I do not own Harry Potter or any of its characters; J. K. Rowling does. In addition, I do not make any profit from this fanfiction. I would like to thank my betas - Glorioux, Lima Bean. A special thanks goes also to my consultants Ignaty.
ChapterTwelve
A Mere Girl No More
"Hermione, Hermione, Lucius Malfoy is here!" said a flushed and agitated Lora, as she burst into Hermione's office. Right behind her, our young witch could already recognize the broad silhouette and blond locks of the wizard.
His velvety drawl preceded him. "Hermione, I hope you are ready, dear. It is time to go, my darling. We need to make the last arrangements in the room. I assume that you do want everything to be perfect. Come." And with that, Lord Malfoy walked through the threshold of Hermione's office. His dazzling smile caused Lora to flush a bright, cranberry colour, and before the impending spontaneous combustion could occur, the poor girl shrieked and disappeared.
Hermione rolled her eyes at her employee's antics and looked at Lucius, who simultaneously arched his eyebrows, his eyes full of humorous mischief. The girl was infatuated with the blond wizard, and Hermione and Lucius both knew that. For this reason, her reactions were often the topic of their private jokes and light teasing.
"Lucius, I am so glad that you are here," exclaimed the young witch, standing up from her chair. A genuine smile of delight found its way to her lips and lit up her face. Our golden girl was truly glad to see him.
It just so happened that barely a minute before Lora's violent intrusion, unpleasant and uninvited thoughts had filled Hermione's mind. She was getting ready for the presentation when suddenly the Minister's remark – "You are just a mere girl for them. No family yet, not even a significant other by your side. Think about it, Hermione," – echoed in her ears. The recollection of the patronizing manner in which Kingsley Shacklebolt delivered his comment made our lioness boil inside. "Such a pompous arse," muttered the witch.
Who knows why she remembered those words at that precise moment, at three thirty in the afternoon, half an hour before her presentation?Regardless, the Minister's phrase brought a wave of apprehension into Hermione's heart. Will the Ministry's officials come today? This thought began to pulsate wildly in her mind and a hard lump lodged in her throat. Hermione categorically refused to fail for a second time. She felt as if she might never find the courage to try again.
Thus, she thanked Merlin that Lucius appeared when he did. When Lora announced his arrival, she was desperately fighting with the panic that threatened to overwhelm her mind and ruin her excited and enthusiastic mood. Now, drinking in Lucius' calm and confident demeanour, our young politician felt much better. No, she was not a mere girl! The Minister was wrong! She was Hermione Granger, the intellectual and assertive witch, who knew what she wanted and how to get it.
Lucius had been watching her with interest and she felt his eyes on her. The blond wizard had probably noticed her inner battle. Hermione gave him another reassuring smile, gathered all the necessary papers, and walked around her desk directly toward the wizard, who was waiting for her in the centre of the room.
"Are you ready, my dear?" he murmured. Lucius' light, grey eyes didn't give Hermione a chance to waiver, and she nodded. "Very well, may I escort you, darling? You look irresistible, Hermione. This light blue is gorgeous on you. The Ministry's officials don't stand a chance today. You are ready, you are beautiful and," at this our Lord Malfoy allowed himself to smirk and tilt his head closer to her ear, "you have a wizard by your side. The Minister will be pleased I am sure. Shall we?" he purred, offering her his arm.
The young witch lifted her chin up, placed her slender arm over his and whispered, "Yes." A triumphant smile graced the wizard's lips and together they stepped out of the office. Maybe it was not right, maybe our lioness had lost her touch or had fallen prey to a momentary weakness. We, my friends, can call it whatever we want, but at that moment, Hermione Granger was truly grateful to have Lucius' strong shoulder beside her.
And even though Hermione was entirely focused on the upcoming event and the warm arm of her partner, she did notice Lora's envious scrutiny and the way her administrative assistant bit her lower lip, looking after them when they passed her desk.
Do You Ever Wonder How the Boy Feels?
