Farouche

Farouche

Disclaimer: Dinnae gi'e me ony mair bevvy. Ma heid's birlin' eneugh.

Translation: Scots vernacular – Don't give me any more to drink. My head is spinning enough.

The next morning as he awoke, Snape's muscles twinged with pain. His neck felt knotty and stiff, his arms ached and his legs hurt as he yawned and stretched, and even his toes and fingers curled in painful cramps. All thanks to the Dark Lord's abundant generosity with the Cruciatus Curse.

In a way, Severus was grateful. He had been absent for part of the evening when he had returned to Hogwarts with Draco Malfoy. The portion he had missed involved Crabbe and Goyle seniors' thuggery, followed by the Lestranges' heavy-handed torture of a Muggle-born wizard. Snape's skin crawled at the memory of the charnel house smell of charred flesh and the bloody footprints, which had tracked through Malfoy Manor's grand entrance hall. He'd wanted to tread carefully, avoiding the stained patches, but had lifted his gaze and walked resolutely straight ahead to meet the Dark Lord, portraying an air of detached indifference which belied the turmoil of disgust in the man beneath.

Dropping to one knee and kissing the megalomaniac's hand and then the hem of his cloak had not saved Severus from Voldemort's wrath. Neither had trying to explain he could not extract information from an informer, who was now dead, if he was not there at the time of the torture... interrogation. Merlin, the madman had maintained his curse for a long time after that slip of the tongue.

Before he had crawled back onto his knees, Voldemort had harangued him again for not giving the Carrows enough control of the Hogwarts students, continuing to admit filthy non-pure-bloods to the school and, worse still, making evil tasting potions.

Severus was the only wizard Voldemort trusted with making his personal potions, and one of Snape's small delights was making the regular potion with a bittering agent added, telling Voldemort it was 'new and improved'. When the Dark Lord would complain about the unpleasant taste, Snape would suck air in through his teeth and make a comment such as 'if it's doing you no harm, it must be doing you some good,' or 'bitter medicine, better cure'. Inevitably, the other wizard would swallow it with a look of distaste and a serpentine slither of a shudder.

Every minor transgression was punished with a hex or a curse until Snape learned his lesson and grovelled before the magnificence of his Dark Lord.

In previous years, Severus would also have had to endure a forceful ransacking of his mind for any evidence of Harry Potter's movements and motives. Voldemort's focus had always been fixed on the scar-headed boy, but the degree of obsession was increasing, and the mutating wizard could think of little else. Since Potter and his trained monkeys had failed to return to Hogwarts, after an initial gruelling inquisition at the beginning of term, Severus had enjoyed a reprieve from Voldemort's invasive Legilimency, as the madman now assumed Snape had little contact or information regarding the irritating trio.

The dark-haired man shifted his aching limbs and tried to imagine what kind of punishment would be his if Voldemort ever found out what he was going to do on his Sunday off. He had planned a lie in, but with the after effects of the Cruciatus making his tender muscles twitch and spasm, he had no choice but to get up and get moving.

First, he would have a slap-up breakfast, then head out to a spot he knew where he could collect the freshest ingredients before he headed to Edinburgh for a brewing and teaching session with Miss Granger. Wouldn't the bigot love that, his right-hand man spending one-on-one time with a Mudblood, making and improving potions for a werewolf?

Trying not to groan like an old man as he rose from the comfort of his bed, Severus started the day with the agreeable, though likely short-lived, feeling of getting one over on the bastard who had ruined his life from the moment he had taken the Dark Mark.

~*~

Hermione also had her day planned as much as possible, though planning and focus, with the Horcrux warping her concentration, were not easy tasks. Pushing open the flap of the tent, she squinted into the low, weak winter sun as she scoped out the campsite. They had arrived in the middle of the night and erected the tent and protective wards without taking much of a look around, and she was delighted to find they had set up camp in a small woodland clearing with sand dunes ahead of her and the sound of crashing waves not far away. The cool, clear morning and the pleasant setting brought a smile to her face.

