Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Severus and Hermione walked into the painting of the library. Forgetting her hand was placed firmly in Severus', Hermione looked around in amazement.

"Wow, this is wonderful! It's just like the real library."

"For me, it is the real library."

"Of course," Hermione said softly.

Severus gave her a measured look. "You will not mourn my death. I certainly didn't. As a matter of fact, I was quite happy with it until I appeared in that stupid portrait you commissioned."

Hermione looked back at him quizzically. "What do you mean, Severus?"

"My death... you know, before this time?"

She shook her head. "I thought that portraits were just imprints of the person. You shouldn't remember anything except what happened in your life. I've never heard of a portrait remembering being dead."

"Well, now you have," Severus said shortly. He walked back to the Restricted Section and began fingering the titles.

Hermione watched him with a concerned look on her face. She moved a bit past him and began her own search. Her eyes scanned the books on the shelf. She muttered to herself as she searched.

"I know that book was right here."

Severus looked up at her. "What are you looking for?"

She shook her head slightly. "I can't remember the title, but I know that book is always here between Death Where is thy Sting? and Afterlife: A Glimpse.

Severus meandered over to her. "That's odd. I've found that there are many more titles on these shelves than in the actual library."

"Could it be that someone else has it?"

He shook his head. There are innumerable copies. If I remove this one," he said as he pulled a book from the shelf, "a new one appears in its place."

Hermione nodded as a new book appeared in place of the one Severus had pulled.

"So, the book I'm looking for doesn't exist in this painting?"

"Perhaps it came out after this painting was commissioned," Severus offered.

Hermione's eyebrows came together as she thought. "No, I'm sure it was an older edition." She waved her hand at the bookshelf. "Maybe it was acquired after the painting was created, though. Oh, well. I'll just have to look for it when I get back to the real world."

Severus scowled but said nothing. He went back to the shelf where he'd been looking before. Realizing her error, Hermione went over to him and placed a hand on his shoulder.

"I know that to you this is the real world. I meant no offense. It's just that my world is out there." She pointed to the canvas edge, where children could be seen at tables with books surrounding them. Severus gazed out at them and gave a curt nod before losing himself in his search once again. Hermione sighed.

"What are you looking for, then?" she asked him.

"It is a book entitled: Enchanted Portraits and How They Work"

Hermione scanned the shelves, spying the book on the top shelf of the stacks. She pointed up.

"Is that it, Severus?"

He looked up and nodded. Reaching up, he pulled the book down, motioning for her to follow him as he went to a table and sat down. He opened the book and pushed it between the two of them. Scanning the contents, his finger stopped at a chapter title. Moving from Picture to Picture

"We might as well start with that," he said.

She turned to the page, and they both began to read. After a few minutes Hermione looked up at Severus.

"So, it's kind of like Apparating. You think of where you'd like to be, and you get there."

"Evidently, but I have found that it doesn't have to be as specific. If you're not sure where exactly you want to go, you can concentrate on a general location. You can think, 'Third floor hallway past the stairs,' and you'll appear in a painting there.

She nodded. "Severus, can I ask you something?"

He looked to her as his eyebrow arched.

"Did you know you were going to die?"

"Everyone dies, Hermione."

"What I mean is..." She hesitated for a minute. "Did you have any inkling that Voldemort would send his snake after you?"

Severus winced. He looked off in the distance, reflecting on her question. "I didn't expect to survive the war, no. Actually, given my past, I was hoping for death over incarceration. Did I think the Dark Lord would use Nagini on me? I did."

"But... couldn't you have had some sort of antivenin or something?"

Severus nodded absently. "I thought about it. I even brewed one using some of the snake's own venom. I had it all planned out. I would take the antivenin daily to save myself. In the end, however, I chose not to take it."

Hermione shook her head. "Why not? Why would you let him kill you?"

Severus glanced at her, seemingly surprised that she was so concerned about him. He shrugged. "What did I truly have to live for? Everyone thought me to be a murderer. I had no desire to spend the rest of my days in Azkaban. Death was welcome."

"You were cleared of everything, Severus." Her hand reached out to his. "You would be free right now."

Severus frowned as he stared at her hand. "I am free... at least I was. Spending eternity within these walls is not so bad anyway."

A tear fell from Hermione's eye. Severus looked to her and frowned. "I chose my fate. I am not unhappy with it."

"But..." she sniffed. "Think of what you could be doing now. Think of the freedom you would have." She turned her face away so he wouldn't see more of her tears. "It just seems to be such a waste."

"Look at me," Severus demanded.

Hermione quickly wiped the tears from her eyes and turned her head back to him.

"Why are you crying for me?" he asked in astonishment.

"I... I just don't think it's very fair. You spent your entire life working toward defeating Voldemort. You never got to find out what it would be like to not have him around."

Severus smiled then. "Yes, I did. It just doesn't fit into the parameters that you've set up."

She searched his eyes and nodded finally. "Would you do the same thing? If you knew you'd be cleared and could live a normal life, would you still choose to let Voldemort kill you?"

Severus looked away, his eyebrows narrowing as he thought. Finally he looked back at her. "I honestly don't know. It would be nice to live without being under the thumbs of both Voldemort and Dumbledore, but I have not been unhappy in the afterlife. There would have to have been something... special to make me choose life."

