Knit Me Together

by QueenOfTheDreamers87

"Darkness is not dark for you, and light shines as the day." Some are dead, and some are gone, and some are left behind, scrambling for sense in the darkness. Severus' and Hermione's stories resume amid the bleak altered realities created in "In The Shadow Of Your Wings." This is Book Two of the Psalmody series.

2. Chapter 2

The first thing Hermione noticed when they landed was the sky. It was dark - black as coal and smooth like the softest velvet. The stars were plentiful and pointed as she gazed up, as though there were no such thing as a light bulb in all the world. The vibrancy of the night sky was so striking, in fact, that Hermione gasped aloud and clutched a bit to Severus' sleeve, asking quietly,

"Where are we?"

She'd known they were going to go to Scotland - rural Scotland, though nowhere near Hogwarts. That was all Severus had told her.

"Loch Enoch," Severus said matter-of-factly. "Just southeast of Merrick."

Hermione stepped forward carefully from the spot where they'd landed. The air was cold, crisp, and clear. She felt the crunch of wet granite sand beneath her feet, heard the delicate lap of the water's tiny movements, and she flicked her eyes up and down to see the night sky reflected upon the loch's surface. She could not close her mouth for disbelief of the beauty.

All the constellations were clearly visible - not just the little connect-the-dot versions that Hermione had seen in basic Astronomy texts, but the multi-dimensional relationships between the stars that had been related by the centaurs. She marveled up at the sky for a long moment and pondered the night.

"Is it safe to assume your bag contains some means of outdoor accommodation?" she heard Severus prompt, and Hermione was abruptly torn from her reverie. She turned to face him, trying to make out his face in the darkness. She nodded wordlessly. "Good," he said rather sharply. "Then I think it best we make camp and set up protective spells and wards as quickly as possible."

Hermione could certainly agree with that sentiment. She pulled her small purple bag out of her pocket and opened it, reaching around until she found the tent that had once belonged to Arthur Weasley's colleague, Mr. Perkins. Hermione had begun setting up her bag the previous year, before Dumbledore had even been killed, but she'd surreptitiously Summoned this tent the day of Bill and Fleur's wedding, at the Burrow. She'd left a few Galleons on the table where she'd been as payment, and she now wondered whether or not Arthur Weasley ever received them.

The mass of poles and canvas worked their way out of her tiny bag, and Hermione watched as Severus pointed his wand at the heap of materials.

"Erecto," he said smoothly, and the tent built itself in a fluid motion. Severus flicked his eyes to Hermione. "Go on, then," he commanded her. "Set up a perimeter of protective charms."

Hermione felt a small swell of pride at the fact that he was entrusting her with the task of guarding their camp, rather than doing it himself. She watched for a brief moment as he slid into the Extended tent, making sense of the charmed space. Then she cleared her throat softly and took out her own wand, gliding it around in careful motions as she incanted the necessary protections. She said them each multiple times, making her way in a large circle around the tent.

"Repello Muggletum… Protego Totalum… Salvio Hexia… Muffliato… Cave inimicum…"

When at last Hermione felt the area around the tent was adequately protected, she cleared her throat again, for her magic felt a bit drained from the effort. She lowered her wand and glanced over her shoulder to see the tent glowing a bit from the light of lanterns inside. She wandered between its flaps and was hit first with the smell of cats, and then the sight of the bright decor and enormous space. The Expanded tent concealed a bathroom and a small kitchen. Severus stood in the center of the room, looking mildly impressed as he took in the space. He began unfastening the buttons of his frock coat, folding it neatly after he'd shucked it off. He placed it over the back of an overstuffed armchair and set to work on the sleeves of his white dress shirt. Hermione suddenly craved a hot drink, for the air outside was frigid. It was getting toastier in the tent minute by minute, and she sensed that Severus must have cast a Warming Charm upon the place when he'd come inside. Nonetheless, tea sounded pleasant.

So she opened her bag and dug about inside until she unearthed a kettle and two mugs, as well as a tin of bagged tea. She cast a nonverbal Aguamenti into the tea kettle and set it to boiling, scouring the mugs out with her wand as Severus sidled up behind her. He slid his hands around her waist, and Hermione glanced down to see he'd rolled his sleeves up to his elbows. She shuddered as she turned round to face him. It was attractive enough, to be certain, to see him with his white shirt unbuttoned at the collar. But something was nagging at her to keep her distance from him tonight.

Perhaps, she thought with a bit of an internal scowl, it was the fact that they were hiding in the middle of rural Scotland in a tent - because they were wanted by just about everyone, and if anyone found them, they'd be killed.

Perhaps, she thought with an angry, silent huff, it was because some of her friends were dead, and others in grave danger… and therefore the idea of frivolous sexual relations seemed uncouth at best.

Or, perhaps it was because Severus had used the Killing Curse twice tonight and wiped the memory of a third person. Yes, that was probably it.

Hermione sighed and watched Severus drag her hands up to his mouth so that he could kiss her knuckles. She pulled her own hands away hesitantly, feeling a bit queasy. Then, suddenly, she was hit with a shock of alarm, for she realized that her left hand was entirely bare.

She yanked her hand away from Severus as if it were on fire and clutched anxiously at her fingers.

"Where - where is my ring?" she cried, her voice an unhinged shriek. Severus furrowed his eyebrows and shook his head calmly. He said nothing for a moment, and then pointed his wand about them in a little arc.

"Accio wedding ring…"

Hermione waited, flicking her eyes about in a panic and massaging her left hand with her right. But the ring did not appear. She stomped her foot and moaned softly, looking up at Severus with a miserable expression.

"Oh, Severus… it must have fallen off my hand as we were Disapparating! Or back in Wales; I've no idea. I'm so sorry…"

She watched as Severus shut his eyes and appeared to concentrate very hard. He pointed his wand straight out from himself and took a deep, steady breath. "Accio Prince ring," he murmured smoothly.

Hermione felt her eyes go wide. "What?" she exclaimed, feeling abruptly horrified for having lost the thing. "'Prince' ring? As in… your mother's? It was your mother's ring? And I've lost it?" She clutched at her hair, ignoring the whistling of the tea kettle behind her, and began to wheeze frantically.

Severus put his hands upon her shoulders and gave her a heavy, deliberate stare. He curled the corners of his lips up into a reassuring little smile. "It was my great-great-grandmother's ring," he corrected Hermione, making her feel, if possible, worse. "I've Summoned it, and, as you know, distance makes no difference so long as the object is clear in the mind. I'm not certain if it will be able to appear through our charms and wards, but I'm not willing to chance taking them down. In any case, Hermione… it doesn't matter where the ring is. It's just a ring."

Hermione felt guilty tears suddenly boil over her eyelids, and in a rush, every terrible thought eating at her mind gushed forth in a violent, sobbing stream.

"I've ruined it! I've ruined everything. I've lost your family ring. I'm going to get us both killed. I've already gotten them killed - Remus Lupin and Ron. Oh, goodness… Ron… if I'd gone with him and Harry, Ron would be alive. But I didn't go with them; I stayed with you, Severus! I was wrong. I let him die. I let Harry wind up alone. I let Ginny get captured, and now who knows where she and Harry are? Poor Molly Weasley's going to have no children left and it's all my fault! My own parents have no idea I ever existed. I did exist! They taught me how to walk. They came to my ballet recitals. But they have memory of that, and they wouldn't know me if they saw me on the street. And it's all my fault. And now I've gone and lost your great-great-grandmother's ring, and I'm so, so sorry, Severus…"

She collapsed into the overstuffed chair to Severus' right, putting her elbows upon her knees and burying her face in her hands. She shook with cries for a long moment until she felt her face being pulled off of her hands. She looked up with puffy, tear-stained cheeks to see that Severus had silenced the kettle and knelt before her. He was kissing her knuckles now, like he'd intended to do, and was brushing the rough pads of his fingers over the bare ring finger on her left hand.

"Ms. Granger, are you quite finished with your self-loathing diatribe?" Severus sounded almost bored. Hermione just stared at him, confused. He sounded like his old self, like the teacher he would never be again. Who would he be now, she wondered?

What sort of future was there for them? If the Light triumphed, what sort of paths were they to carve? And if Voldemort could not be vanquished, how would death overtake them? Hermione shuddered back into tears, feeling entirely overwhelmed. She'd finally had too much, she realized. One person could only take so much, and she'd finally had enough.

She felt herself being heaved off of the overstuffed chair, carried in strong but thin arms, and she reached up to hold fast to Severus, afraid of letting go. Then she felt herself being set down between sheets and blankets, felt shoes being pulled off her feet. All the while she shook and heaved with uncontrolled sobs. It was months' worth of crying that she'd long held back, and it was all coming out at once. All of her guilt, anger, and shame were bursting forth at once like a broken dam.

"What about Neville? Luna? Who's keeping them safe?" Hermione demanded fiercely up at the ceiling. No one answered her. "You protected Luna from the Cruciatus Curse that Alecto Carrow hit her with… who's protecting her now? No one. And, again, it's all my fault. All my fault. Even those damned Snatchers - no one truly deserves to die, you know. And you killed them because of me, really. Everyone's dead because of me."