She had slept well last night after the first decent meal they'd had in ages, and now she planned to have a big breakfast of fruitcake and leftovers, followed by a quick stroll to check out their surroundings. After that, she would have to take the locket from Harry for her allotted stint.

They shared the misery of the Horcrux evenly. Hermione had written rosters, trying twelve-hour shifts which were too long, then six-hour shifts which, whilst shorter, meant they always had the locket at the same time of day, every day, making life miserable in its predictability. Currently, they were working eight-hour shifts which seemed to work best. It was a long time to carry the Horcrux, but it also gave each of them a reasonable period of time to recuperate.

This morning, she was taking over at eight and carrying the locket until four in the afternoon when she would hand it back to Harry and head out for her session with Professor Snape.

Grabbing a slice of cake, she ate as she walked towards the splash and suck of waves rolling onto a rocky shore. Before long, she crested the dunes and gazed across the foreshore to the flat grey of the sea. Flocks of seabirds trotted light-footed along the water's edge or bobbed on the waves while, further out to sea, an intermittent ripple and spray indicated a pod of dolphins feeding offshore. Hermione paused, absorbing the scenic tranquillity.

Suddenly, the birds rose squawking from the water in a clattering flash of white wings. A whining crescendo increased to the throaty roar of jet engines as a brace of fighter jets screamed overhead. Hermione followed them with her eyes until they disappeared over the sea's far horizon.

At least she now had an idea where they were. It was a place where Muggles had run a spiritual and eco-community for decades, and ancient magic thrummed in the ground, which meant potions ingredients gathered from here were excellent quality.

Hermione had holidayed here as a child with her parents and must have had them on her mind when she Apparated last night. This area had provided their escape from the day-to-day concerns of work and city life. She loved the peace and harmony of the spiritual community of Findhorn Foundation juxtaposed with the twentieth century. Whilst her dad foraged for mushrooms in the forest, she and Mum watched the jet planes coming and going at the nearby Air Force base or paddled in the frigid waters of the Moray Firth.

With a smile and a lightness of step, she turned back towards the tent, planning to gather some potions stocks before she met with Professor Snape after dinner. However, the closer she got to returning to her responsibilities, the more her pace slowed, and her good mood slowly evaporated. By the time she reached the canvas, she was feeling morose again, and being in these familiar surroundings made her realise how much she missed her mum and dad during these stressful times.

The Grangers had been solidly behind her throughout her childhood and had bolstered her self-confidence. She had never been the most sociable of children; being bright and a bit different from other children at her primary school had made Hermione at times socially inept. Summer holidays spent in Scotland or France with her parents had been some of the happiest times of her life. Even after she had found some acceptance at Hogwarts, she had their unwavering support. They didn't always understand the wizarding world, but tried their best, and she loved them to bits. Feeling a lump rising in her throat and increasing anxiety for their safety should she and Harry fail, Hermione opened the tent flap and went to relieve her friend of the Horcrux.

As she laid her malnourished, weary body down on her camp bed, with the weight of the locket pressing over her heart, the young witch's desolation seemed fathomless.

"I want my mum," she whispered to Harry as the evil gloom descended.

"At least you have one, ʼMione," he replied. "Perhaps you should go and see her."

"Later, thanks, Harry."

~*~

Time was wearing on, and it was after noon before Severus managed to get away from all the dragging, minor tasks he would normally finish on a Sunday evening. As he put a final signature to a detention form, he pushed his chair away from the desk, stretching and looking up at the ceiling to ease the cramps which tightened the muscles at the back of his neck. His gaze caught on the patch of clear sky he could see through the oculus. He recalled the bizarre conversation with Lovegood about the ceiling's aperture, and he started to wonder what other anomalous properties the strange Ravenclaw's 'magical' window might have.

