AN: Finally, a chapter I have long been waiting for. Thank you to everyone who's reading, whether you were here a year ago when we began or if you've joined recently. Thank you for the reviews, the favorites, and the follows. Please enjoy. :)

Chapter 16: Argentum Aurumque

It took several long seconds of blinking up at the stone ceiling to figure out where he was, remember why he had a pounding headache, and discover that the unusually loud thudding he could hear was coming not from his skull but from his sitting room. Failing to stifle a groan, Severus rolled onto his side and reached one long arm over to the drawer of his bedside table, which he pulled open. Inside, neatly stacked vials awaited him: lilac headache relief, electric blue calming draught, crimson blood replenisher, acid green Wiggenweld, and a few opal Skelegros. He plucked one of the purple vials and tipped the contents past his lips. He counted to five, and once he began to feel the effects, got out of bed, pulled on a dressing gown, and seized the door handle separating his bedroom from the sitting room.

"Tilly, if this is another one of your revisionist schemes—"

But it wasn't a house elf making the racket. As he pushed open his door, the hidden bookshelf door on the opposite side of the room also opened, and into his sitting room tumbled…

"Granger?"

The girl picked herself up off the floor, pushing her riot of curls out of her face. Once again, he noticed, she was wearing blue Muggle clothing. Saturday, his brain reminded him helpfully.

"Morning, sir," she said, straightening out her sleeves. She then peered at him with a calculating expression that wouldn't have been unusual on Minerva's face. "Are you alright?"

Utterly baffled, he decided to ignore her question.

"We were to meet at seven in the evening, not—" His eyes flashed to his clock. "Half six in the morning?" He glared down at her, watching with some satisfaction as she cowered slightly. "What is the meaning of this?"

"I'm sorry to bother you, sir. But it was bothering me all last night. I couldn't place it. Just kept going over and over everything." The more she talked, the faster she spoke, and the more her hands waved in the air between them.

"Did Nott hex me when my back was turned? Was Ron just especially annoying?" Her eyes squinted in the middle distance, then she shook her head. "But neither of those explained the images. And I didn't think of it until this morning— Well, it is morning. About half an hour ago—and then I felt like a complete idiot, but of course it makes sense. And…"

She stepped closer until she was half a foot away and sniffed. "Is that lavender I smell? Have you had a headache?"

She pulled away, eyes round. For some bizarre reason, she sounded excited. She opened her mouth again, but Severus held up a hand.

"For the love of Merlin, stop…talking…" he said, anxious to put off a second headache that day. "Wait."

He returned to his room, shutting the door firmly behind him, then dressed and freshened himself before returning to the sitting room where he found the girl sitting on his sofa, hands clasped impatiently in her lap.

"Wait," he repeated.

He turned to his drinks tray, poured beans into a hand grinder, and flicked his fingers at the kettle on the fire. He heard the shuffles as she craned her neck to watch what he was doing, but he ignored her, breathing in the aromas as beans ground and then were steeped in water. He counted rhythmically, then finally poured. Only once he was settled in his chair and had taken a long sip of the coffee did he look up at her.

She was sitting staring at the mug in his hands, and the only way he could think to describe it was the way a cat looks at a mouse it wants to chase.

"Do you roast your own?"

"I do," Severus replied, inclining his head, not at all surprised that she had guessed, but wondering how. He raised an eyebrow. Daring her.

Ask me, he thought in her direction, ready to relish the satisfaction in telling her no.

She returned his look, eyes shifting between his own as she realized his challenge. He watched as she ran through scenarios, bribes, bargains, no doubt. After a moment, she straightened her spine, for she had leaned forward unconsciously, sitting up with all the politeness Pureblood witches had perfected in elocution lessons at half her age.

"Please, may I have some?"

Severus's lips parted in the smallest of gapes. He had expected all manner of Gryffindor brashness, or perhaps pestering akin to that of a bird that refused to stop pecking just as she often had the habit of refusing to stop talking. But while one part of him was shocked that she had taken neither of the expected routes, another part of him was stunned at hearing the simple request. When had anyone ever asked him nicely for anything? Not demanding, not sarcastically, not while already knowing he had no other option to comply.

