Chapter 7

"I... I did not want to... I'm sorry," Hermione stammered, out of breath. Snape looked at her with such disdain that she felt shivers run down her spine. At once, she felt trapped in a nightmare with no recollection of ever falling asleep.

"Did you enjoy the show, Miss Granger?" he asked with that velvety, soft voice that reminded her of a deep ocean. Seemingly smooth and motionless – but with menacing depths lurking beneath the surface.

"No," she squeezed out, "honestly, I didn't. It was not my intention..."

"To eavesdrop?" He approached her with slow strides.

Her instincts told her to retreat, but she forced herself to stay where she was.

"To observe me? Is that so, Miss Granger? Is that your idea of Gryffindor courage, or are you driven by a personal curiosity about my most private concerns? "

"Please, sir, I'm sorry! I just wanted to fetch a glass of water when I heard your and Harry's voice, " she said, her voice trembling.

He was so close now that she could clearly see the moist traces the tears had left on his cheeks. The rapt expression on his face that had been so present just moments ago had now made way for cold contempt.

Her fingers grasped the banisters tightly, and she forced herself to look him in the eye.

"Severus, I am sure that Hermione really did not want to eavesdrop," Harry said calmly.

"Mind your own business," Snape snapped and turned to Hermione once more. "You bwill/b answer me, Miss Granger," he said soft as silk and made an inviting gesture towards the settee. In some grotesque manner, he looked like a host, eager to comfort his guest.

Hermione almost wished he would scream at her, that he would rage and throw into her face how much he hated her. But he did none of these things, and somehow that made matters even worse. When she did not move, he took one more step towards her, and she backed away involuntarily.

"Well, well, Miss Granger," he said, gloating. "I only asked you a simple question. Isn't answering questions one of your favourite hobbies? You do deceive me. No hand raising? No impatient jumping?"

"I already said that I am sorry, sir," she said quietly. "What else do you want to hear?"

"But I already said that. You heard me, did you not?"

"I don't understand," Hermione started, helplessly looking in Harry's direction.

"Gryffindor courage or personal attachment, Miss Granger. These are only some words. Which one did you not understand?" He looked her up and down in the intense manner that made her feel as if she were a rare but disgusting insect whose reactions he wanted to study.

Hermione took a deep breath, looked into his cold, black eyes and finally said, "Sir, I only came down to get some water from the kitchen when I heard you and Harry speaking. I realised that I could not just barge in, so I stayed where I was. You know the rest. I admit that I was curious. I am very sorry."

He sneered at her. "That does not answer my question and you know it. You can do better, can't you, Miss Granger?"

"Let it be, Severus. She has apologised, and she knows that she has made a mistake." Harry stood next to Snape. For a moment, it seemed as if he wanted to grab Snape's shoulder, but in the end, he just kept standing beside him quietly.

"I already told you to mind your own business," Snape rumbled.

"I do not want any quarrels in my house." Harry's voice was still very quiet and controlled, but Hermione sensed that his calm demeanour belied his feelings.

"And I think that I have a right to know why Miss Granger takes the liberty to eavesdrop on private conversations..." Snape retorted, adding, after a small pause, "... in your house..." The corners of his mouth turned to a malevolent grin when he faced Hermione again. "Well, I will not ask you again to answer my question," he warned, almost whispering.

"I already told you, sir," answered Hermione, avoiding his gaze. "I was curious and I am ashamed about my behaviour. I had no right and all I can say is that I am sorry. I... I admit that the subject of your conversation," her cheeks turned flaming red and her stomach clenched painfully, "made me stop. I did not think what this meant for you, sir. Please forgive me."

The ensuing silence became agonising. She could almost feel Snape's contempt rolling over her in waves.

"I have always been under the impression that you have no respect whatsoever for the privacy of other people. That you would cross any visible or invisible line as long as it serves to satisfy your personal curiosity, to add another point to your list of things you managed to study." His tone was chilling. "I see that my assessment was perfectly correct," he said. Then he turned around and left the room and the house without another word.

oOoOoOoOo

"I am so sorry," Hermione repeated for the umpteenth time. Although Harry assured her that he was okay with it, she felt that he was angry with her.

In the meantime, Ginny was up. Speechless, she listened to what had happened, and said, "I understand you, Hermione. I would have been just as curious as you. It is just – I was under the impression that we had established some kind of mutual acceptance with Snape." She sighed and put three steaming mugs of tea in front of them while James jiggled around on his chair. "Yes, I will get your breakfast in an instant," Ginny snapped at him.

This was the very first time that Hermione saw her annoyed about him, and it made her feel even guiltier than before. "Yes, and I screwed it up," she said, while her eyes filled with tears. She knew that building a respectful relationship with Snape meant quite a lot to Harry. Since he knew just how much he owed his former teacher, the thought just had never left him: he wanted to show Snape that he held him in very high regard for his actions and the risks he had taken.

