Mornings were quickly becoming Hermione's favorite time of day. She woke surrounded in warmth. Severus was spooned around her, her back pressed to his chest, his head resting above hers on the pillow. His arms were around her, the bottom arm positioned just right so that it went under her neck with her head resting in the curve of his shoulder. Their legs weren't tangled together, but spooned just as much as the rest of their bodies; his knees against the back of her thighs.
His morning wood was a warm presence between them, as usual, despite the rigors of the night before. She could feel the ache of it deep inside her, the stiffness in a few joints from the odd positions. It made her smile.
She stretched, loosening his hold on her, and rolled in his arms. Of course he was already awake. She could never tell if he woke when she moved, or if he just held her and let her sleep even though he woke up.
"Morning," he said, and she smiled broader.
"Hello."
He reached behind, momentarily shifting the sheet across them and letting in cool air. She shivered and felt her nipples contract. It wasn't precisely uncomfortable.
Severus handed her a small vial she didn't recognize. "For the soreness," he explained when she raised her eyebrows at him. He clinked her vial with one of his own before they both drank. She felt better immediately. All those little aches she wouldn't have had if she were really eighteen, even if she'd spent several hours the night before putting the kitchen surfaces to that particular type of good use.
She hummed, turning around so that he was spooned against her back again. He wrapped his arm around her, holding her close. She shifted, pressing back and down, making her intent quite clear. He wouldn't be getting rid of that charming hardness on his own in the shower today; he had to share.
"Wench," he murmured.
She ground her hips back against him, and he groaned low in his throat. The sound seemed to travel mostly through his skin and into hers.
He kissed her neck, the hand that wasn't holding her to him running down the length of her spine and then cupping her ass. She pressed into him again, beginning to set a rhythm to the grinding. He picked up on it, beginning to twitch, his arms and legs moving indecisively behind her. Then, his lips came down on her shoulder, kissing and then spreading wide so that he could press his teeth into her skin. It was her turn to groan, arching back involuntarily.
The movement was quick, he rolled them up, and she settled on her hands and knees in the pillows. He positioned himself behind her, one hand snaking between them and holding her flesh open, the other guiding her hips back onto him.
Usually their mornings were lazy, tender. Not this one. He slammed into her, jerking her back against his length, then pulling his hips away only to do it again. It was magnificent. His hand was between her folds, fingers pressing at her clit, driving her insane. Her elbows gave and out she fell forward onto her forearms, changing the angle yet again, and he hit that perfect spot. She moaned. He shouted.
They were a mess of limbs on the bed again. The pillows had fallen off at some point, and most of the blankets. He still held her from behind, but he was limp between them now. They lay like that until they could both breathe and their hearts had slowed to normal.
He shifted behind her, beginning to get up off the bed and pulling her along with him. Most of the time she liked that he could carry her around, especially in the instances like the night before, but sometimes, like when she wanted nothing better than to lay in bed forever, it was obnoxious.
"Let's shower," he said, and suddenly it wasn't so obnoxious.
He led her to the bathroom by the hand, smirking over his shoulder. Bastard.
\\
It wasn't two hours later that Hermione dropped a plate back into the sudsy water in the kitchen sink when Severus's Patronus burst through the wall and stood on the kitchen table. A silvery fox, larger than any fox she'd ever seen, with a clever narrow face and a tear in one ear that made him look a bit scrappy; it was Severus, alright.
"Get your parents," the fox said in Severus's voice, then vanished. Hermione left the dishes, turning and running out the door for the end of the hall where she could Apparate.
The neighborhood was quiet. They'd woken at barely five, as was their habit, and it was just now going on eight. The people in the houses were waking up and going to work. A low, wet fog clung to the grass and gathered under the boulevard trees.
Hermione ran for their house, going up the path, looking for a disturbance. There was nothing; it was quiet. No hooded figures leapt out of the bushes at her.
"Mum? Dad?" she shouted, running through the front door. The foyer and living room were exactly the same as they always were. There was the sofa. The blanket her grandmother had crocheted. Her photo was on the mantelpiece, one that had been taken the summer after fifth year right after she got out of St. Mungo's.
Something thumped upstairs, and she heard their bedroom door open. The light on the top landing flicked on, and there was her father's silhouette at the top of the stairs.
"Hermione?"
She ran up the stairs, launching herself at him. He was barely taller than she was, with narrow shoulders and white-gray hair. She got her curls from him, but it was hard to tell because he kept his hair so short.
"They're coming," she said, her voice cracking. She pulled away from him, making an effort to marshal her thoughts, to come up with a plan. "They're coming," she repeated, steadier.
Her mother appeared in the doorway. Her face was pale, bloodless, and for a moment Hermione was terrified that she'd been hurt. But it was just panic.
Hermione spun, flicking her wand and nonverbally Summoning the suitcases out of the hall closet. They thumped down at her feet and she did some more wand waving. "Pack!" she cried, and the house began to pack itself into the two bags. Everything from knick-knacks to furniture obediently floated over to the bags and shrunk itself down before disappearing inside.
"You need to disappear. Now. Today." Hermione yanked at her hair, conjuring an elastic with a thought and binding the mass of it back out of the way.
"Where will we go?" her dad asked. He'd stepped over by her mother and had a comforting arm around her shoulders. They looked so small and vulnerable there in their flannel pajama sets.
"I have a plan," Hermione promised. She and Severus had talked it over ages ago, but she'd been hesitating. As far as he'd been able to tell, they hadn't been targets, not yet. So much for that. "First we have to get out."
She began checking windows, going from one room to the next. It didn't actually matter if they were locked or not, but it made her feel better that they were. She would've pulled the curtains closed, but her spell had packed them away already.
The suitcases clicked shut, the only noise in the house. It sounded very final.
"Check to make sure I didn't miss anything," she said, poking her head in what had once been her bedroom as she said it. It was completely empty. Bare. Out the window, she saw dark figures making their way toward the house. They brought more fog with them, thicker and darker, more ominous. False fog. Conjured to maintain the Statute of Secrecy, or was there some other trick? "Try to stay away from the windows."
"Hermione," her mother said, part chastising part nervous, "you're scaring us."