But she was composed. Though she clearly sought affirmation, she would accept denial. And she had said please.

It was perhaps that word that tipped the scales. He waved a hand and the French press poured a second cup which floated over to her. Quiet delight illuminated her face, and she picked the cup out of the air with both hands, brought the rim under her nose, and inhaled slowly. The sounds of her breath, the warmth of the flames crackling beside him, and the chocolate and cherry notes on his tongue filled his senses. Her head bowed and she took a drink. She sighed, and he let out an exhale.

Her eyes, not terribly far in color from the coffee in their cups, gleamed up at him. "It's very good. Thank you."

He nodded, but she had already returned to her cup, and they sat for several minutes, drinking the hot liquid and warming their hands until the pale porcelain at the bottom of their cups showed through again.

"The house elves are excellent cooks," she said, placing her cup in the table between them. There was a slight grimace on her face, as if she didn't like admitting it. "But they have nothing on that."

Severus fought the urge to fidget uncomfortably. He set down his own cup and leaned forward.

"Will you now explain—clearly—why you are here?"

She nodded, now much more at ease than she had been a few minutes ago.

"Last night I was in the common room talking with Harry and Ron, when I suddenly experienced the sharpest headache I've ever known. It started strong and built up even more as I escaped to my dormitory. And then suddenly it all stopped. My head didn't hurt for the rest of the night."

"And you don't think this was a mere headache because…?"

She pursed her lips. "Because I saw images but couldn't make them out, they kept disappearing as if they were falling away or being pushed aside." When he didn't say anything, she pressed on. "They were memories."

"I thought you said you couldn't make them out," he reminded.

"I couldn't, but I knew somehow that they were important. That's why they were being hidden."

"You think someone was trying to perform Legilimency on you?" he clarified, his words coming out more a statement than a question.

She shook her head, eyes alight with the look he had grown all too accustomed to seeing in her eyes. It was the look she had when she knew something.

"Not on me. On you."

If his coffee had contained milk, it would have curdled in his stomach.

"And you were, weren't you?" she pressed. "You went to…him last night. Professor McGonagall was gone for part of the evening, too."

"How do you know that?" he asked.

"I have rounds," she said simply. "Usually when I walk by, the light shines through under her office door for a couple of hours. But she wasn't at dinner or in her rooms last night."

So much for having clandestine Order meetings… He didn't know whether he wanted to laugh—Dumbledore thought he was being so secretive as he scheduled his meeting—or keep the fact that she had discovered something was amiss to himself. He couldn't explain the latter instinct.

"What happened last night, Professor?"

He blinked and returned his attention.

"There was an Order meeting, which, yes, was followed by a Summons. The Dark Lord did use Legilimency quite intently in addition to his usual verbal interrogation. I'm not greatly injured, as you can see for yourself."

The girl nodded and settled back into her seat. "That's a relief," she said.

"A relief?" he asked, brows raised. Her brow furrowed and, had he been in a grumpier, less caffeinated mood, he could have shaken her. "You experience the effects of Legilimency from hundreds of miles away and you're relieved?"

She crossed her arms in front of her stomach. "Well, not when you put it that way… But I know none of the memories were mine. Surely my mind wasn't…you know…open to him."

It's only a matter of time…

He examined her for a long moment, calculating and running through various courses of action, but finally his spine bent. There was nothing else for it.

"Return this evening at our scheduled time. We will begin Occlumency lessons immediately."

Hermione loved learning. That fact was clear to her when she began reading everything she could—books, receipts, even coupons in the bottom of her mother's purse—as a child. It was clear to her peers when she always raised her hand to answer the teacher's questions in primary school, which ostracized the already awkward, bushy-haired girl even more. And it was clear to all who became aware of her Time Turner usage in third year as she ran herself into the ground, repeating hours and hours each day to attend classes, study, and eat.

She progressed through her Saturday, completing an Arithmancy project due the following week, writing a letter to Fleur confirming the time of their lunch, listing out spells she thought it would be handy for Harry to teach the DA after the holidays, and knitting hats while the boys played chess (the argument from last night lay completely forgotten).

But she did the same thing she always found herself doing in third year that set her on a path of assured destruction: she forgot about sleep.

