DISCLAIMER: All characters seen here are the exclusive property of JK Rowling. She's the genius, I'm the fangirl who can't resist playing with her creations.

Chapter 2

"Suffering is one very long moment. We cannot divide it by seasons. We can only record its moods, and chronicle their return. With us time itself does not progress. It revolves. It seems to circle round one centre of pain."
-Oscar Wilde, De Profundis

Whether Snape was really asleep or not, Hermione couldn't tell. Nor could she tell anything else. If she strained, she could hear him breathing, but other than that, there was no noise. The silence was unnerving, especially after months of living with Harry, Ron, and Ginny at Grimmauld Place. No wonder he lost track of time here. It seemed to have stopped altogether.

Eventually, she fell asleep; at least, she thought she might have. It was difficult to tell, when her last conscious thought was of darkness and silence, and her first waking thought was the same. There was a noise now, though, which hadn't been there before. She didn't immediately recognize it, but she had time to listen and analyze. Eventually it came to her: chewing. Snape must be eating.

It was a strangely comforting sound to hear while sitting in that room. The sounds of a man eating, even if he didn't seem to be doing it with gusto or relish, were sounds, thanks to Ron, that she associated with warmth and home and happiness.

But the thought of Ron, so far away, was an unfortunate one. Homesickness overwhelmed her in a sudden rush. What was he doing right now? She had no idea what time it was. He could be asleep, or talking to Harry, or out somewhere looking for her even at that moment. Or perhaps he was dead. Perhaps he'd fallen in the same ambush that had led to her capture. A lump formed in her throat, and she swallowed. How long ago was it that she'd been at Grimmauld Place, listening to him shower and feeling pre-emptively annoyed by the knowledge that, when he was finished, he would want to spend time with her instead of leaving her to her thoughts?

The tactile memory of him filled her senses, made stronger by the absence of other sensations. She could feel his arms around her, his shoulder under her cheek.

"You're awake?" she said to Snape, anxious to reassure herself that she wasn't utterly alone.

The chewing stopped.

"In theory," he said at last. "Miss Granger?"

She raised her eyebrows, though she knew he couldn't see. "Who else would it be?"

"I ... was not sure that you were actually here."

"Oh," she said, unable to come up with an answer that felt adequate.

She heard him take another bite and chew it rather loudly. "After a certain amount of time," he said, when he'd swallowed, "the mind can play tricks on itself. Are you hungry?"

"I guess so."

"Come here."

She blinked, and felt again the unnerving sensation of vertigo that came with unexpected blindness. "Where are you?" she asked, hoping he'd speak again.

"Follow the sound of my voice." He sounded impatient. "You might as well start learning at once how to navigate in the dark. It is nearly always dark in here."

The floor was wooden, and seemed flat enough. Still, not knowing anything about the room that held her, Hermione didn't want to stand up. She crawled on her hands and knees in the direction that she thought his voice had come from, until she was stopped by the unpleasant sensation of her head hitting the wall, hard.

"A little more to the left, I think," said Snape, sounding amused.

"That hurt," said Hermione, ashamed to discover that she was near tears.

"Of course it did. Next time, keep track of where the walls are. You will learn the dimensions of the room soon enough, I assure you. They are not over-large. Now, if you're hungry, come here."

She tried again, this time keeping one shoulder against the wall so that she could tell where it was. This time, instead of hitting the wall, she bumped into him, although not as hard. She'd learned, at least, to crawl slowly.

"A tolerable effort. Sit."

His commanding tone, so much like the one he always used with students, made her want to protest. But what was there to protest about? From the direction of his voice, he was sitting on the floor, so there was no point in standing up. Nor did she want to eat while on her hands and knees.

She sat.

A hand brushed over her thigh. She jumped.

"Stop moving." She heard a soft scuffing noise, and then he located her hand with his, and nudged it with his knuckles. "Open your hand, girl," he said impatiently. When she did, he pushed a piece of bread into it.

She brought it to her nose and sniffed. It smelled faintly rancid, and felt strangely dusty. She wondered if it was moldy.

"You might as well eat it," he said. From the sound of it, he was very close indeed. "You won't get anything else. Whatever state of decay it's in, it won't kill you."

Hermione took a bite. It tasted as dry and dusty as it felt, but it was edible. After three bites, though, her jaws were beginning to tire, and she was horribly thirsty.

