A/N: Sorry that it's been a while, but I promise that I have plenty more chapters planned!

Chapter 23: The Christmas Ball Part Two

For a moment, absolutely nothing happened while Hermione took in the enormity of the action she had just initiated. Her thoughts were so jumbled and panicked that all she could really think about was how her lips were pressed against Snape's. He had gone as stiff as a board in surprise and Hermione's heart sank at the realisation that she had just forced this upon one of the only true friends that she actually had here.

However, before she could pull away, something seemed to come over Severus at the sound of the tapestry's movement. Within the blink of an eye, he began to respond to the kiss in earnest, taking a hold of Hermione's waist to hold her close. She could no longer tell whether it was genuine or pretend when he nipped at her lower lip for entrance. At her gasp of surprise, he used the opportunity to delve his tongue into her mouth, clumsily brushing against her own.

All thoughts of their audience forgotten, she reached up to snuggle closer to his body, effectively draping herself over his form as her hands tangled in his hair at the base of his neck. As if possessed, Snape groaned and pushed them both to the other side of the passageway, switching their positions so it was now her that was sandwiched between the wall and his body. The action surprised her so much that she let out an involuntary and slightly embarrassing whimper of his name.

He growled again and enveloped her mouth with his own, muttering a curse against her lips when they came up for air between kisses. It was obvious to Hermione that he was quite inexperienced with his sloppy kisses and yet he seemed as keen to learn in this aspect as he was with potions. His enthusiasm more than made up for this, causing her to whimper in reluctance when finally he broke away.

Their dilated eyes locked onto one another for a moment before he lowered his chapped lips to her collarbone. She distantly felt her head roll backwards against the wall when she felt his warm thigh creep between her own, bunching up the skirts as he trailed kisses up her neck. It wasn't until he closed his lips around her pulse point that she opened her eyes in surprise to see the faces of three Marauders staring back at her.

Choking out a genuine cry of surprise, even though she had distantly known that they would be there, she frantically pushed at Snape's shoulders to pry him off of her. Ever the gentleman, Severus backed off as asked, not breaking eye contact until the last possible second and looking just as rumpled as Hermione assumed she did. Hermione couldn't work out if he moved so reluctantly because he truly didn't want to stop, or if he were just playing along as she had asked him.

In the heat of the past few moments, Hermione had completely forgotten what she had been doing, or at least intending to do. Her ruse to keep her head and eventually talk her way out of the situation dissolved as soon as Snape's lips had responded, and now she was even worse off. She was entirely too warm, flustered and thoroughly snogged to think of anything to say, and now she had even more to worry about, if his response was any indication.

Finding it too difficult to look into Snape's unfathomable eyes without knowing what he was thinking, she decided to look at their onlookers instead, wincing once she realised that it was almost as bad. She soon became aware of why they had been allowed to continue embracing for so long without interruption by the looks of complete surprise and horror that reflected back at her.

No one made a sound or even attempted to move and Hermione was almost tempted to take Snape's hand and sneak past them before a strangled sort of sound escaped Sirius's throat. It was like this opened the floodgates, because almost simultaneously, both Peter and James loudly demanded, "What the hell are you doing?"

She just looked between them both before looking at Sirius, swallowing deeply before replying, "I think that's fairly obvious given the evidence."

Snape snorted and her eyes were drawn towards him again, she briefly noted that the collar of his dress robes was skewed, he had fairly rumpled hair and his lips had the faint smudge of her red lipstick smeared in one corner. Unthinkingly she raised her hand to rub it away but didn't get far before Sirius's hand enveloped her wrist to stop her.

He yanked her around to face them again, "Don't get clever Mione. You know what we mean."

The other two boys nodded vehemently in agreement, both sending side eyed glares towards Snape, who did not respond in any way. It was so dramatic and unnecessary that Hermione couldn't help but find it hilarious, though she kept her amusement to herself in order to keep the peace.

