Author's Note
A few hours ahead of officially being Wednesday but the chapter is ready to go, so no sense in holding on to it. Going forward I'll be striving to update one a week on Wednesdays. This will continue through November. After November, this will go on a small hiatus for the month of December while I work on updates for The Resurrection Witch, A Sorted Marriage, the Headmaster's Devil series, and the In a Time of War series.
I hope you enjoy the update and thank you so much to all of y'all for the comments, kudos, and bookmarks.
SLaG
Chapter Three
Stupid was not a good look and unfortunately for Hermione, it was the only one she was capable of portraying as she was struck dumb by the sight of Professor Snape. This wasn't even the first time she had seen him so casually dressed but there was always a sense of alarm at seeing her professors in something other than teaching robes. It was as if the mind couldn't grasp the notion of teachers being real people, with lives of their own away from the classroom. They filled a singular role as an educator and were supposed to stay within that mold. If they didn't, it shattered the notion of unattainability. Or at least that's how she had felt upon seeing Professor Snape in something other than his voluminous robes for the first time summer before last at Grimmauld Place.
It had been there - in a cage that she was sure had been gilded once upon a time - that her girlish fancy of the man had grown. Prior to that summer, Professor Snape had existed in her mind as a brilliant professor and fearless knight only short a noble steed as he had rushed to save her from a turned Lupin. Or more accurately, to save Harry who she too had been protecting with her slight body. Either way, the fantasy had taken root within her mind, leaving her to dream of him as some dark alternative to the depthless Prince Charming.
Then, trapped as she had been inside the crumbling Islington house of horrors, she had gone and truly fallen for her Potions professor. Living in the same space as him - though he was often a ghostly presence rarely seen outside of the lab if he was even in residence; experiencing the overwhelming amount of mistrust and whispered, derisive comments that circulated around the other members of the Order about the Death Eater turned spy; and hiding down in his lab where he aided and abetted her escape from Molly Weasley who seemed to take joy in cutting Hermione down at every turn but especially in front of him. It was down there that she had discovered him to be infinitely more patient and indulgent with her admittedly incessant questions, proving him to be a wonderful teacher when he wasn't overseeing thirty brewing cauldrons carelessly thrown together by a class of students fulfilling a requirement. He had humanized himself that summer, unknowingly stepping down from the pedestal she had placed her idolized ideal of him on. In doing so, he had sealed the fate of her infatuation, allowing it to grow into the incomparable, devastatingly unrequited, sexually awakened, harbored love she felt for him.
So for the last year and a half, she had tried to project an air of deep, unreguritated intelligence and unmistakable competence whenever she found herself in his presence. She desperately wanted him to see beyond her place in his classroom, where despite what the bows that held her hair back and Gryffindor uniform suggested, she was a witch of age; one that was in want of him. Instead, she was reduced to a gobsmacked, empty headed, bint with not only him, but the Headmaster, her head of house, and Remus there to witness. And all thanks to a single word: Daddy.
It was a word that fit in her mind. It slid home giving a name to the things she yearned for. A subtle warmth heating her still settling nerves, its evidence gracing her cheeks as she continued to fixate on it. Daddy… That was what she wanted, needed , and it was painfully obvious as she continued to stare at the unassuming bracelet that honored him as such, that it was a role he would never fill in her life. He was someone else's and the realization split her tender heart in two; breaking for the first time as she finally tore her eyes away and began to dissect the carpeting of the office, looking for the hidden seams so as to not shed another tear in his presence.
With their questions finally done and the period of silence as they calculated over, Hermione finally reached an emotional neutrality. Watching as Professors McGonagall and Snape compared their findings - he seemingly satisfied and vindicated and she looking for all the world as if a heavy weight had been lifted from her shoulders - she turned inquisitive despite Dumbledore's request.
"If I'm not to be sent to Azkaban, expelled, or incur any sort of punishment - I'm not right?" She quickly interjected, her heart slamming into her chest as she realized they had only promised to spare her from the worst of her fates.
"No, Miss Granger," Dumbledore smiled softly. "You are in no trouble and shall receive no punishment."
"Then why did my age need to be verified?"
