Chapter Four: le Rejet

Chapter Four: le Rejet

Hermione's stomach clenched painfully, and she felt fortunate that her breathing seemed normal enough. Severus was gaping at her. She hurriedly dropped his hands and, ignoring both the mint and the oregano, started chopping sprigs of thyme.

"Granger, I long ago realised you, Harry and Ronald only had one brain among you," he said, "but up until now I had thought you were the one in possession of it. Have your friends' gains resulted in your own loss?"

"You've been friends with Ron and Harry for years now," she said, somehow managing to keep her voice matter-of-fact. "I had thought we were becoming friends, too."

He rejoined her at the workbench. "I would hesitate to call my relationship with Harry a friendship, and Weasley is..."

"He's almost family," Hermione supplied. "And Harry, too, by now." When he didn't contradict her assessment, she felt brave enough to go on. "Well, your family – and your friends – have had some things to worry about lately."

It took longer than she had expected to get everything out, to explain about the Ministry and how he had effectively been training his own replacements, to tell him how his friends had been searching for a solution because they'd all been so worried – "especially the Weasleys because they think of you as one of their own" – and to promise that they hadn't meant to behave like Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore. By the time she was finished explaining, he had already prepared the oregano and had a pot set to boil on the hob.

"We have it all worked out, and that's one of the things I wanted to talk to you about tonight. I want to help you, and I need your help to do that."

"And you're not in love with me?" The look he gave her was pointed, the raised eyebrow irritating.

"W-what?" she sputtered. "Of course I'm not!" Is that why he's been so reluctant to give me extra lessons?

He nodded and weighed a portion of pulverised oregano, but after almost a full minute had passed, he said, "And yet your behaviour tells quite a different story."

"My behaviour has been perfectly in line with the sort of relationship I thought we were starting to have," she said primly. She laid down her knife so her trembling hands wouldn't reveal her disquiet. "I'm still getting to know you. Of course I don't love you."

"Then tell me," Snape sneered, "why is it your two dearest friends have each independently come to the conclusion that you do? That you might even wish to marry me?"

I'm going to murder Ron. Or maybe just torture him. It wouldn't be fair to make Demelza an almost-widow before she gets to be a wife. At least Ginny won't mind me hexing Harry.

"If you believe everything Harry and Ron have to say, you've changed more than I realised," she snapped, finally at the end of her tether. "I only said I wasn't in love with you, didn't I? I've already said I've considered marrying you!"

For a few breathless moments – for both of them, she was certain – Snape gaped at her again.

"That is... I mean, I did tell the others I would be willing to be the one who appears to be considering marrying you."

She didn't like the way he was studying her so intently now.

"Good god, woman! And to think I believed you lacked cunning." He snorted appreciatively. "You've got them all fooled, haven't you? Most of them believe you've been secretly pining for your old Potions master, and those who can't quite wrap their minds around that disturbing prospect believe you offered out of the kindness of your noble little heart! None of them have guessed your motives are purely selfish, have they? Either the generous war heroine, returned to do another good turn at great personal sacrifice or the lovesick young witch out to get what she wants by any means?"

She knew she shouldn't indulge in the curious niggle of pride his words inspired – really, why should she be proud that he thought her capable of such convoluted machinations? – but she was powerless to stop the grin that insisted on plastering itself across her face.

But grinning like a fool won't convince him you're not a 'lovesick young witch', will it?

Forcing herself to sober, Hermione countered with, "Not all of my motives are selfish. I really do want to... improve your public image. For your sake, not for any dubious praise helping you might grant me. But, yes, there is something you can do for me. Possibly. Eventually."

"Oh?" Snape raised an eyebrow, his mouth ticked up just a bit at the corner.

Hermione frowned in earnest, then. Why had she said anything? Now he expected her to actually tell him!

"You might find it a bit... er, a bit... shocking."

"I assure you, miss, after the life I've led, I am decidedly unshockable." He stooped to pull a foot bath from beneath the workbench.

"Er... You see, I hadn't really intended to approach you about it tonight. Actually, the other thing I mentioned was supposed to be a question about countering side effects while still harnessing the benefits of nettle when using it in a hair tonic." She gathered up the herbs they had prepared and dumped them into the simmering pot. "Although, I suppose it is related, in a way, to what you might be able to do for me. Eventually. If I decide to ask, that is."