And so it was that, despite her excitement to study the subject of Occlumency, her feet dragged slightly as she returned to Snape's office after dinner. Her mind, an ever whirring machine, helpfully pointed out to her that she had scraped by this week with twenty-four hours of sleep. She knocked on the door.

The door swung open and she entered. Snape was standing behind his desk, one hand already resting on the jar that flattened to open the bookshelf. For a moment, he looked just as exhausted as she felt, but in the next, his expression was as smooth as an untouched lake.

She followed him dutifully into the sitting room and sat when he nodded at one of the chairs set by the fire. The usual ample square table and been removed entirely, and the chairs turned to face each other straight on.

"Sometimes when one first undergoes Legilimency," he said, seating himself in the chair opposite. "They may react physically to defend themselves. I don't need you cracking your head open on the corner of any furniture."

In the light of the fire, she now noticed he was dressed in the same clothes he had appeared to her in the park over the Summer: dark jeans and a black shirt.

"Understood."

"Am I correct in thinking that you have already done some research into Occlumency?"

"Yes, sir," she replied simply again.

"Good, then I won't have to lecture you on the basic theory and we can progress to the practical side. For our first test, I am going to enter your mind without your employing any kind of mental strategies whatsoever. Why would I do so?"

He spoke briskly, businesslike, but his calm assurance wasn't enough to fully smother the jump of panic she felt. Her books had started off by presenting visualizations as a defense against attack. She wasn't supposed to defend herself?

"Um…because you want to see how I'll react?"

"Close." He inclined his head. "I want to see how your mind naturally orders itself. Much can be determined after I get a read on your normal disposition, so to speak."

"You're…not actually going to read my memories, are you?" Hermione asked, a flood of embarrassing moments making themselves known to her in rapid succession.

"Why?" he asked, tilting his head slightly. "Would that be bad?"

He gave a small, shark-like grin, and she shuddered.

"Yes, it wou—"

"Legilimens," he cast quickly.

And just like that, Hermione felt herself pulled into the depths of his dark eyes. She tried to close her own eyes, tried to turn away, but she felt as if she'd been petrified again.

"Don't resist," a voice said in her mind. "Don't strategize. Don't think…"

"Don't think?!" she thought fiercely.

"Don't overthink, then," Snape said in her head, amusement warming his tone. She felt a flare of panic, but then his voice filled her skull, soothing, swelling, everywhere. "You are safe. You are calm. Let me in…"

"I am safe," she said, willing herself to believe it. Nothing bad had ever happened to her under his guardianship. He had protected Harry from Quirrel's curse, had put his body between hers and Lupin's transfigured one, had set wards around her house…

"I am calm…"

She remembered the way his wand had cast magic for her, the power and reassurance building around her magic.

"Let…let…"

But some self-preserving instinct created a mental block, and she couldn't even think the words.

"Let me in," the voice crooned. Like a child begging for food. Like Crookshanks brushing his cheek against her hand. Like fingers gently prying at her clenched fist. "You are safe…"

"Safe… I am calm… Let him…"

Her magic rose within her, tinging the borders of her mental vision with a kind of golden shimmer, as if it sensed the impending intrusion. A silvery light pressed on the borders of her magic. The two forces slowed lazily, caught somewhere between liquid and airy in appearance.

"Let me in," Snape whispered.

Hermione hesitated. And then…

"Come in."

Silver bled into gold, and then the scene shifted. It was as if their prior conversation had taken place in an antechamber, but now they were both in the cathedral sized space that was her mind. Faintly, she recognized arches and shelves, and she was sure the shelves held objects, but she couldn't focus on them.

He poured in like water. Flooded her mind like an endless ocean had been emptied into it, and she watched, dismayed in a detached kind of way, as the water rose up to her ankles, her knees, her hips.

"I'm only entering," he told her. "Being. We're just existing here. It's safe."

"Safe," she repeated, looking around. The architecture lines solidified, the shelves spread out in all directions, and hazy objects on the shelves began to come into focus.