"You truly are incapable of not asking questions, aren't you, Miss Granger?" Professor Snape, asked snidely or maybe it was dryly and she hadn't put as firm a lid on her injured feelings as she had thought.
"I think we can allow this particular one, Severus ," Professor McGonagall chastised.
"I agree," Remus conquered, giving her an encouraging smile, as he knocked his knee into hers, whispering, "Chin up, Hermione. It's not as fatal as it seems now."
Though her former professor had no knowledge of what exactly he was reassuring her of, she still wrapped the words around her reminding herself that heartbreak from an unrequited love had never actually killed anyone. Even if in the moment it felt as though it was ending her world.
"I see no harm in bending my own rule so long as your questions and the subsequent answers remain vague," the Headmaster ruled, signing his own name to Professor McGonagall's copy of her age map.
Stuffing the map into an already filled envelope that he had produced from one of the numerous drawers of his desk, he answered, "While seventeen is the age of majority, you are still a student and as such, a minor by rule of morals. However there will come a time in your not too distant future where you will find things to be as they were in the past. There was a time when choices between legality and morality had to be made resulting in the sacrifice of one in the name of the other."
Sealing the envelope first with a multitude of privacy charms, then with the official seal reserved for use by the Head of Hogwarts, he handed the small packet to her.
"You are still a student but if you choose, this will grant you an avenue around such debates when that moment occurs, should you choose to use it. However by taking it, you are by no means obligated to utilize what is inside. It merely provides you options."
Tucking the envelope into the front pocket of her knapsack, Hermione proceeded to cast her own selection of charms. One to prevent anyone from opening the compartment, a second to alert her if by chance her deturances began to fail, and a third to banish the contents into the lining of her bag should they collapse. She undoubtedly painted a paranoid picture but after a year of tyrannical reign under Umbridge, she had learned that she could never be too careful with sensitive information.
"Sir?" She asked slowly, mulling her words over as she tried to muddle her way into vague speech. "Is there a coming matter in which what I did will be needed?"
"Yes, but there is to be no more said about it, Miss Granger."
Understanding that they had reached the end of what was required of her, Hermione rose from the armchair, swinging her bag around her back. Tilting her head to the side, she untucked the heavy length of her hair from where it had been trapped and said, "Thank you for your consideration, Professor. I hope you have a pleasant day," navigating herself around the sitting area.
"Miss Granger," Professor Snape called, the lilt of his voice making her heart jump, plummet, and fall bruised against her ribs.
"Yes, Professor?" She responded quietly, unable to meet his eye.
Holding out the gold ribbon that had wrapped around the tie that secured the top half of her hair back from her face, he said, "You dropped this."
Stepping forward to collect her wilted bow, it vanished from his hand, her reflection in the Headmaster's mirrored cupboards showing her that it had reappeared in her hair, tied with matching large loops, and delicately curled tails.
" Sine dolore haerens ," he casted, with a delicate flick of his wand. "A sticking charm without the risk of removing hair when canceled."
Touching the back of her head and feeling the fading caress of his magic along her fingers, she murmured a light, "Thank you, Professor," her stomach flipping from his simple care as she left.
He gave a simple, downward incline of his head at her words before turning back to join the other two professors and the headmaster in whatever they were conspiring. The desire to pick and linger over their odd behavior was strong. However, with only a fraction of her now canceled Defense lecture remaining before her free period with Theo while the boys continued with Magical Creatures, she noted and filed her questions away for later. Between Harry's continued meetings with Dumbledore, the aurors and Order members patrolling the school, its grounds, and the nearby village, and now whatever secret she carried from the headmaster for herself, she knew they were past the point of sideline speculation and that plans and contingencies needed to be made.
Reaching around her back to the secured front pocket, she patted the brass buckle - a new habit she was already going to have to focus on breaking - her curiosity piquing further. Forcing her fingers away, she instead reached up to finger the tail of her bow as she stepped around the gargoyle, softly smiling.
"Well? What did he want?" Harry asked, jumping up with Ron from the bench opposite the office entrance making her shriek, the sound bouncing off the empty stone corridors.