"The answer to your question will depend on which side effects you wish to counter and which properties you wish to retain," he told her, removing the pot from the hob. "We can go over that subject in depth after you tell me what, exactly, I might possibly be able to do for you if you eventually decide to ask it of me."

She twisted her fingers into painful knots and gnawed at her lip.

"Just spit it out, Granger."

Might as well get it over with.

She sucked in a deep breath and shouldered on the vestiges of her Gryffindor courage. "Well, you see," she said, "I know nettle has been known to cause difficulties with pregnancies on occasion, and I may need to know how to prevent that because I may need your sperm. One day, that is."

"What did you say? You need my what?"

"I said that I might need your..."

"Shut up!"

"It's not..." Hermione's protest was cut off when Knowi let loose an admonishing hiss.

Severus looked from witch to Liverpudlian Rex, then visibly calmed himself. A bit, anyway. He tipped the fragrant brew into the foot bath, added an extra measure of dried peppermint and began stirring in a precise, measured pattern.

"Will you, for just one moment," he began, his gaze focussed somewhere between the cat and the bath, "consider shutting up?"

Hermione glanced at Knowi, but the fastidious feline, apparently satisfied with her charge's feeble attempt at civility, was washing a paw and not paying either of them the least bit of attention.

~*.*~

Hermione pressed a hand against the brick wall facing her and waited for her stomach to stop swirling. Now that she was using it at least weekly again, Apparation didn't usually affect her very much. But she'd been upset when she'd left Snape's Ministry quarters, and she hadn't been much better by the time she'd found a safe place to turn on her heel. She counted herself lucky she hadn't splinched or ended up somewhere miles away from the back of Lara's shop in a smart street of fashionable boutiques.

Feeling perfectly fine after a few deep breaths, Hermione pushed away from the wall and approached the shop's back door.

It swung open before she touched the handle. Light poured out from the room beyond.

"Bearded the lion in his den and survived to tell the tale, did you?"

An urge to sob welled up in Hermione at the sound of Lara's teasing voice. The sight of her flatmate's smiling face nearly pushed her over the edge. Instead, she pasted a fierce frown on her face.

"I told you I'd be late tonight," she said as she stepped past Lara and into The Witch's Daughter.

"So you did," Lara said, closing the door behind her. She crossed the room and started shifting shining laboratory equipment from workbenches to shelves and cupboards lining the walls. "But I've already done your batches for tonight, so all you need to do is tell me."

After a moment, Hermione joined her. "How'd you know where I was? Did you have a visitor of a spectral nature?" Living and working with Lara was scary at times. The woman was far too perceptive for someone who claimed to be a Squib.

Lara laughed. "No. Though, I wouldn't have minded if he had come." She gave an exaggerated shiver. "Dead sexy, Fred Weasley is."

Hermione was powerless against the grin that fought its way to her lips. Even as she marvelled at Lara's uncanny ability to just know things, amusement at her friend's perfectly timed bout of silliness soothed Hermione's agitated nerves.

"How did you know, then?" she asked, determined not to be distracted by levity.

Shrugging, Lara put away the last set of scales and said, "Where else would you have gone? And speaking of, did you manage to ask about the nettles?"

The question brought a rush of fire back to Hermione's cheeks, but she ignored it as best she could. "I did, but before he could give me answer we... Oh, god! I think I might have ruined everything, and now we'll never know the answer, and I don't see how I can possibly face him on Sunday!"

She refused to cry over this. She wasn't the crying sort and hadn't been since she'd left school. Something about fighting a war against ultimate evil had burned the tendency right out of her, she told herself.

"Right," Lara said, and she started pulling pots and bottles and bunches of herbs from the cupboards and shelves. "I've been dying to try out the recipes for 'Me Cry?' and maybe some 'Woe, Begone!' tea. No sense having a makeshift lab in the shop if I can't use it to experiment on friends."

The gleaming laboratory hidden at the back of he shop was by no means makeshift. The Obiye sterling had seen to that. But Hermione found herself smiling again as Lara started ordering her round the room.

~EP~SS~

"You're quiet today." Ermengarde Prince set her cup on a side table and stared at her nephew until he deigned to answer.