Hermione looked at them, trying to think of something to say that was both honest and soothing. Nothing came to mind. She was saved from responding by the Death Eaters. The house shuddered. Something fell off the roof and landed with a hard crack in the yard.
She turned the landing light off and led the way down the stairs. They stood by the big window in the living room, standing back far enough that they would be hidden by the darkness of the house.
There were four Death Eaters in full robes standing out on the street taking turns prodding the wards. She recognized Severus's silhouette, and the wide forms that were probably Crabbe and Goyle Sr. The last one she didn't recognize.
The house shuddered again, and this time she saw a flicker of yellow-green along the dome of the wards.
"Who are they?" her mum asked.
"Death Eaters," she said. "They'll tear the house down after we're gone."
She knew she sounded empty. They looked at her, and they were terrified. She'd lost the ability to be scared like that; she would probably scream and cry later, but right now she was hollow, Occluding reflexively.
She turned to her parents, assessing. They were both mussed from bed; they'd been asleep when she arrived. They had probably scheduled themselves a bit of a lie-in for whatever reason, moving appointments to after lunch. They did that every few weeks to keep themselves relaxed. They had a lie-in, went out to brunch together. Normal lives.
See that tall one out there? I'm in love with him; we got married but it's a secret because people would kill us if they knew. Literally kill us. How's that for normal lives?
Pushing away the thoughts, Hermione led the way into the kitchen. The bareness there was even more jarring than in the rest of the house, since the kitchen was always the heart of the house. The pleated curtains gone, and the loud tablecloth. All shrunk in the bags floating along behind her.
"Okay," Hermione said, bringing her wand up and turning to look at her parents. She tried to ignore the fear written so clearly across their faces. "I'm going to Disillusion you and the bags. Then we're going to step outside, but you stay by the house. I'm going to distract them. As soon as they are paying more attention to me than anything else, you run for the tree across the street.
"You get there and you stay there. If anything happens to me, stay there until the Aurors come. Speak loudly and clearly, and tell them who you are and what happened. They'll sort you out."
Before they could protest or ask questions, Hermione tapped them each on the head with her wand. They both shivered as the spell trickled down them, and then they were a pair of shimmers. She did the same with the bags, making sure each of them had one in their hand before casting the spell. It wouldn't do to lose all her parents' worldly possessions so stupidly.
"Why would you even bother to come here?" Hermione said as loudly as she could without shouting, sneering at the Death Eaters. They'd frozen when she stepped out the kitchen door, letting it bang against the outside wall (which meant it opened nice and wide for the two mostly invisible figures to creep out after her). "The parents were evacuated to the States ages ago."
"You lie," one of the roundish ones said gruffly.
"Saw them moving around last night," the other said.
The Death Eaters were standing and watching her. They'd stopped attacking the wards in favor of stalking around the perimeter of them toward her. She moved away from the back of the house, moving closer to them, keeping them away from where her parents would be.
"Are you sure?" she asked. "I'm awfully good at spells, you know."
"Not that good," Severus drawled in his best aloof professor voice. The others chuckled appreciatively.
"Fuck you," she called back, holding her arms away from her, a clear 'bring it on' stance.
"Mudblood bitch," the fourth Death Eater called from behind his mask. She still didn't know him.
She drew the knife from the wand sheath on her wrist and threw it at Crabbe/Goyle Sr. as she launched herself across the wards at the closer one. She kicked him in the chest as she crossed the line of the wards, and then started with the curses, as many of them as fast as she could. He was off balance and she Disarmed him, snatching his wand out of the air and aiming her next kick at his head, which knocked him down. The one she'd thrown the knife at lurched toward her, pulling the knife out of his neck. That was a mistake; blood started pumping out of the hole and he dropped to one knee.
Hermione called up Fiendfyre. First, she burned the bleeding one, then the unconscious one. She didn't let them burn for long, but she didn't need to.
She spun toward the fourth, knowing Severus might make a show of a few flashy near-misses but her attention needed to be on the other. She turned the Fiendfyre on him, but only singed him, letting the cursed fire eat his wand and char his wand hand black. When he reeled back from it, screaming, she Stupefied him. Comically, he stumbled back and fell on his ass before going limp on the ground.
She disbanded the Fiendfyre with a flourish of her wand, then put it back in the sheath as she turned to Severus. He was behind the fourth one, off to one side. She took a few steps toward him, intending to talk, but he stepped around her and looked down at the fourth one briefly before casting a curse she didn't know. A jag of red light flew from his wand and sliced clean through the Death Eater on the ground.
"What the hell are you doing?" she asked, throwing her hands up. "I was leaving you a witness!"
Severus turned to her, taking off his mask and stepping up close. His eyes were, in a word, intense. He raised a hand and put the tip of his finger at the top of her curse scar just below her collarbone, slowly drawing it down the length of the scar to end at her hip. It was completely hidden beneath her shirt and robes, but he probably knew the lines of her scars better than she did.
She wrapped her arms around his middle, surprised at the emotions that welled up. She hadn't known that, after all the time that had passed, it meant something that Dolohov was dead. It had been her first injury, her first scar from the war. The first time she'd realized just how vulnerable she was.
"Sh," he soothed, wrapping his arms around her, holding her tight to him. His hands were large and warm on her back, one of them rubbing gentle circles. "Sh, Hermione. Sh."
She was crying and wished she could stop. She'd been crying too much lately.
"Thank you for the warning," she said, forcing herself to step back and wipe her eyes, trying to compose herself.
"You're the only one I can warn these days," he said, but it was said tenderly instead of bitterly.
"Well." She tried to smile, but it didn't work.
They stood there in silence for a moment, then Hermione remembered that her parents were around somewhere. She sighed but tried to hide it; Severus wasn't fooled. He cupped his hands around her face and kissed her forehead softly.
"I will see you at home. After," he said, visibly withdrawing inside himself and pulling up the Death Eater persona. She could feel the cold of his Occlumency. He stood tall, the heavy black robes making him seem even bigger than he was. His eyes were dark in his pale face, inscrutable.
She put a hand on his arm and squeezed, then took her wand out again and began lowering the wards. It didn't take long; she was the one who had set them, and the prods by the Death Eaters had been alarmingly successful.
The wards fell with a burst of yellow-green light and a shower of red sparks. Severus walked forward, casting the Dark Mark into the sky and beginning to, quickly and effectively, reduce the house to splinters and dust.
