Hermione was up at six o'clock as usual the next morning. She glanced at Snape through the dark before leaving for her own rooms. She had just made it inside when a soft snore from her bed reminded her that Harry was still there. She quietly got her clothes from her wardrobe and went to the bathroom, where she bathed and got dressed. For the first time in a long while, she actually took a moment to look at herself in the mirror. Harry was right; she looked completely exhausted, physically, emotionally, and mentally. And it wasn't just her face; she looked thinner and more work worn than ever before in her life. The fact that her face hadn't seen makeup or any cosmetics since she'd started caring for Snape might have made a difference as well as she was used to seeing herself at least mildly touched up. Sighing, she grabbed her things and went back into the bedroom, where she looked at the drawn curtains and wondered, for lack of the snores she'd heard earlier, if Harry was waking up.

Back in Snape's room, she made her way through the darkness, now knowing the layout of the rooms and being able to move through them with her eyes closed. Sitting down in the chair, she watched Snape's figure in the darkness. The fire had been lit by house elves and the light didn't reach the bed because of the frame that separated the study from the bedroom. The dark green fabric in the frame seemed to eat up all of the light and gave allowed only a feeble glow to show thorough it. The orbs on the ceiling were dark, but even with so little light, Snape's pale skin seemed to glow slightly in the darkness.

Snape stirred not long after she sat down and Hermione looked up, concerned. He didn't usually wake until over half an hour later. She didn't want to wake him if he had only twitched in his sleep, and leaned over the edge of the bed, peering at him through the darkness. She searched his face and realized that his eyes were open. With a sudden feeling of dread building in her stomach, she sat back and raised her wand to the floating orbs, and they dimly lit the room with a soft golden glow. Hermione looked over the man on the bed. Not knowing why she did it, and feeling just as she had when she went to the shrieking shack those weeks before, she put her hands on the edge of the bed and leaned on them, staring at Snape's face. He stared back. Although it was absurd, as he was too weak to talk, Hermione found herself asking softly, "Professor, are you all right?"

She jumped and nearly toppled over backwards when he turned his head towards her and said in his usual brusque voice, "Quite, Miss Granger, though I could do with some water."

Hermione leaned away from the bed and grabbed the cup on the bedside table. She was too shocked to reply as she held it to his lips and he drank until the cup was empty. She used her wand to refill it and asked hoarsely, "More?" but he shook his head so she set it back on the table. He blinked several times and she just stared at him. He stared right back.

She reached out and felt his arm. It was no longer burning, but cool. Her mouth fell open in shock. She stood up and leaned over him, lifting his left arm and examining it. All that was left of the dark mark was what looked like a simple, plain, normal scar. Her eyes widened as she looked at it. She noticed his arm was limp in her hands and turned to look at his face. "How do you feel?" she asked, and her voice was still hoarse.

"Much better than before. To live without pain is a nice thing to experience again," he answered, his deep voice ringing in the room and in Hermione's ears.

"No more pain?" she asked, shocked but hopeful.

She got the feeling he would have nodded if he could. "No. Though I am extremely weak. Speaking in itself is draining my energy."

Hermione looked at the clock. McGonagall would be there in a matter of minutes; there was no need to send Kreacher or some house elf after her. She turned back to Snape. He was looking at the clock now. They sat in silence until the door opened and McGonagall walked in with two trays of breakfast floating in front of her. She saw that Snape was awake and gave him a kindly smile. Then she looked to Hermione and said, "You look pleased about something. And there's color in your cheeks. I haven't seen that in days! Weeks, even! What's happened?"

Hermione turned and looked pointedly to Snape. "He's not burning up or in pain anymore. His dark mark's become nothing but a scar. And he's still terribly weak, but talking again."

At this, the headmistress hurried to the bedside and looked down on Snape. She touched a finger to his arm and her mouth opened in shock. "Severus," she said quietly, staring. She had obviously accepted that he was going to die and now the hard part was being sure that she could believe that he would live.

