to play, and he would go along with it.

There didn't seem to be any point in resisting.

---

It wasn't until the next morning that Hermione remembered.

She'd spent the evening - well, sulking, really. Ginny had offered to break out the Firewhisky again, but after the last time Hermione wasn't certain that was such a good idea. A drunk depressed Ginny had been a surprising thing to handle - what would a drunk pissed-off Hermione be like? Better not to chance it.

Now here she was, in the gray light of a rainy morning, staring at Tobias Snape's death certificate, staring at the address. What would she find there? It sounded like a house, at least, not a hospital. If not Snape's home, then perhaps the home of a neighbor or family friend... Someone who knew him as a child? Someone who knew secrets no one else had guessed?

She shouldn't go.

She had to go.

She shouldn't go alone.

What other choice did she have?

Ginny didn't have an Apparition license. She didn't want to talk to anyone at the Burrow right now. Remus... well. She could call Remus. If he were here right now, she'd go with him. But she didn't want to call him. He'd already spent the previous day with her - if he was really about to lose his freedom, she shouldn't be monopolising his time. It would be rude.

Anyway, he knew about the address, he knew she wanted to go... if he'd thought she needed an escort, he should have shown up!

She was tired of being sensible.

Hermione pulled on her Muggle jeans under her robes and slipped quietly out across the Hogwarts grounds, heading for the edge of the anti-apparition wards. Once she had crossed the boundary, she slipped off the robe, transfiguring it into an open umbrella. The mechanical workings of a true umbrella were a bit complicated to get right, but as long as it was the right shape and held water off her head, who was going to notice?

In her rush, it hadn't even occurred to her that it might not be raining at her destination, Luckily - by some standards - the foul weather spread across enough of England that her umbrella was not out of place. As she shifted magically from one location to another, the gentle drizzle around Hogwarts was replaced with gloomy, heavy rain thunking wetly against her improvised cover.

She stood at the end of an old cobbled street, sloping downwards towards a small town. The district was clearly residential - a sign at the far end of the street might be advertising a tiny corner shop, or it might be just another For Rent notice. She could see several of those from here, some faded from long display. Water sloshed and gurgled through the stones and gutters. In the other direction, she could see an old mill looming over the buildings. There were no people and few signs of life in evidence - hardly surprising in this weather. Most of the windows she could see were blocked by shutters. One doorstep contained a hanging basket with a still-green plant inside of it - everything else within her view was painted in shades of dingy gray.

Hermione picked her way along the wet pavement, careful not to slip on the wet rags of decaying newsprint, to the door of the house that she suspected belonged to the Snapes. It looked much like its neighbors - cramped, narrow, out-of-date. No clear signs to show if someone did or didn't live there. She knocked on the door and waited. No answer.

After a quick glance up and down the street to be sure no one was looking, she pushed open the mail slot on the door and craned her head to try and peek inside. Only a tiny bit of floor was visible this way - fairly normal floor, not torn up or swarming with cockroaches. There didn't seem to be any lighting on in the entrance hall. And - yes, there was some junk mail scattered on the floor. But was there a name?

Straining her eyes until they hurt, Hermione thought she could just make out letters forming the name of Snape. Considering how long it took junk mail to catch up with the times, they might not have lived here in sixteen years - but they had been here!

"Alohomora," Hermione murmured, and pushed the front door open. She paused at the entrance to listen for any sounds of occupation. Nothing. She dropped the open umbrella beside the door and scooped up the fallen mail. As expected, it was only advertising, with postmarks ranging back over the past six months. Clearly, no one visited this house very often. There were no names on the letters besides 'Snape' and 'Occupant', though.

Hermione closed the door quietly behind her. "Lumos." The faint light of her wand illuminated a small sitting room. She could make out an old threadbare sofa facing a darkened fireplace and an armchair with a table and folding tea-tray beside it. A lamp swung from a chain on the ceiling. A small cabinet in the far corner appeared to hold a gramophone and a collection of records, but she did not go over to check.

She had seen the books.

Books! The walls were simply covered with them! Most of them looked heavy and old, leather-bound with titles in tiny gold lettering that was too painful to read by wandlight. Eagerly, Hermione waved her wand at the empty fireplace, causing a blue flame to blossom and burn there without fuel. She skipped from shelf to shelf, checking titles at random. Dickens... Shakespeare... Marvolio the Mad... It was primarily a Muggle book collection, but there were definitely wizardly titles mixed in with the mundane.

Did that mean...

... Snape still lived here?

Hermione looked around nervously. Nobody would collect all these books and just abandon them! But the room was dark and musty. The mail was uncollected. The house was neglected.

House? Where was the rest of it? She looked around again. There was only the one door to the outside. The room had no other exits? That couldn't be right. Where was the kitchen, the bedroom? Either this house was an elaborate deception, a fake home for receiving mail and nothing else, or the rest of it was being hidden from her - by magic?

She moved her wand in the form of a triangle, pausing at three points. "Apparecium!"

Nothing invisible suddenly became apparent.

Not invisible... but a portkey, a transfigured door, any number of things could be hidden without being invisible. She needed to check for signs of magic.

"Specialis revelio!"

