About A Potions Master

Chapter 14

By Pigwidgeon37

After her hand-cramping session with the diary, Hermione had taken a shower.  While toweling herself dry and rubbing in the body lotion—there were, of course, spells for that, but she did it the Muggle way if she had time, because it simply felt better—she thought longingly of breakfast. Breakfast with Severus, to be exact. The Polyjuice Potion didn’t need anything but a few stirs in the late morning, and then they could Apparate to the Lake District and have a stroll. Of course, they wouldn’t have needed to really brew the potion, as it had been nothing but a pretext in the first place, but none of them had suggested to abandon the project, because it was somehow nice to keep up the appearance of necessity for her sojourn here at the manor. The weather was still splendid, and so they had agreed about the walk yesterday. What a pleasant outlook on a perfect day, Hermione thought. And to be away from her work was having a very healthy effect on her.

She spelled her hair dry and tamed it into a plait—the choice of hairstyle would have to wait until she was dressed and thus able to decide what went best with the clothes she had chosen. Maybe, she thought, writing in the diary had had a certain effect. For now she felt a little less ridiculous when thinking about selecting clothes. They might not be the most important thing in life, but they had the power of making you feel better or worse, that was for sure. Stepping out into her bedroom, she mused that today she definitely felt like wearing a dress. Chewing her lower lip, she went through her wardrobe and finally decided that she had to use her transfiguration skills. One of the perks of being a witch, she thought, smiling to herself, was that you didn’t actually need a large selection of clothes. It helped when you had the basic object at hand, though. To transfigure, say, a book into a pair of trousers was possible, but aside from the difficulty—not for her, but for many other wizards this already presented a big problem—the spell’s stability decreased in proportion to the dissimilarity between the object and the one you transfigured it into. Then you had to bother with fixing charms… No, it was much better to transfigure an already existing dress into one of different shape and pattern. In that case, the spell would hold for months.

After trying out various cuts and patterns, she finally settled for a plain, sleeveless pale blue linen dress with a square neckline—standing in front of the mirror, she adjusted it a bit lower, so that the top of her breasts was just visible. It hugged her body down to the waist and then developed into a rich, swinging skirt that finished two inches above her ankles. She completed her appearance with the light grey ballerinas and finally transfigured a rather nondescript blazer into a matching jacket. Her hair obediently coiled itself into the chignon she had come to like, and she was ready. It was shortly after eight—hopefully Severus hadn’t yet had his breakfast. At the thought of him, Hermione’s heart began to thump wildly.

“It’s okay,” she murmured to herself, “you’re going to see him in a few minutes, so stop that stupid thumping.”

She opened the door to the living room, to find Severus, back turned towards her, standing immobile at the window and glancing out into the gardens. Smiling, she tiptoed towards him and, standing close, put her hands on his shoulders.

“Good morning,” she said, “What a nice surprise to find you here.”

He didn’t turn to face her, and she felt his body stiffen. “Take your hands off me,” he growled.

Bewildered, she obeyed and took a step back. “Severus, what—”

Now he turned round, and the expression on his face was enough to make her take another step backwards.

“Read,” he said.

Although he had uttered only this single syllable, she could detect the barely contained fury in his voice. Still speechless at this sudden change of mood and behaviour, she took the roll of parchment he held out towards her. His hand was trembling. Frowning with curiosity but also because she was feeling the first stirrings of her very own irritation at his conduct, she unrolled it and began to read.

My darling Hermione,

Africa may be beautiful, but it simply doesn’t stand a chance against you. I have been thinking about you and our relationship almost every day since I set out to see the world. I remembered our kisses—Hermione rolled her eyes—and how much I want and love you. Your brilliance and your kind heart. I know that you feel more for me than friendship, too. I’m aware that it is a bit awkward to propose by letter, but there are things beyond the courage even of a Gryffindor.  Besides, I felt that I simply couldn’t wait anymore. Father told me that you had taken three weeks off from the Ministry without leaving an address, so I though I’d rather write to you and give the letter to Pig, who would find you anyway.  Yes, you read right: I am proposing to you, I want to marry you. I know this is what we both want, so why wait?

I’m at the Burrow right now, so you can just Apparate over—if you aim well, you might land right in my arms. You surely won’t regret it.  Mum is completely over the edge with joy since I told her, so we just have to find a date for the wedding.

Please come soon, I can’t wait to see you again after so long.

Yours

Ron

Under normal circumstances, she would have had a good laugh over that ridiculous epistle and visited Harry and Ginny to share her hilarity with them and devise a strategy to turn down the youngest Weasley male without hurting him too much.  These weren’t normal circumstances, though. Before her stood the man she was in love with, smouldering with rage and, hopefully, jealousy. She had to tread carefully.