You girls never know Oh no you girls'll never know No you girls never know How the boy feels (Franz Ferdinand)
Unfortunate events began to haunt Severus from the moment he stepped out of the Ministry's Floo. First, some insane wizard collided with him, managing to step on his foot. Second, the area around the General Information Desk was extremely crowded, and Severus was immediately reminded why he didn't like coming to the Ministry – there were way too many people for his taste.
When our already rather annoyed Potions master at last was able to battle his way through the crowd to the Information Desk, it took almost all his patience to find out where Hermione's presentation was to happen. For the first two minutes, a blond girl with permanently congested airways – or who at least breathed as if such was the case – simply looked at him with empty, glassy eyes, as if she hadn't been able to understand a word he was saying. Severus almost began to doubt his speaking skills, and only his firm knowledge that he indeed had perfect elocution led him to conclude that the girl was perhaps partially deaf.
Thank Merlin that by the end of the third minute, after Severus shouted his question for the fifth time, the girl snapped out of whatever was obscuring her mind and returned to the present. She sniffled, sneezed, wheezed and finally managed to mumble nasally, "Sorry, allergy season." Then, she sneezed again, wiped her nose with the sleeve of her robes and in a solemn voice informed him that Hermione Granger was to present her initiative in room fifty, which was located on the fifth floor. Severus muttered two letters of a 'thank you' and hurriedly left, giving another desperate wizard with a question, an opportunity to talk to the wheezing girl.
Of course, the elevators were overfilled with people as usual. Severus braced himself for an unpleasant ride and stepped inside the lift. He disliked when people invaded his personal space, but alas, there was no such thing as personal space in an elevator. Indeed, there was no such thing as space in that damn elevator. However, as if to be sandwiched between witches and wizards weren't unfortunate enough, one young and obviously not-so-bright witch decided that the time was right to refresh her perfume.
She had done so, right there in the lift full of people tightly packed together. You can imagine, what terrible suffering that mindless move caused our Potions master's enormous nose. Suffice it to say that by the time he walked out of there, his eyes were as glassy as those of the girl at the Information Desk. Allergy season, indeed!
After arriving at the fifth floor, Severus began his journey towards room number fifty. While our black-haired wizard was walking through the corridor with stern determination, he had noticed that he was not the only one who was moving to that room. Different Ministry officials hurried beside him, in front of him, and, as he suspected, behind him as well.
Remembering Hermione's recollection about her first presentation, our Potions master did not expect to see so many people going in the same direction as he. But, of course, with apprehension, reminded Severus himself that now, once Lucius was involved, it just ought to be something grand and, thus, overly crowded.
"Shit," cursed Severus under his breath. His goal had just become more difficult to achieve.
At last, after a brisk walk through the unpleasantly highly populated corridor, our wizard stood in front of the room with an elegantly glittering advertisement on the door: Miss Hermione Granger, Magical Creatures Rights Law Initiative – Second Presentation, 4 pm.
For a millisecond, Severus paused, drew a calming breath, and then entered the room. It was already full of people. It was not a shock for Severus now and he had a few minutes to analyse and prepare himself during the walk. However, it still was not what he had planned for when he left his villa that day. In his eager rush to get to the Ministry – or, it would perhaps be more accurate to say, to get to his witch – Severus hadn't had a chance to figure out the detailed plan, or words, or manoeuvres.
Now, standing at the doorway to the room filled with people, our Potions master felt totally unprepared – he didn't know where to start. The one thing, however, he did know for sure – he was not ready to apologise in front of the whole Ministry. Thankfully, after a quick survey, Severus identified that Hermione wasn't there yet, and he thus had time.
Our Potions master stepped over the threshold and with his customary discretion moved into the shadows. He needed to think, and he decided to do so while waiting for Hermione's arrival. Alas, unsurprisingly, Severus wasn't lucky enough to have the time for musing, because the moment he settled on a wooden chair, a wave of excitement rolled over the witches and wizards. Severus rose again in order to afford himself a better view and froze. There she was. His witch was entering the room hand in hand with Lucius Malfoy.