Hermione threw a hand over her eyes as a blaze of light rippled through the room. Magic, spells upon spells, layered over the years, all rushed over her in an impenetrable blur. It took precious moments for her head and vision to clear. I should have brought an Auror with me, Hermione thought. Clearly that's not the right way to search a wizard's home.

Perhaps it was because she had just been thinking of Aurors and their methods of investigating dangerous magical criminals, perhaps it was just blind luck - but at that instant, Hermione became aware that someone had entered the room. Her wand was already in her hand - reflexively, wordlessly, she Shielded herself before even turning to look behind her.

It was Severus Snape.

There was the sense of something flickering through the air, but the spell, whatever it was, rebounded harmlessly off her shield charm.

"Better," Snape sneered. "You do learn. But there are some spells, Miss Granger, that a simple shield cannot-"

"Professor!" Hermione blurted quickly. "It's all right! I figured it out! I know you're on our side. I was looking for you. If you'll just come back with me, I can explain-" Her words were cut off as Snape made a quick upwards motion with his wand. A force, like an invisible hand, closed itself around her neck and pulled, stopping the air and lifting her onto the tips of her toes. The wand slipped from her fingers as, by instinct, she clawed at her neck, fighting to breathe, but there was nothing there to take hold of. Her eyes met Snape's, pleading for release.

"What do you know about me?" he whispered.

Images flashed behind her eyes. The book, Property of the Half-Blood Prince. Waking up in Snape's office among the scattered papers. Sitting with Ginny, arguing with Harry and Ron in the fire. Talking to Lupin and Tonks in Hogsmeade. Lupin speaking tearfully about Lily, and Hermione reaching out to hold him.

Snape's booted foot reached out, kicked Hermione's wand away. "Blind, ignorant meddler!" he shouted. A flick of his wrist, and the invisible hand around Hermione's neck flung her aside, her head impacting painfully against one of the bookshelves. She stared at him in shock, blinking away tears. "Have you learned nothing - done nothing - to support Potter's foolish quest?"

Slytherin's locket, dangling from Harry's hand...

Remembering at last that Legilimency was enhanced by eye contact, Hermione looked away, frantically searching the floor for her wand. This was all going wrong. She had to make him stop, had to make him listen to her. If they could just talk things out...

"Crucio."

When she was very young, Hermione had needed to have a baby tooth removed that hadn't become loose yet. There had been all sorts of painkillers used before the pliers came out, of course, but there was no way to blunt the terrifying feeling of roots deep inside your body being torn and broken. And later, as the anesthetics began to wear off, there was the unspeakable pain working through her body, leaving her too weak to scream, too helpless to do anything more than bleed and cry.

For just a moment, that was what the Cruciatus felt like.

As the pain spiraled away, Hermione gasped for breath, dazed, her eyes no longer able to focus on the dark shadow that loomed over her. The only thought her mind could manage was To cause that much pain... he had to really mean it...

"Well, Miss Granger," the hateful voice taunted. "It seems I've finally found a way to keep you quiet."

Unable to protect her body, Hermione could only fight to protect her mind. She squeezed her eyes shut, refusing to look at him again.

"Killing you would cause too much trouble," Snape continued. "If you disappear, people will come looking. Instead, I'm going to teach you a lesson. One that, I trust, your vaunted brain is capable of understanding."

"Evanesco."

Eyes still tightly shut, Hermione could not understand at first why the room had become so much colder. It took long moments to process that he had caused something to disappear - her clothes.

"Keep your nose out of things that don't concern you," Snape hissed.

Sobbing quietly, Hermione wrapped her arms around herself and huddled on the floor, waiting for the next horrible thing to happen.

Nothing.

Silence.

Was it a trick? Was he just waiting for her to open her eyes so he could torture her again?

No! She wouldn't give in!

It was so quiet...

Minutes stretched endlessly while Hermione warred with herself, shaking with cold, fear, and exhausted pain. At last, she dared to raise her head.

The room was dark... and she was alone.

She rubbed her arms to warm them, noticing that at least her underthings - tame blue cotton - had remained. She felt sick and dizzy. There was no point in trying to find any clues here. She was in no shape to make sense of things - and if Snape had left anything of value here, it would certainly be booby-trapped. She crawled around the floor to find her wand, then made several fuzzy attempts before her discarded umbrella at last turned back into the original robe.

The cool summer rain soaked into her hair and skin as she staggered outside. She couldn't Apparate like this. She'd splinch herself for certain.

Why had it all gone so wrong?

No. Think about it later. Right now, she had to get somewhere safe, get some nice warm tea inside her, and center her thoughts enough to make the jump back home.

It was nearly noon when Hermione finally stumbled back into Hogwarts, weary to the bone and desperately wanting a long hot soak in the Prefects' Bath. But before she could get there, a frantic Ginny materialised at her elbow. "Where have you been?"

"Just out," Hermione mumbled.

"I couldn't find you!" Ginny wailed. "We've got to go, right away!"

"Go? Go where?"

"To St Mungo's! It's Ron - he's dying!"

---

Author's Note:

If you thought Severus was going to welcome Hermione's good intentions with open arms - what story have YOU been reading:)

Today is a very bad day to be Hermione.

Okay, so the H/S interaction was still fairly short, but next chapter, you'll get what you really wanted - Snape's perspective.