AN: Happy new year! Thank you to the many kind reviewers after the last chapter. Rest assured, your questions will be answered over the next few chapters. Hope you enjoy!

Chapter 23: Insinuare

"You can accomplish a good deal just by knowing how the body works. So, how would you get out of this one?"

Hermione blinked into Ginny's face as Tonks circled around them. The redhead had cut her a confused glance across the library table when Hermione had proposed the lessons last week.

"But we already have a defense group," she'd said.

"Yes, but that's about spells," Hermione had replied quietly. They had come to her secluded area of the library, but she didn't want to risk anyone overhearing them. As term had drawn on, students–especially in fifth and seventh year–were spending increasingly longer sessions in the library. "Tonks has been teaching me physical self-defense. You know, like Muggles do."

A grin had broken out on Ginny's face.

"Mum would go spare. I'm in."

As Hermione had predicted, Ginny was much more of a natural at self-defense than she was, perhaps a skill honed by years of experience with older brothers. They had started their session only ten minutes ago, and Ginny had twisted out of all of Hermione's holds with instinctual ease. Now Ginny had her hands at Hermione's neck, and a slow smile was creeping across her face as if to say, I know how to get free.

"Er…"

Hermione windmilled, swinging her arms inward, cutting up through the gap between Ginny's arms, and pushing them down and away. Ginny released her hold, and they both turned to Tonks for approval. The pink-haired witch nodded.

"Good," she said. "But that maneuver will not work against every opponent, especially significantly stronger ones. There is a simpler, energy-saving move you can do. Watch. Ginny, put your hands on my neck."

The girl complied, and Tonks raised her arms from her sides until they were pointed in the air. She then twisted away from Ginny fluidly. When she eyed both of the girls with a "See?" sort of expression, Ginny nodded, but Hermione shook her head.

"I don't understand," she said, and though she was getting used to hearing the words come out of her mouth during these lessons, a hint of embarrassment still undergirded them.

"When I raised my arms, my shoulders pinched her hands against my neck, which loosened her grip." Tonks smiled patiently. "If you go with my method, you're completely free and can put distance between yourself and your opponent. If you go with your method, your body stays close, which puts you at a slight advantage to carry out other close attacks. Let's practice both of these strategies now."

Hermione and Ginny complied multiple times, first with one attacking, then the other. Then Tonks ran them through three more positions, which she again made them practice multiple times, before she cast a Tempus.

"That's all for today. I've got to head out. You both did really well. Up for joining us next time, Ginny?"

"Definitely!" Ginny grinned, gathering her loose hair back into a neat ponytail. "So long as it doesn't conflict with Quidditch. You coming, Hermione?"

"I'll meet you back at the common room," Hermione said. "I've just got to…"

She trailed off and threw a glance at Tonks, who tilted her head with curiosity at her. Once Ginny had waved and slipped out of the room, Hermione and Tonks sat down on chairs the room had produced.

"This won't take long," she told Tonks. "I just had a question I was hoping you could answer."

"I'm all ears," Tonks said, then laughed at Hermione's stricken expression. She held up a hand. "Don't worry, I won't do that again."

"Thanks." Hermione laughed nervously. The last time Tonks had used that phrase, h face literally had become all ears. Ron had found it hysterical, but Hermione had been reminded of Old Testament descriptions of seraphim. "I was wondering if in your Auror training you ever learned about Occlumency."

"No," Tonks said.

Hermione couldn't help it the fall of her shoulders.

"But I do know a thing or two," Tonks added quickly. "My mum tried to teach me a bit when I was younger than you. She's excellent at mind magic. I didn't take to it very well, but I remember bits and pieces."

Hermione perked up in her seat, and she felt her heart race in her chest.

"Do you?" she asked eagerly. "I could really use some advice."

Tonks didn't immediately answer. Instead, she observed Hermione shrewdly, eyes passing over Hermione's face as if she was attempting to use mind magic herself to root out Hermione's motivations. Finally, she nodded.

"I'm no expert," she said slowly. "But what do you want to know?"

Hermione let out a sigh of relief and plowed forward. "I've been trying to teach myself, but the books here are rubbish. I know," she said at Tonks's raised eyebrows. The woman didn't know her terribly well, but enough to have gotten the gist of Hermione's reputation for a bookworm. "All theory, barely anything of practical note. I–" Her face warmed. "I've been trying for weeks, but I still can't seem to clear my mind. It's the first step, and I don't think I've made any progress."