All plans for apologizing, and whatever else was on our Potions master's mind, were forgotten in mere seconds. He was burning and hurting all over. Jealousy and regret were very much alive and tearing his heart apart again. Oh, what a fool he was! He stood there dumbstruck, watching the fruits of his own labour. He, driven by his jealousy, had himself provided Lucius with this opportunity. Fuck!
Severus' first impulse was to snatch Hermione from the thief and claim her as his own. However, after a brief but careful observation, he noticed something that made his heart ache even more – Hermione looked so comfortable, confident and so content near Lucius. She looked almost happy.
At that moment, a horrible doubt, or was it an epiphany, struck if he would never be able to make her look that confident, that content? Severus Snape was not a fool, and he was not blind – far from it. Moreover, despite common beliefs, he most certainly was not a heartless bastard. He knew quite well what mattered for Hermione Granger.
That day, that Friday, when he had been shouting at her about her love fora spotlight – it wasn't true, of course. But his accusations weren't wholly without merit. Hermione was a career-oriented witch, after all. She stubbornly believed that it was up to her to try to change the world, to make it a better place. The question was, would our Potions master be able or willing to help and to comply with the demands that these kinds of ambitions would certainly make? Lucius was rather obviously willing, noticeably able and even, annoyingly, enjoying it.
That terrible thought caused Severus to feel cold and empty. Stuck in indecision, the wizard gazed at Hermione intently, thoughtfully. A second later me made a choice. Yes! He still wanted this witch, his witch. Political career, the Ministry and everything else be dammed. He would deal with those later.
The presentation went on, and Severus listened to Hermione's soft voice. The initiative was an excellent one actually, not that he had doubted it even for a second. He knew the witch too well. She had always been an excellent scholar. There were, however, two rather disturbing and mind boggling things that he had noticed during the speech. First, his former friend was by the witch's side the whole time. Secondly, even though the blond wizard did not once touch the young Gryffindor inappropriately, Severus saw, or perhaps only thought that he saw, a sort of bonding between them. They moved in unison; they talked in unison; they even laughed in unison.
How could that be? In two short weeks, how had Lucius accomplished it? That question stirred Severus' heart, feeding his doubts and insecurities further. Displeased with himself, the wizard wondered how he could have allowed another man to do that to his witch?
As you can probably guess, Severus just kept torturing his poor heart until the presentation ended. When at last it came to its end, and many wizards and witches gathered around Hermione in order to ask their questions and give their generally positive comments, Severus rose from his chair. He was still determined to come forward and to talk to Hermione. He was going to swallow his pride, forget about his dignity, and let the witch decide whom she wanted. Fate, however, had decided once again to play a cruel trick on the Potions master.
Severus had only made his first step towards the podium where Hermione had been standing with witches and wizards chatting around her, when he heard Lucius voice announcing, "Dear ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to announce that the Minister, our beloved Mister Shacklebolt, has just given me permission to organize the final presentation of this undoubtedly extremely important initiative at Malfoy Manor. It will take place in one week on Thursday, and will be followed by the official voting that will take place on Friday morning at the Ministry. Drinks and refreshments will be served by paid, free elves."
The announcement was met with cheers and loud ovations, and Hermione's happy exclamation, "Lucius!" drew Severus' attention. Seething, Severus watched how the excited witch literally jumped into Malfoy's arms, giving him a kiss on the cheek while her amber eyes, full of warmth and appreciation, were locked on Malfoy. Lucius' arms possessively circled themselves around her slim waist, and the blond wizard's lips captured Hermione's for a short, but passion-filled answering kiss.
Severus could swear that the instant before the kiss, the grey eyes of his former friend gazed at him. A triumphant fire in them was evident even from afar. This last observation thoroughly drove our Potions master into darkness. He had seen enough, he would not make any more of a fool of himself. He would not be humiliated in front of the whole Ministry. Severus Snape dashed all his plans, turned on his heel, left the room number fifty at full speed and rushed back to his misery.