"Minerva," he answered. His voice was cold as usual, without feeling, and yet Hermione didn't think she could have been happier to hear any other voice in the world. He was going to live! The older witch jumped when he spoke and a smile split across her face. She left to get to her office and meet with Kingsley, who would be waiting for her and needed the news. She also wanted to know whether the other death eaters were getting better or were still the same.

Hermione fed Snape as usual, though now he was free to make faces over the plain gruel and watered-down pumpkin juice without pain and she barely held in her laughter at some of the expressions he wore during the meal. Hermione settled back in her chair when he was finished and began eating her own food. She realized that she hadn't done more than pick at the edges of her meals in weeks. She ate a few actual bites before noticing Snape's hungry gaze, which was directed towards the small loaf of bread on her tray. Breaking it open, she tore bite-sized chunks out of the inside of the loaf so that she got only the soft bread and not the crust. She fed Snape a few chunks of bread, and he actually seemed grateful for once.

She had just set the tray on the table when he said, "Granger," and she looked up.

"Sir?"

He sighed. "I was given a lecture by the headmistress, only the night before I collapsed, on the proper way to treat a colleague."

Hermione was confused. "Professor, I'm afraid I have no idea what you m-"

"You may call me Severus," he said, letting it out in a breath of air that she knew meant he was mildly annoyed to have to follow McGonagall's orders and was even more annoyed that he had to tell Hermione.

"Oh," she said simply.

He snorted and looked at her with his eyebrows raised.

"Oh," Hermione said again, "I suppose that means you can call me Hermione rather than Miss Granger, then."

He jerked his chin in a slight nod and then both fell silent, staring in opposite directions because of the sudden awkwardness. They were saved when the door could be heard opening and closed and they both turned to see who it was. Harry stepped up into the bedroom and saw that Severus was awake. He nodded to him and sat down in his seat, beside Hermione's. Severus looked at Harry. Hermione almost giggled, wondering if and when he would reveal that he was better to Harry. And at last, he did.

"Mr. Potter," he said coolly, as he had so many times when he suspected they were up to something.

Harry jumped in his seat and stared at the potions master. His jaw dropped just as Hermione's had. "You're . . . you're better?"

Severus let out a bark-like, humorless laugh and said, "Hardly recovered yet, but no longer in pain, yes."

Hermione pointed to Severus' left arm and said, "Look."

Harry did, and he stared. "It's gone!"

Snape rolled his eyes and scowled as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Indeed," he muttered.

Hermione made an excuse to leave them alone and went back to her room, actually sitting on the couch and petting Crookshanks on her lap for the first time in a long while. Harry came in later and said, "McGonagall and Kingsley are there and want to know exactly what you did to Snape last night after McGonagall left. I guess the other death eaters are still in really bad shape."

Hermione nodded and stood, pushing Crookshanks gently on his way. She raised an eyebrow at Harry, who grinned. There had been no words, but she knew that Harry had spoken to Severus and thanked him for all he'd done and was at last at peace about it. She smiled back and then left, her smile fading as she entered Severus' room. She went to her seat and looked to the two people standing on either side of the bed. They came over to her side and the headmistress sat down in Harry's chair. Kingsley leaned against the bedpost.

"Did you do anything differently last night than in the past?" he asked.

Hermione shook her head. She had no memory of anything out of the ordinary from the night before. "Harry came in and watched me, but I fed him"—she looked to Severus—"and bathed him as usual. And then Harry went back to my rooms to sleep there and I stayed. After he left I bathed him one more time and-" she stopped. She blushed, looking up at the Minister of Magic. "And I cried while I was doing it. That's the one thing that was different. I guess I cried while I was doing it a long time ago but I never let the tears fall on him. Last night I stopped wiping them away because I kind of stopped caring for a minute. There was too much emotion for me to control." She shrugged, and watched as Kingsley and McGonagall exchanged a glance.

"What?" she asked, wanting to know what they were thinking, "How could my tears change anything against the dark mark?"

