Chapter 8 - Ginny Weasley
At seven o'clock on the dot Hermione stepped back to Severus' side after knocking on the door of the Burrow. She wasn't sure why she was so nervous, after all their mission had been a complete success. Maybe the idea of showing up at the door with not one, but two supposedly-dead wizards had something to do with it… Whatever the reason, her hands were trembling at her sides. She and Severus stared straight ahead, but the butterflies in her stomach momentarily surged then actually subsided as she felt his fingers intertwine around her own.
As Molly Weasley opened the door, her face lit up when she saw Hermione, but froze in fear when she saw Severus. Mrs. Weasley whipped out her wand, causing Hermione to shift her body between Severus and Molly, but it was Severus who spoke. "Don't be afraid, Molly. Put down that wand, let us come in, and we'll explain everything." She searched Hermione's face for reassurance and, seeing Hermione's nod of encouragement, slowly lowered her wand.
Suddenly comfortable once inside the familiar entryway of the Burrow, Hermione took off her coat. "Is everybody here?" she asked briskly. She was answered by a loud shout of "Hermione!" as Harry ran in from the kitchen and gave her a huge hug. She gave an awkward wave to Ron, still weary of him after the last conversation they had had .
Between the end of the battle and when she returned home to check on Severus, Ron had pulled her aside and tried politely to explain that the kiss they shared in the chamber of secrets was simply a heat-of-the-moment thing. She had been momentarily hurt by the nonchalance with which he dismissed her, but after a few minutes of reflection afterwards as she helped Professor McGonagall clear up some of the rubble she had realized how little the two of them actually had in common. Add that to the fact that she had been pining over him for the better part of the last three years without any real sign of the emotional maturity necessary to have a real relationship and she considered it to be the proverbial last straw. In a way she was relieved to finally have a concrete answer in a relationship that had been so nebulous for so long. She hoped that, in time, they would be able to go back to the friendship they had enjoyed before the angst of their teenage years made things uncomfortable.
Seeing Ron's smile at her awkward wave gave her hope that their previous friendship could be revived after all. As Harry took the seat next to Ginny at the kitchen table, Hermione greeted her, George, and Mr. Weasley. All small talk froze as Severus quietly entered the room behind her. Sensing his nervousness, she quietly put a hand on his arm as she addressed the Weasley clan.
"Obviously, there are some things about the night of the battle that haven't yet become public knowledge." She paused, looking around for a sign of how to continue. It was Harry's voice that came to her rescue.
"Have a seat, Professor," Harry said, in a tone far more respectful than he had used throughout his entire academic career with the man. Obviously, Snape's role in defending Harry throughout the years and in the ultimate demise of Voldemort had created a great deal of goodwill for him in Harry's mind. Severus pulled out a chair, but offered it to Hermione, who sat down blushing slightly. As Severus pulled out a chair for himself and sat down, Hermione quickly explained the sequence of events that led to Severus' survival and how he had been recovering in the safety of her parents' muggle neighborhood.
"That explains why you were out of touch for so long," Ron said. Hermione couldn't interpret his tone, but she hoped it was surprise not jealousy tampering his enthusiasm.
"Yes," she responded. "Severus and I have been working on a bit of a project together." Hermione glanced up at Severus, who was gazing Harry with a look on his face Hermione could not identify. She saw, however, out of the corner of her eye when Ginny's surprised face mouthed 'Severus?' at her. Her face couldn't suppress a fraction of a smile, but seeing Ginny's red-rimmed eyes, no doubt from the emotional week the Weasley family had been having, Hermione's thoughts were catapulted back to the first day when Severus had explained his list to her.
"I know you think these are things that can be remedied, but it's not that simple. I know that you are aware of the potentially fatal consequences that can come from foolishly tampering with the past. I was, in fact, there when Professor McGonagall gave you the lecture back in your third year." His silky voice was stern with confidence as he made his case. However, in the past few days Hermione had gotten to know her former potions master much better and this enabled her to stand her ground with him as they discussed.
"I'm not suggesting you go back in time and stand between her and the Carrows. If you would just listen…there is a more logical way to go about this." Surprised by her moxie, he gestured for her to continue in a mock bow, an amused half-smile on his face. "The things Ginny suffered at the hands of the Carrows were horrible, but she lived through them and is actually quite proud of her work with Dumbledore's Army." Hermione had filled Severus in on her side of everything that had happened from the time she set off with Harry and Ron to find the horcruxes through the final battle. "She wouldn't want that to be taken away from her. If you want to do something to right some kind of perceived wrong against her, you need to fix something she would actually want to be different."
In the last few days he had spent more time with Hermione than the past few years put together. He was pleasantly surprised to find that her intellect was not, as he had previously thought, simply an aptitude for absorbing and regurgitating facts. As they talked and he learned more about her personality and how her mind worked, he realized she was every bit as bright as the other professors had made her out to be. She was quick to make connections that others might miss, and she had a predisposition towards questioning accepted facts that he so tried to cultivate in his Slytherin students. He even found himself growing fond of how, when overwhelmed by the excitement of a new idea, she devolved into incourageable bouts of run-on sentences, often without pausing to breathe.
"What single event would Ginny most want to have rewritten?" Hermione asked poignantly. They both stared at each other, knowing the obvious answer before the question was even asked.
"Given the proper preparation," Severus spoke, dark eyes flashing with intent, "that might be something we could actually accomplish…"
"I should mention that my survival, as well as the results of Hermione and my latest undertaking should remain, for the moment, confidential. Before we go any further into the details," Severus' silky voice floated in the stunned silence that filled the Burrow's kitchen, "I would like to apologize to you, Miss Weasley, for the events that came to pass this last year at Hogwarts. Though by now you know that I was in no way aligned with the practices of the Carrows, it is by no means an excuse for allowing any student to suffer such acts within the gates of Hogwarts under my supervision." His dark eyes rested on the table, not daring to see the reactions to his words. "I am truly sorry."