"You like quiet," Severus muttered into his teacup.

"At my place of work, I demand it. My home is another thing." As if to underline that point, she leant back in the deceptively delicate-looking wing-back chair half-facing the fireplace. It was really quite comfortable and sturdy enough that its mate held Severus's weight without complaint. "I see no need for such discipline away from the library."

He didn't quite scowl, but she could see it was a near thing.

"Then perhaps you ought to get rid of the librarian's face," he said.

She cancelled the glamour she so often forgot she was wearing. It didn't change much, she knew – her eyebrows thickened, her hair darkened to a glossy black, the large, hooked nose got smaller and less a bit less crooked, the sunken cheeks filled in, and her vulture-like neck became something approaching swan-like – but it was enough to make her look like a new woman to anyone who didn't know of the spell.

"Better?" She didn't wait for answer before adding, "Even if you haven't got anything to say, I have."

He raised enquiring brows and Emergarde took a deep breath. The news would affect him, whether or not he realised it.

"I've been considering making an honest man out of the old git."

"Which old git might that be?"

"My Argie, of course! Who else?"

"Who?" She didn't think he really cared because he took a sip of the tea soon as the question was asked.

"Argus Filch, you dunderhead! We've been friends since we were children and lovers since you were a second-year."

He spat out the tea.

"You and Argus Filch?" He shuddered unpleasantly, rocking the slender chair that barely contained his tall form. "I might vomit."

Ermengarde brandished her wand faster than many would have thought possible.

"You had better mean that picturing Argus naked turns your stomach."

He still looked a touch green, but he composed his features and said, "Yes, of course, Aunt. What else could I have possibly meant?"

She cast a Jelly-Legs Jinx anyway.

~*.*~

"I've been waiting nearly twenty years to see him like this again!" Severus winced at the harsh scrape of Filch's gleeful voice. "I always said you'd be the one to do it, my sweet."

Isn't that the same endearment he uses for the cat? Another shudder made his wobbly legs wobble more.

"What did the bastard say this time?"

He didn't hear his aunt's answer, but he opened his eyes in time to see the unpleasant caretaker lock her in a kiss that was far too enthusiastic and that went on far too long. If the appreciative noises she was making were any indication, his aunt was quite enjoying herself. When her hands slid down to grasp Filch's boney arse, Severus had to look away before he really did lose his tea.

Still, he wasn't able to stop the gagging sound from escaping his rapidly constricting throat.

Filch prised his lips from Ermengarde to aim a glare in Severus's direction. "What's wrong, Snape? Can't stand the idea of your auntie loving a mere Squib?" He grinned nastily and swung her around to his side, clamping one arm round her waist. "Too bad. You don't get to choose for her."

A burning wave of rage rising from deep inside him threatened to overwhelm Severus's senses. He fought to clear his mind, unwilling to look more closely at the years of pain and shame behind his anger.

"I don't care that you're a Squib." He didn't – at least, not in the way Filch was probably thinking. "And you're right. Aunt Ermengarde is free to make her own choices. I'd just rather not see her suffer any permanent consequences."

"Oh, so it's just marriage, then, is it?" Filch spat, gripping Ermengarde even tighter. "A Muggle was good enough for your mum, but a Squib should be beneath your auntie's notice?"

"I told you it's nothing to do with you being a Squib," Severus spat back. "It's everything to do with you being a fool who, instead of accepting his lot, surrounded himself with everything that he wanted but couldn't have," he said, knowing even as he spoke that the words were vicious beyond reason. But he wanted this man, this interloper to feel as horrible as he was feeling. "It's about you being stupid enough to give Galleons to swindlers, year after year, despite all the proof their promises were rubbish. Dunderheads should be beneath Aunt's notice."

Severus watched with satisfaction as the man's face turned nearly purple.

"You dirty..."

"Enough!" Ermengarde's voice was fierce, but her eyes – eyes that seemed to be trying to bore into her nephew's very soul – were full of concern... and possibly understanding. "I won't have the only two people I love left in this world fighting like animals."

