Caveat Empor

Summary: Hermione learns firsthand what kind of a demanding bastard Severus Snape is and wonders if it's not too late to marry Gilderoy Lockhart.

The last meeting with her former Potions professor had not exactly gone to plan. Not only had Hermione left humiliated and utterly aware of her failure to plan for all contingencies, but she had been thrown entirely off guard by the wizard himself. It was a most unusual sensation; typically, Hermione made men uncomfortable and ill at ease under her scrutiny, which only provided hours of amusement for her.

Regardless, Hermione was unwilling to concede defeat. At the prearranged time and date, she appeared again at Azkaban prison, only this time with legal counsel and in a drab antechamber made for such meetings. The room was scarcely big enough to house the four of them and only consisted of an off-kilter table, uncomfortable metal chairs, and impossibly bad lighting that had an annoying flicker that subtly announced failing charms.

To say she was momentarily taken aback by Professor Snape's legal representative was an understatement. A. Ffoulkes only represented the most upstanding and decent wizards. To give legal counsel to a Death Eater, moreover the convicted murderer of his late client, Professor Dumbledore, caused the blood in her veins to suddenly go cold.

Hermione eyed her own counsel, Mr. Eugene Tattings, who was a well-meaning Gryffindor Muggle-born like herself and who only had her best interests at heart, but was in no way a legal shark. She felt suddenly ill at ease, as if her representative was swimming in deeper waters than he could possibly tread. Every one of Hermione's nerve endings pulsed in warning. Whether Tattings felt similar apprehension, she couldn't say; he appeared to be unfazed by the entire proceeding.

Hermione wasn't entirely certain if that was a good thing or not.

For his part, Severus Snape looked perfectly at ease; the Muggle phrase 'cool as a cucumber' aptly fit. This, more than anything else, caused bright flashing red lights to join the warning sirens going off in her head, but Hermione could play this game, too. She'd made certain that morning as she carefully dressed and prepared for the appointment that she at least appeared poised and in control. Hermione selected her most fashionable royal blue robes, cut in the wizarding equivalent of a 'power suit' and chosen for the House-neutral color, given the situation. It would not do to provoke his ire by wearing maroon, or hint at capitulation by showing up in green. She had to project the confidence she no longer felt.

For the first half hour, the two solicitors droned on and on about the first party and, hereto mention, the second party... Et cetera... Et cetera... upon which matrimony was proposed.... Et cetera... Et cetera...

It was as if the two solicitors had privately colluded to make the proceedings as absolutely dull and pretentious as possible, never mind the fact that she could barely follow the legalese which nobody bothered to break down into plain spoken English. Hermione noted with a certain amount of disgust that her husband-to-be appeared to be following attentively to every word, and therefore, she appeared to follow similarly.

After a long-winded recitation of the Ministry's standard provisions, her counsel, Mr. Tattings, looked at Hermione quite pointedly and asked, "Do you agree?"

Inwardly, Hermione froze. She had never tuned a single lecture out before, not even History of Magic, and yet, at this most important event of her life, she couldn't follow the jargon at all. They might as well have been speaking Mermish the entire time.

"Pardon," she said lightly. "Can you paraphrase that for me?"

"Miss Granger, do you agree to cohabitate or, in this matter, given your husband's incarceration – occupy his ancestral home?"

"What? Live with him?" Hermione pointed askance at Professor Snape, who on the whole, appeared really too smug for the proceedings.

"Yes, well, as you know, Miss Granger," Mr. Ffoulkes began, "the Ministry encourages all witches to be brought to their husbands' residences for domicile. It is tradition, you know."

Yes, it was a tradition. An ugly tradition. The young, helpless virgin bride escorted to her husband's house to be shuttered away for the rest of her life. Well, not for Miss Hermione J. Granger, thank you very much.

"Really, I think not. I, for one, have a home. And as I've done my homework, I've visited Professor Snape's so-called ancestral home at 'Spinner's End' and found it sorely lacking. There is no way I can abide by such a request."

"I agree," Severus Snape spoke up for the first time during the proceedings. "It's an abysmal dump; I expect that the authorities have condemned the site. We are, however, speaking of the Prince Homestead."

"Prince Homestead?"