She didn't stop herself from rolling her eyes though, "I was just wishing Severus here a Merry Christmas, if you must know," she drawled, hoping her lie would be convincing and that none of them would hear the fast tempo of her beating heart, "Though if you're jealous, I'm sure he wouldn't mind wishing you a Merry Christmas too."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Snape recoil slightly and let out a small smile, which proved to make the Marauders much angrier, as she had predicted it would. "Since when has this been going on?" Peter began to ask quietly under his breath before being interrupted by James's, "You can't be serious Hermione?"

When Sirius didn't jump to make his usual joke, she just rolled her eyes again and looked down to right her rumpled clothes, effectively avoiding their eye contact while she lied, "A while now, not that it's any of your business. Now would you mind moving so we can go back to the Ball please?"

A dark sound rumbled from James' throat as Hermione turned to sort out Snape's collar for him, he just let her do it for him with no fuss, though he started to smirk at the boys when he realised that it irked them so much. "So is he your boyfriend then?" James asked and Hermione looked up into Snape's eyes when they both swiftly replied.

"No."

Peter scoffed, "You're letting him use you like that, then? I've seen you outside of lessons and the library, he barely even acknowledges you as a friend, let alone whatever this is."

Hermione turned back to look at the Marauders when looking at Snape for too long proved to be too difficult, "It doesn't matter what we are, we're perfectly fine to work it out without all of your input." Noticing that they were all more than preoccupied with her and Snape rather than with why they were in such close proximity with their hiding spot, she attempted to see if they were suspicious, "What are you three doing walking the halls alone right now anyway? Where's Remus?"

Sirius let out a frustrated sound from the back of his throat, and reached for her arm again, replying, "That doesn't matter, we're leaving anyway."

She let out a tiny breath of relief when none of them clocked onto the coincidence of the location of their passageway to the Marauders meet-up location and then stepped away from Sirius's outstretched hand. "Actually, I haven't finished giving my friend his Christmas gift yet, so if you'll all excuse me."

In a last ditch attempt to get away from them to explain to Snape why she had actually kissed him in the first place, she pushed him backwards towards the other end of the passageway. Unfortunately, James didn't like the sound of that, "If you think we're letting him be alone with you tonight then you obviously don't know us well enough."

"Letting?" She echoed back, outraged yet again by the staggering amount of misplaced male bravado that currently surrounded her, "What makes you think that…"

Unfortunately, the verbal lashing that she felt building up inside of her was halted by their previously mysteriously quiet fifth party, "Hang on sweetheart," Snape cut in with drawling voice, obviously adding the term of endearment to further rile her friends, as she knew that he would never actually use it seriously. "I'm sure that you'd rather be alone to give it to me, and you know that if we wait till after Christmas then it will just raise the suspense."

She ignored the suggestive tone with which he talked, slightly confused as to how to reply to his improvisation and so just nodded, vaguely noticing how the other boys scowled and fidgeted. Snape seemed to take great pleasure in this, and so reached out to hold her waist again, "Until then, Merry Christmas." His lips had scarcely touched the skin of her cheek before she felt herself being bodily yanked backwards and out of the hidden passageway. The last she saw of Snape's face was one of mingled triumph and something else that she couldn't quite identify.

Her gasp of indignation was swiftly cut off as she was hoisted over Sirius's shoulder and they began to walk swiftly back in the direction of the Great Hall. Momentarily baffled that their cavemen sensibilities would sink so low, she stayed in his hold for a few moments, flushing deeply with embarrassment and anger at her position.

Thankfully, this small lapse in judgement swiftly faded and she escaped his hold with a small stinging jinx aimed at his arse. He yelped in surprise and pain and let her go, only to instantly forget about it once he saw the thunderous look on her face. A quick glance and Peter and James revealed that they also looked equally scared.

"What do you guys think you're doing?" She ground out.

"Helping you?" Peter attempted bravely when no one replied for a moment.

Hermione placed her hands on her waist and firmly placed herself in the middle of the corridor ahead of them. "And what gives you the impression that I needed help in the first place?"

