Chapter Nine Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fond ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* Disclaimer: Need I say more?

A.N. Oh, you all know you love the cliff hangers. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Peter Pettigrew wove his way through the group of death eaters crowded in the inner hall of the riddle house and came to stand by Severus, who was having a conversation with Lucius Malfoy.

'The dark lord would speak with you,' Pettigrew said in a hushed voice and slithered off.

Severus had always had a very profound dislike for Peter Pettigrew, but it had grown into down right hatred over the past two years. As much as he'd hated all of them, Lily, James, Remus, and Sirius of course he now hated Peter worse than all of them put together. The fact of the matter was that Peter had betrayed Lily and James, all of them. He would never have actually wanted any of them dead, although he'd come close a few times. But, a man picks his enemies very carefully and Severus had been fairly happy with his rivalry with James when Peter had ended it. Severus had once heard that your arch nemesis is always the only person you can find who is more like you than you are. Severus had always liked that, and nestled deep down in his heart bosom companion to his undying hatred was a profound respect for James. Yet, thanks to Pettigrew, Severus no longer had his rival.

Unexpectedly, a mere three years ago he'd been presented with the next best thing: Sirius Black. Severus had developed a nice little rivalry with James' son Harry, but it just wasn't the same. He never considered Harry his equal, and while the boy looked like James he wasn't the same person. Severus found it hard to look the boy in the eyes and still hate him, Lily's eyes shone as the windows to Harry's soul. Severus had always been fond of Lily, even if she was a bossy muggle-born goody-goody know-it- all from Gryffindor; she'd saved him from some of James and Sirius' more embarrassing pranks. He had been very disappointed when Lily and James started dating and he had been forced to despise her just when he felt the beginning of a developing crush for the girl. Severus wondered if this was part of the reason he felt so strongly about Hermione, she did bear a striking resemblance to Lily. He just hoped that he wouldn't have to loose her to another Potter; she was half his age after all. However, Severus' rivalry with Black had been short lived as well, this had mostly been Harry's fault but the boy couldn't really be blamed. Sirius was thickheaded, one of the things that Severus so fondly hated about him. With his new circumstances Severus had been in the position to push Sirius' buttons in just the right order, often using Harry to his advantage. The open hostility had, at times, been a kind of fond friendship.

His hatred of Peter was not the same, Severus in no way saw Peter as his equal. Pettigrew was a rat that needed to be exterminated; he was the lowest form of life imaginable. James had always been his nemesis, his equal, from the first time he'd met the boy. They had been such similar creatures, too similar perhaps. Severus wondered if the relationship between Voldemort and Dumbledore was really so much different than his relationship with James. It had to be though, didn't it? Voldemort was an evil man; yet the way Dumbledore called him Tom, almost fondly, made Severus wonder.

Severus took a deep breath, bracing himself, and entered Voldemort's office.

'You're trying to destroy me Severus Snape,' the dark lord said flatly with no preface.

Severus' heart stopped, 'My lord?'

Voldemort sneered. 'We've kidnapped a woman from his inner circle. Peter's used a truth serum on the woman, and it would seem that that Dumbledore has someone working on a degeneration potion. As my agent within Hogwarts I would have expected you to have discovered this and informed me of it quite long time ago. I don't know how long they've been working on the potion or how far they've progressed, but you had better hope that it's not far. Or else, I fear, the circumstances for yourself will be most grave indeed. You are going to have to find out when and how they intend to use the potion, I'd ask you to destroy it but I think that would be asking too much of you and we can't risk failure. You should start work on the counter potion immediately, since making potions seems to be the only thing that you're good at. I want a complete report on Monday if that's not too much to expect from you. Now leave!'

Severus left, he had found out the hard way that it was better to just let Voldemort do the talking and let the dark lord think that he was feeble. That way, if it was necessary to make a critical mistake to protect the order Voldemort would just think that it was because he was incapable rather then suspecting sabotage.

There was still a fair amount of people gathered around the hall, but Severus didn't bother with keeping up appearances and just apparated back to Snape manor.

Severus went back to bed. This wasn't good at all, and Dumbledore wasn't going to be back until Monday. Severus desperately wanted to speak with him. He wished Hermione were there, she always seemed to know what to do. At the very least, she would succeed in distracting him. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Hermione flooed herself back into Severus' office and started up towards Gryffindor tower, wondering whether or not she could get up to her room without anyone noticing that she was wearing Severus' shirt.

She hadn't gotten very far however, when she met Harry and Ron on the stairs.

'Where've you been?' Harry asked.

'Talking to the house elves,' Hermione said the first thing that came to her mind. She wasn't entirely lying either, she had been talking to house elves that morning.

'We're headed down there right now,' Ron explained.