"Is there any water?"

Again, a hand fumbled along her body, and then, when he'd located her hand, he set a cool, smooth bottle down on the floor beside it. "Conserve it," he said. "That is all we have between us until they return and deign to bring more."

She took a sip. The coolness of the bottle had promised cool water, but this was room-temperature, and tasted as if it had been sitting for some time. Still, it was water, and it wet her mouth enough to let her continue eating.

"When will they come back?"

There was another noise of fabric rubbing on fabric. When he spoke, his voice was further away, and she knew he'd repositioned himself. "They will return when they wish to return. I have never been left for longer than twenty-four hours, as far as I can tell. Sometimes it is far less."

She took another bite and chewed it slowly, trying to think about how to ask the next question. The thought of it left her with a heavy, anxious feeling in her chest. She swallowed, and took just enough water to wet her lips.

"You said before that they ... interrogate you," she said, trying to sound casual.

Another silence. "Yes," he said.

"Does that mean--do they--"

"Yes." His voice was grim.

"What are they after? I mean, what do they want to know? Any information you've got about the movements of the Order is three weeks out of date. We haven't got much else that's still a secret. What are they af--"

"I prefer not to ask what they are truly after. Ostensibly, they want statistics on Order membership and plans, and about Potter's weaknesses. There are, however, much easier ways to obtain such information. They are not interested in answers, Miss Granger."

Snape was no more talkative than he'd ever been, which Hermione found somewhat surprising, given that he'd spent three weeks with no company other than Death Eaters who only wished to torture him. He soon got up and moved away. He, apparently, felt comfortable enough to walk. What had he done for the last three weeks, in his hours alone in the dark?

"I'm going to explore," she said, mostly to gauge by his answer where he was.

"I would advise you against standing up until you are more familiar with the layout of the room. There are items on the floor that you--" he stopped very abruptly. "Come here," he whispered sharply. "Get behind me."

"Where are you? What's going on?" She felt the floor blindly, crawling towards his voice.

"Follow my voice. They are here."

She crawled another few feet (she guessed), and then felt his hands reaching out towards her. As soon as they touched her body, he felt for her wrist and grabbed it, pulling her roughly towards himself.

"Get behind me," he whispered again, his voice urgent. "Stay seated. Do not meet their eyes. And, if you can possibly keep your mouth shut, do not speak."

"How do you know--" she began, but she stopped. She'd heard it too: voices, saying something that sounded like an incantation to bring down the wards. Snape's hearing, it seemed, was far better than hers. Perhaps the time in the dark had amplified his other senses, as if he had really gone blind.

The voices were male, and she felt a momentary, shining hope that it might be Ron and Harry. Bill was a curse-breaker. Perhaps they'd found her and brought Bill to break through the wards.

A moment later, though, the wards came down, and she heard the door opening in the next room.

"It's really Granger?" said one voice. She didn't even bother thinking about what the speaker was saying for the first few moments. It was enough for her that it wasn't Ron or Harry.

"It's her, all right." She recognized the voice of the blond Death Eater.

"Excellent. I want to see her."

Beside her, Snape made a sudden, jerky movement. "Be still," he whispered, so quietly that she almost couldn't understand him. He thrust some sort of garment into her hands. It was covered with buttons, and she guessed that it was his frock coat. "Cover yourself with this. Pretend that you are sleeping. It is a feeble attempt to make yourself inconspicuous, but perhaps they will pass you over for the time being."

She heard him stand up and walk again. He was wearing shoes. The noise they made on the floor seemed horribly loud, after he'd whispered so softly.

The door opened.

Light flooded the room, and Hermione was subjected to a new kind of blindness, just as complete as that of darkness. She squinted and ducked her head a little lower behind the coat, waiting for her vision to adjust to the daylight now streaming into the room. She was partially shielded by the door, which had opened towards her, but looking at the light was enough to make her eyes water.

Snape, though, didn't shade his eyes. As far as she could tell, he didn't even flinch. He simply stood there, looking at the man who stood silhouetted in the door.

"Snape," said the man.

Snape's lip curled and he wrinkled his nose as if he'd just smelled something terribly unpleasant. "Rodolphus."