She moved slowly through the water to the closest shelf and found an assortment of objects: a small bird skull, a postcard her Aunt may have sent her from Malta, a bundle of dried wild flowers which she knew grew in the fields behind the Burrow. A book lay open to its middle, pages splayed wide in front of her. As she watched, something like an inky screen sharpened into view on the pages.

"What is it?" she asked, reaching out a hand.

"It's a memory."

She looked at the figure to her right. The water had coalesced into a single being, and Snape was standing at her side, looking down at her, not at the book.

"You may access it if you wish, but you would pull me along with you."

"Is there no way to know which memory it is first?"

"Not without beginning to view it," he said. "Your mind, though somewhat cluttered, is fairly organized. For the sake of our first experiment, I am satisfied. Do you want to return?"

"Yes," she meant to say, but instead she asked, "Why do you look different here?"

It was something she hadn't realized until she asked it. He looked younger, smoother, and less sallow, as if his image had blurred slightly, or she was seeing a photograph with too much exposure. Yet he did not appear ghostlike, but as substantial as she had ever seen him.

"Too much exposure is close," he said, and she jumped.

"You heard that?"

"We are in your mind. Of course I heard it," he said, breezing past the topic before she could let her mind run away with any embarrassing thoughts. "When you are in someone's mind, it is easier to view, so to speak, the immaterial aspects of a person. The effect of that is what you are seeing now."

She scanned his face, searching for the lines she was accustomed to see in the furrow of his brow, but only saw a dim glow beneath the skin.

"Am I seeing…your magic?" she asked.

"Some," he said, and then captured her hand which she did not realize she had raised to reach for his face. Embarrassed, she lowered her eyes, even as he lowered her hand back to her side.

"Are you ready to return?" he asked. Nothing in his voice indicated any embarrassment or disagreeableness with her forward action.

"Yes, sir."

Even if he wasn't skilled at reading body language, her self-consciousness pulsed around the edges of her mind like an increased heart beat. Being in her mind was unlike any other experience of Legilimency he had had. Almost all of his forays into people's minds were overwhelmingly invasive; any time he had been on the receiving end, usually by the Dark Lord, it was painful. Her reluctance was obvious in the beginning. No one wanted their mind to be spied upon. Severus knew it would be the least painful if she found a way to lower her natural defenses, but he had not expected her to be willing or able to do so so quickly, a fact he found unsettling. Was it because she was an obvious Gryffindor, or had the connection they shared played a role?

Eager as he was to return to his sitting room, untangling his consciousness felt like trying to unknot Devil's Snare. With a final tug, he disentangled completely and withdrew. He blinked and they were both back to themselves. Opposite him, she had leaned back fully into her chair.

"How do you feel?" he asked, conjuring water for them both.

She took the glass out of the air and took a sip before replying. "A little dizzy. But okay. I didn't know Legilimency could feel like that."

"Typically not," he said shortly, putting aside his glass. "I was able to discover a few things, despite the briefness of the experiment. I wonder if you can tell me what they mean."

"Oh?" She straightened up in her chair, fixing him with an alert, curious gaze.

"Your mental room, so to speak. Did you recognize it?"

Thus commenced a several minutes of conversation in which Severus felt like a Muggle psychiatrist, walking the girl through her self-reflection. Ordinarily, encouraging teenagers to focus on themselves was the exact opposite of what he attempted to do in his classrooms. To his own interest, she navigated the questions awkwardly, as if self-reflection was not a habit she regularly engaged in. She was used to reasoning her way through problems, clearly. He knew she had been the one to solve his poisons riddle guarding the Stone in her first year, and the extensive research she always included in her essays had been a hammer to the face of evidence. However, this sort of self-examination seemed an unusual practice for her, made all the more unusual by the fact that she was considering everything in light of first experiencing an invasion into her mind.

The room, clearly, was an imitation of the Hogwarts library. And while there were plenty of shelves, one of the first things he had noticed was that they were not filled to bursting with books. Instead, her mind was more like…

"A cabinet of curiosities," she murmured, half-smiling at the rug. "Great granddad went on some expeditions in his youth. I never met him, but his artifacts have been passed down to various family members, and my dad had a photograph of his collection, or part of it. He still has a few pieces he keeps in the study."

"Organized chaos," Severus muttered, examining the girl's bowed head. She raised it, displaying a broader grin.