Hermione shook her head against the pillow and sighed with trembling breath. Somewhere in the distance, she heard Severus' slick murmur intone, "Accio Calming Draught." She flicked her eyes over to see him with his wand pointed into her purple bag, and then a small brown Potions bottle flew up into his hand. He stalked to sit upon the bed and said to her, "You are speaking utter nonsense, though it is not impossible to discern why a person in your situation might be overwhelmed. In any case… take this, please. Both both our sakes."

He raised his eyebrows at her and uncorked the bottle of Calming Draught, holding it out to Hermione's lips. She tipped back the little bottle and drank the sickly sweet, syrupy mixture. She tipped her head back and said insistently,

"It's not going to change the fact that Ron's dead because of me… that I've lost a priceless family heirloom… that I've gotten people hurt and killed… that… that I…"

Suddenly Hermione lost track of her thoughts. The negative emotions that had been wracking her brain dissolved quickly, and a warm sense of peace replaced them. She could no longer remember why there were tears streaming down her cheeks, and, indeed, soon enough the crying stopped altogether.

"Better?" Severus asked her, tucking a small potion bottle into his trousers pocket. Hermione noticed for the first time how terribly attractive it was, the way his throat bobbed up and down when he spoke. She blinked heavily and nodded at him. "Good," he murmured, petting lightly at her hair. Then he shook his head and mumbled under his breath, "All that over a bloody ring."

He stood slowly and recast the Warming Charm that was keeping the tent at a comfortable temperature. It grew a few degrees more toasty, perfect for a night's sleep, and Hermione snuggled more deeply against the blankets. She stared up at the ceiling, feeling profoundly tipsy, as though she'd had three or four glasses of wine in quick succession.

"Severus," she mumbled, feeling him slide into the lumpy bed beside her. She glanced over to see he was wearing nothing but his black boxer-briefs, and she shivered a little. The tent went dim as Severus lowered the lights so that they could sleep, and only then did Hermione realize it must be terribly late. Or early. Whichever. She couldn't keep her thoughts straight anymore. "They'll never have to worry about what time it is," she said piteously, unable to help herself. "It doesn't matter when you're dead."

She heard Severus sigh sharply beside her. "I've already dosed you with an entire bottle of Calming Draught," he reminded her. "What do I need to do to get you to sleep for a few hours?"

"I don't know," Hermione admitted, and she reached her hands up to fiddle nervously with the corners of her pillow. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Severus."

He let out an irritated-sounding huff, and then he surprised Hermione by vanishing beneath the blankets entirely. She squealed softly when she felt her knickers being yanked down, and she gasped when she realized he'd moved to arrange himself between her legs. He pulled the blankets back so that he could look up at her, and he pushed her knees apart gently. Hermione squinted down at him through the dim light and tried to pull her knees back together.

"You don't have to -" she began, but that protestation was immediately drowned out by what Severus did next. He parted her knees again and had begun moving his lips up from her knee toward her groin, dragging his lips and teeth over the sensitive skin of her left thigh. Hermione groaned and gripped her pillow, her words dying on the air.

"It's just a ring," Severus whispered against her skin, and the warmth of his breath sent a shock straight to Hermione's core. She went wet between her legs, wanting him badly. His hands held onto her hips as his mouth moved upward. He murmured, "You can't bring anyone back to life. And none the bad is your fault. A great deal of the good is thanks to you. Now, Ms. Granger… will you please try to calm down?"

"Yes…" she agreed, arching her back and nodding frantically. His mouth had reached the top of her thigh, the crease where her leg curved toward her sex, and she choked out, "I'll try to calm down."

"Good girl," he said, planting soft kisses on her labia and purring from the back of his throat. Hermione's hands flew to nest in his hair, and she felt a throbbing heat between her legs. She needed him to make her finish - soon -or else it was going to spontaneously happen.

He was being lazy and slow on purpose as he dragged his tongue over her clit, steady and rhythmic and with just enough pressure. Hermione moaned and bucked against his mouth, worried that she was going to tear hair from his head as she finally moved her hands to grip his shoulders.

"Please, Severus!" she cried out, getting ever closer to reaching the peak that she knew would send an explosion of calm through her veins. Severus chucked against her womanhood, his voice low and rumbling. The vibrations of his voice sent a fresh wave of pleasure through Hermione, and she shook uncontrollably as her toes curled. Severus' fingers dug into her hips, and she knew he could feel her need deep in the marrow of his own bones.

Then there was a firm, quick suction - his lips working on her clit - and Hermione completely lost control. Her fingernails raked over Severus' back and her pleasure detonated. Every inch of her skin was on fire, shaking and tingling. She'd gone briefly mad with the delicious agony of her orgasm, and she murmured Severus' name over and over until her voice was hoarse to her own ears.

Suddenly she was being turned over, moved roughly onto her hands and knees, and she could hear a desperate grunt behind her as Severus took firm hold of her hips and fiercely drove his cock into her still-trembling quim. Hermione cried out, for she was now hypersensitive to the feel of him, and Severus stilled inside of her. He hissed through gritted teeth, and she could hear the way he was struggling to control himself.

"I'm sorry…" he whispered dryly. He quickly pulled himself out of her her and gently turned her over onto her back to lie upon the bed. Hermione, still shaking from the odd mix of sensations, melted a little into the blankets and stared into his eyes as he leaned heavily onto his elbow beside her. Severus raked his fingers through his hair, and his cheeks colored a bit as he explained self-consciously, "It's… the vow… your physical feelings are quite acute to me."

"I know what you mean," Hermione assured him, smiling serenely at him and cupping his warm cheek in her hand. She reached down between them and wrapped her hand around his hard shaft, pumping her hand a little and feeling a swell of pleasure oscillate between his body and hers. "See?" she smirked at him.

Severus said nothing, wrenching his eyes shut and letting out a choked sound as he came messily in Hermione's hand. She watched his face contort as he finished - he looked as though he were in pain, though of course she knew he wasn't. He cleaned up after himself with his wand, but used a soaped-up flannel for Hermione's messy hands. She was grateful for that.

Drowsiness came quickly then. It turned out Severus was quite right about what Hermione needed in order to really and truly feel calm that night.

Just as she was drifting off to sleep upon the pillow, there was a rather loud whizz! and a sharp click! It sounded as though something hard and small had hit the wooden headboard above them.

Hermione gasped and sat up. Beside her, Severus mumbled, "Lumos."

His wand lit up to cast a pulsing glow that revealed the source of the sound. There, upon the mattress between them, was Hermione's wedding ring - the one that had apparently been in Severus' mother's family for generations. The green stone glinted in the eerie light of Severus' wand, and he smiled crookedly as if he were more amused than anything to see the ring. Hermione's mouth fell open as she watched Severus pick the ring up and examine it. He cast a few diagnostic spells upon the ring to make sure it hadn't been cursed, and then he reached for Hermione's left hand gently. She trembled a little as she felt it slip back onto her left ring finger, where it belonged.

"Reducio," Severus whispered, and Hermione felt the ring get infinitesimally smaller in order to fit her finger ever-so-slightly better. She looked up at Severus by the light of his wand and tried to hold back the tears in her eyes. She'd cried enough for one night, but once more she felt overwhelmed.

"Where do you suppose it was?" she asked him, and Severus cocked up one bare shoulder at her.

"It doesn't matter, does it?" he said. "It's on your finger now."

Hermione dissolved against his chest then. There was no Calming Draught, nor any deed between man and wife, that could dam her tears now.

He loved her, more deeply than she deserved. And a fair bit of evil may have come of it. But there was good, too. They'd already destroyed one Horcrux together, and they'd gained information about many more. She had an unfailing ally in Severus Snape, but their unity went much deeper than that.

He'd given her his soul, his very being. If she were broken, he would break. Of course, it worked the other round, as well. But Hermione suddenly realized that she didn't care about that - she would have minded more to lose him, in fact.

Together, they could be strong. They could be powerful. They could defeat Voldemort. And they would, Hermione decided, staring down at her left hand by the light of Severus' wand. They would vanquish the darkness - together - so that their souls might find a long, happy path.

Sleep came quickly then, and when Hermione woke in the morning, she had no recollection of her dreams, good or bad. It was for the best, she decided. She'd needed the good cry the night before, to clear her head and steady her heart for the road ahead.

She stepped out of the tent in the crisp, cold morning air and stared out at the glassy loch before her, for the first time in a long while feeling profoundly grateful to be alive.

Author's Note: I will tell you that that's the last lemon for at least four or five chapters - there is a great deal of action in the coming bits, but it's 100% plot! Buckle thine seatbelts, friends. :-}

Chapter 7: Shell Cottage

A/N: This chapter is kind of dense, and I apologize for that. It's important for the plot, so hopefully it's still enjoyable. :-)

---

The next weeks passed in a quiet, contemplative rhythm. Peas and beans and spotted dick were eaten - everything came from tins and was multiplied, the only way Severus and Hermione were able to increase their food supply in accordance with Gamp's Law. Tea was drunk, and books were read, and conversations happened during frigid outdoor stargazing sessions and after late-night love making. Christmas came and went with little fanfare, but neither of them minded much.

It grew almost comfortable, their life in the tent on the bank of the loch. It was easy, and Severus nearly forgot that the entire wizarding world was after them.

Then one morning, Hermione said from beside him, "Today is the thirtieth."

