Severus cringed as the red and gold-clad, bushy-haired annoyance in his classroom dropped a third utensil, and shoved his thumb and forefinger roughly into his eyes in a futile attempt to stave off the massive headache that had been building since she'd arrived. Yet another set of shrill, stuttered apologies filtered through the pounding between his ears, and he felt the large eagle feather quill in his hand snap into pieces. He sensed a twitch in the muscle just beneath his right eye, and moved purposefully from the perch at his desk down to the work floor, stalking towards the interloping Head Girl in his customary bat-like fashion. He was briefly appeased by her frozen, panicked visage, and the rapid drain of blood from her face.
"Gran-ger," he enunciated each syllable heavily. "When you bullied your way into my office three days ago, you made it a point to give the impression that somehow… against all reasonable expectations… you knew what you were doing. Tell me how that arrogant, insufferable, overconfident menace managed to send you here in her place?" Severus slid his hands in to the opposite sleeves of his robes, crossed his arms over his chest, and eyed the unwelcome contestant-mentee with ill-disguised loathing. Internally, he smiled wide as Hermione Granger's eyes began to water and she shrank back like a first year Hufflepuff. He really shouldn't be responsible for children, he thought bemused. He took inordinate amounts of pleasure from giving them nightmares. Refocusing his thoughts, he tempered his glare with a measure of expectant impatience; even if he didn't care to admit it to anyone else, Severus really did wonder what occurred between then and now to make his most know-it-all student seem to know, rather, nothing at all. He watched motionlessly as she took several shaky breaths in an attempt to settle down and give him an answer.
"Pro-professor S-snape," Hermione sputtered, "I really am sorry, I don't know what's come over m-me." She made a few calming motions, brushing her hair out of her eyes and straightening her robes over her jumper and skirt. "I really will focus, I swear I didn't come here to waste your time." She took one last shuddering inhale, but hadn't attempted to look him in the eye once during her act of contrition. She couldn't stop herself from jumping, however, at Snape's retort.
"You are performing a commendable imitation to the contrary, Ms. Granger," he snapped. "I do not appreciate my time being wasted, especially on such fraudulently 'important' tasks like hand-holding and basic kitchen awareness. Over the last half hour, you have single-handedly managed to coat the back of six spoons with burnt flour. Although I'm certain I'd never live to regret it, I'd feel more comfortable in the presence of Neville Longbottom with a stack of wood and a book of matches right now." He couldn't help his smirk as her standing form crumpled onto the nearest bench. Satisfied that he'd put her in her place –however temporary that was sure to be– Severus moved smoothly to the worktop opposite her last disastrous attempt and rapped smartly on the wood with his knuckles. Hermione's head shot up. In full lecture mode, he started to demonstrate.
"Tell me, Granger," he began, arranging kindling in a small circle atop an iron ring, "the necessary ingredients to prepare a traditional French roux." He deftly drizzled accelerant over the wood, and pulled a strike-anywhere match across the rough edge of the table, guiding the flame to the ring with one hand and dropping a cast iron pan across the top of the wood with the other. A fire roared to life under the cooking implement, and Hermione was mesmerized by the fluid motions as her mouth automatically opened to provide the answer.
"Butter and flour are the traditional combination for roux in French cuisine, although other fats or oils can be substituted to create a similar starter." She watched as he uncovered a small porcelain dish, provided earlier from the kitchens, and removed a plate of solid butterfat. He turned further to the side and retrieved a short canister, which he opened to reveal unleavened flour.
"Measurements?" he asked abruptly.
"One to one," she replied perfunctorily. She noticed his slight frown. "Ratio, by weight, Professor," she amended. His frown did not dissipate as he pulled a set of scales from under the work surface, and used a small scoop to load one side with flour. He then took the thin wooden paddle that accompanied the butter and sectioned off a generous amount. With a quick motion, he flipped the portion onto the other side of the scale, and Hermione was secretly deeply impressed when the scale balanced itself immediately.
"Next steps?" his exasperation broke through her musings. She came back to herself with a quick shake of her head.
"Stir constantly over medium-low heat."
Severus raised an eyebrow.
Hermione quickly rifled along her mental notes, fretful she'd forgotten some obvious step. When her mind came up blank, she had no choice but to add, "until done?"
Snape rolled his eyes skyward. "And here begins, you impudent girl, where you divert from an unquestionable if underutilized brilliance for potion making, to an abysmal excuse for culinary responsibility." He selected a whisk from the basket of cooking paraphernalia, also provided from the kitchens, and used it to slide the butter from the scale plate and into the interior of the pan, which sizzled on contact. He formed a seamless figure-eight to melt the fat down evenly into the pan, and caught the frazzled Gryffindor lilting back and forth like a charmed cobra. She stopped cold and looked up at him sheepishly when he cleared his throat. He resumed his stirring of the melted liquid, simultaneously using his other hand to shift half the flour off the scale and into the butter. He sped up the whisk, and was soon skimming along a pale slurry.
Hermione was riveted as she watched her professor alternate between adding more flour and returning the clumping mixture to its smooth consistency. A little more than three-quarters of the flour was in the pan, and the roux had begun sticking to itself, taking on more granular properties, and transitioning to a tan, sandy color. Her hand drifted automatically to her quill and parchment, and she quickly scribbled disjointed notes across the page. After another minute or so, he was done.
"Now, what have you learned?" Snape gestured imperiously to the pan as he used a cloth to pull it from the fire to stop the cooking process.
"That you think I'm brilliant," Hermione replied distractedly. She was rudely jolted back to the moment by the sound of the pan hitting the stone floor. "Er, Professor, I meant—" She saw Snape's anger gathering like the clouds of a thunderstorm.
"Out, you addle-pated twit!" Severus boomed, wrenching his wand from his robes and violently clearing the cooking messes from the classroom tables and floor.
"Wait, please, Professor!" Hermione tried desperately to backtrack. "What I meant to say was that you didn't use all the flour—"
"OUT!" Severus jabbed his wand at her overstuffed satchel and it zoomed into Hermione's stomach. He barely heard her huff of breath as she managed to catch it before it hit the ground.
"But Professor, my notes—"
"If you aren't out of my sight in the next tw—," Severus' threat died in his throat.
In the process of grabbing her arm to vault her physically from his domain, she'd turned to plead her case once more, and his hand landed squarely in the front of her robes. He stared with thinly veiled horror as her face flushed and she bit down hard on her lip to keep from crying out. He tried to force his hand to unclench from around her breast, but he couldn't move. "Ms. Granger, I…" the potions master uttered, not knowing what he would be able to say to extricate himself from the situation. He was not at all prepared for the breathy little moan that escaped his student's lips; one that did not sound distressed in the slightest. His war-born sense of self-preservation was the only thing that finally allowed him to release her, and he stumbled back several steps to be clear of further danger. He couldn't form any words, and quickly wished he'd closed his eyes when he noticed her legs shifting and her thighs gently clenching through the gap left in her now disheveled robes. He took another step backwards, mute in his culpability, and spun hastily on his heel to retreat to his office. He slammed his door without looking back, the statue of Hermione Granger, slightly turned on and freshly violated, burning into his retinas.