A/N: While writing this chapter and the one before, I've been unable to get Sara Bareilles's "Love Song" out of my head. It's not as if the song actually relates to this story, but those first few lines (Head under water and they tell me to breathe easy for a while; breathing gets harder, even I know that…) just stuck with me as I was writing these scenes. And if you hadn't thought of the song before while reading, maybe it will now stick with you as well for a little while. Sorry-not-sorry. ;)
This chapter is for all the fantastic new readers I've gained through The Death Eater Express, a Facebook group that you might like to check out if you haven't joined in yet. :) But I love all my readers equally, of course.
Saturday, September 21st, 1995
Severus was seething.
While many perceived him to be a man quick to anger, it was rare for the Potions Master to be this enraged at this particular person – himself.
Looking back on the past week, or weeks, as it was, there was much that had gone wrong and little that had gone right. Things that had gone in his directions were probably the fact that the girl was a surprisingly quick study where Occlumency was concerned, and –
Well, that was about it.
Things that had gone quite thoroughly downwards, though…
First, the spanking. Yes, he had enjoyed watching the girl's cheeks warm up and redden under his attentions, and touching them had to be his most erotic experience this whole year. The difficulties that came with it, the self-doubts on his part and the nervousness on the girl's, were a wholly different matter. Did those few minutes of arousal make up for the aftermath? Severus wasn't so sure.
Second, the girl's constant trust. Her gratitude for every sodding thing he did, her sincerity in not being in fear of him, and her respect towards him not only as a teacher but as a person; those things Severus just could not understand, and at most times, they made his skin crawl.
Third, the girl's makeover. Yes, he had tasked her in becoming a woman, both outwardly and practically. Yet why had he been so upset when he'd thought her to be with a boy in the prefects' bathroom? And if the intention behind her makeover was to have her male schoolmates perceive her as a desirable female, why then did he find himself so affected?
And fourth, why in every hell imaginable had the girl chosen to fashion her knickers after his robes? The first pair of underwear she was ever to transfigure, and the first thing that had come to her mind were his robes? Was he such a source of inspiration to her? Surely not, as the only thing Severus was wont to inspire in his students was fear. A secret fantasy? That could not be either, as he was sure he would have stumbled upon such a notion in the girl's head by now. What then? A reason for amusement? Had she transfigured her knickers into a fancy imitation of his robes because she had the guts to take pleasure from secretly mocking him this way, never having expected her dirty little secret to be revealed?
Severus was quite certain he would find no answer to that today. Instead, he went over the changes to her appearance once more in his mind.
It was true, Severus could not push the thought of her silky tresses out of his mind, all the while imagining what it might feel to run his fingers through her soft strands, to wrap her long curls around his hands to control her head and… Nor could he dismiss the image of her glossed pouty lips, already by nature of a luscious cherry red, now coated in a glistening sheen of gloss that simply begged to be kissed away.
No, Severus was really quite beside himself. This wasn't like him at all, to be lusting after a fifteen – oh well, now sixteen year old girl. And more so, a student at that.
Severus shuddered. He used to take pride in the fact that during his long years of teaching at this respectable and esteemed institution, he had never once found himself inappropriately drawn to one of his students. The sharp moral border that divided student and teacher had always been enough to keep his thoughts in check.
But wasn't the girl explicitly known for crossing borders that had never been crossed before?
As it was, she had torn down that wall of morality and propriety, and with it his precious pride.
And why wouldn't she? Why should he remain unaffected by her innocent curiosity, her pure way of seeing the world, her untouched positivity? After all, those were the traits that had drawn him to Gryffindor Muggle-borns before.
Severus cursed himself internally, verbally, but almost longed for someone to do so magically. Perhaps he could persuade the girl? Maybe that would help rid him of some of the attraction he felt towards her.
He might have to address that issue on Monday.
Monday, September 23rd, 1995
Hermione was very glad to have a day filled with classes before her, still reeling from the weekend she'd had.