She walked toward the designated tree, locating them by her mother's crying. She took hold of both of them and Disapparated, trying not to hear the crunches coming from her childhood home.
\\
"Er," Hermione said, suddenly feeling awkward. They'd both thrown up after she'd Apparated them to the flat. She'd cleaned them up and let them in, then realized her parents were in her hall in their pajamas.
They looked at her, blank and a bit numb. She looked around, wondering what they'd see. The hall was narrow, but there was room for a cloak stand and a little bench where they sat to put on their boots. The kitchen was large, with the big table at the far end of it, open to the sitting room at the far end of the counter. The sitting room had the standard assortment of furniture, no television, a stack of old Daily Prophets on the coffee table, bookshelves. The bedroom door was closed. Her dishes were still sitting in the sink, the water cold.
"So, this is my flat," Hermione said, gesturing to the place at large. She flicked her wand at the sink, and the water heated to steaming as the dishes began floating around cleaning themselves.
Hermione took the suitcases and put them in a gap between an end table and a bookshelf. After a moment's thought, she transfigured a spare bit of parchment into a small set of drawers and transferred the things her parents would need—clothes, toiletries—to them.
"Honey, you've got blood on your face," her mother said. Hermione nodded, putting her wand in its sheath and walking to the bathroom. She, in fact, had blood all down her front. Her face was splattered with red droplets going brown as they dried, and the mess continued down her chest and a bit on the skirt of her robes.
She took the robes off, dropping them in the bathroom hamper and rolling up the sleeves on the button-down shirt she wore to keep them out of her way as she washed her face. She felt better when she was done, but that just meant that she would begin to feel the morning's events soon.
When she turned, she saw that her parents were standing in the door to the bathroom, watching her. She didn't try to smile. Instead, she looked them over with a Healer's eye, glad to see that they were both alright.
"I'd give you a tour, but there isn't much to see," she said, stepping back into the hall. There was a moment of quiet. "Would you like tea?"
Neither of them said yes, but she made it anyway. They used the plain mugs from the cupboard instead of the fancy set from the top of the fridge.
"I didn't realize it was as bad as that," her father finally said. He'd finished half his tea, and stared down into the mug as he talked.
"I wouldn't have done so much Time Turning if it hadn't been," she said. They hadn't really talked about it yet, and she dreaded the conversation she'd just opened the door to. They'd exchanged letters; she'd explained bits and pieces. She'd planned to go see them the Hogwarts weekend in March, but it had been cancelled and Ron had been poisoned.
"How much did you do it?" her mother asked, she reached out and tucked a curl behind Hermione's ear.
"The headmaster made it sound like you wouldn't do that much. You'd take a few months to study up for your tests, then that course in France for Healing," her dad said. And that was what Dumbledore had said, true enough.
"The headmaster—" She hesitated. "The headmaster wasn't good at sharing the whole of everything, of anything."
Her mother pursed her lips. Her father narrowed his eyes.
"I believe that, at one point, that was the plan. But it grew and kept folding in on itself, getting complicated. I think he was trying to buy himself more time with his cursed arm, send me back for the Healing not just to help Harry and Severus but to help him, then sending me to Alexandria to look into obscure curses on the longshot that I'd find something to prolong his life."
"That's awfully selfish of him," her mum observed.
"Yes, it was," Hermione agreed, but she couldn't be bitter about it. She'd married Severus, after all. That was selfish, too. "I don't blame him, though. It didn't do a lick of good in the end, but I can't blame him for trying. For wanting to live."
"At the cost of your life," her mum said sharply.
"Only the life I expected to have," Hermione said, sitting back in her chair and wondering how to explain it. "I mean, I didn't get to finish school with my friends, but they're not going back to school next year anyway because of the war. I was away, I didn't get to share things with the people I care about, but I still got to do them."
She stood, walking out to the sitting room and retrieving her box of photos from the bottom of the book shelf. They were all wizarding photos, depicting snatches of her life while she was Turning. She and Claude at the Eiffel Tower. She and her roommates from the Healing program sprawled in the sitting room studying for their finals. A single picture of her in the bright green Healer's robes of St. Mungo's, smiling awkwardly and waving at the photographer. A large assortment of photos from the seminar in Salem, where she'd shared a flat with Lizzie the Potions apprentice from Toronto who also happened to be an amateur photographer. A handful of photos of Alexandria the first time around, mostly tourist-y pictures of her, pyramids and sand dunes. Even fewer photos from her second time in Alexandria, her smiling happily from behind stacks of books and scrolls, candids of her and Roger. Two photos from her time in radio: One of just her in the booth talking into the old-fashioned microphone, and the other of her and her coworkers at a pub celebrating something a few weeks before the studio had been blown up. Two of her and Severus, the first from Slughorn's party when she'd been standing with him and trying to hide her laughter over the screaming gingerbread men, and the second of her and Severus in the kitchen at Grimmauld Place bickering about something, gesticulating wildly, still wearing the aprons and gloves of delicate brewing—it was before they'd fallen for each other, but the Severus in the photo kept putting her hair behind her ear tenderly and the Hermione in the photo smiled at him every time he did it.
Her parents went through the box together, looking at each photo as if they were trying to memorize it. The photos of her and Severus were the last in the box, and she couldn't tell if they looked at them the longest because they were the last or for some other reason.
"He was at the house," her dad finally said.
"Yes."
"Who is he?" her dad said, flat and a little forceful.
"He's my husband," she said, then clapped a hand over her mouth. I can't believe I just said that. Oh my God, I just said that!
Her parents were frozen, staring at her. Her mum's mouth was working like she wanted to say something. Her dad's face was doing that really neat crashing trick that arctic ice flows do so well in spring, one expression slipping away to be replaced by another.
"There are no wedding photos in the box," her mum said sharply.
"We didn't get a proper wedding." Her mother's mouth was working again. Her dad, who had the best angle for it, was staring at the bench by the door, under which sat her grubby old trainers and Severus's spare pair of boots. "We signed our marriage license with a witness, that was it. We can't even file it yet. He's a spy."
"A spy," her mother repeated. There was a vein jumping dangerously under her dad's left eye, something she hadn't seen since she'd accidentally mentioned that she'd spent a large chunk of her second year in the hospital wing before realizing that the headmaster hadn't seen fit to inform her parents about it.