Yet again, no one responded for a second and Hermione wondered how she must look draped in black, with mad hair and an even angrier facial expression. "Well? What are your excuses this time?"

James coughed and she zeroed in on him, "We've told you that he's bad for you already, and now you're just letting him use you."

"What makes you think that I'm not using him?"

Sirius scoffed and Hermione glanced at him, "I guess it's alright for Sirius to sleep around with half the school then, but once I want a relationship with someone, I have to respectfully date them like a good little girl?"

Peter rubbed his eyes tiredly, "You know it's not that, it's just that it's Snape." The derision in his tone frustrated her again and so she decided to reiterate her previous tactics, slowly releasing her wand from where she had hidden it in her sleeve. The boy's eyes all followed this movement and visibly flinched.

"We've been over this time and time again, I can be friends with whoever I want, I can date whoever I want, and if I need to, I can stop hanging around with whoever I want." She raised her eyebrows at the final statement, flicking her wand lazily. "I love you guys, but this needs to stop, or I will stop it for you."

For a moment, none of the boys moved as Hermione flickered her eyes between them all, until finally Peter gained the courage yet again. "Fine, you have got a point. But I just want you to know that I don't like it."

Hermione sighed at the comment, glad that at least one of them could see how stupid that they were acting, "That's all I want. Just for you guys to back off and let me work that out for myself." She looked towards James, who had been the most annoyingly protective until now.

He grimaced, "It's just that I've spent years watching him break Lily's heart and I don't want him to do the same for you."

At this admission, she couldn't help but feel touched, but this didn't quell her frustration much, "Thanks James, but the main thing that's upsetting me right now is you guys." He had the good sense to look somewhat guilty and Hermione heard him let out a quiet apology.

"And you?" She finally turned to Sirius, "I thought you were actually being sensible about this. So what's your excuse now?"

Sirius paused for a moment just to look at her and when she didn't do anything else, he glanced at the others. Seeing that he was the last one standing, he just threw his hands in the air in exasperation, "Fine then, shag him for all we care!" He made to turn as if he had given up on the conversation, but then turned back with an afterthought, pointing his finger at her quite threateningly, "I hope you know what you're getting into though, don't come crying back to me when he stomps all over you. And that's when, not if. I don't have to talk to the guy to know that you're too good for him."

At that, it seemed that the conversation was over, and when it looked like Sirius wasn't going to move, she just squeezed past him to continue down the corridor. After a few moments she heard the boys start to follow her, whispering to one another as they made their way back to the Great Hall. Still a bit perturbed by their attitudes, Hermione just rolled her eyes and huffed, speeding up her gait.

It wasn't long until she made it to the Entrance Hall, but before she could re-join the Ball, her voice was being called from under the staircase. "Hey Hermione, I wondered where you had got to." She stopped herself and turned, still breathing heavily from her hasty descent away from the Marauders.

Regulus's face was slightly pink from what she could only assume was some alcohol that he'd sneakily taken, and upon seeing her, his expression had softened into that of an almost welcoming smile. He looked so abnormally open and friendly that Hermione could help but smile back, questioning, "What are you doing under there? You're not hiding from your date are you?"

Surprising her even more, Regulus let out one of his rare sincere chuckles, "No of course not, you were correct to pick her because she has barely looked at me all night. I was actually waiting to see if the girl that had made Severus so flustered would appear." Mistaking the sudden look on her face for confusement, he clarified, moving towards her slightly, "You'll never guess actually, about five minutes ago Sev turned up looking thoroughly snogged, and…"

Whatever he had been about to say was halted by the entrance of her pursuers and in the blink of an eye, Regulus's whole demeanour changed. Hermione watched as his body stiffened and straightened, all ease forgotten in the face of his brother. His trajectory towards her stopped and they both stood in silence for a moment as they watched Sirius come down the stairs.

