Chapter twelve: Developments
Severus ignored her existence for a month and hated her even more each time he spotted Lily and Potter, as well as the congratulations that followed either of them wherever they went. Didn't Ariel understand? Didn't she see the kind of people they were?
But Lily didn't need encouragement, did she? His subconscious pointed out cruelly. She was gone before Ariel was even in the picture. Severus grabbed at his head. She never cared about you. How could anyone ever care about someone like you? You deserve to be alone.
"SHUT UP!" Severus stood up abruptly and the whole of the Slytherin common room stared at him in silent question. He sneered at the lot and stormed away somewhere, anywhere, where he could be alone in his misery.
*
Hermione wasn't doing much better. She spent nights staying up late to stay away from nightmares. More often than not, she would sneak into the Marauders dorm so she didn't have to be alone. She knew Remus was worried. As were the others. So was she. She was failing. She had one job. She'd gone through worse things plenty of time. This was no harder than the Stone her first year at Hogwarts, but here she was losing her head. Hermione wasn't sure what to do. Remus tried to convince her to go to Madame Pomfrey as she looked awful, could feel herself getting sick with it.
July 7 1996,
Stupid, Albus, incredibly stupid. I had taken the Unbreakable Vow to kill him, as he had instructed, but I didn't realize he was going to make it so damned easy. Hunting Horcruxes, when I've been offering my help at every turn. Now he was cursed and my Hermione would hate me. I hate me.
Severus was wandering around with purpose and no real destination, when he saw them. Or rather, heard them. Lily's tinkling laugh was hard to miss. Ariel was there, watching a few people skating on the Black Lake. Before he could think better of it, he went over to her.
"Are you here to yell at me some more?" She asked.
"I didn't yell," he told her. "I spoke forcefully."
Her slightly hopeful face fell. "Right." And she turned away, taking a few steps towards the water. He grabbed her arm tight and spun her around. "Let go of me."
Remus stepped forward, the wolf in him raging at this threat.
"I'm angry," he said lowly.
"Well so am I," she said, not really sure if she meant it. She had travelled here to help save him. Everything she was doing was for him. She couldn't stop James from proposing to Lily, any more than she could have stopped Lily from saying yes. How dare he just cast her aside like that? But, could she blame him? His grip tightened.
"Severus, let go."
"I just want you to understand. Why couldn't you have left things alone?"
Remus walked over, his hands poised as if dealing with a wild animal. "Let her go." He said in an even voice that left no room for argument.
Severus pulled her to him harshly, his hand squeezing harder and she let out a quiet protest that was drowned by her father's growl. "We're talking, wolf. Mind your own business."
"That's my mate, she is my business."
Hermione gasped at the pressure added. "Sev, please, you're hurting me."
Immediately, he let go of her, not having realized how hard he had her. Lily squeaked.
"Ariel, your arm." Everyone looked down at her arm where there was already the dark forming of a bruise in the form of his hand. Branded.
"I-I, Ariel, I, I didn't mean to- "
He was cut off by a roar from Remus as he lunged at him, slamming him to the ground and snow. With each roll in a fight to be on top another blow landed and Hermione tried to stop them, being stopped herself by Lily as James, Sirius, and Peter fought to pull Remus off the Slytherin. Severus looked awful with a broken nose and blood smeared on his face. She pulled a handkerchief out of her bag and dabbed at it, fixing his break with a wave of her hand.
Remus watched, fuming, and Hermione saw him slowly come back to himself. He pulled her to him gently, mindful of her bruise that he was trying not to look at, and pressed his forehead to hers.
"Are you okay, love?" He whispered.
She nodded. "I'm alright. What about you?"
"Yeah." Hermione hesitantly went back over to Severus and hugged him, surprising the Slytherin more than Lupin's attack.
"I love you," she said. "You're my best friend. I don't want to fight."
He hesitantly hugged her back, glancing at Lupin who was looking away- ashamed at himself for letting the wolf take over like that. "I love you too, Ariel."
*
"It bothers you, doesn't it?" She asked him a week later. She and Severus had made up and it wasn't as if it had never happened, but they were closer for it. Hermione even got he and Remus to stop hating each other for the most part.
"What bothers me?"
"That I just forgave him."
Remus looked down at their clasped hands and traced them. "He left a bruise on you. He hurt you."
"Yes, but you and I both know he didn't mean to."
"I know, I just don't want you to get hurt. I love you."
She leaned her head on his shoulder. "I love you, Remy."
"Hermione?" He shifted and she sat up to look at him curiously. "You know I love you, don't you? I mean, you don't doubt it?"
"Of course I don't doubt it, Remus. How could I?"