"What do we do from here?"

"Now that we know what to expect inside, I should like to return and test what, if any, natural defenses you have." The smile stilled on her face. "What did you think we were here to do?" he asked.

"No, I understand. I just–well, it isn't normal, is it?"

"Mind magic? This connection? Perhaps not. But we know that your mind will need to be protected. I cannot explain why you felt the effects of my own Legilimency, neither can I explain why the Dark Lord was not able to access your mind through my own. But I'd rather not wait sound for him to accidentally find a door, would you?"

She shook her head, then took a bracing breath. "Alright, go ahead."

Severus couldn't stop the bewildered, but still amused, crook to his lips. When had anyone faced down imminent Legilimency and said "go ahead"?

Entering her mind was easier this time, as if sinking into the bath. Her magic hovered defensively for only a moment, and then it dropped beneath his own magic's weight. He appeared at her side, once more surrounded by shelving.

"I want to see," he said, slowly approaching the same shelf he had recently examined. "What happens when I try to access a memory. Are you ready?"

The mental image of the girl beside him nodded. Severus reached out a hand toward the bird skull, which he found to be the most curious of the shelf's contents. His finger had just brushed the bone, and the image of a dead bird, half mangled on the pavement, flashed through the air, when suddenly he felt himself pushed backwards.

"No," the girl said firmly. She had forced her way between him and the shelf. She had one palm flat against his chest, and the other hand curled around his upper arm. Despite her attempts to push him backwards further, he had set his feet firmly on the wooden floorboards beneath them.

He blinked at her in surprise, then drawled, "Manhandling me, Miss Granger? I knew you were reckless, but must you be such a boorish lioness about it?"

Pink flooded the girl's cheeks, and she immediately withdrew her hands, crossing and recrossing her arms in front of her torso and looking anywhere but at him.

"I'm sorry," she said quickly, breathless. "You said you wanted to test my defenses. I just did the first thing that popped into my head."

"Literally," he said, watching with pleasure and she squirmed uncomfortably. "Relax," he commanded, when she looked ready to burst out of her own skin. "May I try again? Will you kindly refrain from punching me?"

"No promises," she grumbled, stepping aside. She blinked up at him, mouth open in an O. "I'm sorry, I–"

"Said the first thing that popped into your head. Yes, I know," he said, and without giving her time to think, seized the bird skull.

A mangled bird lay on the pavement. Half of its insides had been torn away, leaving a twisted skeleton with ruffed and blood-matted feathers. Its head was at an unnatural angle, even for a bird, its beak slightly parted, its single visible black eye lifeless and reflecting the storm clouds above.

"You know, Hermione, dear," a male voice said. The image zoomed out to reveal Hermione, crouched and twisting to her side to look at the slightly balding man bracing his hands on bent knees to examine the bird. "Your mum and I have been able to handle just about everything about your being a witch. It's the cat that I think might throw her over the edge."

"Does it help or hurt matters that it's a magical cat?" Hermione asked, her voice echoing slightly.

"Hmm," her father said, a thoughtful frown on his face. "Let's clear this up and not find out."

As the man disappeared back into the house for a bin liner, the memory faded. Severus once more stood beside her mental self.

"I'd forgotten about that," she said, tracing the edge of the shelf with her finger. There was an uncertain frown on her face, and Severus wondered what was important about the memory. "I didn't tackle you, though. That has to count for something."

"Not yet," he said, examining the shelves around them. "I wonder…"

She stopped tracing the shelf, stilling completely. "What?"

He spared a glance for her face, somewhat pale and obviously wary before he turned abruptly and began walking down the aisle.

"What?" she demanded, rushing to catch up with him. Their steps echoed on the floorboards. "What are you doing?"

"Testing a theory," he threw over his shoulder, and then he began sprinting.

He heard her footsteps stop altogether behind him, and then she was chasing him. He paid her little mind, however. The long shelf at last gave way and he took a right turn in the gap, passing half a dozen shelves before plunging into an aisle on the left. As he ran, light from an unseen source illumined his steps just enough for him to see by. The shelves were the same mahogany as far as he ran, but the objects shifted constantly. A globe displaying constellations. A shard of stained glass that looked as if it belonged to the tail of the mermaid in the Prefects bath. A plant pot. An old silver tea set. Several scrolls of parchment and books in varying sizes and colors. As far as he ran, he still heard her steps behind him, and soon her voice.