Her birthday had been quite pleasant once she'd managed to resume her school day. The boys had fetched her after her last class and together, they had gone down to the lake, surprising her with a lovely birthday picnic on a multitude of varying cupcakes, cold turkey sandwiches, and fresh fruit. Hermione had thought to herself that it was indeed a lucky day for her to have picnic twice, but hadn't told the boys as she had not wanted them to feel unoriginal, as her picnic with Lavender and Parvati had been so spontaneous and the boys had seemed to have put quite some planning into their surprise.
Fortunately, neither Harry nor Ron had seemed to really have noticed the changes in her appearance. It had come of no surprise to her, either. In Potions, they had been far too stressed out (as usual) to take her in – and why would they, really? – and the soft silkiness had left her curls the minute she stepped out into the wind.
She had not been equally lucky with the other males of the school.
Her roommates took care that Hermione applied the charms they'd taught her every morning, though Hermione had managed to take the makeup application down a notch or two; and so it was that every day she walked through the school, more and more heads turned to peruse the changes in Hermione Granger they'd heard all about from their friends and were unwilling to believe until they'd set eyes on her themselves.
Hermione merely hoped that it would stop once everyone had gotten used to the new sight.
It seemed, however, that this was not the case. When she walked down to breakfast this morning, she could still hear whistles and a few catcalls coming her way. Hermione sighed, equally annoyed and exasperated. Truly, Professor Snape had been right. Before he'd mentioned it, she'd completely failed to notice, as he'd put it, the looks boys left and right had been giving her. Now, though, they were very hard to miss indeed, as bold as some advances had been.
With much joy she'd found that weekend that in the library, she was suddenly approached by a steady flow of willing study partners. With much regret, she'd come to learn that few of them were interested in any amount of actual studying, rather keeping her from it with incessant chatter and 'accidental' touches. Luckily, she'd been able to draw back into the corner where the Headmaster had found her studying the books Professor Snape had recommended, though that day now seemed so long ago, only a week past.
Hermione exhaled a sigh of relief when she reached the Great Hall. Under the careful eyes of their teachers, the wide majority of her schoolmates were cowed enough not to heap their unwanted attention on her. She quickly crossed the long hall and sank into a seat at the Gryffindor table – the far end from the entrance, that was, as she hoped to avoid more encounters with pubescent males.
Shooting a glance at the High Table, she found the Potions Master looking at her as if in accident, which she knew it not to be, and he raised a single eyebrow at her, his face expressionless but the smirk implied.
Hermione scowled.
Trust the man to find some twisted pleasure in the fact that she'd followed his instructions to allow and even facilitate others to sexualize her.
The boys joined her for breakfast soon after, and together, they made their way to the first lesson of the week. History of Magic found Hermione practice her breathing once more, and she was glad to discover that already the Pure Black came much easier to her, and she was able to keep it for longer periods before the absolute absence of colour faded into a grey that permitted thoughts to enter her mind. She merely hoped that it might be enough progress to keep her stern tutor from scolding her too much for failing her homework assignment.
When Severus stalked into the classroom for his second class of the day, he found all the students already seated. A glance in the direction of the Gryffindors, he found Misses Brown and Patil in their usual seats. He allowed himself an inward grin. Yes, this was the way he preferred his class.
To his satisfaction, the girl had found her way to the back of the class once more, sitting at the desk furthest from the store room. It seemed she had interpreted his intention correctly in their last lesson, in that she was to sit away from her classmates so that he might be able to teach her in a way that found little notice among her peers, as well as kept her from endangering them should some of the exercises he set for her go poorly. Little as he liked the dunderheads that he was damned to teaching, Severus would not lack in the profession that had been forced upon him to serve both his masters. It simply would not do.
A flick of Severus's wand had the day's potion scrawled on the board, and a sneered command had the students opening their books to find the required ingredients and brewing instructions. A minute later, they were all scrambling to the store room to collect their ingredients.
While the dunderheads were busy in the little side room, some of the less thoughtful ones walking there several times as they forgot this and got the wrong measure of that, Severus walked to the back of the class. The girl sat at her desk, her body still, her posture rigid. He found her to be breathing.
What a strange thing to remark about a person, Severus mused, that they are breathing. But the girl wasn't merely in- and exhaling, of course. She was exercising.
"Miss Granger," Severus called her to attention. The girl's eyes rose to the blackboard, signalling that she was listening, but allowing her to not meet his eyes. Clever girl, Severus allowed himself to inwardly compliment her once more.