Grabbing his winter cloak and checking he had specimen collection containers, the headmaster strode to the middle of the room. Severus felt the soft whisper of fresher air against his face, and with a quick glance up to check, he was directly under the oculus, and he visualised where he wanted to be. He had barely moved into his turn for Apparition before he arrived exactly where he wanted to be, with none of the normal swirling sensation or need to correct his stance when he landed on the uneven ground.

"Interesting," he muttered to himself as he turned to survey his surroundings. "Very interesting indeed."

It appeared Lovegood had shown him the one sweet spot in Hogwarts which was indeed a magical window. More specifically, it was a clear opening in the castle's multi-layered magic, a small area unaffected by wards and anti-Apparition charms, an oasis within the school of magical calm. The clear air below the oculus had allowed him to Apparate to the exact spot he had visualised with no need to walk from an Apparition point to where he wanted to be. With a thin smile, he predicted his new-found knowledge would be very useful.

Taking a deep breath of the cool, clean air at his destination, he set to work cutting and collecting the plants, mosses and lichens he sought. As he worked, he felt the natural peace of the area seeping in, loosening his knotted muscles despite his physical work and the winter chill. This was a place he collected specimens from since he had left school, and it always relieved his burden of worry for the short time he was here. It was somewhere he felt comfortable and distanced from his normally dour, anti-social persona. The natural energies ran through him, lifting his spirits.

His pupils and colleagues would have been stunned to see the habitually grim man running long, gentle fingers over the bark of trees, weathered rocks and lush green mosses. The black-clad wizard hummed as he performed Energy Restoring Charms he had learned to use in this place many years ago.

Just as he was preparing to leave, he caught an unusual scent wafting on the forest-and-sea-tanged breeze. Not unpleasant, but clearly out of place in this part of the world. Severus lifted his nose and breathed it in, noting the sweet sharpness of lemon and the warm spice of ginger. He thought his mind must be playing tricks on him. Perhaps because he was planning to leave for his session in Edinburgh, the thoughts had stirred an olfactory memory. He sniffed again. No, it was definitely real.

"Miss Granger?"

A small squeak was followed by a clatter and low mumble, then a canvas slap and a rustle of feet through leaves.

Severus peered around the clearing with wand raised and pointed in the direction the sounds emanated from, but he could see nothing. He could detect nothing either, though there was perhaps a slight disturbance in the magical energy at the other side of the clearing.

Suddenly, a figure appeared from nowhere, and Snape had his wand charged with a spell and trained on the dishevelled, wild-eyed witch who stood facing him. A sickly bruise-green miasma of dark magic roiled around her rampant, untended hair, and Severus hesitated briefly. In that moment of hesitation, the witch leapt for him with a feral snarl, grabbing the wrist of his wand hand and propelling him backwards. Snape sidestepped, letting his assailant's momentum carry her beyond him where she fell sprawling to the forest floor as she lost her grip on his wrist.

His wand was raised and aimed at her again in an instant as she scrambled to her feet.

"Snape, what are you doing here?" she hissed in a low voice, a manic glint snapping in her eyes. "Did you follow me? No, that mad fucker sent you, didn't he?"

Stepping in towards him, her finger jabbed into his chest as she berated him. The deep evil of the aura surrounding her was palpable as she came closer, and Severus tried hard not to flinch as her touch on his sternum sent malevolent streaks of magic skittering across the front of his robes.

"I don't know what your game is, Snape, but you shouldn't be here. You should be tucked up in your nice, safe, cosy castle being served elf-cooked meals at set mealtimes and living the easy life, not out here sticking your effing great nose into my affairs." She sneered at him as he glared down the aforementioned nose at her.

"I stumbled upon you...ˮ

"Stumbled? What kind of incompetent wanker stumbles over a witch in the middle of fucking nowhere?"

"I...ˮ

"Stay there whilst I go and get my wand so I can hex the bollocks off you for being so stupid," she muttered.

He caught hold of her wrists, though the touch of her clammy skin sickened him, shaking her slightly as he tried to regain her full attention, which seemed to have wandered off.

