Summary: SSHG, AU, Harry decides its time to go and see Hermione and figure out why she won't marry Ron.
Beta Love: Dragon and the Rose
Prompt: The letter lay untouched on his desk, its creases marked by dust.
Serpentine
Flash Fiction for 31 Days of SSHG Flash Fiction 2023
If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking.
George S. Patton
It was so much easier during the war, Harry figured.
Everything was fairly black and white. Good versus evil. Dark Lord vs light. Innocents versus criminals—
The letter had lain on his desk, untouched. It had stayed there for so long, its creases had been marked with dust. The ink had faded under layers of particles.
He'd believed in so many things because that was what was expected of him. The Weasleys had always guided him to the truth of the Wizarding World. They and Dumbledore had been the faultless moral compass he'd relied on to know who was on the "right" side.
And then Snape's memories had, for the second time, proven to him that what he thought had been ruse—Snape really had been fighting on his side all along, however begrudgingly. He'd treated him like toxic waste and the evil of all evils—and the man had been trying to keep him alive. Meanwhile, Dumbledore—the man he'd thought could do no wrong—had known all along that he needed to die and had kept him alive until just the right moment, expecting Harry to nobly sacrifice his life, precisely as planned.
Oh, sure, it may have been for better reasons than most, but it had still resulted in Harry stumbling blindly in the dark toward his death.
When Hermione had finally told Ron off and basically told Harry to pull his head out of his bleeding arse, he had clenched so hard and automatically relied on the Weasleys to tell him what he should do. He hadn't understood why Hermione had been so terribly upset with Ron.
They were meant, after all.
Everyone thought so.
If it was so easy for the entire Weasley family to see, then why was it so hard for Hermione?
As he walked up the trail to Hermione's house—he'd had to look up her address in the records department because he hadn't seen her since—well, since she'd thrown him and Ron out of her flat when Ron had impulsively proposed to her.
He'd told Ron that he needed to give her a proper ring, but he'd used the ring he knew full well Lavender positively oogled over.
"All witches want a big diamond," Ron had said. "As long as they look like diamonds, it's good enough, yeah?"
Maybe Hermione had known it was one of those artificial Muggle diamonds they grew in labs. Or one of those enchanted glass pieces from Knockturn Alley. But how could she have known? She hadn't been there when they'd bought it.
As he opened an iron gate to walk up the path, a gryphon raised its head from the laden blueberry bushes, blue stains all over his vicious beak. The creature gave him a suspicious glare and promptly passed a ripe cloud of fruity stench, bashed the carcass of a freshly-killed rabbit against the bush to stain it blue, and continued eating.
Harry gagged and staggered along on his way. How the bloody hell did Hermione get a gryphon to stay on her property?
As he saw the garden fountain, he used it to rinse off his hands from the random muck he'd gone through, and a small herd of seahorses popped their heads out of the water and spewed over him in multi-coloured jets.
Harry choked and stumbled backwards, rubbing the water out of his eyes.
He scowled, deciding to dry himself off with his wand, but a feathered serpent poked its head out of the nearby hedge and snatched his wand before it disappeared back into the foliage.
"What the—bloody hell!" Harry cursed.
Spurred into action but not quite sure what action that would be, Harry stormed forward toward the residence and smacked face first into a giant spider web.
Large, quaffle-size spiders stared at him from the edges of the web with consternation.
"That's not food."
"Well, it might be. It ran into the web."
"I don't think they'd like it if we ate a human."
"True."
"So, now what do we do with it?"
"Isn't it a he?"
"Is it? It's so hard to tell—"
"Well, if the mistress eats him, then he's probably male."
"Probably."
"Maybe."
"She hasn't eaten her mate, so he might be safe."
"Possibly—"
"What if he dances really well?"
"Might live longer."
"Until her actual mate kills it, er, him."
"True—he's a bit possessive."
"Should we let it go?"
"All that wasted silk."
"We should probably let it go."
"I'm still thinking it's a he."
"It's so hard to tell—"
"Maybe strip him down and check for pertinent parts?"
"Too much effort for food."
"Too much effort for un-food, too."
"True."
