Disclaimer: All canon characters, places, plots and situations from the Harry Potter Universe belongs to J.K. Rowling. I make no profit from this.

Warnings: Rated M for language, violence and scenes of a sexual nature.

A/N: Thanks for your reviews on the last chapters, especially to gypsyfurface and shealone for your encouragements. Ok so it's been almost a week since my last update, which is not what I was aiming for but at least it's good news for me – I got the job! Unfortunately this means that updates will be further apart as I'll have less time to write. I don't want to rush through and give you guys a half-baked story, not when we've come this far! *rallying cry, hoping you'll all be distracted from what I just said* x

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WARNINGS FOR THIS CHAPTER:

Please note this chapter may include scenes of a sexual nature, including implied sexual activity as well as highly descriptive language, so if that's not your thing, move along.

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Chapter Sixteen: Potions and Plans

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August crawled by slowly. Hermione was having a better time with work; Baric had left, which automatically made things a lot more pleasant. He hadn't spoken to her since the incident with Sirius, actually going out of his way if it meant not bumping into her. An although she was back elbow deep in paperwork, at least this time it was follow-up to making actual, real progress.

She had discovered that with daily practice, doing specific actions wandlessly strengthened her ability to do the same ones more easily the next time. She could only practice a little at a time though, to be careful with her magic. Her visit to Ollivander had left her with a few theories about how magic needed to be channeled, and the part that their wands played in doing this. By harnessing elemental magics - earth magics - that spoke to the magical signature of a person, the wand acted as a conduit for spells and charms. Wandless magic could be quite dangerous, Ollivander had said, because it was chaotic and unpredictable. "Imagine the accidental magic of a young child, but with the power of a fully developed witch or wizard," the old man had explained. And not only could that kind of magical burst cause destruction, but the witch or wizard would be at risk of bleeding their magical core dry.

Hermione had taken to thinking of her progress with wandless magic like driving. "It's daunting when you start," her father had said. "You have to pay very close attention to so many things at one time, it can be overwhelming, especially because you could cause a lot of damage to yourself and others with something like a car. But over time, with practice, much of it becomes second nature." Of course she never did get a chance to learn to drive, but she could imagine her mother and father, both intellectuals, would have been fascinated and proud to see her work.

Each time she used magic wandlessly, she felt a corresponding pulling sensation as the magic flowed out of her, and afterwards she would be a little winded. How tired she felt depended on the act itself. If she accio'd something a short distance, she might feel like she needed to take a deep breath afterwards. With directing and manipulating the movement of an object - such as trying to make it fly, she would be exhausted afterwards. She had learned her limits when she tried to cast a Stinging Hex and had almost passed out as a result.

Her days were so full and mostly pleasant that the subject of her ongoing nightmares faded in the daylight. It had been months since the last time Greyback had been spotted. The odd Order meeting, when someone had been captured or sighted made her anxious, but those came and went. She spent her nights with Sirius, or if he was on a mission, in her own bed. Sometimes on those nights she would go to sleep in her bed and wake up in his. Mornings would be spent grabbing breakfast together or with the Lupins, and then work. If she had the time she'd meet with Harry or Sirius, or both, for lunch, or go out with Mari. The evenings were peaceful. She could usually be found in the library, fiddling with the Black spell-book - how fascinating was spell-crafting? Maybe that was something she could research next - or reading novels. Other days she went out for her run, happy enough when Sirius was able to join her.

She was musing on her contentment when she noticed Mari had come back from her lunch break with a morose expression. "Are you still fighting?" she asked her friend. Mari just nodded, throwing herself into her chair and dropping her head onto her folded arms dramatically. "I thought you were meeting for lunch to work things out," said Hermione, frowning.

Mari's head shot up. "Oh we met for lunch. We met for lunch so far out of the way I'm surprised we didn't need a portkey to get there!" Severus and Mari were arguing about making their relationship more public. It was simple; Mari wanted to, and Severus didn't. So far, he was winning, but looking at her frustrated, sad friend, Hermione had a feeling that if something didn't happen soon, nobody would be. "He's so secretive," complained Mari, for the umpteetnth time. "Look, I know he used to be a spy, and some habits are hard to break - especially in his case," she conceded. "Did I tell you, the other day he gets a owl right in the middle of dinner - at his house of course, Circe forbid we been seen in public - and he gets up, says "I have to go," and buggers off without so much as a by your leave!"