Chagrined, Severus looked away. He was disgusted by his behaviour, but the idea he'd tried so hard to suppress – that had his Prince grandfather been alive, he would have looked upon Ermengarde's union with a Squib far more favourably than he had upon Eileen's with a Muggle – brought out all sorts of confused feelings: shame and pain, coupled with an irrational desire to protect his parents nearly fifty years too late. The end result had been the rage he hadn't been able to tamp down.

"Forgive me," he murmured, hoping she would sense his sincerity, but not truly believing she could.

"You idiot boy!" The words may have been harsh, but they were spoken with affection. And suddenly, Severus felt a pair of thin arms wrapping around his middle and a sharp chin pressing into his chest. "It wasn't like you think at all, you know." Her voice was muffled, but he understood her well enough. "There's so much Eileen never told you, and I... And I guess I wasn't ready to tell, either. But it's time you knew."

~HG~

Hermione was half convinced she was paying for the sins of a previous life. Not that she really believed in reincarnation, but certainly she hadn't done anything in this life to warrant everything that had happened over the past two days.

She'd crept into her cubicle at the Ministry hours before she was due, only to have Ron poke his head in ten minutes later. He'd taken one look at the dark circles under her eyes and demanded to know what was wrong. Of course, she hadn't been able to hold anything back from him.

"Shit, Hermione. Everything?"

"Almost everything, anyway," she told him with a nonchalance she didn't actually feel. "I'd only started telling him about Australia when his cat kicked me out."

"Knowi kicked you out?" He looked sceptical. "Are you feeling all right? Did you get any sleep last night?"

"If you can say I'm feeling fine the morning after I've made a fool of myself and possibly ruined a hero's only chance at redemption, then yes, I'm feeling fine. But no, I didn't get any sleep last night." She pressed the heels of her hands to her tired eyes. "Knowi didn't exactly kick me out, but she made it rather clear that she needed to talk to Severus. Alone."

"She said so, did she?"

Hermione uncovered her eyes to find him looking like she'd grown another head.

"He said he's got some sort of translating program for his compu... Yes, Ron, she said so."

Ron shook his head. "Well, maybe it's not as bad as you think, then. She probably put in a good word for you. Liverpudlians know things."

"Just like Lara, apparently," Hermione muttered.

The conversation had ended soon after with his admonition that she should take the day off. She hadn't even learned why he'd stopped by or how he'd known she'd be there. And when her boss had ordered her home a couple of hours later, she'd done as she was told.

Lara hadn't wanted her at the shop, and had advised her to Apparate down to her parents' place "if you think you can manage not to splinch. I'll put you on a train if that's beyond you. And I don't want to see your face again before Sunday night."

Apparating hadn't been a problem, and Mum and Dad had been suitably sympathetic before dashing off to their dental surgery. But by dinner time, Mum was already telling her that "at least you've broken the ice", and Dad wasn't much better.

Now she was alone in their modern flat without even the prospect of arguing with them again to distract her from worrying.

"Sorry, darling," Mum had said this morning, not sounding the least bit sorry. "It's not every Saturday I can tear your dad away from his surfboard, so I'd rather not change our plans."

Deciding that Lara would just have to get over her presence, Hermione turned on her heel, thoughts firmly directed on the alley behind The Witch's Daughter.

~SS~

It came out in fits and starts, first round Aunt Ermengarde's kitchen table: his grandfather's aspirations, his parents' marriage, her romance with Filch, and her secret identity – everything was connected, in a way.

Ermengarde had understandably not wanted to return to the bosom of her family once she'd left Beauxbatons, and the position at Hogwarts had seemed perfect at the time. That it had opened up so soon after her sister's impassioned plea for help "looking after my poor boy" had seemed fortuitous. That Albus Dumbledore had been not only able but actively willing to help her disguise her true identity had seemed miraculous. Even after she'd learnt his ulterior motives, she couldn't fault the fact that the man had tried to keep her safe from harm.

Even better, he also had taken on the suitor her father had deemed unacceptable.

"Did you think I wanted to be stuck at that damned castle with your poncy wizard pulling everyone's strings behind the curtain?" Filch pursed his lips. "He was the one who had me give Kwikspell a go, knowing it wouldn't work for the likes of me. Wanted to keep me in my place, I expect."

Ermengarde patted his hand consolingly.

"I wouldn't put something like that beyond Albus," Severus murmured. "He was, at his core, a good man, but he enjoyed playing what he thought were harmless pranks."