"What kind of silly, little witch attacks a wizard unarmed, Miss Granger?" He snarled at her. "Where is your wand?"

Hermione's eyes faded in and out of focus, and she gave a non-committal shrug, then a small giggle. "Did I call you an incompetent wanker...?"

"Pay attention, Miss Granger." He shook her more vigorously, making her head waggle back and forth. "Hermione!"

"'s your problem, Snape?"

Severus gave her a small push away from him as he let her go. "I don't know what's going on here, Miss Granger, nor do I want to. Just be in the box room at the agreed time."

"Stop hassling me. I'll be there... on time." Running dirty fingers into her wild hair, she turned and walked away from him. "Now, naff off! Harry'll be home soon, and I've got a bit of a headache."

With that, she disappeared from sight, leaving Severus staring into the empty clearing until a disembodied voice said, "I told you to fuck off, Snape. Harry'll go spare if he sees you here."

~*~

Hermione felt nauseated when she appeared in the box room an hour or so later. A combination of post-Horcrux malaise, hunger and acute embarrassment at her own idiocy in front of Professor Snape made her feel quite queasy.

When she looked up, the dour man was standing, leaning back against the bench with his arms crossed and a very sour look on his face.

"Professor." She nodded to him and went to stash her beaded bag under the bench.

"Miss Granger." He acknowledged her arrival with obvious distaste.

"Um... about earlier on, sir," she said, turning to face his disapproval. "I wasn't quite myself...ˮ

"Indeed."

"You turned up unexpectedly."

"Yes."

"Well, you startled me."

"And?"

"I didn't mean..."

"Get on with it, Miss Granger. We can't spend all evening in a stream of your mindless drivel."

"I'm trying to apologise, sir."

"Trying to apologise or actually apologising, Miss Granger?"

"Remus is right. You can be a complete arse at times, sir." Hermione's tone was insolent as she looked him in the eye. "I was going to say sorry for being an idiot, attacking you and then telling you to go away."

"I think the exact words you used were slightly more colourful than that, Miss Granger."

She sighed, scrubbing the heel of her palm across her forehead. "Look, I'm sorry. I wasn't myself."

"I noticed."

Hermione stuck a hand out towards her professor. "Apology accepted?"

For a moment, Snape paused before he unfolded his arms from across his black-clad chest, hesitant to feel the touch of her evil magic again. Steeling himself, he extended his hand and shook hers firmly, surprised by the absence of any malevolent force. "Apology accepted."

"Shall we?" asked Hermione, indicating the workbench.

"Indeed."

"I brought something for you," Hermione said, as she picked up her bag again and started rummaging through its contents. Carefully, she pulled a box out and handed it to him, noticing Snape's eyebrows rise in question. "Open it."

Severus lifted the lid with a certain amount of suspicion.

"I wasn't sure if you'd managed to get down to the seashore, so I nipped out and got these before I left."

"Mermaid's purses with their contents – that's unusual," he said, lifting them out for examination. "And what are these underneath them?"

"Tammie Norrie skulls. Please accept them in atonement for my uncouth behaviour."

"These don't come from Findhorn."

"No, I made a bit of a detour to get them."

"A bit of a detour, Miss Granger? You went all the way to the other side of the country to collect these."

"No, actually I went to my parents' house. I had these tucked away in a cupboard at home."

"You travelled to England, alone, for a couple of skulls, Miss Granger?"

"Yes."

"Have you no idea the danger of such a foolhardy action?"

"Don't give me that horrified look as if you can't believe my naivety. If you don't want them, I'll take them back." Hermione held out her hand, but Snape's fingers remained curled around the fragile skulls with the multi-coloured beaks.

"And with all your gallivanting about, have you eaten, Miss Granger?"

"Um... not exactly."

"For pity's sake," Severus snapped as he whirled around and strode from the room in a swirl of dark robes.

