Part Nineteen

AN: If it wasn't for Lariope using her finely honed skills, you wouldn't be reading this now. If you know her, send her your thanks.

November 6, 2000

Hermione

-~8~-

"I thought these kind of decisions were supposed to get easier as you got older and more mature," Harry muttered to himself as he read Hermione's owl again. "Do I or don't I?"

"I don't know, but if you don't help me with these things, we'll be having scrambled eggs for dinner," Ginny announced as she came in the door, laden down with parcels. Harry jumped up to help, and after all the purchases were stowed away, they sat down at the kitchen table with a pot of tea.

"What has my husband so out of sorts he's talking to himself?" Ginny asked. It still gave her a thrill to say the word husband, especially since it referred to Harry. He gave her a grin before picking up Hermione's letter.

"I still haven't decided and she wants an answer, and now she's threatening me with her version of Ron's hurt puppy eyes," he replied.

"Ah, I see. Well, you didn't give Snape your word or anything like that, so what's the problem?" Ginny asked as she stood and took a package of biscuits out of the cupboard. Sitting back down, she opened it and offered some to Harry. Taking one, he nibbled on it before frowning.

"There's an implied trust in something like that, Ginny. You don't just hand over your most – your memories to just anyone you know? If he'd wanted everyone to see them, he'd have left them in a Pensieve or a bottle or something and labeled it 'To be violated in the event of my death.' I'm sure it would have been a lot more sarcastic and scary in Snape's – Professor Snape's words," Harry advised.

Pursing her lips, Ginny closed the package after taking a couple out for herself.

"That's all nice and tidy for you isn't it, Harry? Well, you weren't there when Headmaster Snape was in charge of Hogwarts, were you? You didn't see what..." Ginny paused and shook her head. They'd been over that ground before, and she really didn't want to start again. "I say give Hermione anything she wants out of those memories, and if there's something in there that you think he wouldn't want the Wizarding world to know – too bad. He's gone, and it won't hurt him one teeny-tiny little bit."

Rising, Ginny headed for the living room.

"I'm going to watch some telly while you fight your latest battle. Feel free to wave the white flag when you come to your senses and join me," she said over her shoulder.

Harry watched his wife as she left him and his letter alone. He loved her more than life itself, but she simply didn't understand. Snape had been more than awful to all of them, but what Harry had learned – or had tried to learn – wasn't mere tit-for-tat.

Hermione,

Harry

-~8~-

"How can I tell him what I'm looking for, if I don't even know myself?"

Crooks meowed, as if to inquire whether Hermione were speaking to him. When he received no reply, he stalked off to the kitchen and his food dish, tail high and twitching.

Hermione didn't even notice.

She was too busy scribbling on a pad of scratch paper, crossing out a word here and adding one there, trying to identify the most likely scenarios that might give her what she was seeking from the memories that Severus had given Harry that horrible night in the Shrieking Shack.

"Not that there is any guarantee that there will be anything to find in the first place."

It wasn't as if she could explain what she was looking for.

"Well, you see, Harry, it's a bit complicated, but I've been seeing this man – who, it turns out, is actually Severus Snape – and he's been having these nightmares for years. I think someone may have cursed him somehow. I also suspect that Albus Dumbledore either had his gnarled hands in it from the start, or the old fart caught wind of it and decided to use the curse to his advantage, but since he can't remember what Albus did to 'make it better,' I'm hoping there might be some clue somewhere in the memories he gave you."

Hermione was pretty sure that wouldn't go over so well.

"Best to stick with what I told him the first time. It's technically not a lie; I really would like to write a book about what really happened during the war. Someday. Just not right now."

November 8, 2000

Hermione

-~8~-

When the Ministry had demanded Snape's memories be turned over to them, Harry hadn't found it the least bit difficult to refuse. He stored them where he'd placed the Elder wand, and it wasn't in Dumbledore's tomb. The idea to place the wand back with the former headmaster had been one of emotion – not of reason. While the thought that it would remain with Dumbledore forever was a pleasant one, the reality was quite a different matter. Not even Ginny knew the location, and Harry had intended them to remain undisturbed long after his own death.