Do You Ever Wonder How the Girl Feels?
No you boys never care Oh no you boys'll never care No you boys never care How the girl feels (Franz Ferdinand)
Hermione was euphoric. The second presentation was a success, and a huge success, at that. First of all, the room was perfect – spacious, clean and bright, and even decorated with flowers – courtesy of Lucius Malfoy, of course. Plus, everybody was there, all the Ministry officials, all the heads of the departments – everybody. And, most importantly, they all listened with interest, and after Hermione finished her speech, asked questions and made comments. A few odd ones came to her to assure her that they had never seen her first invitation. This made Hermione frown in confusion, but she soon forgot about them with Lucius redirecting her attention to the many other wizards and witches with questions and comments.
In other words – everything went flawlessly, and Hermione felt almost happy. The one dark cloud, of course, was the thought about Severus' absence. Maybe not in Lucius' place – no, she could hardly imagine Severus in such a spotlight – but at least in the room, listening to her, being proud of her, applauding her, wanting her. Alas, she hadn't seen him there. Oh well, good thing she accepted Lucius' help. She did notice with satisfaction a slightly peeved expression on Kingsley Shacklebolt's face when he first saw Lucius Malfoy by her side. Here, she thought, you asked for it.
Of course, Lucius' announcement about the third presentation to be held at the Manor caught her by surprise. He didn't tell her about it, he didn't ask for her consent, and, if he did, Hermione would have surely declined. However, when he announced it right there in front of everybody, and the crowd met it with such enthusiasm, she could only squeal in delight and gratefully accept. She knew that Lucius had forced this on her and manipulated her into something she had not necessarily wanted. And yet, the extent of today's success made her feel thankful for Lucius' support, help and supportive companionship by her side. And so she agreed. She also gave him a friendly kiss of appreciation.
She didn't expect that Lucius would answer the graze of her fleeting lips with a scorching invasion of her mouth with his own. This caught her off guard, but she hadn't been able to mull over it, because the moment Hermione came out of the unexpected kiss with Lucius, she felt rather than saw that someone familiarly tall and distinctly clothed all in black had left the room in one impetuous movement. Severus! He came! There was a moment's hesitation while she contemplated whether she should run after him or not. She was still quite angry with him, after all. Yet, the knowledge that Severus had come overruled everything else. The young witch politely but hurriedly excused herself, asked Lucius to wait for her and ran after her lover.
"Severus, wait!" she shouted. It was hard to outrun the Potions master. Thank God that at some point he heard her calls. He stopped and turned to face her, waiting and watching her solemnly.
When Hermione finally reached him, her breath was laboured. She couldn't talk, and they stood in the corridor in silence. Their eyes, however, didn't wait, and when they locked on each other instantly, Hermione was ready to forget and disregard everything. There was so much passionate fire, desire and agony in Severus' black eyes. Hypnotized and unable to contain herself, the witch, stepped closer to him. The next moment his lips were on her, kissing, claiming, consuming, and she was answering him, opening for him, inviting him.
He was everywhere, and he was everything. She had missed him so bloody much. She was breathing his passion, sinking in his desire, giving in again, forgiving broke for air, and pressed her little palms into his chest, and Severus stopped his assault. They both were breathless, forehead pressed to forehead. "Come with me," he rasped into her ear, his fingers already searching for the buttons on her robes.
"Severus, wait. We need to talk about this, about us," whispered Hermione. "Besides, I need to finish here in the Ministry. Will you wait for me?"
Severus released her and stepped back, his eyes expressionless. He was silent for a few more minutes. "No," he said and slowly shook his head. Hermione's heart froze and she blinked nervously. "Finish here and come to me afterward. I will wait for you at home. Don't be long, witch," he said hoarsely and walked away without as much as a back glance.
Hermione stood there for a few minutes, simply looking after him. Then, she turned and walked away as well. To her surprise, when she entered the now quiet room number fifty five minutes later, she was greeted with the familiar velvety drawl. "Hermione, how nice of you to come back."