Severus was feeling a lot more understanding towards the cantankerous caretaker at this point. Filch, it seemed, hadn't really ever been the obsequious sycophant he'd pretended to be. Aunt Ermengarde had begged him to keep an eye on her nephew after his return to Hogwarts as the Potions master. Filch had tossed aside his dignity and complied out of love.

"Still, I would have probably gone after the Potter brat showed up if it weren't for your grandfather's books."

And up until now, that had been the most astonishing thing Filch and Aunt Ermengarde had shared with him. Although Reuel Prince's journals spanned more than seventy years and addressed twice as many topics, one subject dominated. Severus hadn't had a chance to truly delve into his grandfather's writings on the differences between Muggles, Squibs and wizards – and what to do about those differences – before Ermengarde had announced that they were leaving the cottage, but he had read enough to know that the journals would have been dangerous in the wrong hands.

Voldemort would have killed to get his hands on them – had he known where to find them.

Argus Filch had carried those journals, transfigured to look like a giant ring of keys, for nearly three decades.

Severus turned away from the large crumbling house and glanced around him, quickly taking in his surroundings. The garden looked terribly neglected, but it was enormous. A stand of trees stood at the bottom, off to the left.

"Where are we?" he asked in spite of already having made what he thought was a pretty likely guess.

"After I revealed myself and told her of my plans, Minerva shared some confidential information that pertains to your situation, and..."

"You mean that I'm to be sacked and left homeless as soon as I've finished training my replacements?"

She looked at Filch instead of meeting Severus's eye. Clearly, she was up to something.

Princes do breed true, he thought, not for the first time, and not even Beauxbatons could instruct the Slytherin out of her.

"Yes, that," Ermengarde confirmed. "I knew you'd need somewhere to live, and although the headmistress said the Order are making plans, she didn't seem to think they were likely to work out. Not that she would tell what they were.

"But, anyway," she went on, sweeping a hand out to gesture to the house and surrounding grounds, "this is yours, if you want it. It was the family's main residence – the cottage was the other, but I'm keeping that – and it should go to a Prince, and Argus and I certainly won't be passing it on to our children."

The chances of most Muggle women becoming pregnant lessened once they reached their mid- to late-thirties or early forties, if he correctly recalled the module in Obstetrics he'd done before he had to leave university. While he was sure something similar must be true of witches, he hadn't a clue what the age of decline would be.

But down that road of thought lay Granger and her ridiculous request. He shook his head, once again forcing his musings away from the rocky path they'd been taking.

"It needs work," Ermegarde said. "And a lot of it at that. But Argie's cousin Jack..."

"Jack Filch. Best builder in Cornwall," Flich supplied.

"Jack and his sons are willing to help if you want the place."

~TT~

"I wouldn't say she's ruined everything," said Fred, "but he might be a bit more difficult to convince now."

"Plan B, then?"

"I doubt he'll want to go back to Spinner's End, but perhaps Plan C?"

George grinned at his dearly un-departed twin. "Lee's already on it, brother. He can have an updated list of appropriate places, wizarding or Muggle, straight away if it comes to that."

Fred nodded in approval. "Clever you! Almost as clever as your more handsome brother."

"Bill, you mean?"

"Right."

The True Twins shared a laugh, but then Fred got that look in his eyes that George knew meant he was seeing something beyond what a normal person could see.

"What is it?"

"Ickle Ronniekins is going to make Mum very happy tonight."

~RW~

Mum looked happy enough, but Ron could see the worry behind her smile. Demelza was huddled in a corner with his sisters-in-law and Ginny, and he'd finally stolen a moment away from the all the hearty congratulations. He sidled up to Mum and whispered in her ear.

"All right?"

"Everything is wonderful, dear!" Molly beamed at him, but the underlying concern was still evident, and for a moment, Ron wished he could go back to the days where he was completely oblivious to everyone else's feelings. "Now, if only Charlie would find someone, my work would be done."

"Come on, Mum. I know that's not what's bothering you."

At first it seemed she was going to pretend not to know what he meant, but Ron kept watching her the way they'd taught him at the Academy, and soon enough, she was spilling everything.

"It's just... Oh, Ronald, tell me this isn't why Hermione didn't come!"