Clutching her poor, exhausted heart, she scolded, "Merlin, Harry, you gave me a fright! I wasn't expecting y0u to have waited."
"You alright, Hermione? You look funny," Ron observed, tilting his head as he studied her. "You're all pink and Amortentia looking."
Grabbing her cheeks, which were indeed flushed to the touch, she stuttered, "I'm fine," her words lost under the thunderous sound of boots racing down the stairs.
With wands at the ready, Remus and Professor Snape looked primed for an attack as they flanked her, the rustle of robes following them as Professors McGonagall and Dumbledore joined them.
"What's going on out here?" Professor Snape drawled, taking in her two friends who returned his darkening look with sneers.
"Severus, I think they merely startled our Miss Granger," Dumbledore said genially.
"That'll get the heart rate going in the morning," Remus chuckled, stowing his wand. "Well then, since there is no immediate danger to Hermione, or anyone else, I best get back to the classroom. Severus's lengthy lectures aren't going to teach themselves now are they?"
"Why are you dressed like that?" Harry accused more than asked, his eyes squinting at Professor Snape.
"Mister Potter, that is no way to speak to a professor, ten points from Gryffindor," McGonagall immediately reprimanded.
"Well maybe if he would lower his wand," he sassed back.
"Harry!" Hermione chastised.
Always fair but sighing as though she were regretting it, their head of house punished, "Detention, Potter. Tonight, immediately after dinner. Do not be late."
Tucking his wand away but not before lazily twisting it in summons, Professor Snape slipped it into the front pocket of his jeans. Catching his jacket, he shrugged into it, his Dark Mark and the newly revealed and hated bracelet hidden once more as he uncharacteristically dismissed, "Not necessary, Minerva. See you at breakfast on Monday."
"You're going to be gone all weekend?" Harry asked suspiciously, prompting Hermione to cross the hall and grab hold of his sleeve.
Yanking him away, she hissed, "Let's go before that mouth of yours gets you in any more trouble. He's letting your detention pass, don't muck it up."
"And that's not odd to you?"
"Go," she ordered to both boys, sharply pointing down the hall.
As they started to trudge off like the floor was made of ankle deep mud, she turned back to apologize on Harry's behalf. Instead her eyes locked once more with the rich, dark chocolate color of her Potions turned Defense professor and the light feeling she no longer wanted to feel in his presence returned.
"Happy birthday, Professor. I hope you have a good weekend," she said in lieu of seeking clemency for Harry, before spinning around and hastening after her friends, her stupid hormones refusing to acknowledge he belonged to someone else as they sang out with molten heat at the half smile he gifted her.
Catching up to Harry who had slowed down even more as Lavender had flounced in and was now significantly ahead with Ron, she scowled, "Why can you never control yourself?"
"I know you have this… thing … for Professor Snape and that I take the piss out of you for it but I don't trust him, Hermione. He's hiding something."
"Well of course he's hiding something, Harry; he's a spy for the Order. He's probably hiding loads of things as part of the job."
"But he was a Death Eater first . You remember what Sirius said fourth year, 'no one stops being a Death Eater.'"
"Well he did," she said with conviction.
"No he didn't. He's a spy. He has to continue being one to be of use. How do we know he's not playing us all for Voldemort."
With a huff, she turned around to face down her friend, arms crossed, as she asked in exasperation, "Do you trust Dumbledore?"
Dropping his head back as he sighed, Harry scrubbed his hands under his glasses, making her cringe at how aggressively he attacked the delicate skin around his eyes. Taking the round spectacles off and cleaning them on his shirt, he boredly replied, "Yes, of course I do but-"
"No buts. Either you trust Dumbledore's judgment or you don't. Either he's the most powerful wizard whom Voldemort fears above all else or he's not.
"A man like Dumbledore cannot be so easily manipulated. Professor Snape may possess an exceptional mind and have mastered the art of playing both sides but if you believe, truly believe, in Dumbledore, you know Professor Snape never would have been able to fool him.
"So which is it?"
Groaning as he rolled his eyes, he tried, "Can't it be both?"
"Your stubbornness will be to your detriment, Harry Potter. The man has literally saved your life and still you doubt him."
