Hermione walked through the house. It was quiet, but she was used to it being quiet. Bast was in London, rooming with friends. They'd cleared the Prince townhouse, made it livable, and then turned it into a bachelor pad for the three of them as they went through Auror training. (Severus had eventually delegated a pair of house elves to the house when he'd realized none of them knew how to cook, nor could they be bothered to clean without eminent threat of visiting parents.) The girls were in a rented flat in Inverness. Ellie had a Potions apprenticeship and was rarely around, leaving Sofia to her thoughts when she wasn't working at Flourish and Blott's. And Hugo was about to start his second year at Hogwarts; she was almost used to the children being away.
But now Severus was returning to Hogwarts. Not returning like he had the last few years, for meetings about education reform or as a substitute in Potions or Defense. Minerva had been slowly reeling him back in, and she'd finally succeeded.
The baby boom following the war had hit the school. When she'd attended, there had been mere dozens of incoming first years. The first rise of Tom Riddle had seen to that. The first years in the years following had made up much larger classes. The incoming class for the current school year had one hundred students in it; nearly triple the past decade's average. The core classes were all doubling up on teachers, and the elective classes would expand in the next few years as well.
Severus would be teaching the N.E.W.T.-level Defense Against the Dark Arts classes, sixth and seventh years. That alone wouldn't have meant his full return to Hogwarts. Minerva had convinced him to return as Head of Slytherin as well, though. That required that he live in the castle.
"Hugo! I see your trunk, but I do not see Crookshanks."
"He's under the dresser."
"Ask him nicely."
"I did."
Hermione made her way down the hall to the bedroom that he'd inherited when Bast moved out. Her youngest was already in his Hogwarts uniform, but he'd thrown the robe on the bed and rolled up his sleeves. He was sprawled across the floor, one arm beneath the dresser trying to get a hand on Crookshanks.
"Come on, Crooks," Hermione said, squatting down. Her old half-kneazle gave her a look before he scooted out to her. He was more white than orange these days, a bit slower, and much more curmudgeonly. "There we go."
"He doesn't listen to anybody but you, Mum."
"Well at least somebody listens to me," she said, raising an eyebrow at Hugo and making him laugh. Crookshanks sulked his way into his travel case and went to sleep. "Don't forget your robe, now. We need to go."
Hugo pulled on his robe and triple-checked that he had his wand in his pocket. (He was forever misplacing it. They'd had to owl it to him when he'd left it at home after Christmas the year before.)
Twenty minutes later, they were at King's Cross. There were people everywhere.
"You come see me every Sunday, alright?" Hermione instructed, giving Hugo one last hug.
"Mum," he sighed, rolling his eyes. "Nobody else is allowed to see their parents on the weekend."
"Glen Norman is."
"Who's that?"
"Seventh year Gryffindor. His mother is the N.E.W.T. Muggle Studies teacher."
"That's not the point."
"Well fine then, don't come see me."
He frowned at her. "Now you make it sound like I don't want to see you."
"You said you don't."
"I said nobody else got to see their parents." She tried not to smile at him, but she must've given herself away because he all but stamped his foot. "Mum!"
"I'll see you on Sunday, dear," she said, smirking. "Enjoy the train ride. Say hello to Victoire and Teddy for me."
"I probably won't even see them, Mum. They aren't even in my House."
"But they're on the train, aren't they?" Hermione raised her eyebrows at him.
Hugo went up on his toes to kiss her on the cheek, then took his trunk and headed for the train. She suspected the muffled word she heard him say as he left was, "Impossible."
\\
"Settled?" Severus asked her, buttoning up his teaching robe.
"All our things are away, if that's what you mean," she said, fixing his collar for him. The robes were the same cut and style as the robes he'd worn when she was a student of Hogwarts, but not black. Tonight's set was a deep green-gray over his usual coat and trousers.
"You miss the cottage already?"
"It feels like the end of an era is all. The children are growing up, or grown up. You're back at Hogwarts on your own terms. My goals for the werewolf legislation are almost complete. And, yes, it's strange to be back in the castle."
They were in the Head of Slytherin's suite in one of the upper dungeons, a few levels above the Potions classrooms. The Defense professor for the younger levels had the rooms behind the classroom, and it had made sense for Severus to take the suite closer to the Slytherin common room again. These were the rooms he'd had to himself for so long between the wars, and they'd gone unoccupied for the past several years as the Head of Slytherin, Arcturus Martin-Waynebridge, had been more comfortable in the warmer tower rooms near his Divination classroom. (Trelawney had packed up and left two years after the war, likely because of the chafing between her and Minerva though nobody had ever out-and-out said as much.)
"Well. I'm contractually obligated to be in the Great Hall for eight meals a week, three meals each weekend until we start up the Hogsmeade rota, and every meal calling itself a Feast." He flicked a bit of non-existent lint from his lapel. "Are you joining me, or have you decided to take advantage of your ability to opt out?"
"You're impossible," Hermione muttered, holding out her hands so that he could help her up and then fussing a bit with the drape of her own dress robes. They were a lovely cranberry color that flattered her skin tone and were just dark enough that she didn't feel like they were coordinating like holly and berries.
He kissed her and then they walked up to the Welcoming Feast together. (The most remarkable part of the Feast was how unremarkable it was that three Muggle-borns were Sorted into Slytherin.)