"Miss Granger," he began anew, and in a voice that was loud enough to be carried throughout the class, should anybody wish to listen in on them, not evoking the impression that what he was saying to the girl might be said in private, "as your actions last week caused and resulted in the injury of a student, you will be banned from brewing in class."
Most students had now settled at their work stations, and even though they'd begun cutting and chopping their ingredients, Severus knew them to be listening with rapt attention. His voice grew louder.
"I have no desire to see you harm a student in this class anymore. All your work during the collective lessons will be theoretical only."
A collective gasp went through the class, though Severus could hear several of his Slytherins snicker gleefully. No surprise there, he thought, and no surprise for everybody to be shocked at his announcement, either. After all, even after years of Finnigan blowing up cauldrons, and Longbottom doing his best to single-handedly kill the whole class by filling the dungeon in a poisonous vapour, he had never banned a student from practically participating in his class – much less one as talented as the girl, even if in following instructions only.
"Instead," Severus carried on, "you will sit Remedial Potions with me personally overseeing your work every Monday night, starting Monday after next, as tonight and next Monday night are still reserved for your detention with me, Miss Granger." He forced a vicious sneer onto his face and turned a little so that the students of his House could see. He had a role to perform, after all. "Is that understood?"
"Yes, sir," came the shy, but ever polite reply.
He turned to the class. As expected, all the students had ceased attending to their ingredients.
"I don't recall telling you to stop working," Severus bellowed through the classroom, the vaulted ceiling amplifying his voice and adding an even more demanding effect that he'd always liked. "Those of you capable of reading might have found that the Boil Treating Potion needs eighty-three minutes of constant attention. There are eighty-four minutes left of today's period. If you wish to turn in your concoction by the end of the lesson, I suggest you get to work this instant."
A flurry of motion ran through the class, students jumping to slice and dice their ingredients, and hurrying to follow the instructions they found in their textbooks.
Satisfied that everybody had their attention where it belonged, Severus turned back to the girl whose gaze was still fixed on the blackboard.
"Miss Granger," he gently called her to his attention once more, scolding himself for allowing himself any kind of gentility when dealing with the girl. Her posture showed no change, but Severus knew her to be listening. "I wish for you to copy down the instructions for brewing a potion I believe you to be well acquainted with from your second year," his voice carried so much meaning, the girl would be incapable to misunderstand which potion exactly he was referring to, "and I want you to continue breathing while you do so."
And leaving her to ponder how exactly she was to do that, Severus stalked to the front of the class to stare down any students that might plan to defy his strict teaching.
Hermione's lungs demanded a desperate pace in their air supply, but she kept her breathing calm and unchanged. How could he know about the Polyjuice potion she'd secretly brewed in her second year?
It was of little matter for now, though, Hermione decided, as her task for this lesson was clear and there was precious little time to complete it. Writing down the recipe would have been an easy feat close to three years ago, when it had been ever present on her mind; but now, Hermione was not so sure she would be able to remember all the ingredients in their correct order, measure, and method of preparation, much less the different time intervals at which she was to add them into the cauldron, the heat at which the vessel would have to be, and the stirring motions and resting periods that were required.
And even if she could remember it all perfectly, there was still the matter of breathing through it all.
Hermione felt she was completely out of her depth in the task the Potions Master had set for her, but at the same time, her chest swelled with pride at the knowledge that in some way he probably thought it possible for her to actually accomplish the feat. A few weeks ago, she would have been adamant in her assessment that Professor Snape would only ever give her extracurricular assignments if she was certain to fail them, but in the past few dealings with him outside their usual classroom setting – even though their meetings were still in the classroom, and he was very much her teacher and she his student – she had come to know him as a man who supported her endeavour to contribute to the upcoming war in seeking his help to brace herself for the very real possibility of being tortured. In fact, in his words of advice in their previous lesson alone he had shown her more care than she had ever seen him bestow on a single student in all her years of attending his class, even towards students of his own House.
