Summary: A visit from Lucius, and a trip to Hogsmeade.

A/N: Thanks for reading everyone! Hope you like this chapter. I had fun with Lucius here.

Chapter 10

There was a knock on Severus' office door.

"Enter," he called out.

Lucius Malfoy opened the door and waltzed through with his cane in hand, looking like the peacock he was.

"Ah, Severus, it's been too long!" he gushed as he moved toward the seat in front of Severus' desk.

"Lucius, how are you?"

Lucius looked down at his fingernails. "Fine, just fine. Narcissa sends her love. She misses our dinners together."

"As do I. Perhaps we can get together during the summer break?"

Lucius looked over at Severus. "She would be very pleased if we did. You ran off to wherever-you-went during the Easter Hols. She was expecting to see you."

"I apologize that I wasn't able to visit. I went to Australia."

"Australia, whatever did you do there?"

"Hermione invited me to meet her parents."

Lucius arched a brow at Severus.

"Why would you meet her parents? Severus, are you keeping something from me?"

Severus scowled. "No, of course not. Her parents had been pressuring her to date, and she hasn't found anyone she fancies, so I went along and played her boyfriend."

"You did what?" Lucius asked in shock.

Severus shrugged. "I pretended to be her boyfriend. It went well. The Grangers dubbed me their adopted son."

"Wonderful, now both of your parents are Muggles."

Severus narrowed his eyes. "Lucius…"

Lucius raised his hand. "Just kidding."

They stared at one another for a bit.

"So… the Granger girl?"

"She's not a girl, and what are you talking about?"

"Muggleborn, Gryffindor, pretty, loyal… Do I see a pattern here?"

Severus spluttered. "You can't be serious. I…"

"Don't even start," Lucius demanded. "I know you, and I know the type of woman you are attracted to. I've been telling you for months you need to find someone and from the way you look right now, it looks like she is it."

"She will never be interested in me in that regard."

"Did you two kiss?" Lucius asked.

"Yes, of course. It would have been very suspicious if we didn't in front of her parents."

"And did she like it?"

"Merlin…" Severus pinched the bridge of his nose.

"I'm serious? Did she like it?"

"How on earth would I know?" he said with a wave of his hands.

"Surely you…"

The glare that Severus gave him stopped him mid-sentence. He stared at Severus for a minute.

"Did she do anything that made it seem like she was uncomfortable?"

Severus' eyebrows furrowed. "No, she didn't."

"Did she pull away suddenly?"

"No. She seemed to linger and draw them out."

"Well there you have it," Lucius said with a wave of his hand.

"Where, exactly, do I have it?"

"She enjoyed it. If she didn't enjoy kissing you, she'd have pulled away or made odd faces. As she did none of those and kept kissing past when you could have broken it naturally… she enjoyed it."

"Wonderful. What does that have to do with anything?"

"Severus, you're a brilliant man, but I swear, you are obtuse when it comes to women."

Severus glowered at him. "You may be right about that, but you don't have to voice it."

"Well, you walked right into it, didn't you?" he advised, giving him an accusatory stare.

Severus harrumphed but said nothing more.

"She likes you, you daft git!" Lucius exclaimed.

"Don't be ridiculous."

Lucius began to chuckle. "You're impossible, my friend. I tell you, if she didn't care for you at all, she wouldn't have enjoyed kissing you. It would have just been… I don't know, boring."

"Well, it was definitely not boring."

"I knew it. You are smitten with her."

Severus slammed his hand on the desk and got up. "Don't you think I know that? I am smitten with her, but she is not smitten with me."

"I just told you that she is."

"Lucius, just drop it, okay?"

Lucius rose from his chair and moved up to his friend. "Fine, I will drop it, but when you two are together and happy, I will say I told you so."

Severus rolled his eyes and returned to his seat. Lucius sat down again as well.

"So, do you have that paperwork?"

Reaching into his desk drawer, he pulled out the small stack of documents and handed them to Lucius.

"What else did you want to talk about?"

"The Board would like to set up a fund for needy students."

Severus arched his brow. "Has the world come to an end? When have you cared about anyone other than rich Purebloods?"

He shrugged. "I've changed since the war. You know that."

"Yes, but Hell is now freezing over."

Lucius guffawed. "I remember a young man I went to school with who could have used some help from Hogwarts."

"Yes, well, Dumbledore couldn't have cared less about how his students fared in that manner."