The silence had somehow become even heavier as everyone sought in vain for a response to what he had said.
"Why so serious, everybody?"
Hearing the unexpected voice, six heads whipped towards the door.
"Fred?" George's voice shook with a cocktail of emotions.
"Geez, what's a man got to do to get a hug around here?" With this confirmation of identity that only the airy pith of a Weasley twin could give, the room exploded. Mrs. Weasley burst into tears, Ron, Harry, and Mr. Weasley sat open mouthed as if in shock, Ginny knocked over her chair and launched herself sobbing into her brother's arms, and George, taking the longest to get from the far end of the table to the door, wrapped both of his siblings in his arms and lifted them both off the floor in one big bear hug. As Fred made his way around the table, giving hugs and shaking hands, the sobbing Ginny still clinging to his side, Hermione slowly reached under the table and grabbed Severus' hand, giving it a small squeeze as Mrs. Weasley covered Fred in kisses.
After the clamor had died down and Fred was wedged tightly between Mrs. Weasley and the only slightly calmed down Ginny, George finally spoke up. "So you two apparently have quite a story to tell." He aimed his words at Severus, but Hermione, sensing his discomfort with the rush of emotion and the number of expectant faces aimed in his direction, was the one to speak.
"While he was recovering, Severus found a number of things that had happened in the last year with which he could not seem to make his peace. There are always casualties of war, but there were some that seemed…intolerable." She paused, not sure how best to proceed. Severus finally found his voice and continued.
"Given her apparent affinity for rule-breaking, a trait I assume she developed due to the influence of these two," he gesture at Harry and Ron, "Hermione volunteered to assist me to right some of these injustices." He finished as if that explanation would be completely sufficient and the rest would be obvious.
"But how exactly did you do it?" George asked.
Hermione blushed. "After the battle Harry had given me his dad's old cloak, and I never quite returned my time turner after we used it to free Sirius. After a load of planning and research, we found a spell that would shield Fred from the explosion and a charm that would put him into a long-term sleep. We couldn't have him awake because it could have changed history, and we couldn't well have his body disappear, so we let him sleep until you left him at the Coroner's Department at the ministry and then we snuck him out and woke him up."
A stunned silence again stretched out across the table, a silence only Fred could break. "So given that I have, for all extents and purposes, been dead for a week, do you think I could have some food?" And with that, the tension broke and the family began to function once more. Mrs. Weasley began fixing what looked like every piece of food in the house, Fred, Ginny still tucked under his arm, was immersed in conversation with George and Ron, while Mr. Weasley came over and began questioning Severus about his miraculous survival.
Harry stood up and plopped himself down in the seat next to Hermione. Covered by the dull roar of the recently reunited Weasleys, Harry spoke to Hermione in quiet tones.
"Since when are you and Snape on a first name basis?" he asked.
"He hasn't been our professor for over a year now, Harry," her blush undermining the credibility of her answer.
"Come on, Hermione. We've been friends for almost a decade. And you were holding hands under the table. What's going on with you two?" Her blush deepened.
"To be perfectly honest, Harry, I don't even know. It's nothing like what you're thinking, I mean, at least I don't think it is. It's just…" she paused for a second to disentangle herself from her mess of words. "He was unconscious for so long, and I didn't know when he would wake up, or even if he would. I just kind of held his hand because that's what you do when people are in the hospital. I couldn't do anything else to feel like I could comfort him."
"Plus," Harry added, "I bet he's not nearly as scary when he's knocked out."
Hermione felt a rush of gratitude to Harry for lightening the mood "Much." .She let out a small giggle. "I don't know. I was holding his hand when he woke up and he didn't hex me or anything. It's strange," she paused, deep in thought, "it just felt like we were somehow connected by what happened. I don't know if he feels that way too. It's not something I'm exactly brave enough to talk about outright. He is still him."
They both shot a glance in Severus' direction. "I don't know," Harry started. "Something is definitely different about him. I'm not sure what it is, but he seems…younger? Lighter somehow? I can't put a finger on it, but something has changed."
As the talk slowly died down, Severus caught Hermione's eyes from across the table. Not needing words to know he was at his limit for social interaction, Hermione stood up and thanked Mrs. Weasley for what had turned out to be quite an elaborate meal. Severus rose and they both passed a gauntlet of hugs and handshakes as they made their way to the door. Once outside, Hermione grabbed hold of Severus' arm as he apparated them back to the house.
After a quiet cup of tea, in which both were too absorbed in reflection over the night's events for much talk, Hermione stood up and stretched. "I think today was an excellent start. I hope you feel…slightly remedied?" she said, pausing at the foot of the stairs as she searched for the right words.
"I'm not exactly sure how to describe my feelings at the moment." Severus paused thoughtfully, but continued seeing the worry in Hermione's face. "Whatever it is I assure you that it is a positive and welcome change from any emotion I have felt recently. And I attribute it entirely to you."
Not sure how to respond, she shot him what she hoped was a reassuring smile and turned to go up the stairs to bed. Halfway up, she was halted by his voice, quiet but unmistakeable.
"And we were, for your information."
Her stomach flipped as she turned to face him, confusion in her face. "We were what?"
"We were connected by what happened. I simply have yet to figure out what that means."
She was still speechless. She stared into his dark eyes, wishing she could see through them into his head. He stared unflinchingly back, yet yielded no further information.
"Good night, Severus," she said with a warm smile.
"Good night, Hermione."
With that, she continued up the stairs to her bedroom. He washed and dried the cups from their long-gone tea, walked to the couch, and pulled out the black leather notebook.