A/N 1: Ah, us Slytherins and our multi-layered ulterior motives...

Chapter 8

Stop dithering like a ninny, she told herself. She stood motionless outside the opulent office at the top of the spiralling staircase. Her palms were sweating, and she shifted her colour-coded list between one hand and the other in an effort to avoid staining it with the evidence of her nervousness. Everything is fine. She'd heard from her parents just the day before, and they'd reported that everything at Spinner's End was business as usual. The DA was recruiting steadily, and there hadn't been any serious attacks on members in a few days. But still Hermione felt something instinctive trying to rise up beyond her Mind's Eye, something that was trying to get her attention, but that flitted out of sight like a floater in her eyes whenever she tried to focus on it.

She raised her hand, which felt heavy as a stone, and tapped gently on the door.

"Enter."

He sat at the desk in almost the exact posture as when she and Malfoy had attended him here the first time, scratching out some missive, his dark head bent over his work. Hermione stood behind the chair in front of his desk, waiting and looking around the office. Something was different… but she couldn't quite put her finger on what it might be. After a minute, she realised that she was fidgeting, scratching at the back of her left knee sock with her right foot.

"Sit," Snape said without looking up at her.

His rudeness struck her, and she stopped fidgeting and glared at the top of his head. He finally finished writing and looked up at her, his expression mildly annoyed.

"Did you not hear me, Miss Granger? I told you to sit."

"I would rather stand," she replied. "You seem to be very busy, so I won't take up any more of your time than necessary." She waved her parchment vaguely in front of her as she spoke.

"Accio," Snape hissed, and the colour-coded list sailed into his outstretched hand.

Hermione quickly sorted through the anger and embarrassment she felt, and stored them both away in her Mind's Eye. Snape was obviously trying to discomfit her, and she refused to let him win. If she had to deal with him regularly, she would at least stand her ground.

"As you can see," she told him, "your instructions at the start of the week have been implemented with some success so far. Some of the older students are less inclined to circulate about the castle in pairs, however – "

"Yes, Miss Granger, I am quite capable of interpreting this garish confection of rainbow-coloured trivialities." He put the parchment down. "I did not, however, summon you here in order to discuss the minutiae of your performance thus far as Head Girl."

Stung, Hermione immediately retaliated.

"Yes, well, it's not exactly been a picnic thus far, has it?" she said, letting some of her tethered anger show through. "What with the cutting up of my face and all."

Snape gestured at the seat before him.

"Sit, Granger," he said again.

She held his eyes for a moment and then finally sat, feeling her earlier trepidation augmenting. After she was seated, Snape bent sideways and she heard him open a cabinet in the desk. With both hands he carefully retrieved a shallow stone basin that Hermione immediately recognised as a Pensieve. She looked from the magical object to Snape and back again, the fear curling in her gut. She tamped it down, stored it away, and neutralised herself yet again.

"Professor Dumbledore's Pensieve," she said quietly, looking up at the portrait behind Snape, only to realise what her subconscious had picked up on when she had first entered the office: Dumbledore was not in his portrait. She looked around. None of the former Headmasters and Headmistresses was present. A frisson raced down her spine as Hermione realised that she was well and truly alone with the man before her.

"Indeed," Snape said in a neutral tone. "During these weekly sessions, you will use the Pensieve to deposit your memories of your friendship with Harry Potter. Every single memory involving Potter in that – ah –encyclopaedic brain of yours." He sneered before continuing, "You will begin with the most recent memories, and work backwards from there. I will, of course, instruct you on how to do this. We will move forward gradually so as not to damage your psyche."

You were wrong, a nattering voice in her head whispered. It's not Voldemort who wants to get into your head.

"No," she said aloud. It came out a whisper, so Hermione repeated it loudly. "NO."

Snape raised his eyebrows and smiled unpleasantly.

"What, the brightest witch of her age didn't anticipate this?" he sneered. "That brain of yours didn't formulate a colour-coded catalogue of the expectations I would place upon you as Head Girl?"

"You never mentioned this," she answered. "In fact, I recall quite clearly that you said I was to be insurance and intermediary."

"What I said," he snapped, "is that you would be assigned the post of Head Girl and all that it requires." His smile widened, showing his crooked teeth. "And this is one of those requirements." He rose from his desk and planted his hands upon it, arms open so that his robes widened his silhouette. "You see, Miss Granger, no one else seems to have cottoned on that you and Weasley are Potter's helpers, that you are his confidants. I, on the other hand, have observed you three more closely than I ever wished to for six years now, and I know that Potter has relayed every single piece of information he discovered from Dumbledore and from his own adventures to you both. I would have that information, and you will provide it for me."

"You'll have to kill me, first," she told him, staring into his blank black eyes.

He smirked at her suddenly, his eyes coming to life at last, and sat back down behind the desk. Moving with the same economical grace as always, he put the Pensieve away, and Hermione felt an absurdly deep feeling of relief wash over her, colouring the entirety of her Mind's Eye. She glanced up again at the empty picture frames, and wondered what their occupants would have said to stop the man before her, if that was why he'd removed them. Snape was looking at her again, still smirking, eyes glinting with triumph. The relief bled away.