"Well, neither of us is Dumbledore, and the entire Board has come to recognize that there is a need for some sort of scholarship for the less fortunate at the school. Yes, their tuition is covered by the Ministry, but they need to get supplies, robes… decent clothing."

"You have my full support on that, Lucius. As a matter of fact, while in Australia, I visited Sawyer King's wand shop and set up an association with him to supply wands to students who may have trouble being able to afford them. Let the Board know what we are doing, and we can set it as the first part of the plan for scholarship."

"That's brilliant, Severus. The Board will be quite pleased."

He rose and bowed his head at his friend.

"As always, it was good to see you."

"Tell Narcissa that I may have some free time next month once the school year is done. We should get together then."

"She will be happy to hear that. I'm sure she'll have something set up within a week."

"I'll look forward to her owl."

With that, Lucius took his leave. Severus watched him go, his mind whirling about the conversation he'd had with him about Hermione. He shook his head. Lucius wasn't there. He had no idea what went on between the two of them. He was sorely mistaken if he thought that Hermione would be interested in him.

oooOOOooo

Hermione knocked on Severus' door.

"Enter."

She stepped in and smiled at Severus.

"Hey, I was wondering if I could draw you away from your stack of things to do to accompany me to Hogsmeade? I need to pick up some new parchment."

Severus put his quill down and folded his hands in front of his face, running his fingers down his cheeks to wake himself up.

"I actually need to resupply some of my stores, so if you're all right with stopping by the Apothecary, I am happy to accompany you."

"Great! I'll meet you at the entrance doors in ten minutes!"

She spun away and left him to get ready. A few minutes later, she found him waiting for her as she approached the Entrance Hall.

"Do you want to walk the whole way or Apparate?" he asked as she drew near.

"Oh, let's walk. It's such a lovely day."

He tipped his head in agreement, and they were off.

"So, parchment, eh? You never use any of that."

Hermione gave him a sidelong glance.

"What? I think of all the students I've ever had, you were the most verbose. You probably keep Scrivnshafts in business."

"Very funny," she said tartly.

"I live to tease."

Hermione laughed at that. "Severus, you're too much."

"Mmmm."

They were quiet for a few minutes as they walked along.

"Have you heard from your parents since you dropped the bomb that we are no longer a couple?"

Hermione nodded. "They were quite sad. They really took a liking to you, Severus. My mum asked if I was being too quick to throw our relationship away."

He gave a single nod but said nothing for a bit.

"I will admit that it was nice to have some parental figures that actually cared about my well-being," he mused.

Her head snapped toward him. "And they still do. Dad said to reach out to him for anything you may need. I'm not sure what you might need from a Muggle dentist, but the offer is there."

"Are you making fun of my teeth?"

She gave him a horrified look. "No! Not at all! I would never…"

He grinned wickedly, and Hermione relaxed. She shook her head at him.

"You're impossible."

"Hardly."

She looked over at him with an arched brow. "You're lucky I find your humor amusing."

"Humor is supposed to be amusing."

"Yes, but your snarky humor can be taken as insulting."

Severus shrugged. "If people I don't know well want to be offended, it's of no concern to me."

Hermione nodded. "I respect that. As a youth, I had no idea how to take your snark. I will say many of our students now feel similar."

"Which is why I moved from teaching to being Headmaster, so I don't have to associate with them as closely."

"I was surprised when you stayed on here," Hermione mused. "I know we've spoken about it before, but I still think at that time you would have been fully justified in becoming a hermit and leaving all of this academia behind you."

"Yes, well, teaching was never my favorite thing to do, but I did, and still do, like the administrative aspect of running the school. To be honest, I don't think I've ever told you this, but I did mull over just running off to Germany or somewhere and starting over. It was very appealing."

"Why didn't you?"

He shrugged and looked down, watching his feet move forward. Hermione waited for him to gather his thoughts.

"Recuperating from my injuries gave me a lot of time to think. After having plans to flee the country, it finally dawned on me that if I disappeared, Dumbledore and the Dark Lord would have won. They would have beaten me down and cast me away like so many others wanted to do."

Hermione reached out and grasped his hand. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be. You weren't a manipulative despot trying to make the world bow to your will, and you weren't the Dark Lord, either."

Hermione laughed heartily as she squeezed his hand. "I'm amazed that you can make light of everything you've been through."