Mr. Ffoulkes looked over his copious notes. "Yes, it appears that Mister Snape purchased the Prince ancestral home when it fell on the auctioneer's block several years ago, along with the residual house-elves. They've been left to their own devices for quite a while, and likely, there's been unrestrained breeding, so we don't have a current figure on how many elves inhabit the residence now, but per the provisions, you are not allowed to dismiss them." Ffoulkes shot her a significant look at that.

Hermione raised her eyebrows. "What? Didn't inherit it?"

By the dark glare she earned, Hermione knew she just stomped on a tender nerve. "No."

"All right, I'll bite. Why?" Hermione looked around the table at several pairs of eyes who couldn't give her a clear answer. She narrowed them at her dear soon-to-be-betrothed. "Well then, give me one good reason why I should give up my flat."

Hermione's flat wasn't much... Well, it was less than a flat. To be honest, it was little more than a closet. She kept her things there; books, some papers, clothes, a bed, not much, but then Hermione didn't need much. To say she lived at work was an understatement.

"For one, the law is entirely on my side in this matter," Snape said lazily. "As my wife, you are obliged to live under my roof as I see fit. Under Ministry provisions, I could require you to live in that lovely hovel in Manchester you just mentioned..."

"Fine. I'll live in your ancestral home," she said, resigned, "but I retain the right to make changes and modernize as needed."

Wizarding estates, particularly uninhabited ones, needed to be pulled kicking and screaming from whatever age they came from. Hermione could consider herself blessed if the manor only needed updating from the Victorian age, but then, it was an ancestral home; there was no telling what state it was in.

What she possibly couldn't fathom was that was exactly what Severus wanted. The old Prince Homestead was in a terrible state of disarray. His ugly, bigoted grandparents couldn't be bothered to lift a finger to bring it back to its one-time splendor, not when their worthless half-blooded grandchild might inherit the place... not that they included him in their will.

Severus only had the opportunity to make a cursory inspection of the house he had never before set foot in when he bought it at auction. The simple walk-through only reinforced exactly how cut off the unwanted grandchild had been from proper aristocratic wizarding society. Regardless, the stately old manor was nearly in ruins.

Mr. A. Ffoulkes looked quite pleased and gently added for her benefit, "A modest budget for its upkeep has been allotted for you."

"A budget?"

After more ruffling of parchments, Ffoulkes withdrew a Gringotts ledger, "Five thousand Galleons for the first five years to cover any structural improvements or necessary repairs, and two thousand Galleons from there on."

"Let me see that." Hermione held out her hand for the ledger, but Ffoulkes would not relinquish it, earning him a firm scowl from both her and Tattings. She rounded on Snape. "Just what is this crap?"

He raised an elegant eyebrow as if to innocently inquire 'Who, me?'

"Are you yanking me around, Snape? 'Cuz I'll be arsed if I'll play your games."

There had to be an angle. Severus Snape never did anything without good reason, and for the life of her, Hermione couldn't figure it out, which obviously meant he was somehow getting one over her.

Ffoulkes loudly cleared his throat and shuffled more paper while Tattings simply looked wildly around the table, trying to figure out where it had all gone wrong.

Tattings leaned into her to quietly whisper in her ear, "Miss Granger, I don't understand your objections. Certainly, if you would like me to petition for a greater allowance, we might manage that, but five thousand Galleons is quite generous."

"I know it is!" she hissed back, unconcerned that her voice carried. "The question is why. And how does he have that many Galleons to burn? Honestly, the man is rotting in prison; there's no way he could be earning enough Galleons to support a building allowance for the rest of his life, so what's the trick?"

Severus' eyes danced in amusement. Even when his intentions were straightforward and bluntly obvious, Severus' Slytherin reputation always threw off unsuspecting Gryffindors. He savored the moment with glee; it was the kind of moment he could easily relish for at least two, maybe three weeks.

"Is it so difficult a concept for you to wrap your bushy little head around, Miss Granger, that maybe I want my estate well cared for?"

He'd never provide her with any kind of personal stipend; after all, his very hard earned Gallons had no business paying for whatever trivial luxuries or trinkets she stupidly fawned over, but his birthright was something entirely different.

"In exchange for what?"

"Pardon?"

"What are you hiding from me, and where are these Galleons coming from, anyway? I know what you make, or rather what you made. You can't possibly afford this, unless you're running some kind of scam."

"And what exactly do you know of my finances?" Baiting Hermione was so easy, it was hardly worth the challenge, but then, it was so amusing to observe her get worked up into a fury. Severus watched her cheeks color as she radiated wrath.