As she talked, her voice grew higher pitched, and she snapped her mouth shut, forcing herself to take a long, calming breath. Tonks's eyes danced once more over her face, and then, to Hermione's surprise, the corner of her lips quirked.

"Hermione, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you are hyper controlled."

"Is…that a bad thing?"

"Not necessarily," Tonks said, crossing one leg over the other and clasping her hands around her knee. "I'm much more instinctual myself, which I think can be an asset in my line of work. However, as an Auror and in some fields of magic, requiring a firm control–or sense of control–can be a hindrance."

Hermione frowned. "So you're saying…that I can't do it?"

For some strange reason, her chest began to ache. She felt like crying.

Tonks's eyebrows rose once more. "Not at all," she said. "Just that your strategies might need to be different. What have you attempted when you try to occlude?"

"I try to think of nothing," Hermione said.

Tonks smiled. "And how does that go?"

"Terribly," Hermione said bluntly. "It's impossible. I start singing songs in my head or thinking about homework or wondering what dinner is going to be the next day."

She left out the detail about pink elephants that had danced in her vision like bobbing balloons during the prior evening's attempt.

"And that makes perfect sense." Tonks was smiling again, but Hermione didn't think it made any sense whatsoever, let alone perfect sense. "Hermione, thinking of nothing is one hundred percent the opposite of how your mind usually functions. You have to play to your strengths."

"Meaning…" Hermione prompted when Tonks said nothing.

"Meaning, thinking of nothing isn't the only way to practice Occlumency. The more advanced practitioners think very concretely of something. Look–" She adjusted in her seat and started down a new line when Hermione only shook her head faintly. "Has anyone ever cast Legilimency on you?"

"Yes."

"And did your mind have some sort of visual structure to it?"

"Yes, it was–"

"Don't tell me," Tonks interrupted, holding up a hand. "We're already having self-defense lessons. I can only presume that if you're looking into mind magic, I shouldn't investigate too much."

Hermione felt a small jolt of surprise. Had any other member of the Order known the kind of special research she was doing–Lupin or Sirius or Mrs. Weasley–she doubted any of them would tell her to keep her secrets. Especially not Mrs. Weasley.

"That's a further sign that I'm right," the woman continued. "The very organized often employ some kind of visual technique during Occlumency. Usually a single image, like an element, or a landscape. It may take a while for you to sort out what works best for you, but it should be something simple. That's the key. You need to find the balance between utter boredom–that way lies madness or overthinking–and overstimulation. The least thought-provoking it is, the better."

So my cabinet is out, Hermione thought. Her own mental space was bursting with thought as many and varied as the curios held within. But still, this was much better information to go on than anything she'd read so far.

"I'll have to think about it," she mused, biting her lip. "But thank you, Tonks. And…could you not tell anyone about this conversation?"

Tonks looked at her blankly. "What conversation?"

She winked.

"Master Snape!"

Severus yanked his head off of his office desk and blinked rapidly. The candle he had lit was only centimeters tall, casting a small circumference of light around him. A stack of fourth year essays, somewhat scattered but miraculously without any smearing in his red ink had created a not altogether uncomfortable pillow for his impromptu nap. His right hand, however, was smeared with lines of red.

"Master Snape!" The shrill voice sounded again at his right, and he dropped his hand.

"Tilly?" he asked the house elf. "What is it?"

Tilly was dancing nervously from foot to foot, and her usually tidy uniform was hanging lopsided off of one shoulder. Her large pale blue eyes peered up at him steadily without blinking. She reached out a hand for the wrist of Severus's robes and tugged.

"You must be coming quickly, sir," Tilly said, urging him to stand. "Dobby and Tilly is overhearing…she said not to tell the students, but you is being a professor, sir–"

"Tilly, what is going on?" he asked, shaking her hand from his sleeve, but pushing himself to his feet nonetheless.

"Mistress Umbridge, sir," Tilly said. Her ears twitched anxiously and she brought her hands up to their pointed tips, tugging slightly as if she was uncertain whether her words counted as an instance of disobedience. "She is discovering the secret group. She is finding out about Mr. Harry Potter, sir. Dobby is on his way, sir, but he isn't allowed to be saying–"

Severus snapped to attention, hand flying to his side to reassure himself that his wand was there.

"You've done well, Tilly," he said, striding to the door. "You've broken no rule. I command you to help the students escape, but do so unseen."