"But at Slughorn's party, he told Malfoy-"
"Oh bloody hell, not this again," she said irritably. Grasping his shoulders, she jerked him forward so he was forced to fully meet her eyes. "You need to let this go. You've turned into a stalker - no wait, listen to me," she interrupted as he started to step back. "You're obsessed, frighteningly so. This idea that he's a Death Eater has completely consumed you-"
"Your obsession with Snape consumes you," he retorted.
Stopping herself before she denied the unwelcomed truth, Hermione stepped back and examined her friend through a different lens. Slowly as she moved the behaviors around and pierced them with a different light, she said, "Oh my God… do you like him?"
"What? No!"
"Harry, are you sure? You can tell me. I'm not Ron, I won't suddenly begin squawking like a tortured chicken."
"I do not like Draco sodding Malfoy, Hermione. I don't even like wizards," he stressed, mimicking her gesture and gripping her shoulders as he spoke. "I definitely like witches. Well one witch…"
Her eyes lit up with excitement making it difficult to resist the urge to squeal and begin clapping as she hoped it was someone she could tease him as incessantly about as he did her with Professor Snape.
"Who?" She demanded only for him to spring apart from her as Tonks popped up and said, "Wotcher, Hermione. Harry, you fancy a bit of company on your way to Hagrid's? Said I'd help reinforce the barriers for today's lesson."
"Uh, yeah… sure… I mean that'd be great," he stumbled, making Hermione's smile widen even more as she wildly pointed to the bubblegum pink haired witch behind her back, making an obnoxious kissing face he had given her once while Professor Snape had been questioning the effectiveness of his potions on her pain and comfort.
Harry, being fearless in all but two things - crossing her and talking to someone he was attracted to - began to sweat under her actions, his face turning an alarming and hilarious shade of red as he continued trying and failing to speak coherently. Cho had turned him into a blithering idiot in fourth and fifth year and it looked as though the young auror had the same effect on her friend. At least this time he was maringally less spastic, though he didn't have a drink in hand to sputter so she couldn't be sure.
Taking mercy on him, she shooed him away just as the clock tower chimed the release of classes and slipped into the library to watch them go as the halls became packed with students. When she could no longer see the top of Tonk's bright head, she began to make her way towards the back of the library in search of Theo. She was just beginning to realize it was infinitely harder to take the mickey out of someone when you actually liked and respected the subject of their crush when her unlikely friend came into view.
"There you are, Granger. Had I been anyone else, I would have actually begun to worry at how long it took," Theo greeted without looking back at her.
"How do you do that?" She asked in feigned annoyance as she took to the couch opposite him where she stepped out of her shoes and tucked her feet under her. "I didn't make a single sound."
"Magic," he smirked, his blue eyes dancing with a mischief that would have had the twins watching their back.
"Very funny," she responded drily, rolling out their shared assignment. "Truly, you should take that act on the road."
"Nah, I'd make more money setting up shop with a few crystal balls and tarot cards. Maybe I can even get a job here when Sybil retires or is committed."
"Why you bother with that class is beyond me. That woman is a fraud."
Shrugging as he pulled something out of his bag and began fidgeting all over again - a very un-Theo like behavior given that she had seen him sit for hours at a time only moving enough to turn a page on numerous occasions - he quipped, "Yeah but she makes a mean cuppa and those pillows sure do make for a nice nap. The dungeons are just too far to go sleep in during a free period."
Adjusting her skirt, she crossed her legs and leaned forward, her elbows to her knees as she quietly asked, "Theo, is everything alright? You're acting very… odd. Has Thadeous done something?"
"No, nothing like that, mmm… Hermione. He knows better than to come near me after the last time."
"Then what is it? This fidgety, squirrelly behavior isn't like you. At least not when you haven't seen him."
His movements ceased as he looked up and stared at her unblinking. If she had ever been the subject of Legilimency she didn't know but the way his expressive, perpetually haunted eyes studied her, she wondered, not for the first time, if he was a natural born Leglilimens. It was more than the fact that he always seemed to know - or allude to knowing - things she'd rather he didn't. Theo seemed to be able to read a person's soul.