Unsurprisingly, he slowed a bit once he saw who Hermione was talking to and at how friendly his brother had been acting towards her, but ultimately continued. However, before he could catch up with them, it appeared that Regulus did not want to give him the chance to start a conversation. Without so much as another glance at his brother, he swiftly turned to Hermione, "I'll tell you next term anyway, Dumbledore. Have a nice Christmas."

He had turned back into the Great Hall before she could grasp what he had said, and before the other Marauders could join them. Unfortunately, she had enough time to see the look on Sirius's face. "One pet Slytherin not enough for you? Or do you intend to sleep your way through everyone I hate?"

Unable to stop the gasp that she let out, she replied, "You know that it's not like that! We're just friends." The venom in his voice cut deeper than Hermione would care to admit, especially since it was only about an hour ago that he had been comforting her.

Sirius rolled his eyes at this comment and then followed his brother into the Great Hall, though in the opposite direction. When Hermione turned to James and Peter to ask what his problem was, they just shrugged and made their way to follow him. She just watched as they congregated at the buffet table and began to talk to each other in hushed voices.

Annoyed at their reactions, though thoroughly relieved that they hadn't got defensive about her spying on them, Hermione just wanted to enjoy the rest of her evening. Trailing her eyes across the room, they settled on the girls who were sitting at their table looking out across the dance floor. She smiled as she saw them, thinking how odd it was that she now saw her female friends as less confusing than the male ones.

"Hey Guys." She sighed as she sunk down into a seat with them, but Marlene quickly shushed her and motioned to the event that they had been watching unfold. Mary and Remus were stood directly in the middle of the Great Hall, seemingly oblivious to the world as they swayed together in a slow dance. Hermione couldn't help but grin when the tempo of the song sped up and they failed to notice.

"That's so sweet." Hermione began, finally realising why the other boys were content to leave Remus out of their shenanigans for the evening.

"Pffff, sweet? I want to see if she'll follow through." Marlene muttered under her breath, causing Hermione to raise her eyebrows in question.

Thankfully, Alice clarified, "She keeps going on about how Remus keeps acting so shy and it's pissing her off, so we just told her to kiss him first."

Hermione glanced back at the pair for a second and realised that this probably was the best course of action. The boy had turned bright red once again and was stuttering through whatever conversation they had been having. Hermione chuckled as she compared this boy to her calm and collected professor. Although he was acting like a bumbling fool now, it didn't look like Mary was complaining considering the wide smile that hadn't left her face all evening.

Before any of the girls could make another comment, it looked as if Mary had got tired of waiting, and she quickly tugged his face down to meet her own. Remus stood ramrod straight for a moment before relaxing, wrapping his hands around her waist and deepening the kiss. Hermione was momentarily so shocked that she felt her mouth just fall open in surprise.

This, unfortunately for the pair, didn't last for all of their friends because, almost simultaneously, two shouts of jubilation broke out from across the room. Both Sirius and Marlene were much louder than they looked, and so when they shouted after their respected friends, it didn't take long until the majority of the room began to turn their heads. If anything, they both went more red and leaned into each other, blushing deeply.

Before their friends decided to do something stupid like jump up and ambush them, Remus finally took the initiative and took ahold of Mary's hand. She barely had time to look down at it in shock before he began pulling her from the hall, either to go on a romantic stroll or to find a dark corner, though it was no one's business but their own.

Unfortunately for the rest of them, the ambush had actually been Marlene's plan and so she just had to settle with dragging Alice out onto the dancefloor instead, with her respective partner just rolling her eyes at her grumbling. When Hermione realised that she was the only one laughing at their antics, she turned back to look at her final table mate, only to find Lily looking back at her with an odd look on her face.

"What?" She asked, the smile immediately dropping. With everything that had happened that night, Hermione immediately assumed the worst and began to think back to how she could have revealed herself. Luckily for her, Lily had other things on her mind.

Hermione noticed her briefly glance towards the door that Remus and Mary had left from before beginning, "Do we need to follow her?"