He breathed a relieved sigh, and as much as he wanted to follow that up with rolling his eyes, he settled for smiling, instead.

"'Course it isn't." He slung an arm round Mum's shoulders. "In fact, I didn't get a chance to tell her I was going to do it today. She's a bit broken up over Sev, you know."

Molly's interest caught instantly. "Is she?"

"Oh, Mum, you didn't believe that nonsense about her only pretending to like him, did you?" He gave her a conspiratorial look. "It took a long time for her to accept it, but when we were in Australia, we had it on good authority that he was the one."

"Oh?"

"Yes. You see..."

~HG~

Skipping Sunday dinner at the Burrow immediately after that most interesting Thursday night probably wasn't the best way to convince the man she wasn't in love with him and didn't have any ulterior motives beyond the ones she'd already shared with him. The way the infernal man's mind worked, he would decide that, so far as spending time with him, she'd traded quantity for quality, Hermione suspected. After all, she'd still have to show up in his lab at the end of the day four days a week, wouldn't she? And he couldn't exactly turn her away since it had been unofficially suggested that it might behove him to teach Potions to a junior worker in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, could he?

"If you aren't going to actually speak or even listen," her mother said suddenly, "you might as well be at the Burrow instead of hiding out here."

She forced her mind away from her reluctant future (possible) partner in parenthood, and tried to listen to what her mother was saying about colour and light. And living energies, whatever sort of nonsense that might be. Because, she told herself, that was the real reason she was in Cornwall instead of Devon. She wasn't "hiding out".

"Sorry, Mum," she said, hoping her smile looked cheerful enough. "Woolgathering."

Living and working in London meant she couldn't keep an eye on her parents. On Mum especially. And how was she supposed to decide if Lara was right – about everything – if she couldn't tell if her mother was still sane? Dad wasn't much help; he actually seemed to like the changes in his wife, and though the new hobbies he'd brought back from Australia weren't nearly as disturbing as Mum's, Hermione couldn't depend on him to play watchdog when he seemed to be spending more and more of his free time at the beach.

No, neither of her parents were the stodgy dentists whose memories she had modified years ago. They'd even shortened their names because, as her father had said, "'Gray and Bette' sound cooler than 'Betty and Graham', don't you think?"

"Gray and I wouldn't mind going there, for that matter," Bette said. "It's not too far to drive if you can't manage to Side-Along us both. Molly's invited us, you know."

Hermione hadn't known, and the last thing she needed was for her mother to spend more time with magical people. Especially not these magical people. Or the one in particular. It was bad enough that Bette was sitting next to her, casually talking about magical transportation as if it were an everyday part of Muggle life.

"Maybe in a couple of weeks," Hermione said, faking a yawn. "I guess I'm a bit tired from having two jobs. Old age must be catching up with me. And it can be exhausting there with all the children needing attention."

Knowing she'd said exactly the wrong thing, and ducking her head to avoid her mother's keen look, Hermione nevertheless heard Mum mutter, "Old age! I suppose that makes me ancient."

Fortunately, Dad chose that moment to come in, still sandy from his walk on the beach.

~RW~HG~

Tuesday morning, Ron poked his head in again.

"You're looking better," he said as soon as he saw her. "And if you hadn't been hiding this weekend, you'd already know my news. I did it!"

"Did what? And I wasn't hiding."

"Right," he said, snorting at the blatant lie. "And you haven't been avoiding Potions lessons, either." But then he was grinning and telling her, "I asked Dem to marry me!"

"You did? When? Oh my god, Ron! Congratulations!"

"Sunday. Right before dinner."

"You've been engaged for two days and you're only telling me now?"

"It's only been a day and a half, and I would have told you before I proposed – I could have used your help with that – but you didn't come." He grinned again. "Had to ask Ginny to keep Dem busy while I hid the ring in her napkin."

"You hid it in her napkin? And Ginny helped? She didn't tell you that was a crap idea?"

"Hey! It was going to be Sev, but then Mum needed his help in the kitchen. Folding it up in the serviette was his idea. I wanted to put it in the bread basket."

Hermione found it hard to imagine Ron approaching Snape for help in surprising his fiancée, but then she would have had a hard time imagining many of the things that had occurred around that man recently.