Severus groaned a little and dragged the back of his hand over his half-lidded eyes, still drugged with sleep. "So it is," he acknowledged. The next day, they were meant to meet up with the Order of the Phoenix at Shell Cottage. It was bound to be an uncomfortable meeting at best and an utterly dangerous one at worst. Severus and Hermione had spent the last few weeks avoiding the meeting in conversations. The imminent coming of New Year's Eve was an unspoken truth that was silently acknowledged and did not require discussion.

Until, of course, it was a mere twenty-four hours before they were supposed to be at Shell Cottage. Then the conversation could be put off no longer. Severus pushed himself up onto his elbows and looked down to where Hermione lay upon her back, her hair fanned out majestically about her head. She clasped her hands over her stomach and said,

"It's all going to be fine, Severus. The last time I saw the Weasleys, I explained to them that everything you'd done was on Dumbledore's orders…"

"I did not kill Remus Lupin on Dumbledore's orders," Severus mumbled, yanking his fingers through his hair and feeling it knot up in resistance. Hermione frowned at him, and Severus scowled right back.

Surely she was too bright not to realize that things had changed since the day of Bill Weasley's planned wedding. Ronald Weasley had been alive then, and Ginevra had not yet been used (by Severus) as bait. Lupin hadn't been dead then, either, nor Mad-Eye Moody. And George Weasley still had both ears that afternoon. The only thing Hermione had been required to explain away was the death of Albus Dumbledore, and that was easy enough. Too much had happened since then.

"Never underestimate the wrathful vitriol, nor the magical prowess, of a grieving mother," Severus instructed Hermione. She licked her dry bottom lip and sighed up at Severus in response before asking in a quiet murmur,

"Why did you kill Remus Lupin, Severus?"

"I had to do it," Severus said automatically, though of course he had no idea anymore whether or not that was true. Hermione did not argue. Instead, she swallowed heavily and said,

"I dreamed about the Elder Wand. I have an idea."

Severus sat up straighter and flicked his eyes to the little table beside the tent's lumpy bed. There sat the moss agate that Luna Lovegood had given months earlier to Hermione. It was said to induce pleasant or useful dreams, Hermione had told him. Severus had rolled his eyes and chuckled at the idea. Now he wasn't quite as skeptical. He cocked his eyebrows up as he looked back at Hermione, urging her to continue.

"Ende of Deth indicates that all three Deathly Hallows must be in one's possession in order to the Master of Death. Of course, we don't yet know where the Resurrection Stone is. But Harry has an Invisibility Cloak - at least, I'm assuming he's got it with him. Then there's the Elder Wand."

Severus nodded slowly at her, and Hermione pulled herself up to sit, staring determinedly at Severus. She played anxiously with the hem of her nightshirt and said,

"I dreamed last night that you and Draco Malfoy were duelling. You Stunned him, and then you used your Oraverit to disappear. When you reappeared beside me, I was holding the Elder Wand and handed it to you. You flicked it toward a fireplace and the flames turned green, and you said, 'The Wand knows its Master.'"

Severus frowned deeply at her and thought. Draco Malfoy…

Then he realized what had happened. He thought back to that fateful night on the Astronomy Tower, the night he'd killed Albus Dumbledore. Of course, the Elder Wand had been in the possession of Dumbledore for years (or so his brother said). But the events on the Astronomy Tower that night had given the Elder Wand a new Master. Draco Malfoy.

"But I don't understand," Severus heard Hermione saying. "You killed Professor Dumbledore… shouldn't you already be the Master of the Elder Wand?"

"No." Severus shook his head. "First of all, I did not use a Killing Curse upon Albus Dumbledore; I merely Disarmed him. The reason that curse sent him flying is because he had no wand when I disarmed him. It had already been hexed away from him by -"

"Draco." Hermione nodded. "Draco 'conquered' Professor Dumbledore, but you never conquered Draco. The Wand is still subject to Draco."

"Indeed. I believe that is correct." Severus nodded and let out a shaky breath. It was quite a bit to consider. Then the question in his mind quickly shifted toward what to make of this knowledge. He said to Hermione, "We need to go to Hogwarts. If the Elder Wand is still in Dumbledore's tomb, we need to get it before the Dark Lord does. Then, essentially, the course of your rather prophetic dream needs to come to pass. Somehow, I need to corner Draco Malfoy and Stun or Disarm him, giving me Mastery over the Elder Wand."

"Then Harry will do the same to you, and he'll have it to help defeat Vo - to defeat him." Hermione nodded fervently. Severus felt a stab of unease at the complicated thought.

"All of this, of course, is predicated on the notion that we will, at some point, be able to get the wand to Harry Potter. And that we'd have the Resurrection Stone, which we currently do not."

Then, all of a sudden, it was as though someone had switched on a Muggle electric light inside Severus' mind. He thought back to the previous year, when Albus Dumbledore had come to him with the frightening marks of a lethal curse. He'd begged Severus to help him, to brew him a potion to slow the curse. Dumbledore had explained that the damage had been done when he'd put on a ring. He'd been tempted, he'd told Severus. Something about the ring had tempted him.

Severus could see the ring now, lying upon Albus Dumbledore's desk, its ugly black stone cracked and broken - defeated by the shining, powerful Sword of Gryffindor.

Just as the locket had been broken and defeated by another very powerful blade.

That ring had been a Horcrux, Severus realized quickly. He began explaining the memory to Hermione, trying to tell her every detail he could recall. He finished by describing the way Albus Dumbledore had been 'tempted' - by what, he would not say.

"The Resurrection Stone gives the user the power to bring back shadows of the beloved dead," Hermione mused softly. "That would be very tempting. Dumbledore knew about the Elder Wand. I'm certain he knew about Harry's cloak. He sent you to obtain the copy of Ende of Deth for a reason. He must have known about the Resurrection Stone - he must have realized that's what was in the ring."

"But, alas, dear Albus is nowhere near to instruct us upon the stone's current location," Severus considered. "And it shall be quite the feat sneaking onto Hogwarts grounds undetected to 'conquer' Draco and retrieve the wand."

"Maybe it isn't us who needs to do that," Hermione suggested, and when Severus looked confused, she offered hastily,

"There need only be a chain of Mastery over the wand, yes? What if we're able to convince some of the Order members - someone with existing access to the school, like Professor McGonagall - to get the Elder Wand and Disarm Draco before casting a Memory Replacement Charm?"

Severus nearly scoffed at that notion, at the thought of Minerva McGonagall battling a student - on purpose - and tomb-raiding the grave of Albus Dumbledore. But then he considered that these were the only ways of keeping Lily's son alive, and even then it was a longshot.

"I suppose we have much to discuss at Shell Cottage," he acknowledged. "Now… perhaps we ought to begin packing, eh?"

"It's our last day here," Hermione insisted, and she lay back down upon the bed and patted the empty pillow beside her. "Who knows when next we'll be able to just lie side-by-side like this? Come lie with me, Severus."

So he did, letting her curl her body onto his torso and cast her leg over his hips. She was warm and soft, and the morning was adequately long and lazy.

The quietest calms come before the most violent of tempests, Severus thought with a cringe of unease, planting a soft kiss on the crown of Hermione's head. And he waited for the storm.

---

The air was considerably warmer when they landed with a controlled pop on the beach in Cornwall. Hermione looked about herself in the blinding midday sun, letting the brisk winter air whip her hair around her face. She thrust her hands into her pockets and felt her drawstring back there, safely containing every worldly possession she now had.

The sea was an angrily churning, jade green beast as it crashed hard upon the shore. Every wave brought a fresh thud and whoosh as the tide washed the sand.

Hermione glanced down the beach and saw a lonely-looking brown house, small but sturdy where it stood upon the sand. Thinking that that must be the place, Hermione whispered, "Right…" and determinedly set off toward the cottage. She thrust away all the fear she could, trying to tell herself that they were going to meet with friends.

"You know," she said to Severus as they walked, "Bridget Wenlock lived here, in Tinworth. She's the one that discovered the magical properties of the number seven -"

"Yes, I know very well who Bridget Wenlock is," Severus snapped from beside her. Hermione glanced up as she trudged through the sand and saw that he was smirking down at her. His hair was whirling in the air, wild strands of raven silk. His traveling cloak snapped and cracked as it billowed out behind him in the wind.

Suddenly there was a slight vibration that cast over the both of them, and Hermione heard Severus chuckle, low and rumbling, under his breath.

"What was that?" Hermione asked, her eyes going wide with alarm. Severus smoothly replied,

"That was us passing through their wards. They will have done them up specifically to keep out enemies. The fact that we've passed through means that we aren't enemies. Hopefully it will imbue them with some sense of trust."

"Stop saying, 'them.'" Hermione insisted, dragging her feet through the sand. It stung her skin wherever it flew up to hit her in the cold wind. "It's not 'us' and 'them.' The Order is our only hope now."

Severus said nothing in response to that. Hermione felt a bit of dread come back over her as they stepped up the walkway and paused in front of the ancient wooden door. Hermione stood frozen in her shoes and stared mutely at the door for a long moment before Severus cleared his throat beside her and said,

"I believe, Ms. Granger, that it is social protocol when arriving at a residence to announce one's presence by knocking." He cocked an eyebrow at her rather disapprovingly and raised his own fist to the door. He rapped four times and then pulled back beside her, holding his wand firmly in his right hand and letting out a little sigh.