Something is still wrong, the nattering voice in her mind whispered. Something is even more wrong.

"Thank you, Miss Granger," Snape said, giving her a mocking seated bow. "You have just made things much simpler."

And realisation hit her: she hadn't won anything just now, nor had she protected herself by upping the stakes, nor kept herself in line. She hadn't even employed Occlumency to her advantage. No. She'd just confirmed that she had the knowledge he sought.

"It's what you wanted all along," she whispered, feeling herself shaking with a noxious mixture of rage and fear.

"What else could I have wanted from you, you silly girl?" He looked at her appraisingly. "Since you have made things so very easy for both of us this evening, I will favour you with another proposal."

Hermione was on her feet before he finished speaking, wand in hand, hair crackling with the electric anger she now allowed to course through her freely. Snape sat impassively, but one of his hands had disappeared beneath the desk, and she had no doubt that his wand was already primed with a defensive spell.

"No," she spat. "No, you bastard. You're not doing this to me again. Fuck you and your proposal. Fuck all of this."

And she threw her wand down onto his desk. The dark man stared first at Hermione's wand, and then into her face. He rose to his feet and circled around his desk to stand before her. She fought down the impulse to take a step back away from him.

"You give up so easily, Miss Granger," he said.

Hermione felt herself shaking, and she closed her eyes as she'd done in that horrible Dark Arts class, expecting a curse to land on her any moment, saying a quiet goodbye to everyone and everything she knew. Just as when Harry had broken her at the Burrow, Snape had cracked the Mind's Eye and now everything inside raged forward in chaos. All the emotion's she'd shoved into place surged through her. But she refused to cry. She ground her teeth instead, waiting.

"Here."

Snape took her hand and placed her wand back into it. Surprised, she opened her eyes and frowned down, wondering if he was about to do a Voldemort and demand that she duel him. She wouldn't – she couldn't. She wanted whatever it was to be quick; if he tried to tear into her mind, she had her Intercision blade in the back of her head, Mind's Eye or no, and if he just wanted to kill her she would close her eyes and take that too. She would protect the precious information she thought she'd guarded so carefully. She just hoped it would be quick for her parents.

"To think," Snape was saying as she prepared herself for his curse, "that a Gryffindor would be so easily defeated, and one of the Golden Trio, no less."

She heard the sneer in his voice and looked up to see a matching expression on his face.

"What do you want, Snape?" she asked quietly, resignation and anger colouring her voice in equal measure. "I won't give you the information. You'll have to kill me and my parents, and even then you won't get it."

"That is not what I want."

She frowned.

"But you just said – "

"You hear, Miss Granger, but you do not listen. I said that I wanted to take those memories without damaging your psyche. There is only one way to do that."

"Your proposal," Hermione said. She looked at the man in front of her. Absurdly, the thought that struck her was that he didn't fit the lavish surroundings of Dumbledore's office; he was a contrast to the beauty of the surroundings. He was jagged and hard and so aggressively determined that she could almost see the aura of darkness permeating the air around him. He nodded.

"I will teach you Occlumency," he said.

She drew herself up immediately.

"I can Occlude already," she said through a sneer of her own.

"Ah yes, you are employing Sentinella's methods to great effect. However, that effect is to broadcast not your thoughts and emotions, but your employment of Occlumency itself." He shook his head at her. "Tsk tsk, Miss Granger, it will never do."

"It's kept you out of my head."

"I have not yet attempted to get in. If I wanted to slip past your shields now, I could do so easily because instead of using Occlumency to conceal what actually matters, you were exhausting your magical stores by using it to block out everything. And so it was ludicrously simple for me to crack the brittle Mind's Eye you'd put up, and now here you are, more vulnerable than before. It was – if you'll forgive the Muggle expression – a rookie mistake."

"Why would teaching me Occlumency benefit you?" she demanded, trying to ignore the curiosity prickling at her.

"It would be an exchange that would benefit both of us. Please – " he gestured to the chair in front of his desk. When she sat down, he surprised her by sitting in the twin chair before the desk, turning it to face her. "I will teach you how to employ Occlumency safely and effectively. Furthermore, I will lend you books from my personal library, and I will ensure your safety from anyone else who might try to question you."

She looked at the man next to her. He sat easily in the chair, one foot resting on the opposite knee, his hands steepled beneath his chin. He was the picture of relaxation – in fact, the expression on his face looked almost bored. He was a perfect contrast to the tense, commanding figure who'd sat behind the desk at the start of this meeting. But his eyes – his eyes were deep pools focused on her own with an intensity that frightened her. And the fear grounded her, so that she remembered what she had almost forgotten before, when he had been the one to save her from Umbridge and the Dementors, when he'd healed her curse wounds; she thought it with perfect clarity:

This man has saved me for himself… and now he is putting me exactly where he wants me. And I have no choice but to let him.