Rodolphus Lestrange looked around the room, which was still dark in the corners. "Lumos!" he muttered, holding his wand up and looking around the room. He bore a strange resemblance to his dead wife, one that was strong enough to leave Hermione nauseated. Harry had passed on some of Sirius's information about the inbreeding amongst purebloods, and she wondered how closely the Lestranges and the Blacks had been linked before the union of Bellatrix and Rodolphus.

He poked the wand into her corner last, and a feral look of triumph came over his features. "Ah," he said, taking a step towards her. "This is most agreeable, is it not, Severus? A Mudblood to keep you company. Let it not be said that we are unkind to you, old friend. You always did have a taste for dirty blood, didn't you?"

Snape, who looked gaunt and paler than ever, moved his hand instinctively towards the empty wand holster on his sleeve. "She knows nothing. A useful bargaining chip, perhaps, but not a source of information."

"You don't expect me to believe that, do you?" said Lestrange conversationally. "Harry Potter's best friend? The famous Mudblood prodigy, not know anything? I hardly think that the Order would neglect to make use of someone so talented."

He had taken two more steps towards her. Another step and their feet would nearly be touching.

He dropped to a crouch and looked at her at eye level, licking his teeth and looking thoughtful. "I see why Potter likes her. If she wasn't so filthy, I might be interested myself. It's no good pretending to be asleep, little girl." He reached forward and grabbed the frock coat she'd covered herself with, tossing it aside.

"Potter isn't likely to bargain with you if she's been harmed," said Snape.

"On the contrary, Severus, I think he will be very inclined to accede to my demands, once I have demonstrated that I am willing to injure her and will require incentive not to do so. A few trinkets or garments, perhaps a photograph, and I imagine he will surrender himself quite swiftly."

"You demonstrate a gross misunderstanding of the Gryffindor mind, Rodolphus."

"Mm," said Rodolphus, not looking away from Hermione. "What about your mind, Severus? Tell me, what could possibly make you take an interest in her? You know as well as I that it would be wiser for you to cease attempting to draw my attention away from her and onto yourself. I thought you called yourself a Slytherin."

Hermione, though she was no longer pretending to be asleep, kept her mouth shut, as Snape had instructed her to do. Snape kept his shut as well, unwilling or unable to answer the question.

"If you have a weakness, Severus, it is that you are far too solicitous for the well-being of your students. The Dark Lord remarked on it many times during your tenure as Hogwarts Headmaster. It was a regrettable failing on your part that you were so unwilling to see them suffer." His wand was still out, and he was twisting it this way and that in his hand, watching Hermione with an expression that made him look even more frighteningly similar to his dead wife. "I have long since thought that it was time we attempted finding other ways to break you. Granger's arrival is quite convenient in that regard."

Snape was standing behind Lestrange, so it was only Hermione who saw the fleeting look of horror and understanding in his eyes. She had the very unpleasant feeling that she had missed something important.

"Waters," said Lestrange.

For a moment, Hermione couldn't understand what he could possibly mean. Then the other Death Eater entered the room, wand out. After eyeing Snape suspiciously, he turned to Lestrange. "What do you need?"

"Take the girl."

The Death Eater, Waters, crossed the room in two steps, bent down, and lifted Hermione off the ground. He was strong, and not gentle, and her ribs ached from the pressure he put on them. He carried her through the door. Lestrange followed, closing and locking it before nodding to Waters, who dropped her on the floor.

"You had the honor of meeting my wife at one point, I believe," said Lestrange, looking at Hermione as if she were a beetle he very much wished to step on.

"I met her," she said.

"A fine figure of a woman," he said. "Don't you agree?"

Hermione scowled at him. "Not particularly."

He smiled coldly. "I have news for you, Granger. A Weasley has died. The youngest son, I believe. Hit by a curse." He sniffed dismissively. "The funeral's to be held in two days."

She sat up, rubbing her side and wondering if she'd broken ribs from the force with which Waters had thrown her to the ground. A Weasley dead? The youngest son--that meant Ron. She looked at Lestrange, who was watching her closely, and decided that she didn't dare speak a word. She bit her lip instead, tears welling up in her eyes.

0 0 0

Severus stayed rooted to the spot after the door closed and darkness engulfed him again. It had begun to feel familiar, especially as he had learned to associate light with pain. He could hear muffled voices outside, but couldn't make out the words. He wondered what they were telling her, and if it were true.

Feeling the way with his feet, he shuffled carefully towards the door and laid his ear against it. He still couldn't make out what they were saying.