November 10, 2000

Post script – You do realize, I hope, that the Ministry is going to hound you for the next hundred years if they find out you've seen any of them.

-~8~-

"Yorick! What in the bloody blue blazes have you done with my – "

Simon's words and growl ended abruptly when he found the quill – the only normal quill he owned – where he'd left it on the kitchen table.

"Never mind," he mumbled as he passed Yorick's perch. "Don't touch it again."

Hermione,

Post script – Refrain from feeding Yorick any more of those biscuits, if you please. He appears to be developing a pouch where no respectable chicken should have one.

-~8~-

November 12, 2000

Hermione

She carefully sealed the letter to Harry and passed it off to Leontes for delivery before turning her thoughts to Simon's latest letter.

Three? Surely I couldn't have put him off that many times?

A quick mental count told Hermione that Simon was correct. Damn it!

Between gearing up for the holiday season at the bookstore and her efforts to convince Harry to grant her access to Severus' memories, what little free time she'd had left at night had been spent trying to relax in a hot tub...

Great. At this rate, I may find out how to help him just in time to push him away because he'll think I've lost interest now that I've seen him naked, or something equally silly, I'm sure.

Exhaustion wore at her, but Hermione reached for her pen.

November 12, 2000

Hermione

-~8~-

Simon wasn't embarrassed by the sentiment Hermione had expressed in her letters, far from it. The old "fight or flight" syndrome had kicked in quite nicely by the time he'd reached the end, and he couldn't figure out why. The adrenaline released made him pace far more than he'd done in the last few months, and poor Yorick's neck was getting more than its fair share of exercise from watching him.

"She wants to see me... Apparently misses my presence – and from everything I've gathered, that's supposed to be a positive thing, correct?" Simon asked Yorick. "So, tell me, wise Gryffindor chicken, why am I absolutely, positively sensing a trap of some sort?"

Walking toward the window with his hands, one of which was clenched around her letter, locked behind him, Simon vented his frustration with a resounding, "Blast!"

Whipping around and waving the offending letter in the air, Simon strode back toward Yorick.

"She has no guile in her soul! No agenda hidden up her sleeve to spring upon me later! Am I so – so – tainted that I can no longer tell the difference between a trap and an invitation to a pleasant – hell, in all likelihood wonderful – evening?" Simon asked coming to a standstill in front of the perch. "Not that I've had an abundance of the latter, but still."

A visit to the roof did nothing to calm the warning bells going off in Simon's gut, nor did spending three hours closeted in the lab. As he chewed on the last of the well-done roast later that evening, Simon came to a decision.

Hermione,

Simon

"There. That should take care of that. I'll just never owl."

Coward! seemed to come from the direction of Yorick's perch, and Simon's head jerked around.

He sent the falcon a glare and hissed, "I think that's quite enough out of you for this evening, unless you want to live in a coop with the other chickens."

Simon picked up the letter, folded it and placed it in a envelope. As he was putting Hermione's name on it, Coward! was repeated, louder than before.

"I am not a coward!" Simon bellowed as he rose and strode to the falcon's perch. "I am not!"

Yorick returned the glare for a moment, huffed, and turned his back toward his master.

"I am not a coward, you bloody, foul fowl!" Simon screamed, anger tempting him to grab the bird and toss him out the door. The light glinting off one sharp talon quickly doused that particular impulse, and Simon strode back to his desk.

"You will deliver this – tonight!" he hissed at the bird's back and was completely caught off guard when Yorick took flight and left.

"Yorick! Return this instant!" he yelled, chasing after him with the letter waving in the air. "Now who's the bloody coward, eh? Afraid to deliver one little note. All chickens all over the world are ashamed of you!"

Turning back around, Simon flopped into his easy chair and glared at the envelope with Hermio written on it.

"Damned bird. Now how the hell am I supposed to get out of..."

Simon's head came to rest on the back of his chair, and his eyes found their favorite discolored spot on the ceiling to study.

"I am a coward," he mumbled to himself. "A coward who's afraid of nothing it would seem."

Rising and tearing the letter into shreds as he walked toward the desk, Simon shook his head.

Dear Dreamer,

Simon

**********