Silence fell and Hermione slumped down on a stool, resting her elbows on the workbench as she cradled her head in her hands. "Well done, Granger," she said to herself, "yet another overachieving fuck up. We're both as bad as each other."

"Indeed."

"Oh!" Hermione's head shot up in alarm. "I didn't hear you come back in, sir."

"Here." A huge doorstep of a sandwich was pushed in front of her, and a mug of tea slapped down beside it. "I'll start preparing the fresh ingredients while you do what you were supposed to do before you arrived."

"Thank you, Professor."

"Did I not ask you to wash before we started as well?" His gaze ran over her matted tangle of hair as he sniffed loudly.

"Sorry," Hermione mumbled around a mouthful of food as Snape picked up a knife and got under way with chopping. "Oh, look, you got some fresh...ˮ

The flat of his blade slapped her pointing finger. "Do not contaminate my workplace, Miss Granger."

Stuffing the crust of her bread in her mouth, she glared at him, picked up her bag and stomped into the bathroom.

"And don't take forever with your ablutions. You are here to learn, not to waste time contemplating your navel in the shower."

She slammed the door in response and leant up against the back of it. "Merlin, that man gets on my tits," she growled in irritation.

"There is no Silencing Charm on the bathroom, Miss Granger."

Screwing up her face, Hermione stuck out her tongue and made two-fingered gestures at the door.

"That's enough childish behaviour, young lady. I would like you to hurry up, please."

"How did you do that? How did you know what I was doing?"

"Magic, superior intellect, or years of experience dealing with teenage tantrums."

She slapped her hand angrily on the switch for the bathroom extractor fan, which whirred into noisy motion, turned the shower on and fiddled with the taps to find an acceptable water temperature.

On the other side of the door, Snape smirked as he turned back to his final preparations. He lit the fire under the cauldron, using his wand before placing it carefully at the back of the bench away from the heat, and started adding ingredients. The base ingredients were placed into the cauldron in bulk and brought to the simmer as he moved the contents constantly with the stirring rod in his left hand. Then the more specialised ingredients were added one at a time. His fingers hovered over the brew as he sprinkled a finely crushed blue powder around the edge, working it gradually into the mix.

Severus had prepared this potion so many times he progressed through these early stages without having to pay too much attention to his work. From behind the bathroom door, he heard the sound of running water, an occasional splash and rather tuneless humming. That man gets on my tits. He recalled Granger's words with a snort. It was quite fun baiting the feisty lass.

As he leaned over the cauldron to smell the vapours, he wondered idly why she was taking so long, pondering how women seemed unable to take a quick five-minute shower. Probably all that unmanageable hair, he concluded, rubbing some dried ingredients through his fingers to fall in a fine dust over the surface of his concoction before it sank below the surface. Or those luscious tits Hermione had said he got on.

Luscious? Hermione? Bloody hell, he was becoming an old pervert, but he could not get his mind to move away from the rather pleasant thought of the nubile young witch soaping her breasts under the shower's spray just on the other side of that door.

Severus swore as he dropped a larger than expected clump of gelatinous flobberworm into the cauldron in his distracted state. A small splash of liquid leapt upwards, and a thick coil of green gas curled up from the cauldron. Snape stirred vigorously to dissolve the lump, reprimanding himself for losing his focus and making an elementary brewing error. Though he knew it would make no difference to the potion at the end of the process, it offended his normally high standards.

The next stage of the recipe was the part he disliked. When he added the Gondwanan Peripatus' velvet and secretions, the odour would change and become quite nauseating. This had been one of Lupin's suggestions after the werewolf had found out about the carnivorous worm's feeding technique of shooting a sticky liquid at its prey which then set and immobilised the meal. It made a perfect stabilising ingredient, but the smell was awful.

The first time they'd used it, Lupin had doubled over gagging, and Snape had dragged him out of the room with eyes watering, coughing and gasping for air himself. By trial and error, they had discovered the correct amount to use, and he was amazed they hadn't killed themselves in the process. Wiping a drop of sweat from the tip of his nose, Severus giggled as he imagined Hermione's face when she smelt this. What the hell? Giggling and Hermione?