“Severus,” she said cautiously, “You don’t attach any importance to this bit of sentimental crap, do you?”

“What I attach or do not attach to it,” he answered in a voice so icy that it made her shiver, “is of absolutely no consequence. What I find most interesting, though, is that you had the gall to pretend you were not nurturing any romantic feelings towards anybody. That you dared to accept my… interest in you, although you were already otherwise engaged.”

“Severus, I—”

“Miss Granger,” he interrupted her, “forgive me for not being in the right mood to listen to your inane protestations. I apologize for having read a letter that was not meant for me to read, but I think it helped clear the situation. It is definitely not my style, but I must insist that you leave this house.  Immediately. I will be back in ten minutes and would be very grateful indeed if you already had removed yourself by then. Good bye, Miss Granger.”

He stalked past her and out of the room. Hermione stared at the closing door, desperately trying to convince herself that this was just a bad dream, that she simply had to return to her bedroom, step out into the salon again, and there he would be, smiling, opening his arms, catching her, holding her… She felt her throat constrict and knew that she had to go right now. Without packing, without Crookshanks, just go. They could send her her things. It didn’t matter anyway.  She just had to get out of here before she suffocated.

**°°**°°**

Harry and Ginny were sharing a copious late breakfast to make up for last night’s loss of calories when Ron’s head appeared in the fireplace. The proud owner of the flashiest smile since Gilderoy Lockhart’s heyday was looking very pleased with himself.

“Ron!” Ginny exclaimed, “Since when do they have fireplaces in Africa? Or where are you calling from?”

“You won’t believe it, but I’m at the Burrow. Can I pop over for a moment? I got something important to discuss with you.”

“Sure,” Harry said, “Hi, by the way. Come over right now, if you like. There’s some breakfast left. Ginny made blueberry pancakes. They’re spectacular.”

“Blue—count me in,” Ron said, his eyes alight with enthusiasm. “I’m trying to stuff myself with whatever I can get, after the crap I had to eat for almost five months.”

Ginny got up and went to the kitchen to prepare some more of the pancakes, smiling at the fact that some things never changed, among them her brother’s preternatural capability of eating any amount of food at any time—after all, she had reason to suspect that her mother had already fed him a breakfast of truly Weasleyan dimensions. When she returned to the dining room a little later, Ron was already there at the table with Harry, from whose plate he was shamelessly stealing chunks of fluffy, yellow omelette, speckled with very succulent-looking blueberries.

“Ron, honestly,” she said, trying to sound stern, “With your fingers! Don’t tell me you’re hungry, Mum surely was up at the crack of dawn to prepare breakfast for the Prodigal Son!”

Ron grinned, carefully licked his fingers, rose from his chair and hugged his sister after she had deposed the tray she was carrying on the table. “So good to see you, Gin,” he said, releasing her and holding her at arm’s length. “Married life seems to become you.”

“It has its moments,” Ginny said nonchalantly, flashing Harry a quick smile. “Go on, sit down and dig in. These are still hot.”

After narrowly avoiding death from starvation by rapidly eliminating two pancakes, Ron leaned back and patted his stomach. “You’re a fantastic cook, Gin.  Taking after Mum, and that’s a big compliment. How’s Quidditch, Harry?”

Ginny rolled her eyes and prepared herself for a very boring half-hour.

“We flattened India. You should have seen their faces. This time, we took it slow—I deliberately let the Snitch escape three times, as their defence was weak, and our Chasers were in spectacular form. So we let them stew for more than an hour, until we had scored eighteen goals while they had only two. Then I caught the Snitch. Spectacular, really glorious.”

They prattled on and on, and Ginny was beginning to feel sleepy, when suddenly Harry said, “But hey, you came to tell us something important. What was it?”

Ron grinned. “I thought you’d never ask. I’m getting married.”

Ginny shot out of her stupor. “Married? Ron, that’s wonderful! Where did you meet her? Where is she from?”

“Not what you’re thinking, no,” Ron answered, shaking his head. “Or do you think I want to eat Chinese or Indian food every day?”

“Er, Ron,” Ginny said, “Don’t you think there’s more to a marriage than food? I mean it’s important, of course, but I guess it’s not the main reason for wanting to spend your life with somebody.”

“Of course not. But she’s British, not foreign.”

“Great,” Harry chimed in, “So we won’t have difficulties talking to her. Who is she? Do we know her?”

“’Course you know her. It’s Hermione.”

This announcement was not, as he had expected, greeted by cheers and shoulder-clapping. On the contrary: Harry and Ginny were gaping at him like a pair of rabbits at a rattlesnake.

“Hey,” he said, “Where’s the joy? Where are the exclamations of ‘well done Ron, it was about time!’? Or did I inadvertently cast Petrificus Totalus?”

