Author's Note: I could make up all sorts of fancy schmancy excuses as to why it took a bit longer for this, but they'd all be elaborate and involve me being busy with a super villain schedule. In reality, I am just deliciously tan from some time on the river.

Big thanks to Megii for pointing out a rather crucial fact, I changed a bit in that chapter to make it more appropriate. Honestly, what would I do without you reviewers helping guide me through this virginal process and making me reconsider and strive to be better?

Probably bang on pots and pans with a big stick, actually…

Disclaimer: (sigh) No. Just no.

Act V

In which, Hermione Granger says the most heinous things

Hermione was bored out of her mind.

Snape, sitting to her left at the round table, appeared to be just as thrilled to be here. For the life of her, she could not imagine why they had to review their syllabi in a round table discussion with the other professors every year. Probably some asinine Headmasters' Creed, to infuriate the teaching staff with redundancy, considering all syllabi had to be turned in to the Headmistress two weeks prior for review and approval, regardless of the fact that Hermione's own syllabus had not changed in the past two years, and barring any sudden breakthroughs in the world of transfiguration (her own or otherwise), it would probably stay the same for the next three years.

She resisted the urge to loll her head back and release a petulant, exasperated sigh.

The biting ache spanning from her hip to her knee was not helping matters. This was why she taught standing up and pacing. Well, the pain from inactivity and the amusingly terrified expressions on the firsties faces when she swept up to them and caught them passing notes or slacking off. A surprisingly silent approach, and then the dramatic clack of her cane as she departed with whatever goods she had confiscated, each click spelling impending doom.

She really had judged Professor Snape far too harshly as a child.

Snapping her attention to the matters at hand, Hermione noticed that the Headmistress was drawing the meeting to a close after Neville's review of the herbology syllabus. Standing and shuffling her papers together with her weight leant up against the table, she put them neatly into a never-ending folder and shrunk it down to pocket size, stuffing it into her robes and grasping her cane. She made her way over to Neville, smiling at him with such friendliness and caring that she appeared to merely be a slightly more haggard, thin Hermione of old.

"Hullo, Neville. I'd say I'm excited for the new year, but I know these next two weeks are going to fly by and make me miss summer all over again."

Neville's round face melted into a smile. He had certainly not changed much from being a young man, besides having gained an aura of personable courage, and a habit of killing snakes that entered the greenhouses without prejudice.

"Oh, I don't know, Hermione. A new school year means fall will be here soon, and the cool weather will keep the more hostile plants sedate enough to study."

"Who would have known that Professor Longbottom wanted to sic vicious flora on unsuspecting students. I didn't know you had it in you, Neville," came a silky voice from behind them, making the name sound like a filthy curse.

Neville's eyes widened, and he made excuses to Hermione as they reached the bottom of the staircase and made record time without running down the corridor. Hermione cast a bored glance at Snape over her shoulder, and then began walking as he fell into step beside her.

"Honestly, Severus, after all this time, you'd think that you could find a new hobby besides terrorizing Neville."

"Nothing else makes my black heart pitter pat like Longbottom practically wetting himself to get away from me."

"Why, Severus, I'm proud of you. You've managed to grow a heart? How long did it take to brew that potion?"

Snape scoffed. "You wound me, Professor. The agony is unbearable."

Hermione snorted as they turned the corner, and Snape paused his long stride.

"I've found some research material I think you'll find valuable regarding your problem, Granger. Would you care to accompany down to my study?"

Hermione appeared thoughtful for a moment. "I can discuss it for about an hour and a half, and then I've got to go. I've promised Neville I'll keep him company and help him while he plants the whipping roses."

"Granger, you cad. Toying with my emotions and then running off to Longbottom?"

Hermione let out a sharp bark of laughter.

"Ha! Emotions. You're adorable when you jest, Severus."

And they set off to the dungeons chuckling amongst themselves.

Hermione was normally not hindered too terribly much by her limping gait. She could outpace most of the students when school was in session through sheer determination and stubbornness. But her pace was slow on the way to the greenhouses, her eyes dark and introspective. Why, she could almost be a brooding heroine, except for the fact that Hermione Granger did not brood. She vicious chewed her way through quandaries and spat out solutions.

Severus Snape had not touched his tea, and that made Hermione a tad nervous.

Because nothing got between Snape and his tea.

Setting his cup down on the saucer on his desk, he leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers, his elbows resting on the arms of his chair.

"I'm not going to beat about the bush, Hermione."

Uh oh. Snape most certainly never called her by her given name except in the most dire of circumstances.

"I still have no idea why the ghost of Tom Riddle has latched onto your magic. But by all diagnostic testing, we cannot even determine where it is anchored. We must fear the worst and assume that it is irrevocably tangled amongst it. The accounts of circumstances like this are few and far between, and no solution was provided in any of them. So far as I can tell, it has happened only when there are extremely strong, tangible emotions from the person affected, towards the person that's soul has been either sequestered, or drawn back by the emotional energy."

Snape paused, sipping his tea.

"The problem is, usually their emotions are a bit…"

"Less hateful?" Hermione helpfully supplied, setting her tea on the table beside her and ignoring it all together now.

"Precisely. I will need time to develop a potion to highlight where your magic ends and his soul begins in the tether, so that we might separate them without causing permanent damage, 'lest you end up a squib or hopelessly damaged."

Hermione laughed ruthlessly, a sharp, cold sound.

"Hopelessly damaged? That's quaint, Severus."

Opening the door to the greenhouse, Hermione called out quietly and calmly to Neville, so as not to startle him while he was dragging the whipping roses towards the pile of pots that he had, the tiny sproutlings sluggishly waving as if in a breeze. The cooling charm on them kept them from violently snapping their thorned tendrils at Neville, so far as she could tell.