There was the briefest of pauses before the door slowly creaked open. Hermione was not certain who she expected to answer the door - Molly Weasley, probably, or Arthur. Perhaps Kingsley Shacklebolt, or the twins, since they'd been the ones to set up this meeting.

She was therefore most unprepared to see Tonks in the doorway, her left hand resting upon the soft little swell of her pregnant belly.

Hermione felt an instant stab of guilt and pain and horror. This woman's husband, and the father of her unborn child, was dead, and it had happened at Severus' hand. Now, here they stood, face-to-face with Nymphadora Tonks. She looked mousy and weary, her brown hair grown out a bit and tied up into a small, messy half-bun atop her head. She wore no makeup, but her eyes and lips looked swollen and red, as if she'd been crying for some time. Hermione wondered if she'd ever stopped crying after Remus Lupin had died.

Finally, Severus spoke.

"Good afternoon," he said in a silky murmur, sounding unaffected by the presence of Lupin's wife and unborn child before him. Hermione knew he wasn't - knew he keenly felt the weight of his many deeds - but Severus was nothing if not an actor.

"Good afternoon," Tonks whispered back, her voice a cold, harsh clip. She deliberately moved her hand on her belly, and Hermione tore her eyes away. She heard Tonks' hoarse voice say, "They're all in here."

She walked into the cottage, turning away from them without another word. Hermione swallowed heavily and looked up to Severus. He squared his jaw and followed Tonks over the threshold and into the cramped entryway of the little cottage. Hermione followed, shutting the heavy wooden door behind her. The cottage was surprisingly bright and airy. It seemed as though it could be quite a happy place, under the right circumstances. Today was not that set of circumstances.

They followed Tonks through a small, sunny kitchen, and then Hermione saw that beyond her was a dining room filled with people. Some were sitting, others standing. All had once been counted among her friends. Now she had no idea.

There was Molly Weasley, seated at the table with a morose expression upon her face. Hermione noticed at once that Molly seemed to have aged twenty years since last they'd seen one another. Her red hair had greyed considerably, and there were deep wrinkles around her thinned-out face. Arthur Weasley stood behind her chair, his hands perched protectively upon Molly's shoulders. Beside them were Fred and George, and beside the twins were Bill Weasley and Fleur Delacour. On the other side of the table, Kingsley Shacklebolt and Professor McGonagall sat side-by-side. The room was heavy with the absence of Ron, Ginny, and Harry.

"Hello, Headmaster," said Fred Weasley from the table. Hermione and Severus stood awkwardly in the doorway, and Hermione watched as Fred cocked his head and gave a sour little smirk. "Lovely to see you again."

"Let us get straight to the matter at hand, shall we, Fred?" Arthur Weasley tightened his hands upon Molly's shoulders, and Hermione felt a twist in her stomach as she made eye contact with the Weasley matriarch. In Molly's eyes, she could see the pain of losing Ron, the fear she had for Ginny. Just as she'd done with Tonks at the front door, Hermione forced herself to look away. She stared at her shoes and listened as Arthur said, "You managed your way through our wards. Did you break them, or are you truly allies?"

"Our swift disappearance from Hogwarts happened because Hermione and I are no longer able to keep up the ruse of geniality with the Death Eaters," Severus pronounced. "The Dark Lord discovered I was working for Dumbledore - that I've been acting for years for the Order."

"How did he discover that, exactly?" demanded Tonks. She waddled into the dining room, and Fred Weasley stood quickly from his chair to allow her to sit down. She gratefully took the seat and looked up at Severus for an answer. Hermione did the same, watching Severus' eyes tense minutely before he told the young Auror,

"Consilio Legilimens."

There was a beat of silence, and then Tonks said in a soft murmur, to the rest of the table, "It's when two minds output Legilimency at precisely the same moment, upon the same target. Instead of hitting the target, they hit one another."

"The Dark Lord and I happened to attempt to enter the mind of Aberforth Dumbledore at exactly the same time," Severus said. "There was a moment of uncontrolled Legilimency in which each of us revealed truths the that made us susceptible to the other. I managed to escape and have been on the run since."

Hermione watched Kingsley Shacklebolt's mouth open in disbelief, and then Professor McGonagall asked skeptically,

"Well, what did he see, Severus? What did you see?"

Hermione decided to answer for Severus, feeling as though it were very important that they present a united front. She also wanted to make clear that she - an undying ally and friend to Harry Potter - was also linked inextricably with Severus Snape. So she said, "He saw in Severus' mind the moment that Severus agreed to work for the Order. He also saw Severus administer me a… erm… a contraceptive potion. In direct defiance of his orders to procreate."

She hadn't meant, perhaps, to say that last bit, though it was important. Her cheeks colored with embarrassment and she went quiet again. Those around the table looked from Severus to Hermione and back again, their expressions ranging from disgust to disbelief. Beside Hermione, Severus cleared his throat quietly and said,

"And I was able to discern more information on a topic we'd already begun exploring - Horcruxes. The Dark Lord split his soul into many pieces. I believe two of the Horcruxes have already been destroyed - one, a ring that cursed Albus Dumbledore before he 'killed' it with the Sword of Gryffindor. I saw the cracked ring with my own eyes, and I made him a potion to stem the damage. But the curse was fatal, and it was one of the reasons he demanded I kill him instead of Draco."

Tonks scowled at Severus and looked as though she were going to interrupt, to say something. Her hair turned a rather putrid shade of golden-green, and then flared back to brown. She thought the better of speaking up and sighed. Then Hermione decided to speak up again.

"The second was a locket. Mrs. Weasley, Mr. Weasley..." she waited until Ron's parents made eye contact with her, and then she tearfully said, "Before Ron was killed, he very bravely pushed thoughts of this locket toward Severus. That's how Ron was captured - trying to get the locket from Dolores Umbridge. Severus got the locket, and we destroyed it using a Wyvern dagger that was given to me by Luna Lovegood. Ron died a hero, Mrs. Weasley, Mr. Weasley. He'll always be my hero."

Tears tumbled freely from her eyes then, and Mrs. Weasley shocked Hermione by rising slowly from her chair and holding out her arms in resolute silence. Hermione dashed over to Mrs. Weasley and collapsed against her, crying hard into her shoulder for a long moment as the woman wrapped her arms around Hermione and patted her gently.

"Hush, now," Molly said soothingly. "Ron wouldn't want to see you like this, hmm?"

Hermione pulled away, and Molly put her hands on Hermione's cheeks. She gave a gentle squeeze and smiled, though her eyes glistened with sadness. Hermione nodded and whispered,

"I'm sorry."

She slowly made her way back to Severus' side, brushing her shoulder against his arm as she situated herself beside him. There was a pleasant warmth around her right hand as he linked his fingers with hers, and Hermione felt as though she were going to cry again. But she managed to dam back her tears, and she listened as Severus said,

"There are other Horcruxes that still must be destroyed. The snake - Nagini - is one, I believe. There's a diadem, and a cup. I saw them in his mind. Most notably is Potter himself. Dumbledore revealed to me that the boy bears a bit of the Dark Lord in him from the rebounded Killing Curse… I believe Potter is a Horcrux, though I do not think the Dark Lord knows that. Of course, in order for the Dark Lord to be truly vanquished, all the Horcruxes must be destroyed. Then, and only then, can his corporeal form be killed and he will be truly eliminated."

"Then Harry Potter is going to die in the name of victory?" Minerva McGonagall sounded horrified. Severus sighed a little and spent a long while explaining their theory on the Hallows. He told the group about the Elder Wand - how Aberforth Dumbledore had revealed that it had belonged to Albus Dumbledore for decades. How Draco had almost certainly gained Mastery of the Wand the night of Dumbledore's death, and how Draco would need to be defeated to some capacity in order for the Wand to be ultimately used by Harry Potter. He explained his notion that the Resurrection Stone had been contained in the cursed ring, and the idea that James' Invisibility Cloak would be the final piece of the puzzle.

"With all three Hallows, perhaps - perhaps - the boy may be the fanciful 'Master of Death' and survive an encounter with the Dark Lord," Severus concluded, sounding exhausted. "But it was made very clear to me by Albus Dumbledore that, ultimately, the bit of the Dark Lord inside of Harry Potter must be destroyed. I have no idea whether or not these two ends - his survival and the destruction of the Horcrux - are both possible, or whether they are mutually exclusive."

There was a very long silence then, as everyone in the room contemplated the enormous amount of information that had been bandied about. Finally, Kingsley Shacklebolt asked,

"And you, Hermione… you've been figuring all of this out with Snape? This is how the two of you have spent the past six months? Destroying Dark soul-vessels, researching Mastery of Death in order to defeat the Chief Death Eater?" Despite Kingsley's odd terminology, his tone was almost fierce. Hermione nodded at him.

"Yes," she affirmed. "All we've been trying to do is finish Dumbledore's work. It's just… we got caught."

There was another silence then. It seemed as though there was a weight being lifted a bit from the dining room as the suspicion and enmity that had grown up among its inhabitants dissipated slightly. Finally, the silence was broken when Hermione's stomach growled ferociously; she'd been far too nervous for breakfast that morning. Fleur Delacour stepped forward, away from her husband Bill, and asked in a delicate French accent,

"'Ermione, Professor Snape… come, right this way… I 'ave food, and tea, and wine. Make yourselves feel very much at 'ome here, yes?"