A small wave of nausea rippled through him, and Severus took a step back from the cauldron to take a deep breath. Suddenly, he realised he really didn't feel well. His head swam, and the room seemed to tilt around him. Making a grab for the edge of the bench to steady himself, Snape's hand caught on the edge of the cauldron, tipping the scalding hot contents towards him.

"Fuck. Hermione," he muttered as he slid to the floor, his vision blurring and his skin burning where it came in contact with the caustic potion.

Hermione heard the crash and stomach-curdling yell as she turned off the water and stepped out of the shower. Throwing a towel around herself in haste, she flung open the bathroom door to be confronted by a pall of noxious gas and Professor Snape lying sprawled in a puddle of sticky goo on the floor. Without hesitating, she took a breath and leapt forward, lifting a corner of the damp towel to cover her nose and mouth. As the toxic atmosphere made her eyes sting with irritated tears and her nose stream, Hermione tried hard not to breathe in, though the urge to cough was almost overwhelming.

Grabbing Snape's arm, she attempted to drag him out of the mess, but he was heavier than he looked and didn't budge. Forgoing her hold on her towel covering, Hermione caught hold of a dragonhide- booted foot in each hand, her skin burning where it came in contact with the spilled potion, and she hauled the man's deadweight backwards into the bathroom.

Tripping over the dragging towel, the struggling witch slammed the bathroom door closed in a hurry, nearly trapping Snape's trailing hand in the process. She soon had a dampened towel wedged along the bottom of the door before checking that the extractor fan was still on and pulling the unconscious wizard into the shower cubicle.

"Shit, this looks bad," Hermione muttered as she stripped his potion-soaked outer robes off and flung them onto the floor. Fingers fumbling in her haste with the myriad of buttons down the front of his frock coat, she gagged at the putrid smell rising from the smoking holes in Snape's clothing. "Sorry, Professor, I think I just ruined your jacket," she said after the contents of her stomach emptied onto his lap.

Realising she had to work faster, Hermione reached into her bag and pulled out not her wand, but a large pair of scissors. The long blades quickly cut up the front of his clothes, down the arms and down each leg, allowing her to peel melting clothing from his damaged skin. Turning on the taps, she shoved Snape's limp body under the spray, kicking his destroyed outfit onto the floor to join his robe in a smouldering pile.

Hermione took a moment to gather her wand, the wonderful homemade soap from the sink and a tub of soothing balm she had noticed earlier perched on top of the bathroom cabinet. Then she stepped under the cascading water and pulled the injured man up against her.

The girl's wand-hand shook as she attempted to cast a Patronus to summon help, reaching deep within for a happy memory. Memories of angry shouting, Ron running from her and Harry's tormented existence crowded her vision as she stared down at the wounded wizard in her arms, and her mind was overwhelmed by the insidious melancholy of the Horcrux and the terror of her situation. A slim wisp of smoke emanated from the tip of her wand.

Hermione swore under her breath and tried again and again, but her best effort produced only a silvery shadow, which petered out in the steam rising from the shower.

"We're stuck in the bathroom with no way out. What am I supposed to do now, Professor?"

No answer was forthcoming as she rocked and hugged Severus into her misery, running water mingling with her streaming tears.

A/N: Wishing you all a Happy New Year!

Mermaid's purses are skate, shark or dogfish egg cases which wash up on the shoreline. They are nearly always empty.

Peripatus – velvet worm – nocturnal predators, found only in areas which used to belong to Gondwanaland, which trap their prey using a sticky substance propelled from a pair of modified limbs, located on either side of their head.

Translation:

Farouche – sullenly unsociable, shy, fierce, socially inept

Tammie Norrie – Scots – puffin. Atlantic puffins mate in long-term, monogamous relationships.

Thanks go to Clairvoyant for her sterling admin work.