Oh dear. "When was this, exactly?" asked Hermione. The order had had an impromptu meeting two nights before. When Mari confirmed her suspicions, she sighed heavily, making Mari look at her strangely.

Severus and Hermione were hardly close, but even he deserved to be in a good relationship and Mari was her friend - she didn't deserve to be in the dark about things. How could they at least take some baby-steps into making their relationship public? Hermione thought she'd have gone crazy already if Sirius and her hadn't told some of their friends, and they'd only been in a relationship for almost two months. Gods, almost a year?

Suddenly it came to her, and she could've slapped herself for not thinking of it before. Harry had been talking about new initiates for the Order for weeks now.

"Mari," she said, beaming. "Have you heard of The Order?"

Remus walked into the Grimmauld kitchen, stopping short at the scene before him. Hermione was sitting at the breakfast bar, a book in her hand, and she greeted him breathlessly. Sirius, on the other hand, was elbow deep in washing up water, scrubbing dishes the muggle way.

"Hermione, did you know that book's upside down?" he said, suppressing the urge to laugh out loud when her eyes widened and her cheeks went a bit red. She got up without a sound, looking torn between passing Remus and staying in the potentially even more mortifying situation any longer. In the end she scurried past him, mumbling something about the library.

Remus shook his head. How many times had he walked in on the two of them in a clinch, hands roaming places they had no business going in public.

Sirius was wiping his hands on a tea-towel, watching her retreating form, a quizzical expression on his face.

"You know it's full moon soon, right?" asked Remus, when Sirius had remembered he was there.

"What did you do to Hermione?" asked Sirius. Remus rolled his eyes. Sirius had a smear of lip balm on the side of his mouth.

"Full moon, Pads," he said, tapping the side of his nose. "Also you're both really unconvincing."

"Aw fuck. She'll be embarrassed, which somehow turns into being pissed off at me."

"What the hell are you two doing to each other? It smells like frustration in here." He looked around. "Please tell me you haven't, not on the breakfast bar or the table," he groaned.

"No!" said Sirius. "We haven't yet, not exactly." His eyes dared Remus to make a big deal out of it.

"Merlin. Why not?" said Remus mildly, although his mind boggled.

Sirius slapped his thigh with the dishtowel. "Because - well we were taking it slow, but also because we've hardly had private time together. What with work and night shifts and living in a house that's like a train station most of the time…"

"Mate. Friday is full moon so I'll be out of the house and Dora and Teddy can spend the night at her mum's. Thursday is the Order meeting, so Friday just close the Floo off –"

"What if someone needs to use headquarters?"

"Sirius, just do it. I'll think of something, but for Merlin's sake, put that girl - and yourself - out of your misery. If the two of you explode, there'll be no headquarters."

"Did it not occur to you that perhaps I would have been the better person to initiate Mari?" hissed Severus.

"You, should have initiated her months ago," Hermione retorted.

"You told her about me being–" he said, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"What was I supposed to do? Wait until she got here and then, oh yes, welcome our little war party and by the way, your boyfriend is a part of it and that's where he's been disappearing off to?" She waved her arms. "Here he is, skulking in the shadows like always!"

He was sulking. Her ex-Professor, who scared children and small animals everywhere, was sulking. "She's not talking to me," he mumbled.

"I'm sorry, did you say something?" hissed Hermione, taking the sleeve of his robe and dragging him into a room further away from where the Order members were currently socialising after their meeting.

Severus glared at her and she scoffed. "Yes, that doesn't scare me anymore," she said. She mimic'd Mari's voice. "Oh his eyes, dark, obsidian, Merlin, the way he looks at me when we –"

"Alright alright, shut up!" Severus said, looking horrified. Then his expression turned smug. "How would you like it if I went out there and outed you and your mongrel?" he said. It was Hermione's turn to be horrified.

"You can't," she said nervously. "That's different."

