Good Intentions

A/N: I'm so sorry about the time lapse between these chapters! Especially after such an evil cliffy. But, I hope it will be worth the wait! Thank to all who have read and reviewed! Please keep it up!

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How could he have been so careless!? He should have never placed the two vials next to each other. Or put them in such similar containers. None of this would have happened.

His brain then took another avenue of thought. Maybe it wasn't even necessary. I remember nothing past removing our clothing and snogging. Perhaps we didn't even get to actual intercourse. He shook his head. It was wishful thinking, he knew. There had been evidence to the contrary on the sheets.

Severus walked back out to his bedroom and sank onto the bed. He ran his hands through his hair. He could fix this. He could brew a potion that prevented pregnancy up to thirty-six hours after copulation. He didn't know much about it, but surely it wouldn't have been approved by the Wizarding Potions Committee without trial.

It was a tricky process and would take most of the night. He quickly did the math in his head. Right now, it was midnight, roughly twenty-four hours since they had slept together. The potion took six hours to brew and two hours to simmer. That would leave four hours to get it to Hermione.

He sighed heavily as he stood up and began to dress. He had better get started if he didn't want his bollocks hexed off by the woman he was sure did not want to carry his child.

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He poured his fifth cup of coffee and looked at his pocket watch. It was time to bottle the potion. And time to confront Hermione about his mistake and carelessness. Fortunately, he had been able to take a shower and short catnap while the potion had been simmering.

As soon as he had the cork in the small bottle, he walked back to the kitchen, took a pinch of Floo powder, and stepped through the green flames, arriving in his private quarters at Hogwarts. He took a few moments to spell away any residue ash and briskly walked out into the quiet dungeon corridor.

Hermione's quarters were near Gryffindor Tower, so that as Head of House she would be readily available to her students. As he neared her door, his anxiety suddenly came back in full force. What would she do? Would she hex him the same as she had Weasley? Possibly worse? He raised his hand to knock on the door, but paused in a moment of cowardice.

It has to be done. I must tell her now. It will only be worse if I wait. Taking a deep breath, he set his resolve and smartly rapped on the wooden door. There was no answer. He knocked again. Nothing. He looked at his pocket watch. It was half past eight. Perhaps she is at breakfast. Wonderful, his mind said sarcastically. Sighing, he set his path towards the Great Hall.

Since it was Sunday morning, there were only a few members of the staff at breakfast. He saw Hermione sitting to Hagrid's left. He walked around the table and stood just off to her other side, waiting for her conversation to take a lull so that he could pull her aside. But she turned her head toward him before he stopped walking.

"Severus! I didn't expect to see you this morning. Do you always come for Sunday breakfast?" she said with a smile that seemed to melt his insides. Severus cleared his throat nervously.

"Ah, no. I do not usually come for breakfast at all during the summer. But I do have something in particular I need to discuss with you. Do you mind stepping out in the corridor with me for moment?" He felt like a fifth year asking a girl to be his date for Yule Ball. His palms were sweaty and his words came out faster than he had intended them to.

"Oh! Well, I'm still eating. Surely, whatever you need to discuss can wait until we've both eaten properly?" she said with mock sarcasm.

"Hermione...," he started, but she cut him off.

"Oh, sit down, Severus. Have a cup of coffee and a muffin. Let me finish my eggs. Then we can go back to my quarters and talk." She poured him a steaming mug of coffee while she said all of this.

Severus sighed in defeat. "You clearly haven't loss any of your bossy nature. I've just never seen it tossed in my direction before."

Hermione giggled and said, "Well, you've never been my peer before. It wouldn't have been seemly for an apprentice to boss her Potions master around, now would it?" she quipped, while refreshing her own cup of coffee.

"Indeed," he replied with a slight smile. He reached for the basket in front of him and picked out a banana muffin and picked at it until Hermione had finished her breakfast. After telling Hagrid that she would see him for tea later that day, she turned to Severus.

"Well, shall we go or do you want another cup?" She was teasing him, he knew, but a part of him wanted to stay for fifty more cups of coffee if it meant never having to tell Hermione he had screwed up.

"No, I've had my fill, thank you." He stood up and motioned for her to precede him. "Lead the way, Professor Granger." Her smile grew wide at the mention of her honorific.

As they walked into the corridor, Hermione said, "Now, what was so important that you wanted to take me away from breakfast?" The urge to run out the front doors almost took over Severus, but he pushed it down.

"I believe we should wait to discuss it until we are behind closed doors." Hermione shot him a confused glance, but did not argue with him. They chatted amiably as they made their way toward Gryffindor Tower. Severus started to doubt his decision in having the conversation so far away from anyone else in the castle. And then he scoffed at himself.

You are a fully grown wizard! If you can't defend yourself against a twenty-one-year-old witch, you deserve what you get! his mind told him. He wiped his palms on his robes as Hermione let down the wards to her rooms.

"Come on in!" Hermione said in a cheery voice. "Do you want tea or anything?"

Severus almost answered 'yes' out of habit, but then thought better of it. Hot liquid was probably not the best thing to have around for the topic of discussion he was about to have with Hermione Granger.

"No. My breakfast coffee will sustain me until lunch, I'm sure. Thank you." She nodded and sat down in a chair and motioned him to sit on the sofa beside it. Severus sat and cleared his throat. He had no idea how to start.