She imagined that's why he unnerved so many people. There was nowhere to hide once he turned his eyes on you. Every part of a person was laid bare for his examination and more often than not, he found them to be lacking.
"I know I sort of just told you we were going to be friends third year, but you're one of the most important people in my life. You mean everything to me and I didn't like not having you around. He avenges me and has protected me but you, you make the bad go away. You always have and I couldn't keep existing without you."
Tucking her knees back together, Hermione moved to the very end of the couch and collected two of the toss pillows with the school's crest on them. Stuffing her feet into the cushion, she arranged the first pillow along her hip and the other in her lap. Then gesturing to the vacant section of the couch, she waved him over, patting the pillows so there was no misinterpretation.
"Come on. I'll play with your hair and you can tell me, or not tell me, what's bothering you. Maybe you'll even tell me who this elusive he is."
An invitation being all he required, Theo jumped up from his own chair and shoved what had been offering him solace all morning into his pocket. As he stretched out on the couch - his grey sweater removed with several buttons of his dress shirt undone and his sleeves pushed up his forearms - he moved and shifted until his head was comfortably in her lap, his arm tucked between him and the couch, and his face towards her stomach.
Running her fingers through his soft, dark waves, Hermione wondered as to why she couldn't have placed her fixation on someone like Theo. Though she was the first to admit he was peculiar and she had been highly skeptical of his insistence that they be friends once they had been partnered in class, she had grown to care for him. There was a natural ease between them, each finding a comfort in the other that their other relationships seemed to lack. Intellectually it was effortless for him to keep up with her, he was thoughtful with his words, never speaking for the sake of banishing the silence, nothing escaped his notice no matter how insignificant, and he was undeniably attractive.
She could easily love him; in fact she did. That love however lacked even an ounce of romance.
She loved Theo as she loved Harry. It was warm, content, filling, but familial. She felt protective of him, almost like a feral mother protecting its young, when people spoke ill of him. For whatever reason he had sought her out, had chosen her. And while at the start it hadn't made much sense to her, she had come to choose him right back.
"If you were given the opportunity to have what you want most in this world would you take it?"
Weaving her fingers through his waves and lightly scratching her nails along his scalp, she hummed, "I would like to think I would but I'm not sure I would know what I want most."
Snorting as he looked up at her through his long lashes, his face said it all in regards to how little he believed her. "Oh so that's how it is? We're just going to ignore that sappy little face you make whenever you hear Sev talk?"
"I do not-"
His raised eyebrow interrupted her futile denying, causing her to sigh. Dropping her head back on the couch, she bemoaned, "Am I really that obvious?"
"Yes, but lucky for you most everyone is too wrapped up in themselves to take notice. Score one for self centered teenagers."
Rubbing at the crown of his head, she whispered, "He's seeing someone. I think it's serious," her voice breaking halfway though.
"Well of course it's serious. It's Severus Snape. The man doesn't do anything without full commitment."
"That wasn't exactly helpful, Theo, but thanks," she snapped, tugging on his hair.
"Of course it was helpful. You now know that if you manage to turn his head, you'll be all he sees."
"Okay we're going to stop now. I don't feel like allowing my heart to be used in place of a football. Besides, we're supposed to be talking about what's bothering you."
Cupping her face, he sat up and brought their foreheads together. "You're too afraid, that's what concerns me. Too rational. You need to be bold and brash. Take what you want without regret. You can't let this pass by. Otherwise, I lose you. And that would be truly devastating, Hermione.
"So would you do it? If you could have him, would you go after him with the sort of abandon only a Gryffindor could possess and seize that singular devotion for yourself?"
"Why are you so invested in this?" She deflected. "It's an impossibility and I don't like dwelling on things that I do not have the power to change. You said yourself, he's someone who is committed. There is no turning his head."
Standing up from the couch, Theo looked down at her with his hands in his pockets as he said, "Be bold, brave, and daring, Granger. Live without fear and ignore the whispers. For once in your life, take the selfish path and tell anyone who objects to fuck themselves on their way to hell. Remember, your love is kismet."