---

Hermione picked up a small grey stone and turned it over in her hand, studying the way blue and green veins ran through it. She looked up to the sea as her hair whipped her face, and then she tossed the stone into the waves. It landed with a rather unimpressive plop, vanishing beneath the angry, tossing tide. Hermione felt her eyes burn, and she wondered distantly whether the sensation was caused by the wind or by something else.

She thought back to the few hours before Professor McGonagall had left Shell Cottage, to the furtive conversation Hermione had managed with her. Professor McGonagall had told Hermione that Alecto Carrow had taken over as Interim Headmistress of Hogwarts in Severus' absence. However, she was running the school (with an iron fist, apparently) from the Slytherin dungeons, for the Headmaster's Office would not grant her admission. She was a usurper, and the castle knew that. The students were being terrorized worse now than ever by the Carrows, from the sounds of it, though it seemed McGonagall and the other well-intentioned professors were doing all they could to protect their charges.

Hermione wiped her face with her sleeve and sighed, picking up another rock.

"Toss them all you like, but it'll only make you feel better for a brief moment."

There was a soft oof and a dark blur as Tonks settled onto the sand beside Hermione. She rubbed her hands together to rid herself of the loose grains, and then settled her hands onto the gentle swell of her belly. Hermione felt a terrible pang of guilt course through her as she eyed the turquoise-haired woman beside her, and she asked quietly,

"How are you feeling, Tonks? Physically, I mean?"

Tonks shrugged and stared out at the ocean. She plucked a few strands of seagrass from the beach beside her and mumbled, "I was sick for a while after Remus was… after he died. I wasn't sure if it was morning sickness or if I just couldn't get over the sight of him bleeding out on the floor in front of me. It didn't matter, probably."

Hermione felt herself roiled with nausea then, and she shut her eyes against the feel of it. "I'm very sorry," she whispered, and Tonks answered roughly,

"Don't be. It was all a mess that night, Hermione. It was all very complicated. I was very angry when it happened. I still am. But I know full well that if Snape had knitted up Remus' wounds in front of all those Death Eaters, there wouldn't have been an Order member left alive in the end."

Hermione cracked open her eyes, feeling a few tears escape, and was surprised to see Tonks weaving the strands of seagrass into a tight braid. Tonks rubbed her small bump as she continued,

"I begged Snape to look into my head. Showed him that I was pregnant. He told me to run, so I did. There are a lot of awful sights from that night I'll never forget, Hermione… least of all the look of horror in your husband's eyes when he told me to run."

She handed Hermione the little braid of seagrass. Hermione furrowed her brow and took it, and she said quietly,

"I hope you know, Tonks, that he didn't want to do any of it. For either side."

"I know that." Tonks nodded. "I may not like Snape. But he's not an enemy. He's been used and abused, and he's taken his punches, that's for certain."

She sniffed quietly and shook her head a few times as if to steady herself. She started to push herself off the sand, and Hermione rushed up to help the pregnant woman stand. Tonks' turquoise hair blew about in the wind, and then Hermione noticed Tonks was holding two small stones. She turned and threw one out into the ocean, just as Hermione had done earlier. It landed with a slightly larger splash than Hermione's rock had done, and Tonks shrugged.

"Only helps for a moment," she said again, "but it does help."

She handed the other stone to Hermione, and then she turned to trudge back to Shell Cottage, cradling her belly in her hands as she went.

---

Severus sipped at the tea Molly Weasley had brewed for him, feeling a bit guilty at the way the bereaved mother was fussing over him. He'd insisted that she sit down and let him get her something to drink and eat, but of course the woman was Molly Weasley and was having none of that.

Some of the Order who had assembled for the brief meeting had left again, gone off to their respective secret hiding places. Those remaining at the cottage were Tonks, Bill and Fleur, Arthur and Molly, and Severus and Hermione. Even with just the seven, the little house felt positively overwhelmed, and so Hermione had gone out to the beach to get air. Tonks seemed to have followed, and as Severus peered out the window, he could see the two of them sitting on the sand. He hoped they were making things as right as one might reasonably expect between them.

Bill and Fleur were out in the garden, tending to the vegetables growing there, and Severus sat in the kitchen with Arthur as Molly flitted about like a fretful hen. Severus looked up from his tea and noticed again how very tired Arthur looked. The grooves beneath the man's eyes seemed to extend to his very soul. Arthur raked his fingers through his faded ginger hair and said quietly,

"The cup. You say it's at Gringotts."

"Well, it was there last, to the best of my knowledge. It was in Bellatrix Lestrange's vault. And, as far as I know, the Dark Lord is unaware that I know of the thing. As I've said, I overheard a conversation between him and Bellatrix discussing the cup; I did not see it in his mind. However, now that the phenomenon of Consilio Legilimens has occurred between the two of us, I do not think it unreasonable to suspect that the Dark Lord might relocate as many of the items as possible. It may not be at Gringotts anymore. However, it is certainly worth looking."

"Even if it were there, getting into Bellatrix Lestrange's vault to steal the thing would prove nearly impossible, wouldn't it?" Molly Weasley noted, turning to the table with a tray full of shortbread. She set down the tray and picked one up, nibbling anxiously as she slid onto the worn wooden bench beside Arthur. Severus thought it would be rude to ignore Molly's offering of food, so despite not being at all hungry, he picked up a bit of shortbread and took a bite.

"It would present a great many difficulties to stage a heist at Gringotts," he agreed. "It would involve disguises, to be certain. Almost certainly Polyjuice Potion - which would, of course, require both time and some sample of biological material from Bellatrix Lestrange herself. There is the possible necessity of using the Imperius Curse or other less-than-savory means to manipulate Gringotts staff."

Severus neglected to mention the fact that he'd Imperiused Molly and Arthur's daughter out of necessity, the night of the fiasco at Malfoy Manor. He swallowed heavily and continued,

"Of course, the cup itself is likely cursed. When Hermione and I destroyed the locket, it tried to defend itself with cruel trickery. Goodness knows what curses have been placed on the cup."

"Then there's…" Arthur trailed off and gulped. "There are the others. The other horcruxes. The snake, Nagini. You say it never leaves his side. Harry. Destroying the horcrux within him."

Arthur was unwilling to say 'killing Harry Potter,' Severus noted. Instead he said, 'destroying the horcrux within him.' Even after all that had happened, after losing Ronald and after all the chaos and destruction, Arthur Weasley still wanted Harry Potter to live. Severus felt uneasy, but he chewed more of Molly's shortbread and mused,

"Perhaps we should focus on realistic goals in the interim, Arthur. For now, let us train our attentions on the cup. The first thing that needs to happen is to begin brewing Polyjuice Potion. In order to do that, I need to Transfigure my features and get to Diagon Alley to purchase several supplies. And I need to - somehow - obtain material from Bellatrix Lestrange for the potion. I will have a month in which to do that, of course, and -"

"Do you intend on making Hermione… 'become'... Bellatrix?" Molly Weasley looked horrified at that thought, and Severus pinched his lips as he considered it. He pushed his hair from his face and said carefully,

"Hermione knows, Molly, that Harry Potter and your son Ronald would want her to do whatever she could to end this madness. She and I will work together carefully to do our parts. Rest assured of that."

He took another bit of shortbread and chewed it, glancing out the window again to see Hermione standing alone on the shore. Tonks was trudging away from Hermione back toward the house. Hermione was staring out at the sea, her curls whipping around her head madly. Then she raised her hand and something small and black went hurtling away from her, landing with a little splash in the waves.

---

"This is insanity, Severus. Someone will recognize us."

"I assure you, Hermione, that you look absolutely nothing like yourself." Severus flicked his eyes up and flashed Hermione a bored expression as he pulled his wand over his own shoulders. His trademark black robes were transformed into a more vibrant blue, velvet concoction - something he would never normally wear.

Hermione moved to stand in front of the tarnished mirror in the small bedroom she shared with Severus at Shell Cottage. She surveyed her radically altered appearance for a moment with great skepticism. She and Severus had worked together to take just about every feature she had and reverse it, to make her look quite the opposite of herself as they prepared to venture to Diagon Alley for potion supplies.

Her wild brown curls had been changed to an icy blonde bob that fit neatly around her face. She'd been made three inches taller and her curves were shaped in an ever-so-slightly more voluptuous manner. Her nose was narrowed and lengthened, and her cheekbones raised a bit. Her cheeks and jaw were shaped differently, and her freckles had been erased. Her eyes were the same, for, as Luna had mentioned, the eyes could never be really changed. But her lips had been reshaped, and her teeth had been given different spacing and sizing.

Severus remembered with a spike of shame the way Draco Malfoy had hit Hermione with a Densaugeo spell in her fourth year… the way she'd covered her mouth with shame as her teeth had grown rapidly like a beaver's. Ron Weasley had pried Hermione's fingers from her teeth and said to Severus with an indignant, red-faced huff,

"Malfoy got Hermione! Look!"

And then Severus had kept his face impassive, shrugged, and he'd said, "I see no difference."

He could still see Hermione's tears on her young, childish face after he'd been cruel in that moment. But he hadn't known her then, much less loved her. Now he stared at her transformed self and suddenly wished she wasn't a blonde bombshell with perfect teeth. He wanted her back - his frizzled-haired, slightly buck-toothed Hermione, the woman he loved for her beautiful body and soul and mind. He cleared his throat gently and reassured her,

"I very much prefer you as yourself. Nonetheless, I am quite confident that no one will recognize you."

