Hermione sat very still in a chair in front of Snape's desk. Snape was looking at her silently, his face an emotionless mask.
"Miss Granger," Snape said, steepling his hands. "You have caused a significant uproar with your antics, you realize?"
Hermione winced and looked down at the floor.
"Sorry, sir," she whispered.
"Your professors have been extremely concerned with you acting unlike yourself recently," Snape said, his tone conversational. "There were some who wanted you to be examined by Madam Pomfrey, to make sure you were okay. Professor Sprout nearly fainted when she overheard you swear once."
Hermione's face burned in embarrassment.
"It was determined that it was the stress of the situation with the attacks was driving you to act uncharacteristically," Snape continued, "and we decided to monitor the situation — yes, the staff got together just to discuss you. But your mood continued to grow more and more volatile, alarming your classmates more and more."
Hermione winced. "I—I know, sir."
"Then you summoned spiders," Snape said. His eyes glinted. "You are lucky that no one else saw your little stunt – don't deny it Miss Granger, no one else would have done anything so impulsive and stupid – with the dozens of spiders running down the hallways in a frenzy."
"I—I had a good reason, sir, I swear—"
"I thought you had been possessed, did you know?" Snape said, his voice low. "It would have explained the sudden behavioral changes, and Merlin knows you get up to enough untested Grey magic for it to be a possibility." His eyes glittered. "I even tested you during Potions one day, though you didn't know it at the time. For possession. Your magic was your own, though, and so I watched on with concern. And then…"
He paused, black eyes piercing.
"And then tonight, Miss Davis came running to me in a panic, saying you were hallucinating the Heir of Slytherin attacking you, and your delusions were causing you to manifest actual physical wounds and bodily harm. But upon investigation, the cause of all this uproar was…"
His eyes sharpened, cutting into her.
"…you had gotten your period."
Hermione winced.
"I—they call it their 'cycle', in the wizarding world, I believe—"
"Do not presume to lecture me." Snape's voice cracked through the room like a whip. "Your period has caused no little distress to the entire student body, and your erratic behavior has caused concern throughout the entire staff of this school. Your paranoid delusions and hallucinations will not continue, do you understand? The question before us is not 'what do we call it?'; the question is 'what do we do about it'."
His eyes were hard, black holes, and Hermione swallowed.
"I warned you." Snape's anger vibrated in his tone, barely held back. "I warned you, did I not? That your overactive core would become unstable once your magical capacity began to exponentially grow?"
"You—you did, sir." Hermione bit her lip very hard, willing her eyes to not tear up.
She'd never felt so ashamed.
"And yet, despite my warning... this happened." His black eyes glittered. "You knew you needed to plan for this eventuality... and yet, you did not. You did nothing."
"It's really hard to realize you're going crazy in the moment when you're going crazy?" Hermione offered. "Now that I know what's going on, it's a lot easier to look back and realize 'oh, of course something was going on—'"
"And now that you do know that your core is unstable," Snape said, raising one eyebrow skeptically, "do you have a course of action prepared?"
"I—I came up with back-up plans, back when you told me initially," she said hesitantly. "When you originally warned me bad things might happen. The main plan was to complete the bond with my coven and use their magic to help stabilize me."
"And…?" Snape snapped.
"Err—well, Luna's not ready yet," Hermione said, uneasy. "So… that won't work, really."
"Was that your only plan, Miss Granger?" Snape asked, his voice curt. "I daresay there isn't exactly a standard course of treatment for 'spinning out of control with one's magical core' available for easy reference."
"I—I had another one, sir." Hermione took a deep breath. "But I would need your help with it, if you were willing."
Snape raised an eyebrow.
"Miss Granger, I think you severely underestimate the drama your little period predicament has inflicted upon my life." His tone was dry. "If I can help resolve this situation, believe me, I will."
Hermione blew out her breath, exhaling.
"Well, it's—it's like what we did last New Year's. Not a few months ago, but in my first year."
Snape's eyes sharpened.
"Miss Granger—"
"I think if we bind an earth elemental to me, it'll help stabilize my magic," Hermione rushed out. "I researched it, months ago — I looked up all kinds of elemental magic. The earth is very stable, and if I can ground all the extra energy in me into the earth or cycle the magic through the earth, it'll all calm down and I won't have it panicking my thoughts or making me paranoid and manic and then I'll be able to feel like myself again hopefully and—"
"Silence," Snape snarled, and Hermione abruptly cut herself off.
His eyes glittered at her. "You want another elemental bound to you?"
"It's the only thing I could think of that might help," Hermione said quietly. "At least until I can formally bond with my coven."
Snape pinched the bridge of his nose very tightly.
"I have never heard of an earth elemental being bound to a person," he told her. "The Dark Lord was researching such things, but as far as I am aware, he only ever bound the air."
"Then I'll be the first, sir," Hermione said bravely. "The earth has a grounding, stable magic. If we don't want my core to overload and 'pop'…"
Snape closed his eyes and sighed, before standing up abruptly.
"You will tell no one of this," he told her, taking his cloak from a hook on the wall. "You will tell no one that I helped you, and you will tell no one of what we did. If this works, excellent; you will plague me no longer. If it does not…"
Hermione swallowed hard, and Snape's eyes glittered.
"Well," he said softly. "We'll have to see."
It was dark, and it was long after curfew. The grounds were dark, with little illumination filtering through the clouds from the sliver of the moon above, and Hermione had to be careful not to stumble as she hurried after her professor.