"Professor!" she called through her panting. "Sir, wait… What are you…looking for?"

He stopped and ducked behind a shelf, listening as her footsteps approached closer and closer.

"Sir, where–Aah!" she screamed as he grabbed her arm, pulled her into the aisle, and pressed her shoulders back against the shelves. She stared up at him, alarm evident in her round eyes and open lips. Even in this mental image, her pulse jumped at her neck.

"What are you–"

"Point me," he demanded.

She blinked rapidly. "I–what?"

"Point me," he insisted, stepping closer until she had to press her entire body into the shelves in an effort to escape him. He could feel her entire rib cage shaking as he gripped her shoulders. Staring into the depths of her brown eyes, he watched confusion and defiance warring within them. He lowered his voice. "What is your most closely guarded secret? What don't you want anyone to discover?"

"I…I won't–"

But she already had. He heard a faint chime and stuck his head out from the side of the shelf to peer down the hallway. In the distance, a golden light hovered in the air halfway along a shelf. He pulled his head back. The grin inside his own head was sharklike, but he only raised his brow at her.

"Stop me. If you can…"

And then he peeled away from her and ran toward the light. He was sure he left her in a stunned, inactive silence, but then she was tearing after him again.

"Stop!" she commanded.

"You'll have to do more than shout at me, Miss Granger," he called over his shoulder. "Use the clever brain you supposedly have."

He made a left turn, intending to zigzag his way through the shelves to decrease his time. But the next moment, he skidded to a halt as a solid wall rose up in front of him, blocking off the rest of his path. He knocked on its surface. It was sturdy beneath his touch.

"Good," he said quietly, then backtracked to carve a new path. After two more turns, another wall almost crushed him as it slid into place. He ducked out of the way down another aisle, only to be stopped again.

"You won't destroy the structure of your own mind," he said, sure she could hear him. He hauled himself up onto the shelves, climbing until he was standing on top of the shelf. Looking behind him, he saw not only the panels of wall which had filled in the particular gaps he was trying to cross, but also her own stunned form staring up at him from two rows over.

And then he was leaping from shelf to shelf, heading as always for the glowing orb of light. As he leaped to another shelf, he narrowly avoided a thorny vine that had climbed up the side, aiming for his foot. On the next shelf, a wind blew at him, but not hard enough to knock him off course. At the next, a storm cloud formed over his head.

"You wouldn't want to get the pages of your books wet, would you?" he called, and the cloud immediately evaporated. He smiled to himself. Silly girl. They aren't real books.

Now the light was only a few shelves away. He swatted at paper airplanes, dodged a flock of canaries, and jumped off of the shelf when a whole tree grew into existence, branches stretching to block his way. No matter. This is the last shelf. He rounded the corner and came to an abrupt stop.

Hermione Granger was standing between him and the light he sought, arms slightly spread out as he approached. Her hair had fallen out of the braid she'd pulled it back into earlier in the day. Her sweatshirt was half unzipped, the sleeves pulled up, her hood askew.

"Clever enough?" she asked, fighting to keep her breath even.

"That remains to be seen," he said, stalking slowly toward her like a panther. "It was good of you to conjure magical barriers. On anyone who wanted to explore your mind, you could hone each of those defenses into something much more effective. You could have, for example, trapped me within four walls, giving me no access to any shelves whatsoever. Remember what I said: don't strive for creativity. Instead, do a few things very well."

She deflated somewhat in front of him, clearly upset that she hadn't taken his advice to heart quite yet.

"While you did much to delay me, you have not altogether stopped me, however," he said, and she tensed again in front of him, feet spreading to widen her defensive stance. He took a step forward and she shifted in response. "I must warn you not to attempt to cast anything lethal. You are much more likely to injure your own mind rather than me."

"Convenient," she snorted.

"Yes."