He didn't wait for confirmation of her understanding and obedience, but instead ran out of his office and swept up the steps as quickly as he could. He only knew that the Room was somewhere on the seventh corridor, but it turned out that knowing the exact location wasn't necessary. He disillusioned himself as soon as he heard the clatter of running steps, and soon found members from every house other than Slytherin tearing off through the halls. So, Dobby had managed to find a loophole.

Surely it was a matter of time before Umbridge made an appearance, so he slunk along quickly, eyes peeled for Potter. When he caught sight of a mane of brown hair dashing down the hall, however, he made his decision quickly. He pulled out his wand, cast a Summoning charm, and pulled them both backwards into the girl's lavatory, locking and warding the door behind him.

Granger pulled herself out of his hold and whirled on him, wand raised in the air. As she spun, a wave of the scent of her hair rushed up and hit him in the face. She blinked open-mouthed at him, then lowered her arm and took in her surroundings. Her breaths came in heavy in pants as she cast her eyes from the cubicles to the sinks and back to him.

He watched her mind work and felt a kind of void in his torso. He had not been this close to her in almost three months. He'd not been in her presence alone for almost as long, apart from her early morning apology for the Quibbler article. Her brow was wrinkled in anxiety and confusion, and pale purple shadows painted the space under her eyes. Was she not sleeping enough? Eating enough? He quickly scanned down her body, but her robes obscured her shape.

"How…how did you know?" she finally gasped, clutching a stitch in her side.

"Tilly," he said shortly, bringing his attention back up to her face. At her questioning look, he clarified, "My house elf."

"Your–?"

He didn't have time for this. He'd wasted enough of it already…reminiscing.

"Where is Potter? Did he make it out? Is he safe?"

She looked wildly around, as if she could see through the walls and floors of Hogwarts.

"I…I don't know," she confessed, still breathing heavily. Her hair hung around her head like a rumpled halo, and she pushed it out of her face with shaking hands.

"Weren't you with him?" he demanded, stepping closer.

"Yes, but–it was mad. We were just practicing…and then Dobby appeared… He warned us, but… Everyone starting running. I told Ginny to get to the l-library."

She checked her watch and paled, seeing that curfew was only a few minutes away. She raised her eyes, round with anxiety, to his. He stepped forward and gently, but firmly, pressed on her arm to lower it. Then he brought his wand to bear at her heart.

"You are going to be fine," he said, then murmured a spell. "This will slow your heart rate and breathing back to normal. You need to find Potter. Ensure he gets back to his common room and stays there. No hanging about to save other people. Not even Weasley. Understood?"

She frowned, but after a moment of internal struggle, nodded once. He brought his wand to rest against her cheekbone, and she flinched away from him.

"I'm not going to hurt you," he said quietly.

Her eyes darted between his own, large and frightened, but he watched them settle and slow just as her chest did with its breath, which was now stabilized. She swallowed heavily, then nodded, and despite the fact that his hand had been on her arm and his wand tip at her shaking breastbone, her open trust of him felt so intimate that he couldn't look her in the eye anymore.

"You will tell anyone who catches you that you've been ill," he murmured, tracing his wand down her cheek. As he did so, her face went a pale green and a cool sweat broke out across her skin. Her lips went chapped, her nose pink, and, lastly, he made her eyes appear bloodshot. "The glamour will last half an hour, during which time you may need to fake lethargy and weakness, but then it will fade. Can you make any excuses and get back to your dorm within that time?"

Keeping her feet rooted in front of his, she turned her head toward the mirror and let out a soft gasp at her reflection. She raised a hand to prod at various parts of her face, no doubt feeling their usual healthy consistency beneath her touch. Apart from the telltale spots, she easily looked as if she had contracted Dragon Pox. She turned back to him and nodded.

"Good," he said.

They stood in silence for a moment. As the plan solidified in her eyes, he felt her other emotions swirl behind the thin membrane enclosing her mind. Fear, determination, confusion, and–still–a little annoyance. As there should be, he thought. He lowered his wand and stepped away from her.

"Now go."

Granger set her face resolutely and headed for the door. Once there, she turned back to him.

"I–"

She stopped. He had to remind himself that it was only a glamour, that she wasn't really as waifish and desolate as she appeared, that she didn't need him to assist her back to her common room, that she was still irritated with him. He shifted and crossed his arms in front of himself.

"What?"

"Nothing, it's just…" She gave him a tremulous smile, and the expression paired with his spellwork gave her the appearance of a Dickensian orphan. "Despite…everything…" She let the word hang heavy between them for a moment. She gave a little shrug. "You came."