Hermione just nodded, as if her mother had asked a question. "And if our names showed up in the Records Office together, we'd be killed. The only question would be if they'd kill him first and then come for me, or come for me first so that they could make him watch."
She regretted the bluntness immediately, but she was so tired of keeping it in. The stress, the secrets… it was exhausting.
Her mother burst into tears. Her father looked stony, still glaring at the boots.
"I am a target. I was always a target, even before I was friends with Harry," Hermione said, grabbing her mother's hands and hanging on. For once she was glad that they got the Prophet, that they knew why her being friends with Harry was significant. "I stand for everything the Death Eaters are against. My parents are Muggles, but I was the top of my class, very good at being a witch. I prove that their beliefs are wrong. And I was always at Harry's side, so hurting me would hurt Harry. And hurting you would hurt me."
"It's a war, isn't it?" her mum asked, her fingers clenching in Hermione's. "It's not just politics, or opposing factions finding each other in dark alleys for a brawl. It's a war."
Hermione nodded. "Yes."
She'd been so careful when she was young, tucking away the worst of it because she was afraid they'd try to keep her out of it. The Prophet had more information than she'd ever given them, but it was a skewed version. Incomplete at best. While it had finally acknowledged Voldemort's return, the full scope had been held back. The disappearances and attacks on Muggles had been published, but the other things hadn't been noted. The crashing wizarding economy, the way people who weren't even involved in the war asked their loved ones security questions when they returned home at night.
"They keep most of it out of the papers," she said.
"A spy, you say?" her dad asked, finally speaking. He'd turned his hard look on her.
"Yes."
"What's his name?"
"Severus."
"Severus what?"
"Severus Snape."
There was silence at the table. She wondered if they would remember her talking about Professor Snape, the Potions teacher. She'd only mentioned him a few times, being much more enamored with Charms in those very early years, and then talking more about the intricacies of wizarding law in relation to magical creatures or the Triwizard Tournament. Severus had always been involved in the things she knew better than to tell her parents about.
And then she remembered that they got the Daily Prophet and Severus had been picked apart by the paper since the morning edition of the day following Dumbledore's death. The only thing that had gotten more attention was Dumbledore himself—his funeral, and his past (now that he wasn't alive to defend himself or look at potential biographers over the top of his spectacles until they decided they'd rather not write that book anyway).
"The one who—the murderer. He killed Headmaster Dumbledore!" her mother screeched.
"He was your teacher!" her father thundered.
She almost laughed. It was just impossible. And ridiculous. Impossibly ridiculous.
"The murder was prearranged between them," Hermione said calmly, looking to her mother. Then she turned to her father, and said, "I haven't been his student in more than ten years."
"You were his student six months ago," he practically growled. "Two weeks ago!"
"It was never like that," Hermione said, setting her mug down more forcefully than she should have. "Spying is dangerous. He gets hurt a lot." It was like explaining Viktor Krum's letter asking her to Bulgaria again, only this time it wasn't an older boy who lived in a different country, it was a man who used to be her teacher and had just reduced their home to dust. "We spent a lot of time together since I stopped the time travel."
"He still killed a man, Hermione. The headmaster. How could he kill Headmaster Dumbledore?" her mum asked. She looked so lost Hermione wanted to give her a hug and some Calming Draught and put her to bed.
"There were… extenuating circumstances. The headmaster had been cursed; he was dying anyway. By stepping in and—speeding things along a bit—Severus cemented his position with the Death Eaters. He's currently persona non grata with wizarding Britain, but it won't be long before Voldemort controls the Ministry. Then I'll be persona non grata, and he'll be a king."
Her dad was staring at Severus's spare boots again. She glared at him, but when he turned his head and met her eyes, she looked down into her tea. She had no idea what else to say; anything that came to mind sounded stupid and inadequate.
They sat in silence for awhile. She couldn't tell if they were ruminating on her choice in husband or the morning's adventure. And her mind kept circling back to the plan she and Severus had talked about, the one she'd been hoping to put off for as long as possible. She wanted to not have to Obliviate her parents. She wished they were still living their normal lives in the house they'd lived in since she was born.
"I'm sorry about the house," she said when the silence had gotten so awkward it was making her itchy. They didn't say anything.
She found herself thinking of Dolohov. A strange part of her was just tickled at the way Severus had taken up the sword for her, as it were. It was romantic in a very twisted way.
"It's just a house, Hermione," her mum finally said. Hermione looked up, looked them over carefully. They looked hurt, confused, shell-shocked. Her dad kept staring at the boots. Her mum was looking at the pictures of her and Severus.
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you how bad it was," she said, "with the war." She didn't mean recently, because she hadn't really seen them and she couldn't put down any of it in a letter. She meant before that, when she was a student and had been afraid they'd take her away from the magical world.
"I don't think we would have believed you," her mum said. "Not until today."
They sat in the quiet some more. Hermione wished Severus would come home. She was trying very hard not to use Legilimency on her parents.
"Do you have any questions you want me to answer?" she asked at last.
"How do you know you can trust him? Why do you trust him?" her dad asked immediately, almost as if he'd just been waiting for her to give permission, to open the floor.
Hermione took a breath, and then paused to think. Now was really not the time to tell them that she spent a lot of time in her husband's head, that they shared a ridiculous fantasy that involved running away from the world and making lots of babies.
She debated whether she should tell them about Occlumency and Legilimency, about how she and Severus were good enough at mind magic that when they made eye contact or even touched, sometimes, they could share thoughts. She wondered if she should tell them about sitting with him in the hall after Dumbledore died. She wondered if she should talk about the way he protected them when Lupin turned into a wereworlf third year, or the state of him after returning from a Summons.
"I—" she started, then cut herself off. Where could I even start to answer that? "I love him."
"That is not an adequate answer," her dad growled. Hermione sat back, wishing she'd remembered to pick up a bottle of something the last time she'd gone grocery shopping. She really wanted a drink. As it was, she refilled her tea again.
"I can read minds—"
"Pull the other one."
Hermione laughed out loud, and then she couldn't stop laughing. She had to set her tea down.