The two older people exchanged another glance and them McGonagall said, "It would seem that the same reason Harry is alive, and the same reason Severus survived Nagini's attack as he did, is the same reason he is well today."

Understanding dawned on Hermione's face. "But how could I-"

"Harry was protected by his mother's love when he was a baby. He was protected by his own love and sacrifice for the people at Hogwarts when he met Voldemort in the forbidden forest. Severus was protected from Nagini by his love for Lily and his sacrifice to her. And now, it would seem, that love itself has proved strong enough to counteract dark magic yet again; Your love is what saved Severus this time," McGonagall explained, looking from Hermione to Severus and back again.

Hermione spluttered, "But I don't love him! I care whether he lives or dies, but I don't . . ." she trailed off, staring at the man on the bed, who was staring back. They glared at each other for a moment and then their faces relaxed when they looked at McGonagall. "Hermione," she said, addressing her former student by name for the first time, "Don't worry; we do not think that you are in love with Severus. Even I can see that you aren't. What I meant was that you have come to care whether he lives or dies, as you said. You care about him. But you showed him love by accepting the job as his caretaker, and by continuing it even when it got very difficult. You can love without being in love, and you showed love. That was all that was necessary." She smiled then, and said, "You cared, and were sorry because you thought that his suffering was your fault, but by letting your tears touch him, you gave him the only thing you could that the dark mark couldn't reject; love."

Kingsley finished, "And now Severus will live whether the other death eaters die or not."

Hermione couldn't take it all in. This was huge; he would live; she wouldn't be responsible for his death; life could go on. She looked from one person to the next, ending with Severus and allowing her gaze to linger for several seconds longer than was really necessary. She turned back to the headmistress when she said, "As Severus is still very weak, but no longer in a life-threatening situation, you may sleep in your own quarters once again. You're job as caretaker will require that you spend your days here with Severus, though. Unless you wish to resign and help with the school?"

"No," Hermione said quickly, not realizing how strongly she felt about her job as nurse and caretaker until she said it. "I'd like to keep this job, if that's all right."

"Of course it's all right," Kingsley boomed. "You've just saved his life for the second time. I can think of no one better for the job of nursing him back to health and helping him with recovery."

He, the headmistress, and Hermione turned when Severus said dryly, "Do I have no say in this?"

"Well of course you do, Severus," McGonagall replied. "Did you have a problem with Hermione continuing to care for you?"

Scowling, he grudgingly said, "No, but-"

"Then it's settled!" McGonagall announced loudly.

Hermione glanced at Severus and saw that he was wearing a rather sour expression and his eyes had turned colder than usual once again. He was glaring at the headmistress. Before he could protest, she and Kingsley made to leave. "Hermione," she said, "Mr. Potter will have a few moments with you for a goodbye and for you to explain how Severus was cured."

"Then he can get back to the Dementors and help Weasley," Kingsley said brightly. Then his face darkened. "The poor boy's having a hell of a time out there on his own; it's as if when he left without Potter, his happiness died. I don't think he's been able to conjure a patronus since he left yesterday, though he's been trying very hard."

Hermione felt her heart react to Ron's name, but it wasn't the girlish, excited way it had always been before. Now she was defending against sour feelings rising inside of her. Pushing those away, she followed the headmistress and the Minister out to the teachers' lounge. From there the two older people left and Hermione went to her rooms. Harry was waiting inside. She explained Severus' being cured and how it had come about, and Harry was grinning at her. Then she told him about how Severus had complained a bit about her being his caretaker. Harry's answer was simple and made sense: "The old coot doesn't know what to do with someone who cares about him, Hermione! Isn't it obvious? He has never had someone who cared about him apart from his mother and mine, and my mother didn't exactly show him that she cared by loving my father instead of him. Snape is too shocked and inexperienced with people who care in his life; he doesn't know how to do anything but push you away."