'Hermione' gave Severus a sad little smile and said, "Shall I finish your Transfiguration for you?"

Severus felt a bit uneasy about letting her Transfigure his features. He happened to know that Hermione had never been as skilled at Human Transfiguration as she was with other areas of the subject. Minerva McGonagall had made that very clear. But he licked his bottom lip, turned to her, and said, "Go ahead."

'Hermione' cleared her throat, raised her wand, and appeared focused as she began murmuring spells.

"Lapsos Pilos… Nigra Cutis… Spissior Nasum…." Severus felt his body buzzing with warmth as her wand coursed in careful movements around him. She dragged the tip of her wand over his facial features, around his skin, and Severus knew she was radically changing him. He smirked with a great degree of pride, knowing she was working hard to accomplish their goal. "Crescendum Sicut Hoc…" Severus felt himself stretching upward as her wand directed the growth of his height. He grunted at the slight pain of becoming taller. Finally, the blonde-haired Hermione nodded crisply and flicked her wand toward the tarnished mirror, and Severus had a look.

His eyebrows flew up in alarm when she realized he'd become a rather handsome Black man, with long dreadlocks and features that did not at all resemble his own. He was taller and thicker than he was accustomed to being. He turned to the blonde Hermione beside him and nodded.

"Well done," he said tightly. "Let's go."

"Can't be by Floo," Hermione said, and Severus shook his head.

"No, of course not. We'll walk down the beach and do Side-Along," he said. "We're going to Mr. Mulpepper's in Knockturn Alley."

Hermione furrowed her blonde eyebrows over her porcelain skin. "Mr. Mulpepper's?" she repeated skeptically. "Why are we going to the Knockturn Alley location?"

"We can't buy all our ingredients at the same shop," Severus said, as though it were obvious. "It can't be clear we're buying the necessary ingredients for Polyjuice. We will buy little bits for what we need, as well as decoy ingredients, but we'll need to go to multiple sources. We shall need to go first to Mr. Mulpepper's in Knockturn Alley, then to the Diagon Alley shop. Then next-door to Slug and Jiggers. Finally, we'll Apparate to Hogsmeade and go to J. Pippin's… after changing our appearances again, of course."

"Yes, of course," Hermione said softly. She looked uneasy. "This all seems so dangerous, Severus…"

"That's because it is dangerous," Severus conceded, "but we haven't any choice, have we?"

Hermione shook her head, and a resolute expression crossed her unrecognizable face. "Have you got the money?" she asked, and Severus held up his bag of coins. Hermione pinched her lips. "Right," she said. "Let's go."

---

Knockturn Alley felt bleaker than ever when Hermione landed hard on the cobblestone street with Severus. She glanced up quickly to ensure that Severus' and her own Magical disguises had been maintained through their Apparition. Severus still appeared as a hulking Black-skinned man, wearing flowing blue robes. Hermione glanced at her reflection in the dirty window of a nearby shop and saw a blonde-haired witch she did not recognize. She sighed quietly and heard Severus' low murmur say,

"Mr. Mulpepper's is just this way."

They began to stalk, Hermione with feigned confidence, through the alley. She had to swallow a bit of bile, and more than a little fear, when they passed Antonin Dolohov. He had been the man to curse her at the Department of Mysteries, but Hermione had to pretend not to recognize the Death Eater. She squeezed Severus' hand as they brushed by Dolohov, and she knew Severus was struggling, too, to keep his disguised face straight ahead. Fortunately, Dolohov kept walking, whistling a too-happy little song as he did. Hermione held her breath until she and Severus reached Mr. Mulpepper's, and then she heard Severus whisper,

"You do most of the talking here, will you?"

Hermione nodded. She knew why Severus had suggested that. Their voices were still their own, and Severus had a rather distinctive, silky tone to his voice that might be recognized in Knockturn Alley. They stepped through the door of Mr. Mulpepper's, and a magpie perched near the door squawked loudly. Hermione jumped at the sound of the bird, and then she felt profoundly uneasy when the magpie 'said,'

"AVADA KEDAVRA!"

Her hand tightened around Severus', and she felt her heart thrum within her chest. She stepped carefully into Mr. Mulpepper's, and the old wizened proprietor of the shop came waddling out from the back storeroom at the sound of the magpie. He gave a low chuckle and said to Hermione,

"Damned bird says the last thing he heard before his last owner died. Shame, that, innit? Lucky the bird can't do anything with those words, wouldn't you say? Laertes Mulpepper at your service… how might I help you today?"

Hermione shifted upon her feet and tried to smile. It didn't work. Finally she said, "We are in need of several potions ingredients to replenish our personal supply before a holiday. Dittany, knotgrass, and cinnamon, if you please. Oh, and boomslang skin. Thank you."

She adopted a bit of an accent when she spoke to Laertes Mulpepper - something vaguely Scandinavian that she hoped made her seem foreign. The old man just nodded and disappeared back into the storeroom. As Hermione listened to the soft clinking of glass in the back room, she turned to Severus and saw his disguised form nod approvingly at her.

"AVADA KEDAVRA!" the magpie in the window shrieked, and Hermione shuddered.

The trip over to Diagon Alley proved useful and uneventful. The other location of Mr. Mulpepper's provided Hermione and Severus with lacewing flies, saltpeter, re'em egg, and bicorn horn. In Slug and Jiggers, they obtained leeches and doxy egg. Left with only fluxweed (picked at the full moon) in order to complete their Polyjuice shopping list, they made their way into a dark and quiet corner of Diagon Alley and prepared to Disapparate to Hogsmeade.

Severus made a few changes to Hermione's disguise, apparently changing her hair color to a rich auburn and growing out the length a bit, as well as rounding out her face and filling out her curves. In turn, Hermione shortened Severus' dreadlocks and lightened his skin tone back to that of a Caucasian man, altering his features with a few quick flicks of her wand. He still looked nothing like Severus Snape, but his disguise from Knockturn and Diagon Alley was radically altered, too. He looked rather like an American hippie from the 1960s, Hermione thought vaguely, trying not to smirk at the thought.

"Ready?" she heard Severus' voice ask. Hermione nodded, looping her arm through Severus' and clutching tightly to her bag of purchased ingredients. She clenched her eyes shut and held her breath, and then the dark alleyway vanished from around them. She was whirling in a pinching blackness as they Disapparated, and then she landed with a hard thud and a soft crackle. She felt queasy for a brief moment, but it passed, and Hermione opened her eyes.

She glanced about to see they'd landed on a drizzly street outside Spintwitches sporting goods shop. Just down the road was J. Pippin's Potions, and Hermione felt Severus tugging her in that direction. She followed him wordlessly, trying to stay focused on their task. But she could not help glancing up to see the looming shadow of Hogwarts Castle, hovering over the glen in which Hogsmeade village was nestled. She felt her eyes burn as she looked upon the grey beast of a fortress, the school she'd called home for so long. It felt so near, and yet so out of reach now. Beside her, she felt Severus tense, and he murmured,

"I know. It is odd to be here. All we need to do is to purchase the fluxweed and go back to the cottage."

"Yes," Hermione heard herself whisper, but her altered lips felt dry, and her voice died on the chilled wind.

A merry little bell greeted them when they walked through the door of J. Pippin's Potions. It was a far better greeting than the screeching magpie in Knockturn Alley, Hermione thought distantly. She cleared her throat and waited for the plump middle-aged witch behind the counter to finish ringing up the purchase of a spindly wizard customer. When the witch behind the counter raised her eyebrows in an impatient fashion, Hermione said smoothly,

"Good afternoon. I am in need of rose oil, fluxweed harvested at the full moon, and chizpurfle fang, if you please."

The witch behind the counter stared at Hermione for a long moment - too long - and asked in a skeptical tone, "Why, may I ask, does it matter when the fluxweed was harvested?"

Hermione felt her stomach flop in her abdomen. Beside her, Severus answered, his voice strained as he tried not to sound like himself.

"All mustards heal better when harvested at the full moon, madam. I know well what you're thinking; Full Moon Fluxweed is used for Polyjuice Potion. But you will note that we've also asked for chizpurfle fang and rose oil. My paramour here is training to be a medi-witch, and these are all ingredients in Insta-Care Wound Ointment. I'm certain you know that, though, being the proprietor of such an esteemed establishment. Twenty scruples of Full Moon Fluxweed will do just fine."

The witch behind the counter looked terribly offended at the roundabout insult, but she nodded crisply and turned around to her apothecary chest. She rummaged about and began pulling out ingredients. Hermione glanced up to Severus, smirking at his disguised form and suddenly feeling very glad for his extensive potions knowledge. Finally the woman who worked in J. Pippin's turned around and pushed a rumpled paper bag across the counter. Severus opened the bag and checked the ingredients inside and nodded.

"Three galleons, five sickles," the witch said sharply, and Severus paid her. He and Hermione left the shop without another word, and Hermione could not shake the feeling that it had been a bit of a close call with the potions witch.

The street outside of J. Pippin's reflected the paranoid atmosphere they'd found inside the shop. People seemed to be scurrying about Hogsmeade with an air of urgency, keeping their eyes trained straight ahead or downward. It was obvious that the strict environment at Hogwarts had bled onto the village below. Hermione felt her stomach rumble insistently, and she realized she hadn't eaten anything at all in a great while.