"In that case, I'm glad you asked his advice. Someone might have eaten the ring otherwise."

"That's exactly what he said!" Ron's grin was so big now, Hermione thought he might injure himself. "You two are obviously a match made in heaven, or wherever you go after you die. King's Cross, maybe, like Harry said?"

Screwing up her face into a frown that was only half-faked, Hermione grabbed a paper aeroplane that was zipping into her cubicle and said, "Severus Snape and I aren't a match made anywhere, Ronald."

"Then I guess you'd better get to work on that. Because – without giving away too many details; don't shout at me – I told Mum that you were."

~RP~

"Merlin will have our heads if he catches us at it again," Tobias cautioned.

Flashing an impatient red, Eileen reminded him that they didn't have heads at the moment. "Besides," she added, "young Fred has been poking his nose in it every chance he gets."

"Fred is supposed to do a bit a of nudging now and then. It's his job, isn't it?"

"No. It's not his job. And if Merlin can look the other way when that one breaks the rules, then he can look the other way for us, too." She pulsed a soothing pale yellow, tinged with solemn blue-grey. "Our boy needs us, Toby."

Their boy did need them, Tobias acknowledged, and without any more argument, he dove behind Eileen into Sev's dreams.

~SS~TS~ES~

He always slept better when Mam and Da visited. Tonight they'd been full of some strange sort of excitement from the moment they'd arrived, and Severus found that his memories of before were clearer than they had ever been.

Surely there was a reason for that.

"Have you finally come to take me home, then?"

It was hard to tell when they were just blobs of glowing energy, but Severus thought he saw his mam and da exchange glances. Or whatever the equivalent was for glowing blobs of energy. More likely, they were talking to each other without including him.

"Not yet, darling," Mam told him. "You've plenty to do here and learn, still."

In this form, he had discovered many dreams ago, talking to his parents was easy. Soon as he thought of what he wished to say to them, the words – the concepts or images or something that had no real equivalent in the Inner World – reached them automatically. It made lying impossible, and at his level of skill, hiding the truth was equally out of reach. There was literally nothing he couldn't tell them. There was little he didn't want to share with them. But they could keep secrets from him, it seemed. And they did.

"I've been trying to be good," he said. He turned imploring eyes on Da; unlike the fleshly man had been, the spirit was the softer touch of his parents. "It's hard because I miss you both so much. Please. Ask Merlin if I can come home."

"Not till the time is right, son," Da said. "Not a moment before that."

"But when will that be? How can I learn anything, how can I do anything when I don't know what I'm supposed to be learning!"

"I'm sure you'll work out what you need to do," Mam crooned.

Then she and Da enveloped him in their living energy, pouring their love and confidence and pride into this melding that was what passed for an embrace in the Real World.

"We have faith in you, son," Da told him as they both began to pull away.

"But I've been trying!"

~SS~

The beacons of light and warmth that were parents faded away, but waking didn't wrench him from the Real World. Not this time. Instead, Severus slept on, and the faintly glowing entity that now haunted his dream had a presence hardly bigger than his own. Neither he nor his companion was dressed in flesh – or even the facsimiles of flesh his parents and the others had worn when he'd first gone back after the snake's bite.

"I'll be going In before you," she was boasting. "Mum and Dad said I'm nearly ready."

His dreaming self sensed a wrongness to her claim that was confirmed when his dream self snapped back with, "Shut up! You're only little still. I'll be In ages and ages before you."

He knew she was looking at him haughtily then, though he couldn't say how he could tell she was looking at him at all, considering their lack of bodies.

"Don't be silly! My parents have already got their assignments, and they're almost guaranteed to meet in the Inner because it'll be my first time. They do that, you know. Or you would know if you'd been paying attention."

He had no idea what she was going on about.

"And I'm hardly little," she continued. "I might've come to be after you, but I haven't been skiving off, so I've got far more All than you have."

Dream Severus couldn't argue. The evidence was there in plain sight. Dreaming Severus urged his dream self to ask what "All" was, but somehow he knew this was nothing more than memory – it lacked the clarity and... trueness and presence of time spent with his parents. Besides, he was waking up, anyway.

---

A/N: Thanks to karelia (for the beta read) and to noodle (for the alpha read and the cheerleading and for making me laugh and cry).