"Theo, you have officially lost the plot. What has gotten into you? You're making zero sense," Hermione worried.
Grabbing her cheeks again, he pulled her face forward and pressed his lips to her forehead before wrapping her in a hug. With his hand smoothing over her curls, he hummed, "I really did try, but he's going to have his work cut out for him."
Stepping back, he picked up her bag and held it out to her, saying, "Hold this," before swiping a small coin purse off the table and jingling it before her, instructing, "And this."
"Theo, what-"
"I've done what I can, the rest is up to the two of you once you get there but there is one more thing: do yourself a favor and make sure Sev remembers to block his floo. Cissy has a habit of coming through whenever she pleases. Now, catch!"
Without thought, Hermione reached her arm out to grasp what he threw at her. As her fingers closed around the all too familiar multi-dial pendent, she shouted, "Theo! What the fuck did you just do?" Her words falling through time as the device's magic began to heat her hand and the library spun back around her.
In all the times she had rewound the day in her third year, she had never been in the center of anything like what she now experienced. Instead of seeing the rapid backtracking of those who had been where she was earlier, the library swirled and blurred until she was surrounded in blinding, speeding whiteness. Hundreds of conversations screeched through her ears. Thousands of smells passed through her nose, turning her stomach as they warred to stand out. It was a sensory hell that she could not escape without releasing the Time-Turner and as her stomach rolled and knotted, bile rising in her throat with nowhere to go, she desperately wanted to do just that. But then when would she be? Certainly not wherever Theo had intended her to go and while she was beyond livid with him for what he had just done to her, she couldn't risk it. She trusted him and as she told Harry, she couldn't have both trust in him and be skeptical of him, so she continued to hold on.
Finally after seconds or hours or maybe even days of journeying through the library's past, shape and color began to bleed back in. Time was slowing, allowing her to try and regain her bearings. But as the final minutes ticked away and time smoothed out, the device's heated magic cooling, it was a lost cause. She had been thrown in a blender of magic and that was not something one could walk away from unscathed.
"Ah wonderful, you're right on time," someone spoke, as everything she held tumbled to the floor in her desperation to anchor herself to the table.
"What's the date?" She croaked, instantly regretting her choice to speak as she felt her throat begin to open.
"January ninth, though I imagine you want to know the year not the month and day."
Trying to look more menacing than the pathetic picture she surely made, Hermione glared up at the wizard and was met with storm grey eyes.
"Sirius?"
"Guess again, little pen," he smirked, with uncanny similarity not only in his facial features and ticks but in inflection and tone as he teased her.
"Regulus," she guessed, recalling Slughorn's boasting of his house seeker; a soon to be Death Eater if his brother was to be believed.
"There you go. The youngest - and the best if I do say so myself - of the Black brothers." Reaching down, she got an unwelcome whiff of his aftershave as he said, "Here, let me carry that for you."
"Oh God," she groaned as her only warning before turning and throwing up on his shoes.
Unperturbed by the mess she had just made of his Oxfords, he waved his wand to vanish her stomach contents and chuckled, "I really should have seen that coming." Then without permission or ceremony, he took her arm and threaded it through his own, saying, "Now if you're done, I need to get you where you need to be before classes change. It would not do for people to see me with a bedraggled little Gryffindor such as yourself. Your house would crucify me while my own would spread word back to mummy dearest that I've taken up slumming it like dear ole dad and Sirius."
Reluctantly she admitted, "I don't think I can walk just yet," as her head began to rush.
"No matter," he responded, shouldering her bag before sweeping her off her feet. "I'll just carry you. McGonagall's in office hours right now so she's close by."
She thought maybe she had tried to fend him off, but she couldn't be sure as the over stimulating, disorienting effects of having traveled roughly twenty years into the past won out and she succumbed to the darkness that had started to close in around her.
Author's Note
PS: If Daddy Kink or DDlg is not to your taste, save your words and kindly go read something else. Ridicule and judgmental comments about safe, legal, and consensual sexual acts have no place here. There are literally thousands of Snamione stories, find something more to your liking. I will not tolerate the disrespect towards myself or the readers of this story who enjoy this branch of BDSM.