"Can we pop into The Three Broomsticks and fetch a pasty or something?" she asked Severus quietly. He scowled for a moment, but finally nodded. They made their way into the Three Broomsticks, and Hermione saw Madam Rosmerta leaning heavily on the counter at the bar. She felt a pinch in her chest as she remembered all the times she'd sat in here with her friends, the times Ron had talked about how pretty Rosmerta was.

Hermione sat at a bench and waited for Severus to bring them butterbeers and pasties. She shut her eyes for a moment and breathed in deeply, taking in the smell and sound of the familiar old place. Even with all the radical changes to her life, there was something comforting about being here, she thought. There was a gentle hum in the place as people about her had conversations. At the table behind her, a young couple seemed to be discussing something urgent. Hermione tried not to listen, intent on relaxation, but there was something oddly familiar about the couple's voices.

"Here's the thing, Swiss," the young man was saying in a furtive mumble, "the book was one of them. The fang… from the… the snake, you know… it was able to destroy the book because -"

"Yes, yes… I understand," the woman - 'Swiss,' he'd called her, answered. She paused for a moment, and Hermione's eyes flew open as she listened more closely. "The bird."

Swiss, Hermione thought, her heart beginning to race. 'Ginevra' was the Italian spelling for 'Geneva,' which was a major city in Switzerland. Ginevra Weasley was sitting at the table behind her with Harry Potter. Hermione tried to stay calm as she rose slowly from her bench, and she heard Ginny and Harry fall silent as she sidled up to their table.

"Good afternoon," she said, noticing that Ginny had Transfigured her features rather successfully to look South Asian. Harry was rather less convincingly transformed; his jagged jawline and mop of sandy hair were not so radically different as to seem like an entirely different person. And now that Hermione was looking down at him, his emerald eyes were unmistakable. He had, though, been smart enough to cover his lightning bolt scar with a slouch cap. Hermione felt her eyes sear with unshed tears as she glanced back and forth between Harry and Ginny. She saw them both panic a bit at the sudden intrusion, and Hermione decided to skip right to it. She leaned down and said in a low hiss,

"It's me. It's Hermione. Shrieking Shack. Ten minutes."

She left them both sitting in shocked silence, and she hurried her way up to the bar to let Severus know that the pasties would be takeaway.

---

Severus felt his pulse racing as he and Hermione trudged up the muddy, winding pathway that led to the Shrieking Shack. Of course, there were no working doors or windows that granted admittance to the Shack from the outside, but Potter and Ginny Weasley would be waiting outside the abandoned house.

Severus could still remember the time, many years earlier, when Sirius Black had thought it very funny indeed to lure Severus into the Shrieking Shack. Severus had, admittedly, been spying on the Gryffindor boys, and Sirius Black wanted to throw Severus off their trail. But Remus Lupin was in the Shrieking Shack for his monthly lycanthropy transformation, and the night had turned into a dangerous shambles. James Potter had had to rescue Severus, and the shame of that still haunted him to the marrow of his bones.

Then there had been the time four years previously when Sirius Black had caused trouble in the Shack once again. Black had been in his Animagus form as a dog and had dragged Ronald Weasley into the Shack. Peter Pettigrew's identity had been revealed, and this time it had been Severus who had done the rescuing. He'd been simultaneously Disarmed by three young Gryffindors, and apparently Hermione had been terrified about "attacking a teacher." But Severus had told the Minister of Magic that the trio had been Confounded. He'd spared James Potter's son, in an odd twist of fate. He'd spared Ronald Weasley. And he'd spared Hermione Granger. But he'd revealed Remus Lupin's nature as a werewolf.

It was not without reason that Severus Snape greatly disliked being anywhere near the Shrieking Shack. As he and Hermione, still disguised, approached the old place, he could see two figures beneath a leafless tree in the dismal garden beside the house.

"Harry…" Hermione hissed beside Severus, and she trotted off through the mud.

It was odd to see the two figures embrace so tightly, for Severus recognized neither of them but knew them both. The sandy blond boy, he knew, was Potter, but he only very vaguely resembled the boy. The auburn-haired girl was Severus' wife. Beside the bare-twigged tree was a South Asian girl that Severus assumed must be Ginevra Weasley, and as Potter and Hermione whispered furtive greetings to one another, Severus said sharply,

"Miss Weasley, I presume?"

The young witch nodded and glanced around nervously.

"Harry, we must go to Shell Cottage at once!" Hermione exclaimed. She turned to the disguised Ginny Weasley and said, "Ginny, your mum's there. Your father, Bill, Fleur, Tonks… they're all there… we can all sit down and plan, you see, and -"

"We don't want to bring danger with us, Hermione," Ginny said softly, and Harry Potter added,

"Every once in awhile, my scar burns and I see these flashes. I think… I think he knows where I am in those moments, Hermione."

The auburn-haired Hermione scowled and shook her head. She flicked her eyes to Severus and said,

"I thought Severus taught you Occlumency, Harry."

"He wasn't very good at it," Severus admitted, shifting on his feet. The disguised version of Ginny Weasley frowned deeply and opened her mouth to protest, but Harry Potter admitted,

"He's right. I'm no Occlumens. I try to keep him out… during those attacks… with happy memories or even just overwhelming sensations of grief. Sometimes it works. But I'm nervous about going to Shell Cottage, Hermione. I don't want to endanger anyone else. Ginny and I have been on the run for months now, and that's probably the way it's got to be. Just tell us what you two are up to. What we can do. That's all that can be done, probably."

Hermione began explaining to Harry and Ginny that she and Severus knew about the horcruxes. She told them that they'd destroyed the locket. This seemed to make Potter feel some measure of relief, though Ginevra Weasley collapsed a bit against the tree trunk when she thought about her brother Ron having lost his life over the stupid thing.

"What did you use to destroy it?" Ginny Weasley asked meekly, and Hermione rummaged about in her Expanded bag for a moment. She finally pulled out her wyvern dagger and handed it over. Ginny coursed her disguised fingers over the blade as Hermione explained what it was, and that she'd been gifted the blade by Luna.

"Where did Luna get it, though?" Harry Potter asked with a bit of confusion.

"How the girl knew to give it to Hermione, I don't know," Severus piped up quietly. "It belonged to me, many years ago. It was stolen from me early in my teaching career by a sixth-year Ravenclaw. Caliban Lovegood - Luna's uncle."

Hermione took the wyvern dagger back from Ginny and put it back into her bag. She began to explain the other known horcruxes and how Severus had experienced Consilio Legilimens with Voldemort. She showed them the potions ingredients they'd purchased to make Polyjuice and described their plan to go to Gringotts and search Bellatrix Lestrange's vault.

"How do you mean to get a sample of her hair, or whatever else, though?" Ginny asked carefully.

"I'm not certain," Hermione admitted, frowning. "We'd have to get back into Malfoy Manor somehow, probably."

Ginny pinched her disguised face and said thoughtfully, "You know, she tortured me when I was there. When I was being held captive. One time, her sister Narcissa Malfoy shouted at her to end the Cruciatus Curse. 'You'll kill the girl, Bella, and it'll be just like the boy. All for nothing.' So she released the curse. And I took something from her when she released the curse... when I managed to claw at her."

She reached into the pocket of her denims and took out a dull silver pendant. It was a bird skull of some kind, hanging on a heavy silver chain. Ginny turned it over in her hand and mused,

"I'm not entirely certain why I took it. I wanted something… a trophy for my trouble, you know? For Ron."

Ginny sniffed quietly and dragged her thumb over the bird skull pendant. She continued,
"Bellatrix didn't even seem to notice, and then before I knew it, Dobby had come and brought me to Harry. Anyway…" Ginny studied the necklace closely, and then a knowing smirk came over her face as she picked something out of the old, heavy clasp. She held a long wiry black hair up triumphantly and said, "I knew one day we'd all be glad for that woman's insane hair."

Hermione gasped and a grin crossed her disguised countenance. Severus tried to stay calm, and he quickly Conjured a glass phial to contain the hair. He snatched the sample of hair from Ginny Weasley and searched the necklace for additional hair as he heard Harry Potter and Hermione praise the youngest Weasley offspring.

"Ginny, you're bloody brilliant!"

"Have you any idea how much trouble you've saved -"

"There are soldiers in all of this, and there are martyrs, and you're one of the -"

"Ginny, you're bloody brilliant!"

Then the chaos settled down and Severus tucked the glass phial into his breast pocket and nodded crisply at Ginny. "Well done, Miss Weasley," he said, and a little smile came over the girl's face. He knew she'd never received any sort of affirmation from him as her teacher, and he wasn't about to start fawning over the girl now. But if he was truthful, she had managed to solve a rather large logistical nightmare for them all.

Then Harry Potter took the wind out of all their sails when he said, "Good luck to you both. I wish there were some way for us to stay in closer contact in all of this."

Hermione pinched her lips and looked at Severus carefully. "One of the Oraverit?" she asked softly, and Severus felt his stomach sink. He knew she was right. As it stood right now, they had no way of reliably contacting Potter, of locating the boy in a time of danger. And, of course, they would need to find Potter eventually, for within him dwelled a horcrux. Hermione hadn't mentioned to Potter during the discussion of horcruxes that he was one of them. Severus suspected that Potter knew; the boy wasn't that big an idiot.