"You're keeping me in suspense, Severus. What on earth is this all about?" Hermione said, slight discomfort coming through in her words.

"I must ask that you do not immediately react, physically or magically, to what I tell you."

"Now you really have me worried," she said with concern. "Just tell me. I'm sure it's not as bad you're making it out to be."

Severus snorted. "You'll remember yesterday morning that I told you I had given you a contraceptive potion before we...um...well, before the events of the night before."

"Yes," she said, narrowing her eyes in suspicion.

"Well, it seems that I may have been careless in the way that I stored it, putting it directly beside a headache relief and in similar bottles. In my drunken state the other night, it appears that I mistook the headache relief for the contraceptive potion." He hung his head and braced himself for her wrath. But it didn't come. He tentatively looked up at her to find her white as a sheet and wide-eyed.

"So you're saying I was completely unprotected when we slept together?" she said in a small frightened voice. He nodded.

"When I discovered my mistake last night, I immediately began brewing a potion that would prevent pregnancy if taken within thirty-six hours of copulation." He took the vial out of his pocket and set it on the coffee table. She glanced at it and then back at Severus. Her expression turned from frightened to outraged. Snatching the small bottle off of the table and uncorking it, she took a small whiff of the turquoise liquid. She swiftly replaced the cork and tossed the bottle carelessly onto the table.

"That is Yattle's Brew."

Severus was completely bewildered. She was not upset at his negligence to protect her from conceiving a child before the act, but was instead upset that he had spent the entire night and early morning brewing an emergency contraceptive for after.

"Yes, it is. I brewed last night. I finished it just before coming here. Is there something wrong?" he asked, confusion heavy in every word he spoke. He glanced at his watch. It was now a quarter until ten. The time window for the potion to have effect was narrowing.

"Just how much do you know about Yattle's Brew, Severus?" Hermione crossed her arms over her chest defiantly and gave him a hard look. The truth was that he knew very little about the potion in question save that its purpose was to prevent pregnancy if taken within thirty-six hours of copulation and how to brew it.

"I take it by the look on your face, not much," Hermione interrupted his thoughts. "Well, let me fill you in. Although the women in the initial trials suffered no ill effects immediately, several of the women suffered from hemorrhaging that almost killed them months later. And none of them has been able to conceive since participating in the trials. The potion doesn't prevent conception. It prevents the fertilized egg from implanting into the uterine wall. By severing the fallopian tubes."

Severus stared at her, stunned. He had no idea that the potion was unsafe. As a fourth degree Potions master, he received the brewing directions for all non-commercial potions. But none of the notes had mentioned any of what Hermione had just disclosed to him. Why, in Merlin's name, had the WPC approved such a potion?

When he finally found his voice he said, "Hemione, I apologize. I had no idea there were such side effects to the potion. It was never my intention to sterilize or injure you in any way. I was simply thinking of rectifying my mistake."

Her face softened slightly. "No, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have gotten angry with you." She shook her head. "Very few in the Potions community know the true effects of Yattle's Brew. I find it entirely unacceptable and find myself in angry hysterics when I speak of it."

"Understandably so. But how do you have knowledge of this? Please take no disrespect from this, but you are only a second degree mistress. I myself only received the packet on Yattle's Brew two weeks ago."

"I am in the midst of my research project to gain my third degree title." Severus started at this revelation. Many Potions professionals didn't bother advancing to a third degree title. Those that did mostly waited years before receiving grants for starting a research project. Hermione was most assuredly setting some kind of precedence.

"Your third degree? Hermione, that is impressive. What is your field of study?"

"Reproductive studies. I received my letter six weeks ago. I've been allowed copies of any trial notes that pertain to the field, which included Yattle's Brew. I wanted to follow up on the participants to study any long-lasting effects. Imagine my horror when I found that all of them are now barren because of the experiment."

"Have you reported your findings to the Committee? Surely they would publish a warning."

"The master who created the brew is contesting that my research is faulty and incomplete. He's a fourth degree and apparently pulls more weight than I do as a second degree. So, unfortunately, I just have to complete my project and submit my findings with the completed research of the field. Which brings me to another point I think you should know."

Her face flushed slightly as she bit her bottom lip in apparent embarrassment. He had no idea why she should find anything between them embarrassing anymore. They'd shared more than two colleagues normally share. He nodded and said, "Alright."

"Well, when I decided on my field of study, I decided that I needed to track certain regularities within the human body to verify and document cycles. I decided that I would be part of my own study group, keeping a record of my own fertility and menstrual cycles." She paused, the flush deepening as she seemingly struggled to finish.

"Well, I've become very, erm, familiar with my body. Down to the point of knowing when I am fertile and most likely to conceive." She stopped talking and looked at Severus with a worried expression that could only mean one thing. He cleared his throat and it sound more like a choke.

"You're saying that you were at your peak fertility two nights ago," he managed to croak out, not quite meeting her eyes.

"Yes," she squeaked. His head went fuzzy and he suddenly felt as if a toxic gas had filled the room. He abruptly stood up and left the room, leaving Hermione by herself.

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A/N: Another cliffy, I know. But how would I get you back to read the next chapter? ;) A HUGE thank you to my invaluable beta, AmyLouise. I have no idea what this story would be without her. Please let me know what you think! Reviews are the only payment I get!