"Hullo, Hermione. There are dragonhide gloves on the table over there. You'll need them, seeing as how we can't transplant them while they're under the cooling charm. It would kill the roots."

"I was wondering why we had to plant roses that were temperamental in warm weather in the middle of summer," she responded drily.

Neville smiled sheepishly. "Thank you for helping. No one else will get near the nastier plants."

Hermione slipped on her dragonhide gloves, gave a second for the sizing charm on them to shrink them to her hands, and set her cane up against one of the planting tables so that she could kneel beside Neville and drag a pile of pots closer to her. She hid her grimace as she knelt and felt the tendons in her right leg scream in protest.

"More of the potion? I only just gave you that last supply at the beginning of the month."

"Very astute, Severus. And it is now the end of the month."

"Granger," he drawled, his face impassive but his eyes even darker than usual, "this potion isn't candy that you can pop every day. It drains a portion of your magic and is highly addictive. You need at least a week between doses for your magical core to restabilize."

"And I haven't been popping it every day, Snape. But the weekly dose no longer works. I've built up an immunity to its effects. So unless you've got another potion that can function the same way, so that I might actually sleep through the night again, please do share," she responded, her voice strained.

"I've got an experimental potion I've been working on for the pain, one without the same side effects, but just as potentially addictive. I'll supply you with another months worth, and then we will attempt the new potion at the end of the month. I believe we shall resume experiments to repair your muscle tissue around the same time, I've found a promising lead."

A promising lead. Ha. Five years of teaching at Hogwarts. Five years of promising leads, and her mangled leg was still not any better. They'd managed to keep the damage from spreading any further, but what was done, was done. She reached absently for one of the tiny, angry roses, gently loosening its roots from the dirt it was in.

Hermione was a force to be reckoned with on the battle field. She did not have the raw power that Harry did, nor the unadulterated fury that Ron did, but Hermione had her own weapon. A calculating mind, attention to every detail going around her, and an encyclopedic knowledge of spells and hexes. Adrenaline kept her moving, but it also made her shake… but perhaps that was simply the fear making her shake.

Hermione Granger was terrified, but she was more stubborn than any of these Death Eater fucks. She knew that much. She would not back down.

Her voice didn't quiver as she flung spell after spell, spinning wildly in abject terror that someone would sneak up behind her, but it cracked under the pressure of that terror. Her eyes were wild with it, and lent her a deranged look with her frizzy mass of hair standing practically on end, the tips singed from the magic in the air.

And when Voldemort fell, she keened the wildest, most savage victory scream that was ever heard. At least, that was how it felt ripping out of her throat, startling her. Hermione Granger was not supposed to make such noises. And if she hadn't, perhaps she would have heard the spell snarled as she did. All she knew was that something hit her in the middle of her thigh, and sent her toppling to the ground. She heard Ron screech out a spell, heard the Death Eater behind her hit the ground with a devastating thud, as she got a mouthful of dirt, little bits of it turning to mud on her face from the sheer volume of sweat.

How fitting, she had thought, mud on the Mudblood.

She blamed the delirium from the sheer volume of pain that forced incoherent warbles and guttural moans from her throat. Inhuman sounds, as the boys carried her hastily back to the castle and the rest of the Order finished off what Death Eaters were fleeing, or making a final stand, and tending to the wounded. The living did not yet have time for those dead on the battlefield.

Hermione smiled grimly. Severus had said, with guilt in his eyes after she had begun teaching shortly after leaving University, that had he not been lying in the Shrieking Shack, choking down antivenin and potions to stave off his down death, he probably could have stopped the damage before it got so bad with carefully chosen potions. But she'd waved him off. Madame Pomfrey had done her best, forcing potions down her throat as hastily as she could while Hermione choked on them, keening wildly as her veins began to spider black trails through her skin and muscle, the tendons feeling as if they were twisting and tearing irreparably.

Because they were.

Something silvery and unnaturally bright appeared beside her, startling her. Startled her enough so that she jerked, and the whipping rose managed to lash a tendril onto the unguarded part of her arm and dig in as hard as it could.

"Wandgobbling FUCKWITS!" she bellowed, clumsily trying to extricate the thorns from her skin. They had a slight venom in them, as a fire ant did its bite, nothing lethal- except in large amounts- but enough to make it burn.

Like a mother fucker.

"RIDDLE! I told you not to appear like that, I am tired of you startling me like that, you candy ass, undead SWOT." In her haste to extricate herself before the burning got worse, she tipped over the pot and it crashed clumsily over, breaking in half and leaving the whipping rose thrashing angrily on the ground.

And then Hermione realized something.

Neville was staring with abject horror at the ghost. He'd not heard account of young Riddle, but he'd been filled in by the other professors on who this entity had been in life. And you know what? Hermione's face was slowly mirroring that horror.

But for different reasons.

"It's daylight."

"Yes, it is, Granger."

His form was unnaturally bright, but appeared paler with the sunlight filtering through him.

"You can't fucking appear in daylight," she snarled.

"Apparently I can."

And then he pointed at her little pot, and mimicked a swish and a flick with his finger, and it repaired itself.

"Ghosts can't do magic," she screeched, standing swiftly and stumbling into the table as her leg screamed in protest.

Her mind was numb.

"Apparently, you're wrong."

And that was when Neville bolted out the door, presumably to go get assistance, or to escape Hermione's wrath as she let loose a string of slurs and curse words so foul, that they are most likely illegal in several countries. So gruesome and terrible and disgusting, that we dare not put it into print 'lest it be repeated.

Tom Riddle's ghostly head tipped backwards, and laughed in broad daylight as if it was the funniest thing in the world.