"Do tell –"

"You were going to lose her!" blurted Hermione. "Sirius and I... we're taking things slow."

Severus looked surprised. "How strange, considering what a reckless imbecile Black normally is," he sneered.

"Yes, and you are at the complete opposite end of that spectrum," she said, ignoring the slur. "Perhaps it would do you good to take a leaf out of his book and try something different? For example, right now you're standing here with me, arguing about Sirius while your witch is in that room being ogled by, well, a number of single wizards and a witch or two."

His eyes widened, his jaw twitching, and before she could take another breath he turned in a dramatic swirl of robes and stalked out of the room, Hermione close on his heels.

The kitchen was full of Order members standing or sitting in little clusters, the tea service getting a proper workout from Molly Weasely. At the other end of the kitchen Mari was speaking animatedly with the Lupins and Sirius, and noticed when Severus and Hermione appeared in the doorway. She looked at her boyfriend, then looked cooly away, continuing with her conversation. In four flat strides, Severus crossed the kitchen, grabbed Mari by the waist, turned her to him and kissed her so passionately that the two of them almost fell over.

The kitchen went silent, and it was only a quick shake of the head that stopped Hermione's friends from attacking the Potions Master. George's jaw was hanging open, and Molly looked like she'd been hit with a Stunner. Quite a few eyebrows had gone up.

When the odd couple came up for air, Severus looked around, Mari still clutching his robes, looking dazed. His cheeks were flushed red, giving him an uncharacteristically boyish air.

"In case anyone was not aware," he said, his mellifluous voice a little breathless, "this is my witch." Mari was smiling up at him with shining eyes. At his proclaimation she grabbed him by the neck and drew him back down into a kiss.

There were a few hurrumphs, throat clearing and coughs before everyone else turned back to their conversations, trying to ignore the surly ex-Professor bring practically devoured by his paramour in the corner.

"You've got to be kidding me," whispered George, his eyes still like saucers. Luna looked up at him and did something behind him that made the redhead yelp and jump.

"I can't believe you didn't tell me," said Sirius, after everyone had left and the fire in the kitchen was dying down. It was just the two of them left at the kitchen table, steaming hot cups of tea in hand. "She looks... so normal." Hermione thumped him on the arm. "Ow! What was that for?"

"She's my friend!"

"She's dating Snivel–"

"Don't even."

Sirius sulked. "Next you'll tell me you've got the hots for the old bat too."

Hermione latched onto his arm, cuddling up to him and laying her head against his shoulder as they looked into the embers of the fire. "Don't be silly. You're the only old bat for me."

"Hey!" He buried his nose in her hair and breathed in deeply, making her scalp tickle a little.

"I would have told you," she said, "but it wasn't my secret to tell. Besides, they're keeping ours too, don't forget that." She ignored his snort. "You like Mari though?"

"Apart from her taste in wizards?"

"Yes." Hermione rolled her eyes.

"She's nice," he said, looking down at her. "That's another thing, you've mentioned her before but I didn't realise you were that good friends."

Hermione chewed on her bottom lip before speaking. "It's not that I've purposefully been hiding Mari," she said, turning to look up at him, her breath catching when their eyes made contact. Would it always feel this... magnetic? "But neither have I been particularly open about her with the others. Or you. I'm sorry," she said. "I've just done it for so long that I didn't think about it when we got together."

"But why the secrecy at all?"

"It might sound silly, but I think it's been nice having someone to myself, if that makes sense? Everyone we know, we've known for years, and there's so much baggage and history. When I spend time with Mari I feel like all that... stuff gets put to the side for a minute. I can just be a girl with her girlfriend."

Sirius nodded thoughtfully. "That makes sense," he said. "I can't imagine what it's been like for you all."

There was an openness that had developed between them faster in the last two months, and for the first time in a long time, Hermione just let her words come without censure. She felt safe.

"A couple of years ago, there was this guy, after Ron and I finished," she said. "I wasn't heartbroken about Ron but it was disappointing because there'd been so much expectation and I think we disappointed a lot of people too. In hindsight of course it doesn't matter, but at the time it was all so new. Ron started dating Eva soon afterwards, and I was happy for him, but the papers were shredding us. Ron's always been good at coping with the publicity. I think after seeing what fame was like for Harry in school, he realised he didn't want much to do with it, and he was so wrapped up in his family - you know how they are, always something to do, and it was still hard then, for everyone, with Fred gone."