"It wasn't always easy to do. It took some soul-searching and talking it out with a magical psychologist to finally be able to let all of this go. Basically, while I was in the hospital I came to the decision that I wasn't going to flee. I also wanted to be Headmaster again so I could actually be a positive influence on the students. I realized that I had a lot of anger pent up and needed to find someone to talk about it with so I could get past it. One of the Healers at St. Mungo's recommended someone. I still see them now and then to check in."

"I have a lot of respect for you for doing that. Many wizards and witches avoid psychologists."

"I avoided them for years for various reasons, but I knew I needed to change once I didn't have to hide myself and my feelings anymore."

"I told you before I was in therapy for a year or so after the war," Hermione offered.

Severus nodded. "A wise choice. It's too much to deal with alone, especially all you went through that last year."

"Definitely, for both of us."

They walked quietly for a while. Hermione noticed that their hands were still clasped together, but she didn't try to pull away. If he was comfortable, so was she.

His hand released hers as they got to Scrivenshaft's. Hermione requested a half ream of parchment, causing Severus to widen his eyes at her.

'See, I was right about you keeping this place in business."

Hermione chuckled. "I'm willing to bet that when we head to the Apothecary, you will be the one keeping them in business."

"Possibly."

Of course, when they got to the apothecary, Severus ordered two crates of potions and ingredients to be delivered to Hogwarts by the end of the week.

"Yup, definitely not keeping them in business," Hermione mused as they left the shop.

"I am running a school that teaches Potions to many children. You are just absorbing parchment yourself for your verbose ideas."

Hermione frowned and looked away.

"Hey," Severus called to her. "I'm just joking."

Hermione shook her head. "Just ignore me," she advised.

"You are hard to ignore."

"I'm just being overly sensitive."

Severus frowned. "This goes back to when you were a student and I would chastise you for the length of your essays, doesn't it?"

"Severus, it's stupid. Just forget about it. We've talked about your actions as a teacher back then. I totally understand that you had to say things that were nasty to make sure no one realized your true allegiances."

Severus stopped walking and looked at Hermione.

"I know we've spoken about this, but obviously there's still some hurt there. I'm sorry again. Back then it was easy for me to say awful things. I'd been doing it for years to keep my cover. Things fell too quickly from my lips and from my pen. I didn't think twice about saying terrible things to you and Potter, and even Weasley and Longbottom because you were all Gryffindors, and you and Potter especially were the enemy of my leader."

"I don't know why this is disturbing me now. Let's just forget about it."

Severus kept staring at her. She started to move back and forth uncomfortably.

"Come here," he said finally.

She moved towards him, and he enveloped her in his arms.

"I apologize. I was too hard on you back then. I was nothing but a bastard."

She shook her head, which was buried in his robes. Her voice was muffled as she answered.

"You were doing what you had to."

"I went overboard. I'm thankful that you can look past that to be my friend now."

Her arms went around him then, and they held one another for a while.

"Are you all right?" Severus asked finally.

She pulled away and nodded. "I am. I'm sorry I…"

"Don't apologize for what you're feeling. It took me a long time and much therapy to be able to recognize the validity of others' feelings and my own. You have every right to be upset."

She smiled then. "Thanks, Severus."

"Come, we both need some chocolate, and possibly some ice cream."

"How about chocolate ice cream?" Hermione mentioned.

"Sounds good. Let's go."

They made their way to Honeydukes and soon left with a bag of chocolate truffles and two No Melt Chocolate ice cream cones. They had finished their cones about halfway to Hogwarts. Hermione motioned to the bag of chocolates that Severus was holding.

"Let me have a truffle," she said.

Severus passed the bag to her. She chose one and rolled her eyes in rapture as her teeth sunk into it.

"Merlin, Severus, these are divine. Have one."

He reached into the bag and pulled out a candy, popping it into his mouth.

"I think these are the best truffles I've ever had. Thank you for suggesting them. I've never had them before."

"You're welcome."

By the time they made it to the castle, the bag was empty.

"Those were yummy, but now I'm feeling guilty for eating all of them."

"I have no guilt whatsoever," Severus said. "It's not like we're binging chocolate every day, and it was so worth it."

They meandered into the school and headed up the stairs together. When they got to the third floor, they looked at one another.

"I'll see you at dinner," Hermione said.

"I don't know. I'm pretty full."

"Well, you need something in you other than chocolate, so I'd better see you there!" she said with a wag of her finger.

"Yes, Mummy," he said before turning and heading up the stairs to his office.

Hermione went the other way, heading to her office and quarters. She mulled over how nice the afternoon with Severus had been. Sighing, she entered her room. How much nicer it would be to spend time like that with him every day.