A moment later, it started. She began to scream. He flinched, pressing his face hard against the door and straining to hear. They must be using Cruciatus. Nothing else could tear sounds like that from a person's throat. He had never heard her scream before. It was a strange noise, coming from her. She was prone to anxiety about marks, and to being overly gregarious in classes, but, her tendency towards shrewishness notwithstanding, his experience of her rarely involved loud noises.

It didn't last long, though. The drawn-out screams were soon replaced by smaller, softer cries, punctuated by the muffled sounds of a body being beaten. He began to feel ill. This was his fault. Whatever Rodolphus said about his desire to prove his ruthlessness to Harry Potter, Severus doubted very much that they would be torturing her if they didn't believe it would affect him. Rodolphus had said as much to him just before they carried her out.

He frowned. There was no love lost between the girl and himself. Still, Rodolphus was right. She had been his student. He'd spent six years nurturing in himself a desire to protect her, especially given her association with Harry. Her safety had frequently meant Harry's, and he had sworn to ensure that Harry stayed alive. It was difficult to simply forget the toil he had put into preserving her life thus far.

It was so hard to reckon time. Eventually he walked away from the door and sat down beside the meagre crusts of bread still left to them. Feeling carefully with his fingertips, he divided them into equal portions. He took his time about it, breaking the pieces apart with the precision that years of brewing had given his fingers. When he had them exactly equal, he set them down carefully beside the water bottle.

She screamed again. After a moment, he picked up one of the pieces of bread and broke it again, removing a third from its length. This smaller piece, he set next to the other. He would reserve some extra for her. She was not yet used to deprivation as he was. She would need the nourishment, after this ordeal.

Eventually, he ceased to hear anything. There was nothing left but the familiar darkness, and a sick feeling of guilt.

0 0 0

Even though she had heard their conversation with Snape and their stated intentions for her, she couldn't believe them for long. They weren't going to hold her, or use her to extort Harry. She felt sure they were going to kill her and dump her body on the steps of the Ministry, as they had done with so many others. She was going to die.

And, finally, it stopped. Convinced that the killing curse would soon follow, she determined to meet her death like a Gryffindor, and she raised her head, looking Lestrange full in the eyes and refusing to cry out or move in anyway.

He laughed. "Very pretty attempt at bravery, girl. I am curious, do you know what they say about Unforgivable Curses? They say that you have to mean them. Tell me, what is your opinion? Do you think I lack conviction? Do I lack the will to wipe that noble expression off your filthy Mudblood face? Crucio!"

Hermione screamed and screamed, until there was nothing left in the world except for pain, and the sound of her own screaming, and then there was nothing left but pain, because her voice had given out. Just when she thought that she would surely go mad, it stopped. They thrust a glass of water to her lips and forced her to drink. Then, shoving a loaf of crusty, stale bread into her hands, they put her back in the dark room and closed the door.

They hadn't even tried to get information from her.

She managed to get to her hands and knees before she began to retch. When her stomach was empty, she crawled a few inches away from the puddle of half-digested bread and fetid water, and collapsed in on herself, curling up in a ball and sobbing.

Through her pain, she was vaguely aware of the fact that Professor Snape was quite nearby. She could hear him moving, and then, yes, there he was, feeling for her through the darkness.

"Miss Granger," he said insistently. She blinked, though her eyes saw only darkness. He sounded much, much farther away than she'd thought he was.

He said her name again, and she opened her mouth to answer, but nothing came out. She coughed instead, and then her stomach gave a mighty heave, trying to expel things that were no longer there. Her skin felt cold and clammy, and she was slick with sweat.

"Miss Granger," he said a third time, louder, and he was so close to her that she could feel his breath on her face. "You must stay awake," he said. "You are not accustomed to this."

She had only a few seconds to consider the implications of his words--he was accustomed to it, apparently. Then, against every expectation she might have ever formed, had she been capable of thinking at all, he lifted her awkwardly up and held her in his arms. She went limp and lay against him, but he put her down again almost immediately.

"Lie still," he said commandingly. She felt him move, and he lifted her feet and held them in what she presumed to be his lap. "You are in shock. Do not go to sleep. Alert me if you feel that you cannot breathe. Do not be afraid."

"Water," she said, fumbling for the word through the dizzy fog in her brain.

She felt him shift, and then he leaned over her and supported her head while she drank. When she laid her head down on the floor again, he resumed his post at her feet.