"Oh, Hermione." Ginny stood up, sat down next to her and put an arm around her shoulders. "You cannot undo it now. I really do understand why you stayed there. Snape has always showed us just one side of himself – a very unpleasant side. I would have been just as interested in seeing his private face, the things that move him and so on. He will certainly come around. Please don't cry." Ginny gave Harry an unmistakably encouraging glance that Hermione did not notice.

"Yes," he agreed, just a touch too hasty. "We just let some days go by and write him, then. I am sure that he will pretend that nothing has happened."

Ginny nodded and agreed with Harry. The three of them knew that they were just putting it across themselves to make Hermione fell better – yet she did not.

oOoOoOoOo

The last bits of snow had already thawed away one week before and the sun, constantly getting warmer, already held a promise of spring. Nevertheless, Spinner's End harboured only few positive feelings, due to the many dilapidated houses as well as the general atmosphere of the area. It was a curious mixture of dreariness and cheerlessness, as if the place had been left and forgotten long time ago.

When Hermione stopped in front of Snape's door, she sensed a very weak smell. It smelled like old, decaying books and something sweet. iThe smell of wilted lilies/i she thought, holding her cloak even tighter around herself. She knocked and waited, her mind repeating the words that she had prepared very carefully.

When he opened and looked at her with his well-known condescending gaze, she swallowed and was about to speak when he interrupted. "What do you want?" he snapped.

"Sir, it's about Harry and Ginny. May I come in?" She tried to make her voice sound friendly and calm.

"No, you may not," he replied, mimicking her particularly friendly tone.

"Sir, I know that you have ignored all the letters that they sent you during the last three months, and I am here to make a suggestion to you," she added quickly.

"Are you?" he drawled. "Once more, you have made it your business to try and sort out other people's affairs unasked. I would like to know why, Miss Granger? Is your own life that uneventful? Or are you following some kind of inner compulsion? I start getting the impression that there are strings attached to you, like to a puppet. Whenever there is something in your peers' lives that you do not like, some superior power forces you to interfere." He gave her a look that clearly showed her his opinion about her and her character, but she would not be put off.

"It is my fault that you are about to break contact with people who are like the siblings I never had. I cannot allow that. Please, sir. At least listen to my suggestion."

"I will give you two minutes," he said coldly. Then he bid her to enter with a small nod.

Hermione followed him without hesitation. She knew that she ought to seize the opportunity while he was prepared to listen to her. "I had no right to see and hear what happened," she started without further ado. "It was not for me, and I know that I have violated your privacy in a way that cannot be justified. I have been feeling guilty every single day since then."

"Poor girl! May I offer you some Cheering Draught?" His voice was dripping with sarcasm.

"I did not want Harry and Ginny to suffer because of my mistake. Nor Albus Severus," Hermione continued quietly. "Being in contact with you means very much to Harry in particular. Please, sir, Obliviate me."

He stared at her as if he was not quite sure that she had indeed said those words. Hermione took advantage of his obvious uncertainty to hastily add, "I will forget everything I saw and heard that morning. Please, sir."

"Well, that would be a very simple solution for all of us, wouldn't it?" he said, dangerously quiet.

"Well – yes," she replied, blushing under his gaze.

"Stupid girl," he growled. "Don't you recognise a rhetorical question when you are asked one?"

"What?"

He crossed the distance between them in a few long strides and stood in front of her at an arm's length.

"The fact that you forget it, however, does not change anything about the fact that bI/b cannot forget what you saw and heard!"

Suddenly – she had not seen it coming at all – he grabbed her shoulders and shoved her up against the wall. She gave a terrified gasp when her shoulder blades touched the cold plaster and his fingers clutched her shoulders like a vice.

"Let go of me! You are hurting me!" she begged when he used his body weight to keep her from fleeing his grip. He was so close that she could feel his breath on her cheek. His black eyes bored into hers, and on some deep, mysterious level, she knew what he was up to, although she never had experienced this before. "Please don't," she whispered, anguished, and tried to avoid his gaze.

But he held her with so much force that she could not move at all. She perceived his whispered "Legilimens!" through some kind of haze – and felt the presence of another mind inside her own. She desperately tried to occlude her thoughts, to drive him out, but she had no practice at all in getting her mind impermeable to others.

Ron lay next to her under the duvet. They were holding each other tight and smiled, now that they had experienced for the first time that there was magic that needed no wand. Magic that came right from inside of them, from their love for each other and the indescribable spell that formed through the union of body and soul. 'I love you,' Ron whispered into her hair and she returned his murmured words.

"How do you like that, Miss Granger, to disclose your most secret, intimate thoughts and feelings, with absolutely no means to prevent it?" Snape whispered in her ear. She wanted to beg him to let her go, but she knew that this was just the beginning…