"That was my reaction, too," she admitted. When Harry had first told her about his experience with the snake and about how he'd have lessons in keeping Voldemort out of his mind, she'd rushed to the library to research (because of course she had). There hadn't been much there because it was so rare—it took too much mental discipline for the everyday wizard—but there had been enough to prove that it was a real thing and make her very interested. "But there's a spell that lets you see into somebody's thoughts and memories. I first learned it from the other side, learned how to keep people from using the spell on me."
"For the war, right?" her dad asked bitterly. "You learned to keep information safe."
"Yes." She paused, waiting to see if he would say anything else about it. When he didn't, she continued. "Once you master keeping people out—that's called Occlumency—the next logical step is Legilimency—the spell for reading minds.
"Severus is the best Occlumens I have ever met. He could keep me out if he wanted, he could keep secrets, but we've been in situations where he couldn't have kept me out without my knowing. He could have kept things secret but I would have known he was shielding something from me." She scrubbed her hands over her face then ran them over her hair, smoothing the flyaway curls around her face back. "It was an uncomfortable experience, actually. It went both ways; we learned more about each other than anybody has any right to know."
She drank her tea, not quite looking at them, remembering that day in Minerva's office. It had been awkward all around, first the shattering of his shields and their minds pressing together unrestrained, then talking about Spain with Minerva.
"I trust him. I love him." She shrugged. "The Order thinks he's a traitor. We both have parts to play in the—in what's to come. We have to let it play out, and we have to hope that we both come out the other side of it."
They sat in silence again. Her parents went back to staring at their respective reminders of Severus, her dad with the boots and her mum with the photographs.
Hermione got up after awhile and made another pot of tea. She was considering pulling out something for them all to eat when she heard the key in the lock. Her parents were tense, eyes boring holes in the door.
Severus stepped through, tearing the Death Eater robes from himself and dropping them at his feet, letting the mask clatter down on top of them. He took a step toward the kitchen and fell to his knees, hands clenched into fists and held tight to his ribs. Hermione's wand was in hand before she realized she was reaching for it, tracing the almost reflexive movements that called up her diagnostic spells.
"What happened?" she asked. "I'd've thought he would be pleased with you."
"If only I were that lucky," he said bitterly. He was listing off to one side and she caught him, helping him lean against one of the cupboards. "The house gone, the parents gone, but the girl escapes and takes out three Death Eaters? He had to vent his frustration somewhere."
Hermione didn't have anything to say. She knew that was the way of it, even if she hated it.
"This will be easiest with you in a chair," she said, hoisting him up and bracing her shoulder into his armpit, helping him make the few steps to the table. She was aware that she had his blood on her and that her parents were staring, but she ignored it. The only actual wound was on his ribs, a long, deep score from a dagger or something had been aggravated by blunt force. He'd probably been slashed, then kicked.
The frock coat was ridiculous to get off him in this state. Buttons at the sleeves, then the long line of buttons from throat to thigh. A whispered spell undid them magically, but it took time. She helped him out of it, letting it droop against the back of the chair instead of making him stand up to get it out from under him. The waistcoat beneath was ruined. His white shirt beneath that was a bloody mess. She stripped him of them, tossing them in the sink to possibly salvage later.
Wounds always looked worse than the diagnostic spells made them seem. It was the blood smeared all over, the bone visible through the cut, the bruising and swelling.
Still ignoring her parents, she handed Severus the pain relief for what she was about to do. After he'd swallowed it down and braced himself against the chair, she began.
Flick of the wand to clear away the blood, another to align the gaping skin. He was weak from blood loss and gasping from the pain of his bruised ribs, but the immediate problem was the long knife wound in his side.
Needle and the charmed thread from the vial in her kit, fingers held just so, and begin.
She could have healed this with a charm, but that would have left a scar. This way, using the thread, she could seal him up without a mark like she'd done to the slice down her face only a few months ago. She preferred doing it that way; it was easier to forget. And it felt, somehow, like she was denying Voldemort to mark him any further, and she liked that.
Severus set his jaw and didn't react as she sewed him up. When she asked him if he was ready at the end of it, he just nodded. She applied the paste that coordinated with the charmed thread, and it sizzled and smoked. It smelled like blood and, oddly enough, cherry syrup. When the little cloud of white smoke dissipated, there was nothing to see. The wound was gone; just the faintest hint of a bruise, and she had a different paste for that.
"Done," she said, not too long after. Bruise Salve had been applied all over his ribs for the boot prints she'd found there, and to the site of the slice.
Severus took her hand—she noted that the back of it was coated in dried blood, though the front was clean from the amount of time she spent wiping it on her jeans in between tasks —and turned it so that he could kiss the cup of her palm. It was a tender gesture, and it melted her heart a little bit. Then he stood and walked out of the kitchen, closing the door to the bathroom behind him with a soft click. The shower turned on a moment later.
She watched him leave the room, then set about making her kitchen back into a kitchen. There was blood all over the table (again), and his bloody clothes in the sink to deal with. The Death Eater robes in the hall. Her kit sitting open on the counter, and the empty potion flasks.
Hermione was halfway through, having cleared away the blood already and repacked her kit, when she realized her mother was quietly crying.
"What's the matter?" she asked, turning as she tried to clear the blood out of her clothes. It was probably another shirt ruined, but the jeans were salvageable.
Her mother gave her a miserable look and fluttered her hands like she wasn't sure what to say. Her father squeezed her mother's hand tightly, and Hermione just nodded. There weren't really words.
She needed to be doing something, so she began to make lunch. It was already past noon. They had sandwich things, and she started putting them together, made more tea. Severus came out of the bathroom and went straight into the bedroom, closing the door behind him. He brushed his mind against hers gently, assuring her he wasn't about to crack apart. Just physically and emotionally exhausted, going to have a nap.
"We should probably talk about what happens next."
The lunch dishes were washing themselves in the sink. Her parents had taken turns in the bathroom, freshening up and changing into normal clothes. All Hermione wanted to do was go lie down with Severus for awhile, but that wouldn't happen. It was only a matter of time before the Order found out about her parents' home and tried to check up on her.
She took one of Severus's many cauldrons out of the big drawer in the cupboard where they kept the potions. Before he'd moved in, she'd had three cauldrons; now there were closer to fifty of them Shrunk down to fit in the space. The cauldron she selected was standard pewter and large enough to brew a double batch of Severus's recipe Blood Replenishing Potion.