Hermione nodded, thoughtful. "I expect he'll distance himself from me as much as he can once he's recovered; it wasn't exactly comfortable, me bathing his bare skin and him being taken to the bathroom and me nursing him and everything. I doubt he'll want to be around me after that."

Harry's gaze unfocused as he became pensive. "Will it bother you, if he alienates you like that?"

Hermione shrugged. "I care about whether he lives or dies. I'm not trying to have a friendship with him. There's a difference, so I suppose it shouldn't bother me much at all."

Harry nodded and then pulled her into a hug. "Now I've got to go back to Ron and help him; apparently the breakup isn't so easy on his side of things," he grinned at her, which surprised her. She gave him a questioning look and he said, "I was always worried that something might go wrong if you two got to be more than just best friends. But Ron shouldn't have said what he did and acted like he did. You two need a little time away from each other. You know Ron; he just gets caught up in the moment and lets his temper get the better of him. This is a really good experience for him because he'll realize how important it is to hold his tongue sometimes or take a minute to ask himself what he's arguing about and whether it's really worth it to say something. Don't worry, I'll get back to him and he'll be right as rain soon. He might even regret it enough that he'll ask you to be his girl again." Then he saw the look on her face and said quickly, "but that's another matter."

Pulling her into another hug, he gave her a smile and turned to leave. She watched him walk out the door and walked slowly out after him, but when she made it to the teachers' lounge it was empty and he had already gone. She entered Snape's room and went to sit beside the bed in the chair. She pointed her wand at the duplicate chair and it moved a ways away from hers so that any other guests Severus had—though she doubted there would be any—could have their space. He was awake and watching her the entire time.

She took a moment to try and grasp everything that had happened the night before and that morning, and tried to understand the crippling discovery that Severus was going to live. She remembered how she had answered without hesitation when McGonagall had asked if she would continue to care for Severus, and found herself thinking, hmm, maybe Dumbledore knew exactly what he was doing when he told the headmistress to ask me to become Severus' nurse . . .

Her book bag was still under the bedside table and she used magic to clean the cloth there and tucked it back into her beaded bag. She took out the book of muggle fairytales and began carefully looking through worn pages for the one she wanted. She looked up in surprise when Severus said, "Grimm. I recognize the name."

Hermione nodded, though she was quite shocked that he had paid any attention to what she was doing. "They were brothers, wizards who lived with the muggles. They recorded all of the muggle fairytales and put them in this book."

He nodded. "And you like muggle fairytales?"

Hermione smiled. "Yes."

"Why? They're nothing but confused rubbish, often involving incorrect information about magic." He raised one eyebrow, obviously not understanding why she would be interested in anything that held incorrect references to magic.

She actually laughed. It was the first time in a long time that she'd done that, and she couldn't believe it was Severus Snape who had brought it about. "I grew up with them. My mum used to read them to me before bed every night." She stopped, thoughts drifting to her childhood and then to her mother, who was now not even capable of reading.

Severus snorted and she came back to the present. "Have you a favorite of them?"

She nodded, wondering what had possessed him to ask about her favorite story, especially out of a collection of muggle tales. "I've always loved Sleeping Beauty." Then she tilted her head to the side, thinking once again to happy memories from her childhood, and added, "But Beauty and the Beast is my second favorite."

Severus nodded, furthering her amazement that he would be even mildly interested in such matters. No, furthering her amazement that he had even given it a second glance. Deciding to tease him just because she could, she said in a girlish voice, "Oh, should I read them to you?!"

She was completely shocked when he just managed to raise his shoulders in a slight shrug and turned to look at the ceiling. "Wait a minute," she insisted, "I'm serious."

"As am I."

"But you never said anything!" she said, staring at him incredulously.

"I believe I just did." He turned and looked at her, his stare even and neither cold nor warm.

"What?"

He actually chuckled. "Considering the fact that I have no other option to keep myself busy and you are the only form of entertainment here, I suppose I ought to accept your offer."

Hermione was for a moment too surprised to answer. "I could read a potion book or something by Beedle the Bard . . ." she began slowly.