"You made only twelve thousand Galleons a school term!"

Shocked silent for a moment, Severus didn't let her triumph last long. "How did you come by that information?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "I was offered your old job," she returned with complete satisfaction, "but I turned it down." She couldn't bring herself to disparage her much beloved Alma Mater, but it really was downright insulting, the amount of Galleons they offered for what essentially was a twenty-four hour, seven days a week job of playing teacher, parent, and nursemaid to an entire castle full of sniffing, snotty, and generally apathetic schoolchildren. Never mind the hormonally-charged teenagers.

"Miss Granger, I am able to live comfortably, or rather, I am able to let you live comfortably off residuals from my patents, and that is all you need to know. I suggest you drop this line of enquiry for the moment, if we are going to get through the next thirty points."

She sat back dumbfounded. Thirty? Was there time to propose to Lockhart? He was unfortunately considered by Ministry standards 'approved to breed', but at least she could keep him relatively amused with reruns of Muggle cartoons and never have to deal with him. Besides, she could do 'joined-up writing' with the best of them.

After a slight recess for water and use of the facilities, for which Hermione was eternally grateful as splashing even rust colored water seemed to calm her just a tad, they resumed the proceedings.

Hermione had to admit that most of the points were reasonable. She couldn't find any reason to object that he be permitted to use her to send owls, and that she deliver the Daily Prophet, Guardian, and Times when she visited his cell. (It was quite a surprise to note that he kept up on Muggle current events as well, but Hermione also assumed that he was a wee bit starved for reading materials.) Keeping him well stocked with parchment, quills, assorted goodies from Honeydukes and home-cooked meals were the sorts of demands she'd expected to hear in the first place.

Severus requested that she 'keep up' his cell, meaning that she perform more air deodorizing charms, cleaning and sanitizing his mattress and surroundings, et cetera. Honestly, it was all the sort of things she'd want to do. If she was going to have to visit him with any form of regularity, there was no way she'd walk into a pig sty.

But then came the question of how often she would visit the aforementioned sty. If Hermione had her way, it'd be never, but clearly that wasn't an option. And given his demands, he wasn't likely to take her offer of once a month. She was actually shocked when Snape requested twice a week... for an hour.

"Absolutely not! I have a life, a real one; I can't abide by that schedule." Hermione didn't care how cold and calloused it sounded. He was a fucking Death Eater and traitor to the Order. Aside from that fact, they had nothing in common. What could they possibly talk about for an hour?

As far as Hermione was concerned, she needed only to show up, perform whatever cleaning charms were strictly necessary, drop off the requested goods, and be gone.

Snape looked incredulous. "You can't possibly spare two hours a week for your husband while he withers away in prison. Dear lady, you wound me."

Severus was having a field day with this. Gods, this was so much fun, she went from witch to all-out gorgon in seconds. Now he wished he'd requested her at least once a day. Initially, that had been his thought, but sharing too much of his life and living space with the bitch bordered on masochism.

"You deserve to wither away, Snape. You got off too easily, if you ask me."

"Then, by all means, go petition some other prisoner, if I'm that repulsive."

"I can't!" Hermione threw up her hands. If only it were that easy.

"You can't?" Severus frowned, what could the chit possibly mean by this?

"You're the only one with a life sentence here."

"I'm what?" Severus raged, whipping his head to Ffoulkes. "Explain this, now! Nott? Yaxley? Greengrass? Malfoy? What of them? Surely, they deserve, perhaps more than I, to rot away in this hell hole!"

Hermione proudly supplied the answer. "Kissed, the whole lot of 'em. You're the last Death Eater, Snape." Oh, she had tried, but there was no way the Ministry would let her get away with marrying a soulless husk of a man. They couldn't legally sign the marriage certificate. It was damned infuriating.

She watched with much mirth as his eyes went wide and wild as he digested the information. "Why, then..." His silken voice broke and he choked. "...why wasn't I?"

Mr. Ffoulkes gently laid a hand on his arm. "You did not participate in the final battle."

Severus nodded his understanding, but still looked as if he'd been hit violently upside his head by an errant Quaffle. In truth, he hadn't waved his wand once during the battle. His job had been to stay by the Dark Lord's side. If Potter cocked it all up, as he was prone to do, Severus was supposed to step in. What nobody planned for, of course, was the mercurial whims of an insane lizard-wizard and his penchant for turning on his own troops. Severus spent the grand majority of the battle desperately trying not to bleed out.