Her confusement at the question was evident, and she watched as Lily stumbled over the next couple of phrases, "I only mean, ….well, I know he wouldn't really hurt her. It's just that, um, shouldn't she know about….." By this point, Lily was promptly turning red from a mixture of frustration and embarrassment, "I just want to make sure that she's safe."

With all the talk that Hermione had heard about how intelligent Lily Evans had always been, the girl really couldn't get across her point when flustered. With each comment, Hermione's confusement grew and even a hint of fear at the final sentence. It was only when Lily continued, that it all began to make sense.

"I just want to make sure that she knows what she's getting into. After all, if she likes him then she should be the first to know that she's dating a werewolf." Hermione blinked slowly as Lily let this hang in the air for a moment, eyebrows raised in question before continuing, "That is, if you have come to the same conclusions as I have?"

With a quick glance around to make sure that no one else was listening to them, Hermione wordlessly silenced them and turned back to Lily to nod. Lily seemed to visibly relax and leaned towards Hermione, "How long have you known? Do the boys know that you know?"

"Yes. Do they know that you do?" Hermione immediately shot back at her.

Lily shook her head, "I've known for years, really. I just never really talked about it with anyone. But you've spent so much time with them, that I was sure that you must know something."

Hermione hummed in agreement and studied Lily, who was looking decidedly calm even though she had just got confirmation that an old friend of hers is a monster. "Does it make a difference to you? Him being a werewolf?" She asked quietly.

The girl paused for a moment to think before replying, "I guess not, I mean, it's been a while since I first assumed so I've had time to get used to the idea. The books all say that it doesn't affect him much for the rest of the month and it's not like he can do anything about it, so what right do I have to judge him?"

Hermione couldn't help but smile, "That's what I was thinking. It's kind of like with us; the others don't treat us differently because we're muggleborn, so we can't really treat him differently because of his unintended biology."

Lily's face fell slightly, "I suppose, but it's not exactly the same. You know that werewolves act differently with the different stages of the moon, and you even mentioned how they act with their partners. Don't you think it's right to let Mary know what she's getting into?"

She pondered the situation for a second and thought back to Remus and Tonks, the only example that could help here. The only problem was that with them, Tonks knew him as a werewolf even before she began to fall in love with him, maybe even fell in love with him despite or because of that fact. But, regardless of that, there were no other examples that Hermione could draw from.

"I don't know." She answered honestly, "Though I definitely don't think we should say anything now. It's not like they're going to get married anytime soon, they're just having fun at the moment so I don't think anyone is going to get hurt." In her mind's eye, the image of Tonks was brought to her, though in the months where she had been pining after Remus. Hermione remembered how destroyed she had looked, with no hope of having her feelings returned when the werewolf had attempted to shield her from his affliction.

"Yeah," Lily agreed, bringing Hermione back to the real world. "This could all fizzle out at any time, it's not like Remus would intentionally hurt her anyway. He wouldn't hurt a fly." There was a beat before a slow smile spread across Lily's face and she turned to look at Hermione deviously, "Unless of course she wanted him to."

"What are you talking about?" Hermione was puzzled for a second, before she realised what Lily was alluding to. "Oh….ah yes. Mary did seem to like the idea of rough werewolf sex."

They both chuckled for a moment before Lily muttered under her breath, "Now I wish James would get that memo…"

"What!?" Hermione couldn't help but squeal, "Is he not doing what you want him to do? I guess there's a first time for everything."

Lily rolled her eyes and leaned back in her chair, "Of course, he practically falls at my feet every time that I want someone to hold a door open for me or to carry my bag. But the second that I want him to fling me into a wall and ravage me, then he gets all shy!"

Hermione looked over at her dejected friend, "So what's stopping you?"

She got a frustrated huff in response, "It's just that he sees me as breakable and wants to treat me as the perfect purebred lady that he was taught to woo. But I don't want that and no matter how much I prompt him, he doesn't get it."