She felt his reassuring hand on her back. "It wasn't like that for me," she said. "I know it sounds ungrateful since they've been like a second family to me, but they weren't mine and with the boys going their own ways, getting married... I felt alone. And as bad as the gossip and papers were about Harry or Ron, they do tend to be even less supportive of witches," she said bitterly, remembering.

"So at first there were all these articles about my broken heart, about being left to become an old maid. Even that we'd broken up because of problems in the bedroom." The hand on her back paused briefly in its rubbing before starting up again. "So that was hard, but then I met Henry. It was at a benefit for orphans from the war, and Henry was there as a supporter. He was nice, and long story short, I was thinking this was it, I'd never felt this way with Ron before. Everyone around me was getting married, starting to have children... and I thought he felt the same way. I thought he really, really cared for me, that was, until I found out that he was more interested in racking up the celebrity notches on his bedpost. It turned out Henry was actually Jacque, or Emmanuel, or Peter or Kian - depending on who he was seducing at the time."

"Fucker," breathed Sirius.

She snorted in agreement. "And so I broke up with him, which he didn't appreciate at all, seeing as I was technically the highest he'd climbed up the social ladder at that point. So when the papers went sniffing, he was all too ready to tell them about how I was a prude, how I didn't know how to have fun, how even my best friends found me stuffy. It was a really difficult time," she admitted. "I thought a lot about how much I wanted it all to end. My parents were gone, everyone was moving on with their lives and I was alone, and best of all, I believed everything he said about me. Now I realise that I wasn't in the right headspace then, but some of that has never left me."

"Hermione, is that why you won't let me..." She frowned. "I've just never had a good experience with that," she admitted. "Ron tried but it was so uncomfortable. And others... I don't know, maybe I'm just not wired that way." He stroked her hair. "It felt nice sometimes. But not that nice," she said.

"One day you're going to let me," said Sirius. "And I promise you it'll be good." She glanced up at him, a little shy and troubled. He cupped her chin. "Sweetheart I'll never do anything you don't want me to do. And if you tell me to stop, I will. But I want to use my mouth to make you feel as good as you do me." Her cheeks coloured. "Anyway," he said, all businesslike again. "You were saying?" He pulled out his wand and pointed it at the dying fire, bringing it up to a comfortable level again.

It took her a moment to remember what she'd been talking about before.

"Mari, she's not a social climber," said Hermione. "She really loves Severus, and I think for all his coldness and aloofness, Severus really loves her. I didn't want him to lose that because of fear and I didn't want her to get her heart broken because of what some assholes are going to say."

Sirius pulled her into his arms, kissing her on the head. "You're so sweet my witch," she felt the rumble of his voice on her head. "Thank you for telling me about that," he said. "Do you think it's strange that I'm happy with just our little crowd?" he asked.

Hermione smiled. "No," she said. "I think you've missed a lot of time with the people you love, and we're your family too. It makes sense that you want some normalcy and this is where you belong. Anyway, it's not like it's easy for either of us to go off making new friends," she said dryly.

There was a subtle shift in his eyes, something intriguing and a little bit scary. "What is it?" she asked. Had she said something wrong? In response, he ran a hand up into her hair, cradling her head with his fingers threaded through her curls, and leaned down to kiss her deeply. The kiss itself wasn't aggressive, but heavily loaded with something else that tugged at the deepest part of her, making her feel like she had just reached the precipice of the highest rollercoaster in the world, and was about to tip over. Her heart pounding, she reached for his sides, fisting her hands in his shirt. "Hermione," he murmured against her lips, and rested his forehead against hers. Her eyes still shut, she felt the puffs of breath they exchanged as they dwelled in the moment.

This wasn't lust, this moment. This was something else, something that she felt would disintegrate if she looked directly at it, so she kept her eyes closed instead. Little did she know that Sirius was doing the same.

A/N: Thanks for reading. As always please review and let me know what you like/dislike, would like to see etc.