But Severus wasn't dwelling on ancient history now. His thoughts were with the fates of his Death Eater brothers. Severus had heard the guards refer to him as 'the Death Eater,' but then, he spent two decades as 'Snape, the Death Eater.' He just never realized 'the Death Eater' was meant in the singular. Was he really the last of his brethren?

A multitude of conflicting emotions seemed to fill his chest cavity. They'd really done it, everything he and the Order had sacrificed for, and yet being the last Death Eater was somehow so singularly lonely.

He gave himself just a brief moment to clear his mind of his conflicting emotions, Occluding them away to dwell another time. For the moment, he needed to be sharp.

Turning his best predatory smile to the table, Severus cleared his throat and spoke, "Well, Miss Granger, it appears as if I'm your last option, which means you will find time to visit me twice a week. Would you like to sign the contract now, or do you want to continue reading the terms?"

"Bastard!"

He rolled his eyes, not even bothering to point out that the epithet didn't sting nearly as much as his unfortunate upbringing, and all things considered, his life would have been much easier had he been a bastard. "I suggest you keep your emotions under tighter control; unless of course, you'd prefer to give up all your little secrets now? Not that I need any more bargaining chips."

Mr. Ffoulkes seized upon the moment to break the mounting tension by reshuffling his paperwork and loudly clearing his throat. "We've just a few more points to go through, and then, any counters you may have, Miss Granger. On the issue of children..." Ffoulkes was quickly cut off.

"No. There won't be any children in this marriage."

"Miss Granger, as you are no doubt aware, under the new law, you are unable to stipulate that in your contract. We must then, of course, address the issue," Mr. Ffoulkes said calmly. Mr. Tattings nodded to her encouragingly.

Quietly, Hermione gathered her anger and pushed it away; she could hardly afford any more emotional outbursts, not with the way things were going for her. "I suppose that under the highly improbably circumstance that Voldemort himself rises from his scattered ashes, rebuilds an army of evil, murdering Death Eaters, takes over the Ministry, opens the doors of Azkaban, approves of his most loyal servant impregnating his Mudblood wife, and I haven't killed myself by then, then yes, I suppose we could talk about the probability of children."

Hermione was always amused by the way wizards reacted to her cavalier mentioning of the most hated despot. Tattings went as white as a sheet, Ffoulkes closely studied his parchments not meeting her eye, and Snape simply looked at her in amusement with the faintest hint of a smile on his lips.

"Or, Mr. Snape could be found innocent on appeal," Ffoulkes offered.

"Yeah, and maybe monkeys will fly out of my butt." At the unspoken bewildered questions, she offered under her breath, "Muggleism." That was the problem with magic; just about anything was possible.

"Right, then. Highly improbable, but not impossible. If for any reason the conditions of Mr. Snape's imprisonment changes, he may be required to father children under Ministry law. Therefore, we have the following requests: Any children resulting from the union will be home schooled and will never attend any Muggle school. Upon reaching the age of eleven, children will attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, provided they are not Squibs."

Hermione nodded; she might not have agreed with the anti-Muggle stance, but she understood it. Expected it, really. That, and it wasn't really worth fighting. On the ridiculous chance that she was to bear the spawn of his seed, Hermione had always favored home schooling, anyway.

"Furthermore, Miss Granger will be unable to deny Mr. Snape his paternal rights."

"Meaning?" She looked questioning to Mr. Tatting.

"It means that, if you conceive a child, you can't petition to keep Mr. Snape from the child."

"Fine. What else?"

"You and any resulting children retain the Snape name."

"Out of the question. I'm staying a Granger. I couldn't care less about kids, but I'm not taking his name. I have a reputation, you know. I run a very successful business, and I won't allow my company to take a hit for this." As far as Hermione was concerned, this was non-negotiable.

"Hyphenate then, perhaps," Ffoulkes suggested.

"No."

She watched with a slight feeling of triumph as the two men conferred. Mr. Ffoulkes turned back to the contract and frowned, before offering, "We're prepared to allow you to keep your name for the sake of your business, but any children will be Snapes."

"Agreed." The contract clause was amended, and Hermione was grateful that she had gotten one over on him.