She lay that way for a long time, too exhausted to move. Every nerve in her body was in pain, as if she'd been stabbed with a thousand needles at once. It was a feeling she'd experienced once before, and she let her mind dwell on the memory. The situations had been both so similar and so different. First capture, and then imprisonment (at least once), and then she'd been tortured by a Lestrange. Ron had been there the first time, though. Even when they'd dragged him away from her and locked him up, she'd been able to hear him, screaming her name again and again.

Snape hadn't made a noise.

Not that she'd expected him to. She and Ron were in love, and he, unlike Snape, could hardly be accused of being phlegmatic.

"Are you awake?" said Snape, at length.

"Yes." Her throat and mouth felt dry, and she shivered.

"How do you feel?"

"Cold."

"Do not move." He set her feet down on the floor and moved away. When he returned, she felt the weight of his frock coat as he draped it over her, his fingers touching her lightly here and there to discover where she was.

After some time, he asked again, "How do you feel? Are you in pain? Are you warmer?"

"Yes. No," she whispered. Her teeth were chattering, and she wondered if she had a fever.

"I have nothing more to cover you with. You must stay warm. I have no wish for you to die while in my care. I will have Potter and Weasley to answer to when they discover it."

She couldn't tell if he was joking or not. The mention of Ron brought back to her mind what Rodolphus Lestrange had told her, and she began to cry. Snape didn't ask her why.

"In the interest of preserving your life, and for no other reason, I intend to ... keep you warm, Miss Granger," he said, sounding like a man about to undertake an incredibly unpleasant duty. He lay down beside her, and he draped his arm over her, gathering her body close to his.

"Don't," she said, her voice weaker and more pathetic than she'd intended it to sound.

"I assure you," he said irritably, his mouth evidently very close to her ear now, "it is far from pleasant for me. I will not, however, let you die when mere physical discomfort on my part could have prevented it."

Hermione, too cold and too tired to argue that it didn't matter, Ron was dead and there was no point in staying alive because they would never be found, submitted. She lay on the floor in Snape's arms and wept for Ron.

0 0 0

The following days settled quickly into monotony, broken only by occasional meetings with Rodolphus Lestrange and other Death Eaters, who always remained masked. Sometimes they asked questions about Harry, or offered tidbits of information. Other times, they said nothing. Frequently, they simply pulled her or Snape from the room and did nothing, sitting and staring at them for minutes or hours. Hermione wasn't sure what she dreaded more during those times. It was terrible to sit there and wait, wondering how long it would be before they tortured her. She eventually learned to prefer the times when they got straight to it. The uncertainty that came with waiting was often worse than the physical pain, unless they used the Cruciatus Curse.

It was terrible to wait in their presence, but it was equally terrible to be left alone in the dark. She and Snape were hardly friends, but there was a certain closeness that was an unavoidable side effect of spending hours with someone, even if those hours were largely filled with silence. He was the first to undergo one of these sessions. That first time, left alone without the muffled sounds of beating and speaking through the door, Hermione was convinced they'd killed him. It was nearly impossible to tell how much time went by, but when time began to drag ever more slowly, despair crept up on her and she felt a depression worse even than what had tormented her since she'd learned of Ron's death. She was truly alone.

But then they'd opened the door and sent him back in, unharmed. Soon, she learned to feel almost relieved to hear the sounds of his torture, horrible and sickening as it was. As long as they were intent on causing him pain, he was alive and would return. She wouldn't be left by herself in the dark.

The first time it happened to her, she lay on the ground at their feet, feeling their impassive stares as they watched her. Were they waiting for her to do something? Were they going to kill her? She wondered if Snape was waiting for news that she was dead. It was no easier to mark the passing of time in their presence than it was in the dark. It was simply hour after hour of endless waiting.

One day, when they brought him back from one of these periods of silence, they performed a charm that lit the room. The sudden brilliance was painful, and Hermione shielded her eyes.

Snape walked slowly back into the room and stood still until they closed the door, at which point he sat down and, picking up a small strip of wood that he had apparently prised up from the floor at some point, he began to carefully scrape grime out from beneath his fingernails.

Hermione, who had taken some time to finally grow used to the lack of really proper hygiene, watched him with interest. She hadn't had a shower or cleaned her teeth in ages. Her hair was lank and heavy with grease, and, though she'd stopped noticing it, she was sure that she stank.