"What are you doing?" her mother asked, somewhere between distraught and interested.
"I'm brewing Blood Replenishing Potion. I'm down to my last few vials." And I really don't want to talk about Obliviating you right now, so I'm putting it off with busywork.
The cauldron went on the stovetop, and she turned the fire on low beneath it to begin heating the metal. Potions ingredients were in the smaller drawer in the cupboard, all in round glass jars Shrunk to fit. (It wasn't the ideal way to store ingredients; they'd lose potency more quickly than if they were stored properly, but they simply didn't have the space.) She took out what she needed, smiling at Severus's clever charms work when the jars sprung back to their proper sizes as they cleared the lip of the drawer.
The shredding, chopping and measuring of the potion was soothing in its way. She'd never been able to achieve the zen state Severus did when he was brewing, but she still found it relaxing. The base was bubbling nicely when her dad seemed to come to some sort of decision.
"We'll have to get in touch with the insurance company," he said standing and pouring himself a cup of tea. He hovered near her elbow, watching her finish the base, stirring six times clockwise before raising the flame and stepping back.
"No," she said, turning to clean the cutting board she'd used before pulling out the ingredients she's need for the second half.
"No?" her dad asked, his tone somewhere between skeptical and offended. She nodded somewhat apologetically.
"We have to let them think you're dead. Otherwise they'll try again."
"What?" her mum asked, standing up to join them in the kitchen. She had her arms crossed, her shoulders tense.
"You can't go back. I'll get in touch with the insurance company and get all your finances set for you. But you have to go into hiding until all this is over."
She heard the bedroom door open and the soft tread of feet in socks in the hall. If they were alone, she wouldn't have heard him; he would have come up behind her and wrapped his arms around her and make snide comments on her potion.
"And when will this be over?"
"I don't know, Mum."
I wish it was over now, Severus told her silently, pouring himself a cup of tea and sitting in the same chair he had earlier, only this time he wasn't bleeding. She nudged his mind with hers, agreeing with him.
Her parents watched him warily, drawing a bit closer to her. She didn't think they realized that they did it.
Is it because I'm the husband they didn't know you had or because I tore down their house this morning?
A little bit of both, probably.
"So we're supposed to sit in some safe house for an unknown amount of time, not knowing what's happening, not knowing if you're alright, or if you're dead. Not that that's concerned you much in the past, of course."
"Dad, please."
Severus set his cup down too hard, glaring at her father darkly.
What was gearing up to be a highly unpleasant conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Kingsley's lynx Patronus. Her parents jumped, her mother squeaked, and Kinglsey's deep, slow voice filled the room.
"Get someplace safe and lay low. Reply with your status."
"Good God it really is a war," her dad moaned.
Hermione brought out her wand and called up her Patronus, noting absently that it had changed. Since she was sixteen, her Patronus had been an otter. A cheerful thing that tended to bounce around happily. Now it was a fox, big like Severus's but not so sly-looking. Her fox was sleek, the narrow, pointed face serene, the eyes large and unblinking. There was a tear in one ear, just like Severus's. She wondered how long since it had changed.
"I'm safe. I got my parents out," she told the Patronus, and it bounded off through the wall to deliver the message.
"What was that?" her dad asked. Hermione Summoned her Defense book from second year, flipping back to the appropriate page. They hadn't actually covered Dementors second year, they were just in the book. There had been a bit more practical of an introduction to them.
"My Patronus," Hermione said, handing over the book. "They're good for delivering messages because they can't be fooled. They know who the message is intended for and they won't speak to anybody else by mistake."
She turned back to her potion only to find Severus tending to it. She poured herself some tea and stood next to him comfortably while he stirred.
"I thought your Patronus was an otter," Severus said quietly, withdrawing the long-handled spoon he'd been stirring with.
"It used to be."
He turned to look at her, eyes dark and more intense than usual. He leaned over and kissed her gently, and she smiled at him before sipping her tea. She handed him the next ingredient and resisted the urge to sit on the counter next to him while he worked.
Her mum closed the book with a snap and let it thump down on the kitchen table. Hermione bit her lip, wondering if she should be nervous. Her father was quicker to show his anger, but when her mother eventually worked up to it things it could get ugly.
"What a lovely little lesson, Hermione darling," her mother snapped. "You know, I think I'm beginning to realize why you haven't been home to see us. The more time we spend together, the more I'm realizing just how little you seem to think of us."
Hermione's eyebrows shot up, and she opened her mouth but she couldn't think of a thing to say.
The next three hours were awful. There was shouting. There were tears.
There had been four major fights in the Granger household in Hermione's memory. One of them had been when she was nine, before they knew she was a witch, and she'd absolutely refused to admit that she'd stolen a particular book from the library (because she hadn't). The other three had all been about Hogwarts, about her going to the Burrow or Grimmauld Place. Only one of those arguments (the one just after fourth year, the first time she went to Grimmauld Place) had lasted more than a day, but it had been resolved before bed the next day, and at the end of the week she'd been at Grimmauld Place. (Of course, that was a major sticking point in her parents' argument this time around—they'd let her go that time and look what had happened.)
It occurred to Hermione, at one point, that Severus's entire childhood had been one elongated argument between his parents, sometimes hooked into it himself, and never resolution.
My fault. My fault. "You break everything you touch." It's true. Broke her family now, too, just being in the same flat as them. Literally broke their home first.
"Severus!" Hermione shouted, grabbing him by the shoulders. His eyes snapped into focus, finally looking back at her. This argument was not your fault. It's an old argument recycled. Tension that's been there for awhile coming out because it's less easy to ignore it.
I know that. Rationally, I can see it…
If your parents weren't dead, I'd give them such a piece of my mind—she glanced away quickly, not meaning for him to catch that one. But, of course, he did. And he smirked, and she watched the phantom of his childhood fall away. He kissed her temple and turned to the cauldron, Vanishing the ruined potion and beginning again. She turned back to her parents.
They sat at the table, talking quietly, throwing glances toward her and Severus every few seconds. Somewhere in all the shouting, she'd explained her plan to them. Neither of them liked it, but the more they'd… discussed… it, the closer they'd gotten to agreeing to it.