"Good." Ffoulkes sat back, looking considerably relieved. "Then the last bit of business we have here is the fidelity clause."

Hermione waived her hand dismissively. All marriages these days came with a standard Ministry-approved fidelity clause.

"We are requesting a full Fidelity Charm to ensure Mr. Snape will not be cuckolded in any way, shape or form during his incarceration."

"But that's ludicrous! How insulting!" she cried.

"Is it, Miss Granger? Is it really so hard to understand that a man wouldn't want his wife to take up with someone else?"

"Under the Ministry-approved clause, I would be incapable of doing that."

Snape smiled a snaggle-toothed grin, and Hermione thought again that he looked like a pirate, a leering pirate. "Yes, Miss Granger, but there's more than one way to fuck. Or do I need to draw a diagram?" She shuddered, absolutely uncomfortable with speaking with strangers about 'alternatives' to textbook intercourse.

"That's not something that you need concern yourself with, Snape."

"Of course it is, your sexual well-being is just as important to me as your overall health. If you have needs, I want you to come to me first, not slink off someplace. I may not be able to give you the good fucking you so obviously are in need of, but I can be quite imaginative."

"Are you freakin' kidding me? I would never... ever..." Hermione shuddered a bit before reemphasizing, "EVER... consider coming to you for my so-called needs. Pervert."

"Don't flatter yourself, Miss Granger; you're not exactly a vision of beauty yourself. You're hardly a temptress in your wound-tight suits and prematurely lined face."

"Pardon me if I don't find it necessary to get frilled up for the likes of you."

"Obviously," he droned blandly. "But the fact remains, even if you're unable to spread your wide hips and mannish legs for some equally unattractive fellow, you could still take up with one in some way or another. And that's something I'm disinclined to allow. Not when I can provide you the same form of relief."

"What part of 'I would never in a million years touch you' don't you understand, Snape? Besides, I don't know what you think of me, but I don't get out. I don't run around with men now, and I can't see myself doing that in the future, either."

"Why, because you're a frigid bitch?"

"Yes! Exactly that. You've finally got me pegged. I'm a cold, frigid bitch."

The statement hung in the air as every man in the room drew a breath. Such declarations were either made by harridans or women looking to start a fight. Either way, the witch in question needed to be handled carefully: she was still armed with her wand, and that was how precious bits were lost. Severus recovered first.

"A virgin, then?" he asked with a cocked eyebrow, curious whether any bloke had managed to crack her cauldron. As a Prefect, Granger had had a notorious reputation as a cockblocker.

"Hardly!" she snorted indignantly.

It was statistically impossible to live through seven hormone-fueled years at Hogwarts, survive the Final Battle, and still be a virgin. Hell, Snape had nearly caught her in the corridors at the end of sixth year. Thank the twelve apostles and all the hosts of heavenly angels for silencing charms and Invisibility Cloaks. That didn't mean that she allowed her own charges to get away with such shenanigans. If they were stupid enough to get caught, they deserved every detention.

"Lesbian?"

"Ha! You wish."

"Then you should have no problem accepting the clause, though I'm prepared to be magnanimous and allow you use of your hand and stimulating devices." There was way too much unadulterated mischief in his eyes for Hermione's liking. Not that she liked any of it one bit.

"Oh, I'll sign your fucking clause. It was never my intention to cuckold you in the first place. I do have integrity, you know. It's just so damn insulting to suggest I ever would. But this does not change the fact that I will never, ever touch you. And if you even attempt to lay your hands on me, Snape, so help me God, I will hex you so hard that they'll be scraping bits of you off the walls for weeks."

Suddenly, Snape looked like the cat that ate the canary at this little victory. "How I'd love to see the Pensieve memory of you telling Potter this."

"Harry?" she asked, momentarily confused. "Why would...?"

It took a while before comprehension dawned. When it did, Hermione laughed and laughed, unconcerned at the shocked faces from the men in the room. It was such a good laugh that her sides started aching and tears were forming in the corners of her eyes as she gasped for breath.

It took several moments of gasping interspersed with fits of giggles before Hermione calmed. "I never... we never... Potter! Ha!" Wiping a tear from her cheek, Hermione tried to keep it together before another round of giggles hit her. "Harry's gay. G... A... Y... GAY!" Gayer than the headmaster's 'Very-Merry-Happy Un-birthday' robes, she wanted to add, but that might have been construed as an insult to Harry, which would have been blasphemous, given the situation.