He said, "No, I'm curious to know what you think is so fascinating and wondrous about a muggle story."

Hermione narrowed her eyes and looked at him for a moment. Was she losing her mind? Was the old bat of the dungeons actually being kind to her? Respectful, even? Or had she just spent so much time around him—even without him speaking—that she was used to his usual behavior and had learned to detect kind things hidden within the cold and cruel ones? Blinking as she came back to what was before her, she reopened the book in her lap, which she had dropped when Severus shocked her with his words.

She glanced up at him over the top of the book, and watched as he looked at the wall beneath the clock across from the bed. Then she lowered her gaze to the words on the page and began reading Sleeping Beauty. She began with the famous words so loved in the muggle world: "Once upon a time . . ."

A few hours later Hermione was putting down the book and setting a bookmark between the pages to hold her place when Severus said that he wanted some water. She held the cup to his lips, and realized that it was much more awkward to feed him and let him drink when he was completely awake and capable of speaking. But they managed to ignore it. Just before she opened the book to continue, the door could be heard opening and closing. Hermione set the book back in her book bag and glanced at Severus out of the corner of her eye. He was surprising her more and more as the day went on; first he'd accepted when she offered to read muggle fairytales, and now he hadn't interrupted the story with a complaint once, and had only just interrupted for the first time because he wanted water and not because he was objecting to something related to the story. And unless she was dreaming, he was actually listening and letting himself get into the story. Hermione was still wondering if she was going insane when the headmistress stepped into the bedroom and two trays floated in with her.

One tray set itself on the bedside table and one on the edge of the bed. Severus looked particularly relieved to see that there was a small piece of soft bread and a cup of actual, water-free pumpkin juice with his gruel, which also looked like normal, unaltered food. Hermione's tray held a full meal, and she noticed Severus' eyes dart in the direction of the steaming bowl of soup there. McGonagall took a moment to look over the two of them and saw Hermione smiling and that Severus was actually not scowling for once. His scowl returned quickly enough, and Hermione could have sworn he sent the headmistress a glare, perhaps even because she had interrupted the story. She left rather quickly and Hermione fed Severus, and when he was finished she set his tray under hers and took up the book, nibbling on her own food while she continued to read.

That night they had nearly finished the book. Dinner was over, and Severus had seemed rather annoyed at its interruption of the reading yet again. Hermione was sure she must be hallucinating. She stopped reading at eight o'clock and he closed his eyes as she put the book back in her bag. He had glared murderously at Archibald when he came the several times during the day for the bathroom visits, and Hermione knew the man thought Severus was just feeling a bit humiliated by his helplessness. Hermione had let him believe what he wanted, not really feeling like explaining that Severus seemed to be enjoying her reading of Sleeping Beauty.

She rose from her chair and looked back over everything. She had tucked her wand and her beaded bag back in her robes and started to leave. She turned before stepping out of the bedroom and said, "Goodnight, Sir," into the darkness, as she had darkened the orbs completely. She left his quarters and went back to her own, where she enjoyed a hot bath and curled up in her own bed for the first time in weeks. It actually felt strange for her not to be curling up in her chair, and she tossed and turned and took quite a while before she was comfortable and could fall asleep. She had strange dreams all night and woke in the morning with the scenes from several of the most unusual still hovering behind her sleepy eyes.

Going to the bathroom, she brushed her hair and actually put on a bit of makeup. Brushing her teeth, she realized that true to McGonagall's words the day before, she did actually have some colour back in her cheeks and she looked less tired and worn than only two days before. Flashing a smile at herself in the mirror as she thought about what Harry had said about Severus' reason for possibly alienating her in the future, she left the bathroom and sat on the edge of her bed, snatching her wand and beaded bag and scratching Crookshanks behind the ears before she stood and left her rooms for the day.