The day would inevitably come when Hermione and Severus would need to contact Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley. It had been pure luck that Hermione had overheard their conversation in the pub earlier. Severus swallowed heavily and reached beneath the collar of his robes, pulling out the iron pendant around his neck. He unclasped it and handed it to the sandy-haired boy before him.

Harry Potter took the iron pendant and studied it, coursing his fingers over the Futhark rune laguz as Ginny Weasley asked from beside him,

"What is it?"

"This is an Oraverit," Hermione explained patiently. "It's something Severus created. It's enchanted with a two-way connection, rather like a Portkey that works on command in conjunction with a second Oraverit. It's a modified Protean Charm - yes, Ginny, the same sort of charm that linked our Dumbledore's Army coins, and the same sort that links all the Dark Marks. But this one links only this pendant and one other object."

She reached into her Expanded bag and pulled out Severus' old brass pocket-watch. She held it up for Ginny and Harry to see, and Severus finished explaining,

"The two objects are impervious to anti-Apparition charms, so they will work anywhere. If you clutch the pendant and incant, 'Oraverit,' you will be instantly transported to the pocket-watch. Hopefully, that will take you to Hermione. Now, of course, the dangerous thing is that you won't necessarily know that the pocket-watch is in a safe location at any given time… so reserve this ability for only the most desperate of times, Mr. Potter."

Severus gave the sandy-haired boy and the dark-skinned girl before him a firm scowl, feeling once again like their teacher. Potter frowned and put the pendant around his neck. He nodded and said with a degree of maturity Severus was unaccustomed to hearing from the boy,

"Thank you, Professor Snape. This invention of yours may very well save lives one day."

An odd look came over the disguised Ginny Weasley's face, though, and she asked, "Hermione, is that how you vanished from the Hospital Wing the night…" She looked up at Severus very deliberately, then back to Hermione. "The night that Professor Dumbledore was killed? You reached and grabbed something, and then you were gone. Was it…"

"Yes," Hermione nodded her auburn hair without hesitation. "I used the Oraverit that night, because I knew I couldn't make anyone understand in that moment that Severus was not an enemy. He had the pendant, and I had the pocket-watch."

"What if the two of you become separated?" Harry Potter asked, flicking his emerald eyes nervously between Severus and Hermione. In that moment Severus knew more firmly than ever that the boy was a true Gryffindor. Hermione pinched her lips and said bravely,

"We shall have to try very hard not to become separated. It's important, Harry, that you and Ginny, as a team, have one of the Oraverit. Severus and I, as a team, will have the other. We're all on the side of the Light, and we must all use whatever weaponry we've got in our arsenals. Now is not the time to cling to selfish fear, is it?"

Severus looked down at her, suddenly wishing very hard that she looked like herself. He wanted to kiss her, all of a sudden, even though they were standing right in front of Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley. He gripped the bag of potions ingredients he held - the ingredients to disguise Hermione as Bellatrix Lestrange. As he breathed deeply, he could feel the glass phial with Bellatrix's hair in his breast pocket.

Severus cast his eyes up beyond the Shrieking Shack to the looming shadow of Hogwarts Castle, staring at it for a long moment as Hermione said farewell to Harry and Ginny, telling them to stay safe and be careful and to protect one another. Suddenly the weight of everything felt very heavy indeed upon Severus, and he took a shaking breath as he glanced back down to the disguised teenagers before him.

"Yes," he murmured softly to James Potter's son. "Do be careful, Potter."

Then he took Hermione's hand, lacing her fingers in his, and took a few steps backward. He turned hard on the spot, and he Disapparated back to Shell Cottage without another word.

---

The moon cast its light onto the churning sea, and the black waves scattered the moonlight into a thousand milky shards. Hermione stood on the sand and bent to pick up a smooth stone, turning it over in her hand for a moment before tossing it out into the water. The stone landed with a plop, and Hermione thought back to the meeting she and Severus had had with Harry and Ginny earlier that day in Hogsmeade.

Ginny and Harry hadn't looked like themselves, except for their eyes. Even so, it had been very good to see them. It had been important to see them, Hermione thought. Remus Lupin was gone. Ron was gone. Hermione's parents were as good as dead to her. It was very important that she'd hugged Harry and Ginny today, that she and Severus had told them details of 'the plan' and had given them an Oraverit.

All of that was very important.

So why were Hermione's eyes stubbornly burning with tears? Why could she only think of Ron, of joyous times at Hogwarts and in Hogsmeade village? Why did she feel a terrible spike of dread in her bones? Why did she want nothing more than to stand on the beach and shriek at the moon and hurl boulders into the sea and scream for Ron and Remus and her parents to come back?

Hermione swiped angrily at her face, inadvertently rubbing grains of sand into her eyes. That only made her feel more cross, and she cursed aloud as she whipped out her wand and cleaned her face with Magic and Conjured a tie to pull her hair from her face.

"The potion is brewing," said a smooth voice from behind her, "and everyone in the cottage is asleep."

Hermione did not turn around. She felt Severus sidle up beside her on the beach. His black robes whipped and snapped in the cold nighttime wind, and his low murmur was nearly drowned out by the crashing waves as he said,

"You should come inside. It's past midnight."

She shook her head and sniffed. "I'm not ready to come in yet."

"Very well," Severus said in a stiff tone. "Shall I Conjure you a sleeping bag for the beach, then?"

Hermione scowled up at him, noting the way the frosty moonlight cut across his face. "You needn't be cruel," she mumbled. She looked back out at the ocean, at the way the waves tumbled onto the pebbled shore, and she mused, "One time, when I was nine years old, my parents took me on holiday to Portugal. We went to a place called Portimão, in the south. There was a beach called Praia de Rocha, with the most beautiful white sand you could imagine. The water was this stunning jade that faded into a rich, deep blue… my father and I took a double kayak out beyond the stone cliffs, and my mother waved to us from the shore. It was warm. The air, the sea. It was warm, and sunny, and I remember it vividly. I remember them vividly, Severus, but they don't remember me."

Hermione glanced up at him again to see that Severus had shut his eyes against the night, and she swallowed the knot in her throat before she finished,

"And the sea here is very cold."

She felt him lace his fingers through hers then, and his lips touched her ear as he whispered again,

"Come back up to the cottage with me, will you?"

She did, reluctantly trudging up through the sand that fought back with every step until they reached the stout little cottage. They were silent as they made their way inside - so silent, in fact, that Hermione knew Severus had nonverbally muted their steps to avoid waking the cottage's other denizens. As they crept back into the tiny bedroom they shared, Hermione flung open the tattered shutters and heard the sound of the ocean crashing, saw the moonlight come pouring into the space, and her eyes burned again.

"Come to bed, Hermione," Severus mumbled quietly. Hermione ignored him, staring out through the window for a long while. She could hear Severus undressing behind her. The old wardrobe creaked in protest when he opened the door to hang up his clothes. Finally she felt him behind her, the warm flush of his now-bare chest against her back, the comforting way his arms ensnared her, the way his chin rested atop her head. Hermione shut her eyes and listened to his words as Severus said gently,

"We have, for the time being, done everything that we can do, Hermione. I promise you that at the moment I can do more, I shall. I promise you that. I love you. I promise you that, too."

"I know." Hermione nodded and turned around. She looked up at him, and his inky black eyes were lit up by the moonlight as she studied him. He looked older than ever, worn down by the way they were running. She reached up and grazed her fingertips over his cheekbones, trying to smile at him and knowing that it came out as a grimace. She felt him carefully pull the tie from her curls, and she let him yank her jumper up over her head. She let him unclasp her bra behind her back, let his hand cup her breast and squeeze gently.

She let him lower his face to hers and press his lips against hers. And then she kissed him back, moaning quietly and realizing they had not made love in what felt like an eternity. It hadn't been so very long at all, but it felt like ages. They were one another's power source nowadays, she thought. They were, in a great many ways, all the other had anymore.

So she let him push her against the wall and yank her unzipped denims down over her hips. She let him pull her thighs up around his waist; she even helped him do that bit. And she cried out, grasping desperately for his shoulders, when Severus thrust himself into her body against the wall. The moonlight came pouring in through the window and cast them both into a pale, milky spotlight, but Hermione did not care. All she cared about was the warm licorice taste of her Severus. All she cared about was the way he stretched and filled her as he pushed her over and over again onto the wall.

She liked the way he growled into her mouth, the way he wrenched his lips away and hissed her name into her ear. She liked how he flopped her down onto the edge of the bed when his strength gave out. She very much enjoyed the way his fingers dug into her hips then, how he pounded and railed into her. She ignored the insistent squeaking of the small, old bed. All she could hear was Severus' quiet groaning, the way he kept whispering her name through clenched teeth.

Then she felt her walls clamping down around his manhood - erratic explosions of pleasure that were mirrored in every atom of her being. Her ears went hot and rang, her mind went blank, and she may have called out for him then. She would have had no way of knowing. He snarled and his hands clutched her hips so hard that it would have hurt if it hadn't felt so wonderful. He bucked and jerked against her a few times, and then the creaking bed went still beneath her.

Sleep came easily that night. Outside the window, the cold black sea churned, and the milky white moon rained its light down. The Oraverit sat quietly on the table beside Hermione's head. And somewhere worlds away, the iron pendant, the other half of the link, rested around Harry Potter's neck. So sleep came easily to Hermione.