"And what do you get in return?" she asked at last.

He raised his eyebrows.

"I should think it is rather obvious."

"Spell it out for me, then."

He leaned forward a little.

"I get what I mentioned earlier. Access to your memories of Potter, and what he conveyed to you." He held up a long hand to forestall her angry outburst. "Yes, yes, I know that it is information you wish to defend to the death, but rest assured, Miss Granger, that I am the one at a disadvantage here. It will be exceedingly difficult to penetrate your memories effectively enough to get a complete picture of what I wish to see, but my trying to do so will be the best way to teach you Occlumency, and it will be my best chance of gaining that information without injuring you."

"Why would you care about injuring me?"

"You are more valuable to me alive and well. I did not lie to you, Miss Granger, about the political benefits of your position as Head Girl."

"But it's a paradox," Hermione countered. "The more you teach me, the more I'll learn to defend myself, the harder you'll push, and so on. We'll just keep matching each other… unless you simply overcome me to begin with."

"I remind you that should you enter into this arrangement, Miss Granger, I would guarantee your personal safety, which would preclude such an action on my part."

Hermione did the math. They would haggle now, she knew, deciding on price and payment. But the Horcruxes… If he gets to the memories he'll tell HIM that they're out hunting for them, and then it's all over. She remembered the Intercision blade for the second time that evening and realised that she had an ace in her back pocket – albeit an extremely dangerous one that she would hopefully never play. But she was confident that with Snape's help with the rest of the Occlumency she could learn to cut away the memories of the Horcruxes on her own. If the worst happened, she could always wield the blade and risk nothing more than herself… and perhaps her family. It wasn't enough. She needed insurance of some sort.

"You will not divulge any of what you see to anyone," Hermione said firmly, straightening her spine and trying to remember everything she'd ever read about negotiating.

"And of what use is information that I may not share?" Snape asked, looking down at his fingernails nonchalantly.

"Information kept to oneself is always useful. If one can manage to get it, that is."

She watched as his eyes went slightly out of focus. He stared out the dark window behind her, tracing his thin mouth with his index finger in a characteristic gesture she recognised.

"The information will remain undisclosed until next summer," he said finally.

It was an excellent concession, but Hermione wanted more.

"And you will release my parents and myself at the end of the school year, one month before divulging the information," she said quickly, cursing herself for sounding so eager, so vulnerable. But she would need to get back to Harry before Snape revealed they were hunting Horcruxes; she would buy as much time as she could. Just in case. "And," she added more slowly and firmly, "you will do this regardless of whether or not you are successful in your endeavour."

He stopped tracing his mouth, and looked into her eyes. She felt the pressure of the eye contact, and looked away, down at her hands in her lap. They were clenched together in a grip so tight it was almost painful.

"I'm giving you access to my… to everything, Snape," she said quietly, frightened by the fact as she voiced it. "You'll have months to break me down. You have to let me go afterwards."

"One week."

"Two."

"Done."

She looked at him, trying to emulate the same air of calm that radiated from him. Inside, she was screaming. There was no choice, a voice nattered on in her head, it was this or…

"Before I agree to this formally," she blurted, "I require you to make an Unbreakable Vow."

She and Snape looked at each other for a long moment before he spoke again.

"Dobby," he said, surprising her yet again.

The house elf appeared immediately, standing in the narrow space between their chairs.

"Harry Potter's friend, miss," the elf said, bowing deeply to Hermione before turning to Snape with an even deeper bow. "Headmaster, sir."

"I require you to perform the binding for an Unbreakable Vow," Snape told the elf brusquely. "I will instruct you. You will keep your knowledge of this matter secret, Dobby, is that understood?"

Dobby nodded soberly, staring between Hermione and the dark man. Snape reached out and clasped Hermione's hand firmly in his own, and her stomach flipped over. His hand was strong, and she could feel the magic coursing through him, beneath his palm. It was darker than her own, which always seemed to flash out like lightening. His was liquid and cool, and thinking of it this way while touching him made her blush. She nodded at him to begin.

"Place your hand over ours, Dobby," the headmaster said. The elf did so at once. "And now exert a mild force of will over our joined hands while I make the Vow. It should take very little of your energy because you are simply calling upon my own magic to bind me to my words. Is that clear?"

The elf nodded, and Hermione felt the warmth of another foreign magic over their clasped hands. She knew the elf was powerful, but having his power validated and used by Snape resonated oddly with her sensibilities toward House Elf enslavement. But Dobby isn't a slave anymore, the chattering part of her mind whispered to her.

"I, Severus Snape," the man began, and Hermione felt his dusky power running through her hand, and up her arm, "hereby vow that I will teach Hermione Granger Occlumency. I will ensure her safety throughout this endeavour, above my own goals in teaching her. I will keep any information I glean from her secret until two weeks after the end of this school year, when I will release her and her parents from my custody and back to the Order of the Phoenix."

A/N 2: There you have it, folks. Let me know what you think of this probably-unexpected-but-hopefully-intriguing twist.