The spiders whispered to each other conspiratorily.
"Fine, I'll cut the threads."
One spider tapped the lines with its feet and then snipped them. Harry went crashing down, face first, into the thorny rose bushes.
"Ouch."
"That looked pretty painful."
"We should probably bandage it up."
Severus slithered up to his mate, wrapping his scaled tail snugly around hers as he took her into his arms.
"Having a good sun worship, love?"
"Don't I always?" Hermione said, her headsnakes giving him a fang-filled yawn from multiple heads. The scales that framed her face glistened like rainbows on obsidian, and she smiled at him before tucking her head under his chin.
"I banished Harcourt outside after his last batch of flatulence almost killed your hydroponic garden."
Hermione thumped her head against his chest. "That gryphon is toxic. It's no wonder his family kicked him out of the nest."
"And you just had to adopt him," Severus said, his lips flattening into a firm line.
"I understand outcasts a bit better than most," Hermione said, her headsnakes giving decisive nods of agreement.
"You don't have war-grade toxic flatulence," Severus noted.
"No, I just turn mortals into stone statuaries," Hermione said with pursed lips.
"I find that one of your most endearing qualities, my mate," Severus rumbled.
"You would, you're immune," Hermione accused.
Severus gave her a gallant shrug. "How could I possibly speak illy of the trait that found my mate, hrm?"
"And gave the DoM a few arboretum statuaries—"
"They were pompous imbeciles anyway," Severus said. "If they can't follow directions, how is that our fault?" He tickled one of the vipers under the chin, and its tongue flicked in approval.
"Oh," Hermione said. "I let Tobias take the snakelings to the museum. He's ever so engaged in their education now that he doesn't have to be drunk all the time."
"Who knew petrification powers were dulled by alcohol," Severus said. "Unfortunately, when he was drunk, he couldn't even remember what or who he was."
"I feel bad for him—I mean—he fell in love with a mortal, and the only way he could not murder her was to drink, but in drinking, he became—"
"An unmitigated bastard," Severus said, his brows knitting together. "I suppose I have to thank Nagini for starting the entire chain of events. If she hadn't bitten me, I'd never have Turned properly, you'd have stoned me instead of mating with me, and my father would still be a wart on the rump of humanity."
Hermione frowned. "Magic works in strange ways, I will confess that I had no idea—my parents kept it under wraps for over twenty years. They ran a dentist practice! It does explain why they always wore tinted glasses and never drank, though. I always thought they were near-sighted and sensitive to sunlight. I feel bad your father didn't know about that. Your home life could have been so much easier."
Severus sighed. "Or more complicated. If I had known what I was going into Hogwarts, a lot of things would have ended badly. I was not the wisest of adolescents, and Potter's gang of reprobates did not help any. I would probably have stoned them, and I'd be stuck in the DoM as a classed XXXXX creature with no outside rights."
"I'm surprised the stress didn't flip your bloodline on," Hermione said.
"As triggers go, better bitten by Nagini than almost raped by a hormonal carrot headed weasel."
"You're so romantic, love," Hermione said. "If it weren't for Ron, you'd never have slithered into my life. Not that I appreciated being sexually assaulted, but at least thanks to you he didn't get far."
"Well, at least the Obliviation teams took care of his libido permanently along with his memories of your species," Severus said.
Hermione laughed. "Good things come to those who wait."
"I should have let you stone him to death," Severus said wistfully.
"Then we'd both be in the DoM," Hermione commented.
Severus sighed. "Fine, I will admit that a secret seaside cottage with my own brewing laboratory and snuggly mate beats incarceration."
Hermione sputtered and put a tender kiss upon his nose. "I love you."
"Hn, and I you," Severus answered, forked tongue flicking.
Their conversation was interrupted by a half-cocooned Harry Potter landing face first at their feet, half on fire, butt full of thorns, and an angry mini quetzalcoatl cursing at him in fluent scorn from the hedges.
Severus' lips twitched.
Hermione sighed. "He didn't open the letter."
"Obviously."
And here we reach the 1500 word limit again. *sob*
Death to word limits!
A/N: Hope you enjoyed the story.