Realising that she wasn't getting through to the girl, Hermione leaned forward and clasped her hands in front of her face. "You misunderstand me Lily. I said what is stopping YOU? Just get more forceful with him, or tease him until he gets so frustrated that he has to. Or, sorry if this is a bit out there, but you could actually talk to him."

Lily blushed slightly in embarrassment and nodded, causing Hermione to continue, "Actually you should probably talk to him about Remus too, he's probably agonising about telling you already. If this party at the Potters on Christmas Eve is anything to go by, then I reckon that he's pretty serious about you and he'll want you to know."

"Oh my god!" Lily gasped and dropped her head down on the table, "I completely forgot about that." She looked back up at Hermione, "Please tell me that Sirius asked you to come. Sorry to annoy you but I need some moral support and you'll only have to pretend to like him for an hour or two."

Hermione smiled and nodded before looking up at the boy from across the room, "Yeah, that's if he still wants to put with me then. We sort of just had an argument." At Lily's questioning look, she explained, "The boys all kind of ran in on Snape and me kissing and blew up at me so I yelled at them."

Lily rolled her eyes, "Seriously? Did they do that 'we're just looking out for you' protective bollocks? They kept doing that to me whenever I had a date in the early years and it was dead annoying. Then again, I think it was mostly because James liked me and was getting jealous. You don't think any of them have a little crush do you?"

The laugh that bubbled up couldn't be stopped, "As if? More likely they just wanted to ruin Severus' evening." She glanced back at Lily, "You still don't mind?"

Lily looked away for a second before leaning across the table to take hold of Hermione's hand, "Of course not, if you want to date anyone then that is up to you. I don't really see why as he was a bit of a dick to me, but before then, he was a decent enough guy that it makes some sense that you might like him."

"Yeah?" Hermione checked, glad that not everyone would act like the boys had, "That being said, I'm not apologizing to Sirius, so if he's still angry at me by Christmas Eve then he may need to pretend to date one of the other girls."

Lily scoffed, "That definitely won't work because Mrs Potter has already met us all and so knows that a relationship between any of them and Sirius just wouldn't work. You two will look more realistic and he knows that. Anyway, Sirius likes you too much to stay mad at you for long."

Hermione met her eye in question, "You think?"

Rolling her eyes, Lily replied, "Of course, as annoying as he claims to find you, I think that he actually enjoys your company quite a lot."

At this, she couldn't help but seek out the boy in question and when their eyes met across the room, she let out a small friendly smile. Sirius seemed to pause what he was saying to Peter for a second and then replied with a slightly hesitant smile of his own, subtly tilting his head in the direction of the Slytherin tables.

"See, I knew he'd be fine. Now what the hell have those guys done now?" Almost as soon as Lily had closed her mouth, there was suddenly a huge puff of smoke from the place that Sirius had been indicating to. Smoke at an event would normally be a cause for panic or concern, but the colour of this cloud and of the people escaping from it instead made people laugh.

Where the tables of Slytherins had been sat only moments before was a huge cloud of hot pink powder, seeming to have come from the dress robes of every male Slytherin there. Their previously jet black robes had all been simultaneously changed in the blink of an eye and continued to exude more pink powder as they all jumped up in surprise, effectively showering their dates and everyone else in the vicinity also in the colour.

Although she immediately disapproved as she claimed to do with all of the Marauders jokes and pranks, this harmless bit of fun brought a huge smile to her face. Hermione couldn't help but let out a laugh at the particular sight of Dolohov attempting to pat down his jacket, only for more of the powder to come out of it. She tried to hide this fact by covering her mouth with her hand but by the time that she turned back to Sirius she knew that he had seen.

Where the other Marauders were all standing laughing at the spectacle, Sirius was smiling across the room at her. When she shook her head at him in mock outrage, all he did was shrug his shoulders and laugh, as if to say 'Well, what did you expect me to do?'

Up next is Chapter 24: Fake It Till You Make It