Oh, the sight of Snape's reddened face was precious. She wanted to take a photo of it to cherish forever.

"Shit," he murmured underneath his breath, "Flitwick owes me twenty Galleons."

He'd always taken Harry for a pouf. He'd have bet his every last Galleon that James had been one, too. He'd always been too suspiciously close to that filthy flea-infested mongrel, Black. Severus had nothing against homos. The world was full of centaurs, merpeople, half-whatevers, and unidentifiable 'its' that crept around Knockturn Alley. Gay was downright unoriginal. But he drew the line, and his wand, at using Lily as a beard. Especially because, underneath it all, James Potter...the Heartthrob of Gryffindor...was such a fucking coward that he couldn't tell his parents that he preferred cock.

Still, Granger and Potter seemed unnaturally affectionate towards each other. Severus contented himself that he was still getting Potter's witch, in a way.

Ffoulkes cleared his throat and resorted to doing what he did best by reshuffling parchments while all parties at the table desperately tried to get back on track. "The fidelity clause was our final piece of business, and I believe that our side of the contract has been satisfied. Do you have anything to present?"

Hermione calmed instantaneously, the switch was so night–and-day that Severus was impressed by it and idly wondered if Hermione happened to practice Occlumency.

"We have," Mr. Tattings spoke up. "On the subject of finances, Miss Granger retains full rights to her business, intellectual property, patents, savings, money market accounts, retirement fund, and venture capital investments. Additionally, she will assume zero liability if any of Mr. Snape's investments require a bailout or margin call. At no point in the future will she be required to support her husband or provide him with care beyond the agreed to contractual stipulations."

"You're very protective of your wealth, Miss Granger," Mr. Ffoulkes added unnecessarily. His eyes were roaming appreciatively over the amended clause Mr. Tattings provided to them.

"I need to protect what's mine." Hermione shrugged.

"And what exactly do you do for a living?" Severus couldn't help but ask. Normally, he couldn't care less what past students did; he didn't follow their careers, unlike his predecessor Slughorn, but Severus couldn't help but be curious about his bride-to-be.

"I develop interdisciplinary personal and household products under several brand names."

"That's rather vague," he frowned.

"Perhaps, but then I create what interests me and typically there's a market for it. For example, my first product was a hair care solution I developed for myself. The problem with Sleekeazy is that over time you have to use more and more of it to achieve the same look. I developed a solution incorporating both charms and potions that's much more manageable and longer-lasting. It's still our biggest seller."

"And yet you couldn't be bothered to use your own product," he remarked, obviously eyeing her 'electrocuted hedgehog' fashion statement.

Unruffled, Hermione easily replied, "I've made peace with my hair, but then, I really am not trying to impress anyone. I have my business, my research... it's enough."

"And everything else is just a distraction?" Severus supplied; now he clearly understood her reluctance to visit him. Severus knew exactly how frustrating it was to have to put down good research when a breakthrough was just beyond his grasp.

"Precisely. Which is exactly why you and I are sitting at this table."

Mr. Tattings took the opportunity to interrupt; they had been going at each other's throats for nearly three hours. "The financial issue was our only concern, that and Miss Granger's last name, which has already been settled. Is there any further business?"

The room was strangely silent. It felt odd that they were finally finished.

Mr. Ffoulkes made a large production of ordering and reordering the parchments and adding the additional financial clause, and with a few taps of his wand, they were ready for signature.

"Oh, just give that here," she huffed. Hermione hastily scrawled her otherwise perfect signature. If she hadn't signed it then and there, she might never have. That, and Hermione was trying to keep her hand from shaking.

Severus Snape said nothing at all but signed where indicated, watching the contract glow in a golden light, furl itself into a roll, and settle back down, magically sealed.

They were now officially engaged.

Hermione turned to him with a vicious glare. "Will next Tuesday work for you?"

Next Tuesday was fish night, meaning an oily unseasoned and slightly cold cod fillet would be delivered to his cell. "Next Tuesday would be fine; just remember to bring the first of my requirements then." But then, what did she expect? He'd be taking tea with the Queen?

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A/N:

Chapter title: Caveat Empor - Let the buyer beware.

'Muggleism' courtesy of SNL's Wayne's World. Party on Readers.