Determined not to disappoint his trust in her abilities, Hermione prepared her breathing while reciting the ingredients required for a successful brew of Polyjuice potion in her mind. A pleasant blankness settled over her mental vision though she found that the veil – for that was what her attempt at Occluding felt to her in this moment – allowed portions of her conscious to slip through if she concentrated enough on them.
So concentrate she did. Gradually, the ingredients came to her, and with them their order, measurement, and everything else she needed to know about them and their relation to the potion. All she needed was to lift her hand and –
Hermione wanted to curse herself. So much had she looked forward to completing her assignment, that she had forgotten to prepare her workstation. The table in front of her was empty, and Hermione's concentration broke and her breathing rhythm faltered when her anger at her own thoughtlessness surfaced. Raging inside, she bent to retrieve her ink and quills from her book bag, together with a few scrolls of empty parchment. Placing the ink pot at a position where she would instinctively reach for it, Hermione took the quill in hand and smoothed out a piece of parchment. Then she kept her eyes open but let her focus fall away as her mind dipped once more into the emptiness of Pure Black.
Severus watched as the queue of students waiting to place their vials filled with their regrettable attempts at a useable concoction on his desk shortened, accepting their homework assignments as they dropped off their lesson's work, those finished hurrying to grab their bags and racing off to enjoy their lunch break before the next period. A smirk crossed his face as the two dunderheads usually trailing around the girl watched her, still completely immersed in her assignment, and eventually shrugged, leaving the classroom with only her and him in it.
Severus rose from his desk and walked slowly to the back of the class. He cancelled his usual muffling charm and instead allowed his shoes to give off a satisfying click-clack as the hard soles met the unyielding floor of the classroom, the noise resounding from the vaulted ceiling. He was both proud and disappointed when the sound didn't even make the girl flinch, her hand holding the quill still flitting over the parchment, slower than usual but faster than he would have expected. Probingly, he touched her mind with his, her eyes wide open but hardly seeing as she stared at the parchment steadily filling with her scrawled notes. He was surprised to find that her mind was almost completely darkened. The only light he found seemed like that of a candle burning in an adjoining room, though the sight of the flame was filtered through the milky glass of the door filling the doorway between the two chambers.
Severus was impressed. Even though her mind was not Purely Black, the girl had managed to have her mental source of light dwindle to a degree where it was barely worthy of mention, other than for the fact that it existed. Of course, he had had high expectations of the girl when he'd thought of the task but had not dreamed that she might reach more than the deep anthracite that she'd accomplished when he'd plunged into her mind the previous week, and he'd certainly not thought that she would be able to hold the blankness when he probed into her mind.
Her concentration was almost absolute. Severus wondered, as she did not react to his touch to her mind, would she realize that his fingers were sliding into her hair, slipping through the chestnut tresses that looked silky to the touch, until they were gently tugging at the curls at the nape of her neck?
Before he could lose himself to that thought, and subsequently put the fantasy into action, he decided to break the girl's concentration.
"Miss Granger," he almost bellowed, choosing a demanding tone that had her jumping out of her seat and skin, lest he betray his traitorous thoughts, "the lesson ended five minutes ago. Why have you not yet turned in your assignment?"
"I'm sorry, professor," the girl hastened to apologize, "I did not think to check on the time and got lost –"
"I expect you to do better next time, Miss Granger," Severus scolded her in his most scathing tone of voice that he almost regretted using on her, the one student who had so highly over-achieved against his prior judgement. "I would hate having to fail you on grounds of formality."
"Yes, sir," she complied meekly, her cheeks burning with embarrassment, and she hastened to roll up the scroll of parchment filled in her neat handwriting. Some lines were smeared, Severus could see, as there had probably been no focus to spare on cleanliness in the way of lifting the palm of her hand where it would otherwise collide with newly scribbled words, the ink still fresh and wet. There were few details he could make out as to the content of the paper, as the girl was quick to roll it into a tight scroll, tying it off with a silk bow she quickly conjured with her wand, but what few words he could see appeared accurate. Boomslang skin and lacewing flies he could read before the bow was tied and the scroll held out to him.
Taking the parchment from her, he gave her a nod and she scurried off to join her classmates in their break. Before she could leave the classroom, Severus called her back.