Harry laughed, 'Yeah, Ron's hungry. What else is new?'

'The kitchens,' Hermione said, remembering the look on Dobby's face the night before. 'I forgot my bag; I'll bring some food up to the common room for you. Meet me there!' Hermione yelled this all very abruptly and ran up the hallway towards the kitchens.

'She sure does forget her bag an awful lot,' Ron observed.

'I imagine that she has a lot on her mind,' Harry said. If Ron hadn't noticed that she was wearing someone else's shirt he certainly wasn't about to point it out. It really wasn't any of his business, and he was sure Ron and Hermione would end up fighting over it. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Hermione awoke Monday morning with a flock of butterflies fluttering about inside her stomach. She decided to go straight to Dumbledore's office and not bother going to potions at all. She wanted to see Severus, but she wouldn't be able to really talk to him with the class there, she'd have to appear to hate him.

Much to Hermione's surprise she met Severus at the entrance to Dumbledore's office. He smiled at her, but didn't say anything except the password, which happened to be, 'Toot sweet.'

It would seem that Dumbledore had run out of real candies to use as passwords and had proceeded on to fictional ones. It would be wonka scrumdidlyumtious or slugworth sizzler next.

Hermione followed Severus down the spiral staircase and into Dumbledore's office where, upon entering, her vision was abruptly blurred by a frenzy of red feathers as Fawks landed on Severus' shoulder.

'Hello then,' Severus said softly scratching the bird's neck. Hermione had only ever seen Fawks except such attention from anyone save Harry and Dumbledore, let alone seek it out.

Dumbledore stepped into the room from the adjoining one, and sat down behind his desk. 'Oh, Severus, you're here as well; I'm happy.'

'I'm not,' Severus sighed, 'It's on other business I'm afraid.'

'Really?' Dumbledore furrowed his eyebrows.

Severus frowned, 'No I guess not, well kind of. The Dark Lord knows about the potion.'

Dumbledore furrowed his eyebrows deeper still.

Severus continued, 'He wants me to start making the counter potion.'

Dumbledore let out a sigh of relief, 'That's not so bad then, we can use it to our advantage.'

Hermione was feeling more and more confused, and Severus must have noticed this because he said, 'I think it's about time that we let Hermione know exactly what we're dealing with.'

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow and gave Severus a look of surprise, 'Indeed, you're right.

'Hermione, you and Severus have spent the past few weeks working on a degeneration potion.' When Hermione only looked confused he continued. 'What a degeneration potion does is make a magical person into a non- magical one. Can you imagine what this would mean for someone like Voldemort? It would destroy him.'

Hermione nodded slowly, and then frowned. 'But the potion isn't that difficult to make, couldn't you have used it a long time ago when he was first coming into power.'

Dumbledore nodded, 'It is a fairly simple potion to make, the difficult part is finding the ingredients to make it and making sure that it doesn't effect more people than you want it to. Finding the recipe is no easy task either. Severus was fortunate enough to stumble upon it in one of the ledgers in his library.'

'It's like an atomic bomb then,' Hermione observed, 'But beetle eyes and dragon scales aren't really controlled substances.'

Severus now turned to her, and pulled the glowing cave stone out of his pocket. 'I think you left this in my office,' he handed it to her.

Hermione smiled at it as it glowed red once it had transferred into her hand and put it into her pocket. But then she frowned, 'But is it safe for me to be carrying this around in my pocket?'

'It's not going to hurt you any,' Dumbledore answered. 'But I think you know enough to go on Hermione, Severus can answer your questions later. If you'll excuse us Severus and I need to talk privately.'

Hermione nodded, and left Dumbledore's office in favor of the cold recesses of the dungeon.

The moment she had gone Dumbledore turned to Severus. 'What do you think you're playing at you foolish man?' ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

A.N. Yup, that's it. Kind of liking this slight cliffhanger thing.

Belle Mortis: Uhh, gasps how could you. Well, I, I, I, I'm going to..sticks tongue out at Belle Mortis So there!

Amara Tsu: rises from the melted puddly mess on the floor Mwahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah! Well, now that I've gotten that out of my system. Did I ever tell you that you're my favorite person in the whole world, Amara. I'd resolved to no longer establish deadlines for myself, that is until this morning when I resolved to finish this chapter today. I have told Sarahamanda to write real reviews, but she doesn't seem to listen.... At least she does review. And, if your reviews aren't real reviews I don't care because they're the best ones I get. I like pineapples. But... I have to go, I'm running out of time.

Parody-of-an-Angel: Another cliffhanger for you, I like hormonal Snape, he's like surf party Ken.

Kaori 7395: I still don't think Snape's OOC.

I'll finish these up next time, cause I don't have any.