She entered Severus' room and sat to wait until he woke up. He drank some water after he woke and she'd lit the floating orbs on the ceiling, and then she sat back and looked at him as she picked up the book of muggle stories. She opened to the place they'd left off and went back into reading. She'd never read aloud to anyone before, especially not a fairytale story. Trying to put animation into her voice and not to speak in a monotone had been a challenge for her so far, but she was getting better.

Archibald came shortly after they had begun and Severus seemed a bit more tolerant of his interruption this time. When they were back from the bathroom McGonagall had left breakfast. Hermione fed him and again ate while she read. They finished Sleeping Beauty only a matter of minutes after that, and Hermione closed the book and set it down, looking up. "Well?" she asked.

"What?" His voice was still clipped and cold, but not quite as biting as it had been when he was angry with her all those weeks before.

"What did you think?" Hermione specified.

"The story was acceptable."

"That's it?"

He turned and looked at her. "That's it." Seeing the unsatisfied look on her face, he added, "It is understandable why muggle children would be so enchanted by the idea, after hearing the way you read it."

Hermione was surprised. "How did I read it?"

"As if you were still an enchanted little girl who believed every word she was reading."

Hermione didn't know whether to be pleased or offended by his verdict. On one hand she did still feel like a little girl who was enchanted by the story, but on the other she wanted to sound a bit more mature than that. Deciding that it really didn't matter, she nodded, not really agreeing but thinking of other things.

They were silent for quite a while and then Hermione picked up the book again. Severus had always been unafraid to voice his opinions and if he wanted her to stop reading, he would say as much. So she started reading Beauty and the Beast.

"I'll have you know," he said that night when they had finished the story, "this is not what I saw myself spending my summer doing."

Hermione laughed out loud. She couldn't help it. Severus Snape had managed to say something humorous. He actually chuckled with her. She wondered if perhaps the dark mark's ailments had caused problems with his mental health. She went to her own rooms, thinking over the day's events with a satisfied smile on her face. And before she left his room, she told the darkness, "Goodnight, Sir," once again. It just seemed rude to get up, turn out the lights, and walk away without a word. He had yet to respond, and when they weren't talking about the muggle stories he was still just as cold and cruel as before, which left Hermione a sense of peace and she was able to believe that he was perhaps still in his right mind.

That night she bathed again and actually fell asleep while soaking in the hot water. She woke up sometime past midnight and laughed sleepily at herself as she climbed out and dried off, pulling on her pajamas before using her wands to turn out the lights and stumbling to bed, half asleep before she even hit the mattress. She wasn't even awake enough to glance at the clock and see what time it was. She drew the curtains around the bed, and Crookshanks who had been sleeping in her bed with her, curled up in the small of her back, as she slept on her stomach.

Over the next few days, they finished all of the stories in the muggle book and when it was over Severus had plenty of not-so-kind comments about it. Then the conversation turned to classes, which would start in three months, and they discussed lesson plans. Severus continued to insist, "Weasley and Potter were the worst students I ever had to deal with."

Hermione grinned when she asked, "What about Neville?"

"Longbottom," Severus sneered, "Is so far beneath even the worst description of a student that he is in a different placing altogether.

"I see," Hermione said, holding back a laugh.

"You were just as terrible as Potter and Weasley at times," Severus continued, "don't think I never knew how many times you helped Longbottom with his potions. He ruined every one he brewed, but you managed to coach him well enough with whispers behind my back to keep most of his concoctions from exploding and harming any of the students."

Hermione couldn't keep a laugh from escaping when he said this. He said it in a very unkind way, but the bit of truth in his words and the fact that he was looking back on teaching Neville, Harry, Ron and her was something that made her smile.

He saw her laughing and rolled his eyes. "And McGonagall informed me my first day here from Saint Mungo's that he plans on returning to take the position of Herbology teacher," he said, scowling. "There'll be a dead student from infant mandrakes within a week of the first of September, I guarantee it."