Ginny looked at Harry, and Harry looked at Ginny, both at a loss for words.  Ginny was the first to recover. “Ron,” she said, “How did you… I mean, look. You returned from Africa yesterday, didn’t you? So how did you find the time to speak with Hermione? Apart from the fact that she has taken some time off from work?”

“Speak with her?” Ron said with a look of utter astonishment on his face, “I didn’t speak to her. I wrote her a letter and sent it with Pig. Father told me she had taken a vacation, but Pig’s gonna find her anyway.”

“You…” Harry cleared his throat. “Let me get that right. You came home, realized that you wanted to marry Hermione, and wrote her a letter saying what?”

“Well,” Ron said, making a sweeping gesture with his right hand, as if to clear the air of unnecessary questions, “I told her that I wanted to marry her, and that mum was beside herself with joy. Oh, and that I love her, of course,” he added hastily.

Harry saw the telltale red blotches spread rapidly over his wife’s face and throat. “Gin, darling,” he said pointedly, “I think we might need some more coffee. Would you be so kind?”

His words were accompanied by a small wink. Ginny understood but hesitated.  Should she really let him deal with her brother? On the other hand, she thought, maybe it was better to cool down a little and gather her wits together in the kitchen. So perhaps she might avoid killing that conceited bastard she regretted having to call her brother. Winking back at Harry, she gave a short nod and disappeared into the kitchen.

Ron, thoroughly unaware of what was going on, asked, “What’s the matter with you? Aren’t you happy for us?”

Harry, who during the war had learned to keep his impulsive nature at bay rather well, wasn’t so sure anymore whether he could control his temper. Therefore he took a few steadying breaths and counted to ten before he spoke. “Ron. Listen.  I, and doubtlessly also Ginny, would be incredibly happy if you and Hermione got married. But she hasn’t yet given her consent, has she? So why are you bragging about an imminent wedding, when you don’t even know whether the lady in question has accepted your proposal?”

For a moment, it seemed as if the message had got through. But then, Ron shook his head and said, “Why shouldn’t she accept? She’s single, bookish, not exactly a looker, so why shouldn’t she want me?”

Now it was Harry’s turn to flush scarlet. “Are you implying, you… you silly, conceited git,” he asked through clenched teeth, “that you are proposing to Hermione, who is our best friend, just in case you forgot, out of pity?”

Shifting a little on his chair, because this conversation was beginning to take a rather unexpected turn, which made him uneasy, Ron said, “N-no, not out of pity. But it’s the logical solution, isn’t it? She’s alone, I’m unattached, so why shouldn’t we—”

“Ron!” Harry interrupted him, in a tone that would have made Snape blush with envy, “Ron, I will ask you one single question, and I want an honest answer. Do you love Hermione?”

“We-ell,” Ron said, a little alarmed by the murderous expression on Harry’s face, “that depends on how you define—”

“No cheap philosophy, Ron. Do you love her?”

“I guess… well, it’s difficult…”

With a single, fluid movement, Harry was out of his chair and beside Ron, pulling him up from his chair by the upper arm. “Listen,” he said, “just do me one favour. Go home, or wherever you want, think about my question and don’t come back until you can answer by a simple yes or no. Understood?”

“Harry, what—”

“I said go. Now. Or I’ll banish you through that window.”

“Okay, okay, I’m leaving,” Ron muttered, “As you’ve all gone mad…”

With a plop, he disappeared. Harry remained standing on the same spot, breathing heavily, and trying to calm down.

“Here’s the coffee,” Ginny announced, emerging from the kitchen, “And now let’s—where’s Ron?”

“Gone,” her still-furious husband answered, “and he’d better not come back too soon.”

**°°**°°**

When Cassandra Snape returned from her morning walk, she found the house empty but for two cats busy cleaning each other’s fur.

“Lovebirds!” she snapped and went to look for her son. He was nowhere to be seen. She knocked at Hermione’s door but got no answer. “Silly me!” she suddenly said, slapping her forehead, “They went to the Lake District! My memory is indeed deteriorating.”

So she decided to have a look at Madam Malkin’s recently-arrived autumn collection and descended to the kitchen, in order to tell Peggy that she didn’t need to prepare lunch. Passing through the entrance hall, a piece of parchment, propped up against one of the mirrors, caught her eye.

“The children know that I am getting old,” she muttered, “But how nice to remind me where they have gone.”

Still smiling, she snatched the parchment. Then her smile gave way to an expression of utter horror when she read,

Mother,

I have left for Hogwarts where I intend to remain for the rest of the holidays.  Miss Granger has returned to Canterbury. I believe that there are a few of her possessions left and would be most grateful if you could take care of the matter. I do not wish for you to ask any questions or try to contact either me or Miss Granger.

S.