"But why take our memories?" her mum asked again.
"So that you can't get curious and try to find out what's happening. It removes the entire possibility of somebody finding you by accident because you were asking around."
"Have a little faith, dear," her father grumbled. "We'd know better than to just walk up and ask a random person on the street if they know how things are faring with the war."
Hermione opened her mouth to respond (though her response—that she expected they might do just that if they were worried enough—would not have been productive), but a special edition of the Prophet arrived instead.
"Oh, for heaven's sake," she said when she saw the front page. She'd quite forgotten the fall from grace. Even worse than when the world had found out she was going with Viktor Krum and thought Harry Potter was torn up about it.
The article above the fold was about her parents. There was a prominent photo of the remains of the house, the Dark Mark floating overhead. Her photo, the ID badge photo they'd taken for her internship at St. Mungo's, was at the top of the right-hand column, looking out at the reader and occasionally smiling without showingany teeth.
Somebody—and she strongly suspected it was Mundungus Fletcher, mostly because it was always Mundungus Fletcher—had leaked the fact that Dumbledoer had had her messing about with time. They didn't report just how much, but it was made clear that she'd aged herself quite a bit, and that it was a little odd that she'd been at Hogwarts acting as a student after the New Year.
They knew about "Dumbledore's dragon," too, which wasn't surprising. Barely half the kills she'd made were attributed to her, but she was willing to give them time to catch up. The morning's deaths of Crabbe, Goyle and Dolohov, respected Obliviators who arrived at the scene to sort out the Muggles who had witnessed the awful destruction of her family home, were attributed to her. She was unhinged, dangerous. They'd labeled her Undesirable Number One. She didn't have a wanted poster yet, but she was willing to give them time for that, too.
Page three held a sordid breakdown of her time at Hogwarts, her descent into criminality, her Dark association with a Durmstrang student (no mention that he was a well-liked international celebrity) at a young age, the unnatural closeness with Dumbledore (who was remarkably bad in the press at the moment, too, mostly from the leaked tidbits of Rita Skeeter's upcoming memoir), and her "questionable closeness" with Harry Potter.
The rest of the paper was just the usual tripe. The Head of Magical Law Enforcement was pioneering new safety measures, fighting for the average witch and wizard from the conference rooms of the Ministry. The Dementor problem in Bath had been sorted out, more or less. Noted novelist and wireless personality Laurel Williams had died at the ripe age of one hundred and twenty-eight of natural causes; she was remembered by her sons, Ezra and Patrick, and there would be a memorial service open to the public next Tuesday. No word on the latest developments from Harry Potter, but Percy Weasley, brother of Potter's best friend from Hogwarts School, was glad to wax lyrical on several topics across the back page.
"I might vomit," Hermione said, handing the paper across to her parents because there was no point keeping it from them.
She glanced at Severus, letting him see the articles in her mind, then took some roots that needed shredding and set to work. She needed to keep her hands busy, and she was damned if she was going to clean things. There wasn't anything to clean, anyway.
"But, this—" her father spluttered indignantly, "—this is downright slander!"
"Really, I'm just glad they spelled my name right," Hermione said. "And just you wait. This is going to be a trend. Tomorrow they'll have dug something else up to talk about, and they'll probably start dragging Harry through it, too. It's a smear campaign, but not just for me. It's a transition. It's the public image side of the coup taking place in the Ministry."
She let that sink in for a minute, going to the front closet and rummaging around for the Unbreakable vials in the felt bandolier Severus had received for Christmas. The vial with Minerva's memory of their wedding—or at least the signing of their marriage license—was the only one with anything in it. She could hear them talking quietly, but didn't make an effort to listen in.
Severus finished the potion and began decanting it into vials. When he finished, he set his things to cleaning themselves in the sink and pulled her into his arms, holding her close with his chin on her head. She wrapped her arms around him and wondered if her parents would ever consent to going into hiding or if she'd be sending them against their will.
"How are you feeling?" she asked, not sure if she was asking about his recently healed side or the aftermath of the fight.
"Fine," he said, shrugging and pulling back to smooth a hand over his ribs. "That's always the odd part—all the awful things that can happen with no real lasting harm."
"I really don't feel like debating 'real lasting harm' right now," she said. He wore a soft long-sleeved t-shirt, and she rubbed the spot on his ribs she'd so recently healed through it.
"Good," he said, chuckling without real humor.
They continued to leave her parents to themselves, letting them talk through things in the living room. They made soup, chopping and stirring. Hermione sliced up what was left of a baguette and put it in the oven to toast.
Dinner was awkward. Her father glared at Severus but didn't say a word. Her mother stared at the table, taking too much time eating her soup. Hermione and Severus made conversation in their minds, not wanting to break the bubble of silence because they really didn't want to experience the conversation that would come out of it.
Severus took care of the washing up while Hermione modified the furniture in the living room. The sofa expanded into a bed, the coffee table shrunk down to be an end table, the rest of the furniture squeezed out of the way.
By silent agreement, none of them talked about anything. There were perfunctory explanations of where the extra toilet paper and clean towels were, and quiet goodnights. Hermione brushed her teeth.
"If you need anything, just knock," she said, gesturing to the bedroom door. Her parents nodded mutely, and she left them for the night.
Severus hadn't bothered to turn on the lights, but that was fine. She knew where everything was and had fairly good night vision, besides. He hadn't bothered to put on pajamas, so neither did she. She wanted to be close to him, to feel skin on skin and be comforted.
He watched her undress, watching her with dark, intent eyes. She leaned forward when she finished and kissed along the line of fresh pink skin at his ribs. By morning it would be as pale as the rest of him, unnoticeable. When she finished kissing the not-scar, she kissed the old scars along his ribs near it.
Severus wrapped his arms around her, pulling her down onto the bed with him. He was much bigger than she was, and that was annoying sometimes but not right now. Right now, she could pretend Severus was the only thing in the world; she could hang onto him and not feel as though her life was spinning out of control.
"I love you," he murmured into her hair, and she squeezed him tighter.
"I love you, too."
She looked up at him, and he brought his lips down to hers. It began soft and tender, but quickly escalated. He pulled her up to him, and his erection pressed into the top of her thigh, hot and throbbing.