"Miss Granger," he spoke at a normal volume, but his voice carried and as every student, the girl was used to obey his tone. She turned and looked at some point over his shoulder, not meeting his eyes. "What colour today?"
The blush in her cheeks intensified, Severus saw to his pleasure. Rather than tell him off for asking her such a personal question, the girl shot back, "Crimson."
Her eyes flitted to his for a second, and Severus dipped into what was supposed to be the window to the girl's soul. What he found was blankness, her walls impressively stable and unyielding to his perusal of her thoughts. He could not find an image to go with her answer, and before he could attempt to dig deeper, the girl averted her gaze. With a muttered "Good-bye, sir" she was gone, and Severus was left to visions of crimson knickers.
Lunch turned out to be an interesting affair, to say the least. When Hermione plopped down opposite her two best friends, Harry shot her a worried look, as had become his custom whenever she would return from a one-on-one meeting with their feared Potions Master. Hermione graced him with a reassuring smile, just as Ginny fell into the seat next to her.
"Say, Hermione," she began, "whatever managed to change your mind on cleaning up your hair?"
Hermione almost choked on the grilled vegetables that filled her mouth, now her meal of choice for Mondays.
"Excuse me?" she countered. "For your information, my hair has always been clean. It just didn't quite fall into the waves that others might find desirable."
"Oh, believe me, Hermione," Ginny stage-whispered, leaning closer to her with exaggerated secrecy, "you are most desirable now."
Hermione laughed, more than a little nervousness at the younger girl's words seeping into the sound, and at that, Ron eventually looked up.
"Oi, 'Mione," he exclaimed, only now catching up to the girls' conversation, "wherever did all your hair go?"
"Honestly, Ronald," Hermione replied, "I've been wearing my hair this way for half a week now, and you're only just noticing a change today?"
Mumbling something about Quidditch and weekends, Ron turned a bright beet red and his face almost vanished into the beefsteak on the plate in front of him. Hermione shook her head in a benevolent incredulity that could only be found between as close friends as them, and shared a smile with Ginny.
"Really, though," Harry now joined the conversation, "you look amazing, Hermione."
Hermione blushed.
"Thank you, Harry," she answered, honestly pleased at the compliment.
With that being said, the boys soon resumed their conversation on Quidditch, and Ginny left Hermione after a few more exchanged words to sit with her yearmates. After lunch, the trio departed on different ways as Harry and Ron climbed the stairs to their Divination lesson and Hermione went off to Ancient Runes. Together, they later suffered through a double period of Defence Against the Ministry Toad, and spent their dinner bashing Umbridge in every way possible.
Leaving her two best friends to finish their dinner in their own time, Hermione waved a quick good-bye to the boys, shooting them a reassuring smile that she hoped conveyed her certainty that everything would be okay, and off she was to the dungeons.
Severus was still perusing the parchment the girl had handed in when a knock on the door startled him out of his reverie. A quickly cast Tempus gave proof to what he had already expected – he'd missed dinner.
A flick of his wand had the door swing open to reveal the girl standing behind it. Though she should have been used to him magically opening the door, her eyes widened slightly, and Severus, eager to find something lacking in her progress of mastering Occlumency, dived in.
A wide basin filled with bubbles smelling of the clean air of a green forest filled his vision before the image grew darker. Eyes closed, water enveloped him as he submerged fully into the bath. Where before there had been random spots of light, darkness took over and the colourful mindscape turned to shades of grey. When the grey had turned to a tone of anthracite that was close to merging into black, he drew a breath –
– only to resurface, coughing and spluttering, desperate to get the soapy water out of his lungs. Wiping lengths of wet, curly, brown hair out of his face and water out of his eyes, he heaved several gasps before leaving the perspective of the girl to look upon her. Her nakedness was well hidden underneath the thick bubbles coating the surface of the bath in a generous layer of opaque foam. He wondered for a moment whether the girl had added such a great amount of bubble bath to the water with him in mind, to protect her bareness when he would be scouring her memories later. Before he could find an answer, the girl in the memory grabbed her wand to recast the wards she had erected around the bathroom, now faltering in their strength with her partially water-filled lungs.