"Professor," she said, inspecting a hole in her jeans that she hadn't noticed before, "how long have I been here?"

He waited a moment, studying her thoughtfully before answering. "I could not say for sure," he said. "It has been demonstrated that my reckoning of time can be ... inaccurate."

"Could you guess?"

"A month."

"They haven't said anything about Harry."

"No."

She hugged her knees to herself. "Why not?"

He shrugged laconically. "I doubt that they have actually been in communication with him."

"Then what's the point?"

He looked at her again, raising his eyebrows in surprise. "I thought you would have understood by now. They do not require a reason. I am a traitor, and you are Harry Potter's friend. That is enough for a death warrant. Or, I suppose, for torture." He crossed his legs at the ankle, stretching them out in front of him. "After all," he said softly, "they can only kill you once."

"You mean they're just torturing you because they can?"

"You sound surprised."

"I--I hadn't really thought about it before now."

"There is valuable information they could extract from me, if they ever succeeded in extracting it from me. They do not wish to. Rodolphus Lestrange is a sadist, Miss Granger. I trust you are familiar with the term."

Hermione shivered. "Have they ... given you any news?"

He blinked. "News?"

"When I first came, they told me that--that Ron was dead," she whispered. It was the first time she'd ventured to speak of it. Somehow, Snape was easier to talk to when he was visible and not merely a disembodied voice in the darkness.

"Do you believe it?"

"I don't know. I don't want to believe it, but if I refuse to believe it, and I--we ever get out of here, and it turns out to be true..."

"It is a conveniently disturbing piece of information to give you." He'd averted his eyes, as if he preferred not being able to see her. "I doubt I should trust it, if I were you."

She took a deep breath. She was long accustomed to trusting him and accepting his words. Even when he wasn't in a position to truly reassure her, it helped that he made the attempt.

"Why did they light the room?"

He wrinkled his nose. "I imagine to let us experience some sensation of disgust at our relative appearances. Days without proper hygiene are unflattering to you, Miss Granger."

"You can talk," she snapped.

"I, however, am used to going without proper hygiene. Or so I have been informed."

She smiled before she realized what she was doing. It felt strange to smile, as if her face wasn't used to it anymore.

"Your nose is broken," he added conversationally.

Hermione's hands flew to her nose and she frowned, feeling the small, painful bump there. "I thought it might be. I hoped not, though."

"The damage is not irreparable."

"I--it's easier to talk when the lights are on."

This statement led to the longest pause yet. Finally, he shifted where he sat, crossing his arms and studying her curiously. "I disagree," he said.

"Why?"

He shrugged. "I have very little to say in either case."

"I noticed. Why don't you want to talk?"

"I believe I answered that question a moment ago."

"Not really. I don't have much to say, but I could still talk."

"A blindingly obvious fact," he said, sneering slightly.

She hugged her knees more tightly to her chest, trying not to feel the sting in his words. "I just--it makes me feel less alone to talk."

"You are not alone." He sounded almost surprised by the idea. "Talking or not talking is immaterial."

"Why is it easier to talk in the dark?"

He sighed. "You are a former student. I am accustomed to certain formalities. It is easier to forgo them when I cannot see you."

Hermione let her legs slide away from her chest and lay down, pillowing her head on her hands. She'd grown used to sleeping on the hard floor, and had learned to be comfortable there. The light was giving her a headache, and she closed her eyes. "Oh. I don't see why it matters, anyway. You don't talk."

"Do you wish me to talk more?"

Surprise made her open her eyes again, and she looked at him. "Does it make a difference? I mean, if I wanted you to--if I asked, occasionally--would you?"

His face was impassive. "It might be better than listening to your endless crying."

She wanted to turn away from him, to tell him not to bother putting himself out on her account. But the offer of an occasional real conversation, as opposed to terse exchanges about food or drink or injuries was too good to pass up. She nodded.

"I shall consider it, Miss Granger."

"You might call me Hermione."

He snorted. "I might. For now, however, I plan to sleep."

"Why sleep now? Don't you want to enjoy the light while it's here?"

He met her eyes. "Do not make something special of it, Hermione. It will be gone soon enough, and you will regret its absence more if you do."

Author's Notes: Sunday is update day, just so you all know.

Many thanks to Renita Leandra for her prompt and thorough beta work. She is made of love.