It was windy, and Hermione shivered, following Snape silently as he marched her to the edge of the forest, where he stopped. He made a small circle with a triangle inside of it out of the white, glowing material he'd used the last time they'd done this, when she'd pleaded to learn how to fly. He put malachite in the center this time, lustrous green stones instead of moonstones, and he stood with a wide stance, his feet on two different points of the triangle.
Apprehensive, Hermione took her place on the last remaining point.
"We are going to summon an earth elemental," he said finally, his eyes holding hers. "We will then bind it to you. The goal is this will allow you to ground your excess energy, to stabilize you as your core struggles with its own growth."
She could recognize more of what Snape was doing this time; it was always important to state your intent and purpose before a ritual, regardless if the participants were already aware of it or not.
"I understand, sir," Hermione said quietly.
"You will need to subdue the elemental," Snape warned her. "I know not the strength of those of the earth; I have no idea how difficult this will be compared to that of the air." His eyes glittered. "If the earth elemental is more powerful and you cannot subdue it, I will do my best to exorcise it from you, but know that I have no knowledge of earth magic myself, Miss Granger. There is no guarantee I will able to." His eyes held hers. "There is the very real possibility that this will go very poorly."
"I know." Hermione took a deep breath. "But I need to try. And it's my risk to take." She held his eyes, determined. "I'm ready."
With a solemn nod to her, Snape closed his eyes, and he began to chant, tracing a symbol in the air with his hands. Hermione kept her breathing even and held fast to her determination, remembering the force of the fight she'd had last time, and she watched and listened attentively as he cast. Magic built in the air around them, swirls of light spiraling inside the circle, and the grass began to glow.
There was a rumbling beneath her feet in the ground, and gradually, a small being made of mud was pulled up from the ground into the middle of the triangle; a vague humanoid being made of mud with no eyes or face.
Golem, Hermione thought.
Then Snape chanted louder, there was the loud rumble of an earthquake, and the mud creature disappeared into her, inside of her chest.
Hermione screamed.
There was something inside of her crushing her lungs, squeezing her breath out from inside her chest cavity, a solid, forbidding presence that was determined to escape. She could feel the golem inside of her, thundering against her organs and insides, wanting out. Hermione fought the urge to swallow mud and choke herself, to jump off of a tree, and she grit her teeth, focusing on the physical pain in her kidneys and womb from her cycle. Feeling pain had helped her last time, with the air—
The pain helped focus her, helped remind her of her own body. She was a person, not a woman made of mud. She was determined, and she would not fail against the earth—
The ground shook underneath her – or was she shaking? – as she fought, pushing her will against that of the golem as she struggled for breath. She could feel herself weakening, though, from the golem's fight as it crushed her lungs – her lungs were empty, she just couldn't get enough air—
Air!
In a flash of insight, Hermione pulled on her air elemental, which immediately went spinning into action, pulling wind into her lungs and inflating them full with a sharp gasp. Awakened, Hermione could now feel her own will rejuvenated and fighting against that of the earth, but also the will of the air, pushing the earth further into submission, forcing it into a place alongside itself. Struggling, Hermione forced the spirit back, shoving, coughing as she did—
Something slotted neatly into place, the struggle vanishing, and Hermione abruptly fell over from the sudden absence of force.
"Miss Granger—!"
Snape was at her side, Hermione realized dizzily. She could see him peering down at her in alarm. She gave him a shaky smile.
"I did it," she slurred. "It… I think it wanted to kill me, but I got it…"
"We are not done yet, Miss Granger." Snape's eyes glittered. "Now, you need to see if you can use this to stabilize your core."
Hermione swallowed. "…right."
Closing her eyes and focusing, Hermione traced her power through her arms back to her magical pool.
As she suspected, the entire thing felt shaky, like a cauldron shuddering over too hot a flame. The walls of the container themselves were splotchy and thin, stretched out and gaping in places, and if her magic had truly been a liquid, it would be leaking out over the ground. Her core at the bottom of the pool was spinning frantically, she could tell, constantly generating power to try and keep up with her new exponential pool growth.
There were still little airy bits of energy inside of her, she could feel, but there were new, rich pieces of a steady, protective magic as well. As she reached for one of these new parts, she shuddered, and she could feel the new magic take over, grounding her with barely a thought.
Hermione fell instinctively to the ground, her bottom set on the earth. She could feel the bits of earth energy inside of her filtering her own magic, feeding it down into the earth and drawing it back up like it was cycling it, and gradually, Hermione could feel her own magic settle down.
There was still her magic in there, growing. But most of the magic inside of her now was solid and steady, and for the first time in a long time, Hermione felt her thoughts slow again, and she felt like she could breathe.
She looked up at Snape, who regarded her with one eyebrow raised pointedly.
"Well?" he said.
Hermione smiled. "It worked."
"Thank the stars above," Snape said. He gave her a curt look. "And whom will you tell of this adventure?"
"No one," Hermione promised. "I will tell no one."
"Good."
She followed him back to the castle, and he escorted her to the Slytherin dungeons – after all, no one was allowed to be alone, and it was far past curfew now.
"Congratulations on your stopgap for stabilizing your energy," Snape told her, nodding to her formally at the entrance. His eyes glittered. "And congratulations on your chrysalization as well."
Hermione moaned in embarrassment as she went through the door, Snape's dark laugh echoing in the hallway behind her.