"You know, Miss Granger," Severus said in greeting, or rather instead of it, when he exited the girl's mind, "that pool is intended for up to five people of the same sex to enjoy in parallel. Even if you don't wish to invite the female prefects from the other Houses and the Head Girl to join you in your evening bubble bath, you should at least allow access to the showers, so that your seven co-prefects, not to mention Head Boy and Girl and the Quidditch captains, may clean themselves up if they wish to. Heavily warding the bathroom against everybody does not seem very cooperative of you."
The girl, still standing in the hallway, completely baffled, collected her wits at that and entered the classroom, closing the door behind her.
"Good evening, sir," she greeted with emphasis.
Severus ignored her.
"I suggest you do your homework exercises after curfew from now on," he continued as if she had never spoken. "I understand that Potter has his ways and means to stroll about the Castle undetected. Perhaps you might beg his assistance in that aspect."
The girl seemed to grasp that she would get no polite, yet empty phrases from him tonight. Not that he regularly used those, anyway.
"Yes, sir," she complied.
"Now, it seems that you failed in your homework assignment," Severus judged her memory correctly. "And your task from today's lesson was not fully completed, overstepping the time limit anyway, and lacking in tidiness. Let us see if there is at least one thing you can do right, shall we?"
And without waiting for her answer, or acknowledging the wetness that filled the girl's eyes, Severus twirled his wand in a complicated movement and a faint blue line appeared just beneath the bottom border of her skirt. Standing and crossing over to where the girl stood, Severus bent his knees to better examine the distance between line and seam. To his eye, the measure seemed to be correct.
"Very well, Miss Granger," he concluded when he straightened, "it appears that you are capable of hemming your skirt by an inch."
The girl stayed silent. Severus had almost expected her to thank him for his assessment, but was rather grateful that she remained quiet.
"Now, Miss Granger, how about –"
His gratitude at her silence had been too early, it seemed, as her curiosity broke through and she interrupted him.
"What spell was that?" she asked, almost breathless. "Professor," she added, as if in an afterthought.
Severus could feel his lips disappearing into a line so thin the girl would probably be unable to discern whether his face featured a mouth at all. Unfortunately, she saw none of that, as her eyes were firmly fixed to his chest, cleverly avoiding his gaze. Her cheeks, however, blushed with the embarrassment of having interrupted her stern teacher, and her silken curls frizzed a little at the ends as her magic reacted to her emotional tumult. Severus felt himself giving in to the charm that the sight of the embarrassed young witch spread, though entirely unintended on her account, he was sure, for otherwise she would not have been half as charming.
"I am certain that there is an incantation written in some textbook or other to reach the result that I just procured," he replied, "but I used no such thing. This was mere intention on my part."
Emboldened by the fact that he had answered her in the first place, the girl pressed on, "But what intention was that exactly? Did you intend to procure a line at a specific distance from my waist downwards?"
"No," Severus said, "I simply wanted to know where your lower hem was supposed to be according to the current dress code regulations at this esteemed institution."
"Then how," the girl continued, "did the magic know what the current dress code regulation stated? Or is your sense of proportion that perfect that the line appeared at the correct height? How can you be certain that it is the right height at all?"
Severus rolled his eyes in obvious annoyance, though his insides frolicked in joy at the natural curiosity that the girl possessed. Instinctive, inner magic was not something taught these days, and to find a student interested in such things was a rarity.
Instead of answering her straight away, Severus decided to ask a question himself.
"Tell me, Miss Granger," he began, "what subject based on ridiculous wand waving comes least easily to you?"
"Transfiguration," came the girl's instant reply.
"And why is that?"
The girl thought on that for a minute.
"I'm not quite certain, professor," she admitted.
"Guess, then," Severus encouraged generously.
Another few moments passed before she came to a decision.
"I suppose," she said slowly, "that it has to do with the fact that beside the words that we are told to use in a spell, we need a lot of imagination to picture exactly what the result is supposed to look like?"
Severus kept himself from gracing the girl with one of his exceedingly rare, proud smiles. Barely.
