It was snowing. Thus far, winter had produced lackluster snows, but it was finally falling in more than a powdery dust.

It had been coming for some hours now, and the ground was surely cushioned in its white splendor. Flurried tufts of flakes fluttered in the wind to gently fall upon the blanket covering the earth.

Above, the sky was twinkling, majestic darkness. It took her breath away if she stared too long into it. Wizardkind didn't care to know much in the way of science, and that included the remainder of the universe outside Earth.

They looked to the Heavens for meaning, but not anything else.

For Hermione, to look into the night sky was to face infinite possibility.

In an infinite universe anything could happen. When one took into string theory, there could be universes, where Grindewald never rose to power, where Hermione was never a ward, where she was an equal to her peers.

Where she knew her parents and could stay with them, grow with them, experience magic through their eyes and allow them to view it through hers.

The cool night chilled her tears before they slipped down her cheeks. She sniffled and huffed a bitter laugh; mist puffed in front of her mouth, like the spirit she felt herself losing given form.

The scrape of shoes across the stone tower floor sent her heart skipping like rock. She knew who it was.

"It's after curfew. You should be in bed." He strolled toward her and she forced herself to keep facing forward, to resist his draw.

"I'm a prefect."

His shoulder brushed hers. "You're hardly making rounds, Hermione."

He had not used a pet name since their conversation. It was good, she told herself, though it made her heart sink.

He was petrifying her, turning her into stone with his presence and its lack, with the way his cool eyes passed her by. Her heart was a heavy stone sinking into the depths of heartbreak, and her throat was becoming a closed tunnel.

The pivot of his foot was loud in the silence. He turned to face her and she could see the paleness of his face. It was like the moon, and it glowed though the waning quarter provided not even half its brightest luminance.

And his scent— sandalwood and cinnamon and something musky that reminded her of warmer days, had that last always been there?

She'd forgotten how heady it was.

"Thank you. For the book, I mean," she mumbled. She had to speak first, since the fear of what he'd speak into the intimacy of the open night overwhelmed her.

Tom studied her and she caught the twitch of his lips as he smirked. "I'd have given it to you far sooner if you hadn't rejected me."

"I—" What reply could she possibly give?

"Look at me, Hermione." His voice slid across her skin and left gooseflesh in its wake. She shook her head. When white flashed out to her, she squeezed her eyes shut. It was his smooth, cold hand, fingers gently guiding her chin so she would face him. "Come, now, love. Is it such a huge concession?"

She took a deep breath and let her eyes do what they longed for.

He truly was a beautiful winter night incarnate. His dark curls ruffled in the wind, and his cheeks bloomed roses in the chill. He wore a black woolen jacket and black slacks, and his other hand was hidden in a pocket. "There, that's a good girl."

Her cheeks would have flushed had blood not reddened them already. "Don't do that."

"Do what?" A black brow arched.

"Tom," she pleaded, and he grew smug.

"It's 'Tom,' now, is it?" he teased. "I don't know. The way you say 'professor' has grown on me over the years."

He was so beautiful it hurt. If only he wasn't as cold inside as his knuckles were brushing her cheek.

Hermione flinched away from him, but his grip was implacable. "I've missed you," he murmured, leaning toward her so she could smell mint in the ghostly plume of his breath. "Have you missed me?"

"I—" Hermione squeezed her eyes and heart shut tight.

Even his tut of disapproval made her chest ache. "Darling, I know you're upset with me, but are you going to ignore me forever?"

"You've been ignoring me," she retorted without thought, then grimaced. How easily he coaxed truth from her tongue.

"I was giving you space. Isn't that what you wanted?"

Her gaze flicked up to his own against her will; he was sincere, as far as she could read him. Once, she thought she knew him better than anyone else, but the last few months had proven he was still a mystery. "I don't know."

"Does it hurt, when I pass you over for another? When I ignore your hand waving in the air?" When she didn't reply, his lips curved, and his dark eyes glimmered sadly. "You hurt me, Hermione. You rejected me after I had spent years pouring myself into you."

"You were taking advantage of me."

He swatted her paltry excuse like a fly. "I was transparent in my wish to recruit you for greater things."

"You behaved inappropriately." Could he feel her pulse rushing like rapids beneath her skin. "You were grooming me."

Tom's open expression dropped into unreadable lines. "Grooming you?" he huffed. "Grooming you. Like Lucius Malfoy was grooming you when he caned your arse? You insult me, Hermione."

The words were like a knife, and she reacted accordingly. The drag of their edge distracted her from the obscenity and out of the wound welled her tears. "No." She nearly choked on the word as it came from her tight throat. Every letter spoken cut her esophagus with its lines. "I would never— you're nothing like— you wouldn't. Would you?"

"Oh, Hermione." The ice of his grip loosened to smooth across her cheek. "How can you ask me that?"

The moonlight of his face shimmered in her shining vision. "I'm afraid."

"Of me?" She didn't answer; he sighed. "Whatever I have done to others aside, have I given you reason to fear me? Have I ever once harmed you?"

She shook her head against the marble of his palm.

"I would not hurt you, Hermione. You are much too precious to me. You are a treasure, meae deliciae, my most cherished one. Trust that I would never harm you."

When, again, she did not speak, his fingers skimmed down her throat to wrap around her shoulder and draw her into his solid form. She breathed in the clean scent of his woolen jacket. It was soft against her cheek, and she longed to curl her fingers over his lapels and bury her face against his chest. When his fingers combed gently through her curls, she sobbed.

"Let me take care of you, my love."

Her forehead rested against his strength and her tears dropped straight to the ground, invisible in the velvet shadows. "I want to," the girl admitted, "But I'm afraid. I'm so scared, Tom."

When her hands finally curled in the cloth of his shirt and her forearms flattened against him, he wrapped his arms around her in an embrace as whole as the night. "I know, my love. Trust me, and I promise you that one day fear itself will tremble at your power."

They remained like that for long moments; Tom listened as she cried out the pain and loss she'd endured for the last few months, the last year, the entirety of her young life. She was always so forward, so strong, ready to take on the world with her study plan and her encyclopedic knowledge, but that was merely the wall she built around herself. It was how she fortified herself against a world that did not want her, that was prepared to reject her at the first opportunity.

Inside that wall was a girl desperate to prove herself, willing to fight, loyal to those who were beside her, but she was tired. She'd been molded her whole life to fit in the mold the Wizarding world had forced on her, contorting her curves and edges until she was made smaller than her true self. The weight of words hurled at her, the chipping effects of the violence, and the horror of what her guardian had forced upon her… those experiences threatened to overwhelm her walls and drown her completely.

It was only the force of her own will that kept the flood at bay. It was that will that made her a Gryffindor. She could not only withstand the storm but turn and walk back into it if necessary.

It didn't mean she wasn't hurting.

As the clock in the courtyard somewhere below began to sing the bells of a new day, she allowed this man to carry a little of the weight on her shoulders. It was a moment of weakness, and she might regret it later, but for now it was desperately needed.

Her tears dried and she sniffled. "Oh. It's midnight."

"Indeed," her professor mused.

"Happy birthday, Tom."

She couldn't see him, her cheek against the soft scratch of his jacket and her tear-salted lashes clinging together, but Tom smiled. Avarice battled the odd contentment that gleamed in his eyes.