"Neville might not have been so great with potions . . . or transfiguration . . . or charms . . . or history of magic . . . or- never mind. He was excellent at Herbology from his first year and now he's going to take over, but no worries; he's not starting until next year. He's trying his hand at being an auror with Harry and Ron first," Hermione defended her friend.

"An auror," Snape spat, "He'll kill one of the others or someone from our side—if not himself—within the first three days."

Hermione cleared her throat indignantly. "He has been working with some of the best aurors in the Ministry since the battle here and he's not killed anyone yet! He was involved in the captures of several of the death eaters, too, and no one's dead. And he's the one who killed Nagini."

She didn't know how she expected Severus to react at the mention of the snake who had nearly killed him. But he didn't react. He rolled his eyes again. "Longbottom would be better off teaching Herbology than trying to cast defensive spells and save the world," he said with a scowl. Hermione only shook her head, knowing that further argument and more harsh words from Snape were all that could follow if she said anything more on the subject.

Then the same small female house elf who had summoned Hermione to the headmistress' office about a week before apparated into the bedroom again. Hermione left for McGonagall's office and arrived shortly. She stepped onto the slowly rising spiral staircase and knocked before entering. She sat down, looking over towards the fireplace, where the flames were green. Seeing her glance that way, McGonagall said, "Kingsley's just flooed back to the Ministry." Then she sat down behind the desk and faced Hermione. "Now, I called you here to tell you that there has been a mass number of deaths in Azkaban in the past two days. The dark mark has finally succeeded and ended their suffering."

Hermione's mind whirled as she pictured the faces of multiple death eaters who she knew had fled the battle at Hogwarts and she wondered who was dead. The image of the Malfoys' sneering faces seemed to stick in her mind.

As if she read Hermione's thoughts, McGonagall said, "It seems that Lucius and Draco Malfoy were weaker and nearer to death than Narcissa. And, she seems to have come to the conclusion that you did and been bathing them with a wet cloth. And, as you did, she cried over them for fear of their quickly-approaching and seemingly imminent death. Now, they are recovering as Severus is and it seems that in giving her tears, Narcissa was cured as well. She, as the giver of the tears and perhaps because she was less affected by the dark mark's retribution than her husband and son, is healthier than they and able to take care of them though very weak and still recovering herself.

"The Malfoys are the only death eaters who besides Severus are expected to survive, as none of the rest of them have anyone who would care enough to shed a tear over their coming deaths." When she finished she searched Hermione's face.

Hermione didn't know what to feel. She was still angry with Draco for becoming a death eater and participating in Voldemort's plans, but she also understood that his family's survival had depended on his actions and he had done what he had to in order to get them out of such a situation. He and his family had also refrained from participating in the battle at Hogwarts, so she couldn't hold that against them either. Overall, she found that she felt a bit relieved that the Malfoy family would survive this strange destruction of all the still-living death eaters, and also slightly annoyed. But more relieved than anything.

She returned to Severus' quarters and gave him the news, and he seemed neither relieved nor upset by the news. He simply grunted and stayed silent. Hermione read him a page of potion instructions from one of the volumes on the shelves in his study and went to bed that night with knowledge of a new potion she'd never heard of before. Severus had listened to her read and then asked her questions as if he was teaching, wanting to know how much she'd absorbed. Then he lectured her for a short while as he had often done to the entire class of students when she was back in school.

Hermione found it strange but comforting to have him lecturing and quizzing her again, even if he did fit some rather cruel, unkind remarks from past times they'd shared into his imitation lesson. He called her an "Insufferable know-it-all," and several other names that he had used to insult her in the years when she was his student. But she was finding his comments and remarks less and less aggravating and hurtful and more to laugh about as she remembered those beloved days when she had attended Hogwarts as a student, wondering what new memories she would make as a teacher in the coming year.

Here it is! The big chapter! What do you think? Leave a review and tell me whether you liked it, hated it, were suprised, already saw that coming, or had something else in mind! Thanks again for reading! I'll try to get another chapter up tomorrow or sometime in the next few days! All my love! ~Taelr