"More exactly," he corrected her instead, unwilling to outright tell her that she was on the right track, "one needs to know what the desired outcome is made of, how it works, and why it doesn't fall apart. Animagic, as one of the most advanced forms of transfigurational magic, is so rare because after having discovered through meditation what animal's form a wizard is going to take upon mastering Animagic, he needs to intently and intensively study that animal's physique; what it looks like, where its organs are placed, how it moves, and so forth. If he doesn't, he might place the liver in the wrong spot, or be forever limp and off-balance because he got the tail wrong, or be unable to think correctly because some synapse does not work the way it's supposed to. That is why that brand of magic is so rare. Many wizards and witches who have attempted Animagic have ended up in an incomplete or imperfect form, and either got stuck because they were unable to transform back, or died a pitiful death because their animal did not function correctly.
"The same problems exist on a much smaller scale in what Transfiguration is taught at Hogwarts. Many male students fail at transforming a match into a needle in their first year, simply because they've never bothered to examine a sewing needle up close before. Things become worse in later schoolyears, when lessons progress to inanimate to animate transfiguration. A house mouse to a goblet is easy, because everybody knows what a goblet looks like. But transfiguring a goblet to a house mouse usually ends in tragic deaths for the procured mice, as few students bother to think about how a mouse comes to live in the first place.
"Now," Severus ended his long monologue, "what am I trying to tell you, Miss Granger?"
The girl's bottom lip turned a lovely shade of cherry red as she continued to nervously chew on it, deep in thought. Severus was almost certain he had imagined the little plopping sound that it made as she released it from between her teeth.
"For the mice to die," she eventually replied slowly, still thinking on her answer even as she gave it, "they must have lived first. So intention, as long as it is clear in the magician's mind, can produce results that are physically impossible."
The sentence sounded almost like a question. When Severus made no move to answer, the girl took that as encouragement to continue.
"So, if one can procure life that would usually be impossible under the laws of physics," she mused, "it is quite easy to procure a line at the perfect height stated by school regulation if one is intent enough on doing so, even though the concrete knowledge behind it is lacking."
"What if you were to conjure a ruler, Miss Granger?" Severus pressed, eager to find proof that she really had understood.
"It would measure perfectly," she replied, more confident now that he hadn't proven her wrong yet, "but only while I concentrated on the intention for it to do so. The moment I relied on its calibration, the measurements would mess up completely."
Severus nodded his satisfaction with her answer.
"And why, Miss Granger," he continued, "are glamours inadvisable?"
Her eyes shot up to his for a second at his change in line of questioning. She lowered her gaze once more, and was surprisingly quick to answer.
"They demand constant attention, sir," she spoke, "otherwise they will fade. Subsequently, the more glamours one uses simultaneously, the less concentration one can spare for other things."
"Academically speaking," Severus supplied, "they diminish the caster's capacity for magic. As a rule of thumb, however, one might say that with a great focus on artificially improving one's appearance comes an empty head."
"Is that why you checked me for glamours last week, professor?" the girl asked.
"It is," he confirmed. "When magically changing your appearance, Miss Granger, you would fare well to do so at a physical level. It is less likely to fade with your waning concentration, and should you wish to disguise yourself and were caught, the disguise would have to be detected at the level it was cast first, and then be dismantled. Of course, changes to the genes themselves are highly risky and generally not advisable. But often it is enough to understand how colour seeps into the hair, and hope that you will neither spend enough time in captivity for your natural colour to grow out, nor for your captors to think of casting a growth acceleration charm on your hair. Likewise, it often is more effective to conjure long lasting contact lenses that cover your natural eye colour rather than glamour your irises."
The girl looked confused.
"I didn't think such Muggle means were common knowledge in the wizarding world," she said.
"They aren't," Severus replied. "That is why you would do well to get back to them, especially when fighting against pureblood supremacists who would rather sacrifice their first-born than study anything originated from the Muggle world.
"But for now, Miss Granger," he terminated their current topic of conversation, "let us turn to your progress in Occlumency instead. When you entered the classroom earlier, your concentration was completely off. I suggest we work on that. Where did we stop last week? Ah, yes," a smirk crossed his features, and the girl shivered under the expression that she more guessed from his voice than saw on his face, "your sixth birthday…"
And thus the girl's detention really began.
Coming up: Chapter thirteen, wherein are encountered failure issues and the first fall of snow.