She nodded and frowned slightly. "I think I can understand that. I truly felt lost after the war. People I cared about had been killed, I wasn't sure whether to finish school or move forward, even my relationships with Harry and Ron seemed to change overnight."

Severus arched an eyebrow. "You mean you're not close with those two dunderheads still?"

Hermione chuckled. "Oh, of course I am. It's just that... Harry had a hard time. One minute he was elated, the next, he was depressed because he felt that everything bad that happened was because of him."

Severus growled. "It was not the boy's fault."

Hermione gave him a curious look. "I thought you hated Harry."

He shrugged. "Hate doesn't really fit into the peace I felt after death. Harry Potter didn't matter anymore. No one did. Not even..."

"Lily?"

He gave a slight nod. "I suppose all my secrets came out after my death."

"I doubt all of them did, but many did, especially your love for Lily."

"We chatted now and then... in the afterlife. I actually was excited to see her the first time. I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting, but it was different than I'd hoped when I was alive. With my debt to her repaid, everything sort of fell into its proper place. Of course I still felt love for her, but it was more as a close friend. And Potter, I didn't even feel animosity towards him. It seems that given the reality of life after death, some things just don't have as much weight as they used to." He shrugged. "You were saying about your Potter?"

Sighing heavily, she continued. "He was like a rollercoaster, and nothing I did or said helped. I decided to move out of Grimmauld Place and be on my own. Ron threw a fit. We had started into a relationship, and it was going all right. After the war, however, my perspective changed. I realized what was important to me. Ron was important, don't get me wrong. So was Harry. As someone I was dating, though, Ron just wasn't right. We parted ways as a couple, and eventually everything smoothed out when he started dating an Auror. They eventually wed. Harry married Ginny. I sort of felt left out."

"Surely you..."

She smiled. "Oh, believe me, I've had my share of relationships. It's just that the right person has never come along." She looked over at Severus. "That combined with the solitude I felt after the war... I can understand your feelings about being alive. If it were me, I would want something worthwhile to stick around for."

He nodded and looked back to the book. He was quiet for awhile, and Hermione left him to his thoughts. She turned to the pages, too, and began to read through them. Severus tapped the page.

"When you tried to Apparate, what were you concentrating on?"

"The hallway."

He nodded. "Maybe you can just walk out, like you can walk from painting to painting. Why don't you try this method and attempt to walk out of here."

Hermione read through the procedure once again quickly, then nodded. She rose and walked over to the canvas wall, followed by Severus. She looked back at him and smiled, then got a determined look on her face. Concentrating as hard as she could on the floor in front of the painting, she moved toward the canvas edge. Her heart began to race as she got closer. It had to work!

Bang!

She bumped right into the edge, unable to go any farther.

Her shoulders sagged in defeat. Turning she gave Severus a plaintive look. "What are we going to do? How am I to run the school from a picture?"

His gaze was intense, and she felt as if he were examining every bare inch of her. "We'll find a way," he said quietly. "We should alert someone to your predicament. Filius, perhaps?"

She nodded. "There's a painting in his office we should be able to get into."

"The one with the sea? Do you really want to land in that boat? It's very stormy."

"We have no choice. I'm unfamiliar with any other paintings nearby. It'll have to do."

"I can't think of any others either," Severus acquiesced. "If I recall correctly, that's the only painting in his office."

Hermione extended her hand. "Help me along. After that last try, I'm not feeling too confident in my abilities."

He took her hand and led her out of the library. In a second they were standing on the boat, which was being tossed to and fro on the waves. Hermione stumbled into Severus, and he caught her in his arms. "It seems that you are constantly grabbing me, madam," he said lightly.

She looked up and caught her breath. He was giving her a smoldering look; his touch sending shivers down her spine. This was not a reaction she was expecting. Staring into his eyes and drowning in their depths was not something she'd planned on with this surly man. He was dead and made of brush strokes. She definitely shouldn't be attracted to him!

Clearing her throat, she pulled away. His gaze lingered on her, and she felt that uncomfortable sensation in her stomach again. This was truly bad news.

Turning away from him, she looked out into Flitwick's office. Luckily, the small man was behind his miniature desk, grading papers.

"Professor Flitwick!" she called out.

His head rose as his eyes concentrated on the painting across the room from him.

"Hermione? Is that you? With... Severus?"

The little man hopped off his bench and hurried over to the painting.

"Merlin! How did you end up in a painting?"

Hermione could feel herself getting seasick with the rolling waves. She leaned into Severus for support as the rocking boat threw her to the side again.

"Oh, Filius, I'm glad I found you. Something's happened; we're not quite sure what."

Filius listened to her explanation, nodding here and there. Finally she finished.

"Well, let me try something," he muttered. Raising his wand, Filius chanted, Hominem Extrictus and sent a shot of light to the painting. He frowned when nothing happened.

"I suppose that was too easy a solution," he said.

He tried several other charms, none of which brought Hermione back into her world. By the time he was finished, Hermione was turning green.

"Filius," Severus called. "Professor Granger is ill. I'm going to take her to a different painting. We'll research on our end, and you see what you can figure out."

Filius nodded vigorously. "I'll get right on it!" he said before the two painted figures disappeared.

A/N: Once again, many thanks to slytherinlaurel for the beta work. I'm glad you're all enjoying this!