Hermione grabbed him by the head, weaving her hands into his hair none too gently. She wanted him, all of him, right now, in her and around her and everywhere. She ground her hips into him, moving her legs around him, missing a bit and pressing his erection down instead of in.
He groaned deep, holding her close with his hands across her back for a moment, then pulling away to reposition. He twisted her bodily with an arm around her waist, pressing her into the bed on her stomach. He lay on top of her, holding the lines of their bodies together. His erection was settled in the dip where thigh turned into ass, not quite penetrating. He ground his hips against her and she gasped.
"Up," he whispered, getting off her and trying to move her again, but their legs were tangled together. "On your knees."
She grabbed the headboard, pulling herself forward so that his legs weren't pinning hers to the bed. She gasped as she slid forward, nipples scraping along the soft fabric of the sheet. He reacted to the gasp behind her, bracing a hand on her hip as he crawled up behind her on his knees.
He took her by the hair as he leaned over her, pulling her head back so that he could suck on her neck while he entered her from behind. One hand held her like that, arched back into him, and the other explored, first squeezing a breast, pinching a nipple, teasing down to where their bodies were connected.
"Severus," she gasped, and he left off, withdrawing to a singular wonderful focus. She held onto the headboard for all she was worth, matching his fast, rocking movement with her hips and he slammed up into her again. Again.
"Yes," she was repeating, "yes, yes!" He was breathing hard, each thrust punctuated by a deep grunt that was delightfully male.
His thumb found her clitoris again, and she exploded, clenching around him, her entire body arching backwards with the pleasure of it.
They were flat on the bed again when she came around. He was mostly on top of her, his hands idly cupping her breasts, fingertips teasing along the sensitive undersides.
"I do, you know," she said at long last. She was very sleepy. Shagged out, the thought made her smile.
"Hm?" Severus hummed questioningly.
"I love you." She wanted to turn around so that she could look him in the eye as she said it, but she was too comfortable. He pulled her closer, rolling them onto their sides and burying his face through her hair so that he could kiss that particular spot on her neck.
"And I love you," he replied, muffled by the thickness of her hair.
\\
She woke before he did. There was pale light coming through the bedroom window, dimmed by the curtains but undeniable.
She was still wrapped up in him, though not quite so tightly since he was relaxed in sleep. He was warm behind her, and solid. The idea of the war was so much easier to manage here in his arms; she felt like she could handle it, like it would be worth it to go and fight even if it was just so that she could come back to this place.
She wondered what he was dreaming about. He was hard as a rock. She couldn't guess if that was just a hazard of a man in the morning, or if he was having a particularly nice dream.
Hermione turned in his arms, and he began to wake. She kissed him, trapping his face between her hands and kissing along his eyebrows, down his nose, across his cheekbones. When he smiled, she kissed his lips. He was awake.
They were still gloriously naked. She stroked her hand along his side, flicking over his ribs and the mended skin, following the line of his hip down. He groaned, leaning his forehead into hers.
Last night, they had fucked. This morning, they made love.
She pushed him back flat on the bed and straddled his chest, leaning over him to kiss him. His hands found their place on her hips, pulling her to him. His groan was deep, vibrating through her hands on his chest.
They kissed, long and deep, and then she sat up, tossing her hair out of her way, giving herself an unobstructed view of him. He was beautiful, to her biased eye, lying there below her. His hair was dark on the white sheets, tangled off to one side. His eyes so dark in the pale face, thrown into sharp relief by the early morning light. Strong jaw, sharp cheekbones, proud Roman nose.
She let her eyes trail down over him, leisurely. The smooth skin of his throat, Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed. Broad shoulders speckled with shining white scars. Flat nipples, begging her to brush her thumb over them. He was too thin, and his ribs were easily visible in his chest. Scars everywhere, like she had. A dusting of black hair down his chest, thickening below his naval to lead the way down.
She glanced up at him when her eyes reached his cock, smirking at the look in his eyes. He had his hands fisted in the sheets on either side of her knees, obviously forcing himself to let her look, to not grab her and slam her onto him until she'd finished.
She touched him, fingers wrapping around, squeezing, pulling just slightly. He moaned long and low, his hips twitching beneath her. His hands found her knees, fingertips trailed up and down her thighs. He gasped her name when she teased a finger along the tip of him.
It was too much. She had to have him in her; she couldn't tease anymore.
She leaned forward, spreading her knees around his hips to lower herself onto him, and he guided her down with gentle hands on her waist. She whimpered as he disappeared fully into her, leaning down onto his chest to kiss him again. He held her there for a long moment, leaning up to meet her mouth.
Hermione sat back, grinding her hips down against his with the movement. They set a relaxed pace, rolling their hips together, letting it slowly build between them. She watched him as she moved, holding on to his forearms, his hands warm on her waist.
She met his eyes and let her thoughts wander over to him. It was all sensation, pleasure, nothing coherent. He groaned, eyes pools of inky black sucking her in. She dropped willingly onto the surface of his mind as they moved, feeling his own pleasure, the happy thrum deep in his chest whenever she was near.
She was weeping, like an idiot, again, but neither of them minded. He sat up beneath her, pulling her to his chest. Their combined emotions were overwhelming, but she was loathe to break the connection.
I love you. I love you. I love you. The thought was on loop, in time with the little movements they were managing with their hips. She didn't know if it originated with her or with him, but it didn't matter.
He stilled their movement, holding her to him and kissing her for the world. His tongue and his cock, connecting her to him, his arms around her. As close as humanly possible.
She was already beginning to come apart when he broke the kiss, twisting them so that she was beneath him on the bed and he could thrust into her, deep and urgent.
"Hermione," he gasped, losing it. His seed burst in her somewhere deep, hot and familiar. That alone would have been enough to send her over the edge, but she was still there on the surface of his mind and felt his release.
She arched back, eyes closed, entirely losing her sense of the world except for Severus pressed to every inch of her skin.
Then he was beside her, breathing hard. His hand was still on her waist, his head back buried in her hair kissing along the line of her neck.
Twenty minutes later, they were dressed and presentable for company. Instead of trying to sneak to the bathroom, they'd used charms to clean themselves. She'd directed his spells for shaving. They would've been out sooner, but they kept pausing for lingering kisses.
A/N: 10 points to anybody who caught the Douglas Adams reference!