Remus almost asked her, but it just didn't feel right. He knew he wanted to do it in private, away from other ears so that he could use her name. He loved her name. "What is it you are planning on doing when we leave here?"
"Well," she said, thinking aloud. "It wouldn't be a bad idea to find a flat, obviously. Probably somewhere in London, but I'm not sure."
"You should stay with me." He said lamely. "I mean, wherever you decide you should live, we can go there together. Get a place together."
She beamed and kissed him. "That would be amazing."
"I find that I sleep better beside you," he confessed.
*
"My lord," Severus addressed on one knee.
"Rise, Severus," he drawled. "How is your progress with the McGonagall girl?"
"She trusts me implicitly, my lord."
"Excellent."
"My lord? If I might, ask something?"
The Dark Lord's dead eyes narrowed. "You may ask," he said warningly.
"Why capture her? Why not simply use her to gain information? Then, when it is you who is triumphant, she and her godmother will have to live with the fact that she helped you."
He studied the boy before him, for that was what he was. A boy. The idea had merit, he'd give it that. He had asked Malfoy about this boy in particular to find that apparently, he had the misfortune of falling in love with a pretty Mudblood who was now engaged to Dumbledore's golden boy. Yes, he had the boy's loyalty.
"Inspired," he said after a time. "Truly. I consent. Get her to tell you everything. No doubt she will be joining that ridiculous club of his. And you say she is to be engaged soon?"
Severus bowed his head. "Yes, my lord. Another Gryffindor, friend of that Potter and the Black disgrace."
"Yes, Lupin, I believe is the name. We shall have to keep an eye on that."
*
September 1 1996
Potter is asking for trouble now. Apparently, he has it in his head that Draco is a Death Eater (which he unwillingly is). My girl fusses over him and I feel guilty for being tempted to take him to the Dark Lord myself.
October 12 1996
I am going to throttle my godson, cursing that girl. Fucking Bellatrix has him convinced not to take help from me. Says I'm a spy. Can't I both, be a spy and worried for him?
November 9 1996
My Hermione is experiencing her first heartbreak. She deserves better than that Weasley, even if better is Lupin. I may just tease him about this later.
Hermione looked up to where Remus stood in front of her table in the library. He flexed his hands at his sides. Fist, relax, fist, relax, fist, relax.
"Are you alright, love?"
"Me?" He asked, light headed and nauseous. It was March 1st and he had decided. This was it. He was going to ask her. "I'm good. I love you."
"I love you," she answered back in a confused tone, setting down her father's journal. "What's on your mind?"
Remus closed his eyes and took a deep breath, opening them again and crouching beside her. He took her hands in his, kissing them both and pressing them to his forehead. "Hermione, I love you. I-I realize that you've known me longer than I've known you, but I have known that you were meant for me the moment we met. I can't tell you how happy I was to find Sirius' charms didn't work on you. To hear later that you loved me. To see you asleep on my chest in the morning. I understand that you will be leaving to your own time. I can handle that, because I love you so much. I need you. I feel stronger when I'm with you."
He paused for a moment and pulled something out of his robes pocket. "Hermione, my mate, will you marry me?"
Hermione's eyes teared and she gazed at his scarred, handsome face, grabbing it and kissing him for all she was worth. "Yes," she gasped when their lips separated. "Of course I will marry you. I love you."
Remus slid his grandmother's pale gold ring over Hermione's knuckle and kissed it.
"It's beautiful," she whispered.
"It was my grandmother's," he said. "I asked my father for it at Christmas."
"You've had it since Christmas?"
He nodded. "I avoided you because I was afraid that at any moment I would ask and I wanted to ask your father first."
"My- "
"Admittedly it was before I punched him, but he did consent as your best friend."
Hermione, upon hearing this, pulled him away from the library so she could show him how much she loved him.
Christmas 1996
I gave her a book on Wizard Survival, with my disguised commentary added, and I even was able to watch her open it at Headquarters. When she saw the yellow paper, she got a strange smile and opened it carefully and deliberately. Only Lupin, Nymphadora, and I were with her. I pretended not to be paying attention. Tonks and Lupin were discussing her upcoming nuptials with the second oldest Weasley boy and he looked at my Hermione with a heartbreaking expression. I know he must have been remembering a similar conversation between Ariel and I.
He questioned her about the package, glancing at me from the corner of his eye. Of course he would know who sent it. She shrugged.
"I don't know, I get one every year in the same paper. Sometimes it's just a book. Phenomenal books that have become my favorites. Other times it's like they know what I'm doing because they send a book to help me."
"Maybe it's from a secret admirer, desperately in love with you."
I had picked the most inopportune moment to take a sip of my tea, and found myself choking on it, with Lupin clapping my back- his own face red.