He found himself too tired to argue the point or explain to himself why, despite his anxious alertness, he felt his spine soften. Instead, he only jerked his chin and commanded quietly: "Go."

An hour later, Severus arrived back in his rooms to find Minerva sitting on his sofa.

"Albus has left the castle," she said the moment the door had shut behind him. From her tone, he could tell she didn't mean that the man had left just for the evening.

He sat down hard as she recounted the events in the Headmaster's office, and only several minutes and a couple drinks later did she get up, brushing the front of her robes at wrinkles that weren't there.

"Severus," she sighed. "What are we going to do with this woman?"

"Chuck her in the Black Lake?" he suggested dully, setting down his empty glass with a thunk.

"Be serious," the woman said, a bite of her accent in her voice.

"I am."

She gave him a narrow-eyed look that communicated that he was acting like a sulky teenager. But he didn't care. Dumbledore had given Snape every instruction to keep going, to stay close, to protect the boy. Three months remained of the school year. What were they supposed to do in his absence?

Shortly after Minerva left, Hermione's note arrived, but he couldn't find the energy to read it. He began to heave himself off the sofa when a flame burst into existence in the middle of the room. The fireball vanished and a square parchment fluttered down to land on his table.

"One of these days I am going to die of a heart attack, and it will be entirely your fault, Albus," he said, picking up the parchment and sliding a finger under the seal. Dumbledore's spidery writing relayed a brief message.

Keep an eye, and don't forget lessons.

The word "don't" was slightly bolder than the rest of the sentence.

Severus rolled his eyes. He knew exactly of which lessons Dumbledore wrote. Not even in his absence would he relent.

Perfect, he thought the word with sarcasm.

With all the information Minerva had had to relay to him late the prior evening, she had left out one spectacular detail, which he only discovered in the morning. Poppy had requested his presence shortly before breakfast, and, given its written rather than Floo delivery, he had strolled up to the Hospital Wing at a leisurely pace. Along the way, he caught whispers from the students confirming what he had already expected would occur: Umbridge had replaced Albus as head of Hogwarts.

The thought put him in a foul mood, but he found himself fighting laughter only minutes later.

"Severus, there you are," Poppy called to him from a bed at the far end of the wing. "I wondered if you could assist me."

His brow furrowed. The hospital wing was empty of students, so why was there someone behind the curtains as far as possible from the door? When Poppy pushed back the curtains, he understood why. Marietta Edgecombe, a sixth year Ravenclaw, sat up in the bed. Upon seeing him, she had let out a small cry and pulled the covers up to her face, but she wasn't quick enough. He had seen the bright pimples spread across her face spelling out SNEAK in stark letters.

"Oh, for heaven's sake, girl," Poppy reprimanded her. "He needs to see it if he is to help you."

With trembling fingers, the girl lowered the blankets to her chin and lowered her gaze to her lap. Severus examined the girl's face, gesturing for her to turn her face once in his perusal. He and Poppy withdrew, closing the curtains once more, then advanced to her office. A variety of medicines lined the walls and he scanned their shelves

"How…?" he asked, plucking a bottle down.

"Apparently, it was Miss Edgecombe who alerted Headmistress Umbridge–" She said the title with an ironic resect that Minerva would have approved of. "–about an illegal study group which was caught late last evening. The minute the words were out of her mouth, those boils erupted."

"That is an interesting bit of magic," Severus said evenly, while inside his chest warmed with a vicious kind of satisfaction. He set the bottle back on the shelf.

"Oh, yes," Poppy said. "It appears the students in the study group signed a charmed contract. The jinx was woven into the parchment."

Clever girl.

He selected another bottle.

"I confess myself unfamiliar with this jinx," he said. "But this tincture may help. I'd be happy to administer it for you."

Without waiting for her reply, he strode out of her office and slipped behind the curtain. Miss Edgecombe was twisting the fraying hem of the blanket between her fingers. She looked up upon his entrance. The skin beneath her pimples was pink. He tossed the bottle at her and she fumbled to catch it against her chest.

"Apply one dropper of this each morning," he said carelessly. "But I make no promises. This jinx is tricky, a sure sign that the person who devised it knew what they were doing. Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

Tears filled the corners of the girl's eyes, but she shook her head.

"No," he agreed. "You've said enough, haven't you?"

As he left, he twitched his wand between his fingers. Miss Edgecombe would not remember his reprimand, but she would hold a lingering fear of him for some weeks.