And then he strode toward her at his usual gliding pace. He watched shock still in her features, clearly not having expected him to act so brazenly normal. When he was within arm's distance of her, she tried to block him as she had at her previous memory, but he continued to advance with his additional height and weight to back him. When they were still a few feet from the orb, she wrapped her arms around his torso.

He almost laughed. "What are you–?"

But then he felt her foot hook behind his knee, and with her standing leg, she threw all of her weight into him, toppling them both to the ground. He stared up at her, winded and too shocked to move as she clambered up his body and pressed her knees into his elbows, pinning them to the ground.

"And where, precisely, did you learn to do this?" he asked, watching as the curls hanging over her face shuddered with her heavy breathing.

"Self-defense lessons," she said, grinning. "Summer after second year."

"Impressive," he said, giving her a moment to bask in her victory. "But I see they didn't teach you to incapacitate an opponent completely. Allow me."

Her smile fell and so did she, as he pressed his feet into the floor, raised his hips, and, throwing her off balance, twisted them both until it was she who was pinned to the ground. It was her turn to stare up at him, face red and shocked. Within the curtains of his hair that fell forward between them, he gave her a crooked smile.

"Notice how much more efficient this is," he said as if it were any other class lecture. Like her, he had used his knees, pinning one of her arms at her side with his right, but holding her right leg bent open in place with his left. With his left arm and the weight of his upper body, he had her right wrist pinned to the ground near her head. His free hand pressed into the ground on the other side of her face, fingers splayed across the sway of curls that had been whipped to the side. "Now, why should you favor this position when up against a wizard?"

Her face flooded with more warmth as she tried to examine their bodies in as clinical a way as possible. Beneath him, her chest rose and fell shakily in an attempt to steady her breathing. When she still didn't answer, he waved his free right hand in front of her.

She swallowed, but when she spoke, her voice was still dry. "It leaves you free to use your wand. Of course…"

He nodded.

"You should still be familiar with nonverbal and wandless magic, but yes. Now…try to get free. I won't add any pressure or resist. Truly," he added at her raised brow.

Eyes scanning between them again, she finally discovered that her left leg, which lay flat against the floor, was the only limb not pinned to the ground. She raised her knee, setting her foot flat on the ground, and tried, as he had done, to raise her hips. However, her right one wouldn't budge under the weight of his knee on her leg. The fingers of her right hand writhed in an attempt to grip his wrist, as if to anchor her movements. They did not help. All she succeeded in doing was twisting slightly in his grip. Keeping his face blank, he saw the exact moment she realized that her attempt had entailed pushing her left hip, if only a few inches, up the line of the inner thigh of the leg which he was using to pin her arm in place. She halted her efforts immediately and wavered, partially elevated, before slowly sinking back down.

She shuddered out a breath, trying to look anywhere but at him, a task he could appreciate was particularly difficult to do given their present situation. The light on her face dimmed suddenly, and he half turned to glance over his shoulder. They watched as the orb they had both worked so hard to get to disappeared completely. Turning back to her, he saw her eyes first narrow in confusion, then widen in understanding.

"Did–" he began. But his suspicions were confirmed, when a new chime sounded directly above them. The moment he caught her eye, half illumined in brilliant gold where his head did not cast a shadow on her face, heat suffused her cheeks. "Hmm…" he said lightly, absently noticing the pink flush in her cheeks descend down her neck and over her collarbones. "I think that means I won."

The girl's chest shuddered as she inhaled, her eyes fixed to the collar of his shirt.

"Will you tell me how to get free?" she requested quietly. When he didn't move, she added, "Please?"

"No," he said, even as he rose to his feet and pulled her up with him. "Your homework is to think about it yourself."

Think about it indeed, Hermione told herself over the next few days, during which she found herself thinking about it rather a lot more than she would have liked. As if the very experience of Legilimecy was not already enough, the challenges he had set up for her on top of the way his mental visit had ended was enough to put her on edge during her waking hours and incredibly paranoid about her sleeping hours. Because as she tried to wind down her mind at the end of the day–another mental homework exercise he had given her–her thoughts repeatedly turned to the weight of his body, the herbal scent of his clothing, the low timbre of his voice as he relished his success over her.

For the first time in six months, she was beginning to have doubts that she would survive this partnership with Severus Snape.