Sleeping Dogs Lie

A/N: Many thanks to FerPorcel, Anastasia, docmara and indigofeathers, for various reasons.

13: Sleeping Dogs Lie

He wondered if that was how Potter had felt when she'd taken a piece of his best friend's soul and shoved it into his scar.

As it was, it curled its brim over its eyes, and prayed for morning.

--------------------------

Severus shifted uncomfortably on the stair, and, from his arms, Hermione glanced up at him.

Speaking low, to avoid making an echo, he asked, "Will you be able to sleep?" His voice sounded oddly brittle in his ears.

She nodded, her face resuming the tighter visage that her students so feared.

He affected not to notice. "Goodnight, then," he said, nodding abruptly.

Hermione watched his retreating form descend into shadow. "Goodnight," she said quietly.

Her voice echoed in the stairway and his mind. When he reached the bottom of the stair, he felt more than heard her add, "Sweet dreams."

He slammed the stair door, hard, behind him.

And the slamming echoes grew in intensity as they traveled up the stairs to where Hermione was standing motionless.

Without knowing why, when the echoes washed over her, Hermione smiled.

-----

The tiny ghost sat stroking the dragon's unmoving head with a sad, slow finger. In the dim light, the film over its eye was the same color she was.

The torches flickered, heralding movement at the end of the corridor, but the little ghost did not look up.

A pair of heavy black boots appeared in her line of vision, the leather creased in places with the familiarity of long wear.

The leather creaked as the heels rose off the floor, and long, pale hands surrounded the obsidian dust on the floor. Then they waited.

Severus looked quietly into the tiny ghost's pale, pleading eyes until she nodded and withdrew her finger, scooting backwards, skirling a trail of powder into a small, wispy spiral with the breath of her retreat.

The ghost watched as the dragon reformed, the powder coalescing into a shimmer of wings and, scale by scale, its long, sinuous tail took shape, the last grains of powder forming the very tip, which was curled across its nose.

She glanced up at the black-clad man before her and smiled.

He didn't smile back.

She looked down and saw that the film had remained over the dragon's tiny eyes.

With the film covering its eyes, it did not look at all like it was sleeping.

Her eyes squeezed shut as she turned her head away. One of her long plaits slipped forward, brushing the dragon's head.

She made no sound, but slipped up the corridor, where she seemed to be absorbed by shadow.

Severus' mouth hardened, but his hand closed gently around the obsidian figure.

"I don't have that miracle in me," he muttered, entering his chambers.

----

Poppy held her solitary vigil at Slughorn's bedside.

When she saw the flower stem shrivel, she jerked backwards, knocking her chair over.

The hands with which she righted the chair were clammy, but, setting her mouth in a firm line, she sat down, determined that no patient in her care should pass unwitnessed.

She'd given up trying to understand the conflicting results her periodic examinations of the unmoving Slughorn kept yielding. He was both alive and not alive.

She couldn't explain it.

On a level she barely knew existed, she was relieved that such explanation was beyond her responsibility.

On another, of which she was fully aware, she was shaking, and couldn't for the life of her make it stop.

----

Only two people in the castle slept soundly that night; everyone else who could sleep did so restlessly, their hours disturbed by dreams of a dark wind through darker trees, of a low trembling, almost too low to register, far, far underground.

The two sleeping soundly felt only a deep, rumbling purr and were held in its arms, comforted, sleeping quietly, safely, beneath the hushing lullaby of wind.

----

When Hermione awoke the next morning, she automatically made her bed herself, as she hadn't done in twenty-two years.

The house-elf arrived with her tea as she sat brushing her hair. Hermione looked up as a cup appeared at her elbow. "Thank you," she said.

Blinking rapidly, the house-elf squeaked, "You is very welcome, Professor, Miss."

Hermione said nothing further, and the house-elf pattered over to the bed and clambered up on it to change the pillowcase.

The house-elf's eyes grew wide. Waggling her ears in confusion, she smoothed her hand over its unblemished whiteness, pristine as newly windswept snow.

All over Britain, cups clanked, utensils clattered, as ears waggled, wiggled, and flapped.

Not one witch or wizard thought to question this minute stutter in the habitually smooth progression of their morning routines.

There was no accounting for house-elves. Strange creatures.

Useful, though.

Almost as one, witches and wizards reached for their Daily Prophets and smiled, seeing Harry Potter, with his arm around his pretty wife, smiling almost sheepishly from the front page, his three sparkling daughters laughing around him.

He'd announced his retirement from Quidditch, and his candidacy for the Ministry.

Witches and wizards all over Britain sighed happily, assured of his successful election before he'd even run.

It was as certain as their morning tea.

----

Two house-elves set a clattering tea tray on a low table before the fire in the headmistress' office, and as Severus leaned forward to accept the cup Minerva poured for him, he felt a sharp, hot knife in his hip – and the memory, the heat of Hermione's willingness under his urgent hands flushed his skin. Adjusting his seat, the low brush of leather on the wooden chair swept her hair into and across his mind. The stabbing pain in his hip subsided to a dull throb, and he eased back in his chair, his enigmatic smile hidden behind the raised teacup.

If such was to be the legacy of their touch, so be it.

"You said you required additional information, Severus?" Minerva had not slept well, and her tone reflected the dull ache that had settled behind her eyes.

Severus nodded, setting his teacup carefully on a side table. "Has anyone died in the Castle since the war?"

Knowing she would receive no explanation for this latest of his apparently random questions, Minerva didn't bother to ask for one. "Yes, Argus Filch passed away some years ago."

Something flickered in Severus' eyes, and Minerva had the fleeting thought that something in her response had annoyed him. "And Hermione – was she in residence then?" he asked.

His slightly bored tone did not fool the headmistress into believing his question a casual one. Minerva thumbed her ring, thinking. "No... I believe she was in London, settling her parents' estate."

"Ah," Severus remarked, sounding satisfied. "The first, then. No wonder..."

The ache in Minerva's forehead grew pinched as her conversation with her former colleague appeared headed toward its usual path of twisting obscurity. "Severus, I'm going to assume that your question was pertinent, and inquire," she said, her tone sharpening in anticipatory exasperation, "what its relevance is."

A slow smile spread on Severus' face. "Isn't it obvious, Minerva?"

"Of course it's not obvious, Snape, or I wouldn't have asked you," Minerva snapped, "a fact of which you are maddeningly aware." Her ring clanked against her teacup.

The Bloody Baron drifted through the ceiling and hovered there.

For reasons she didn't fully understand, the appearance of the Slytherin ghost struck her as a particularly well-timed and disturbingly apt portent – of what, she had no idea. But it unnerved her, and she had to force herself to exhale.

"No one else has died while she was here?" Severus was asking.

She sniffed. "As I've told you, no."

"You're absolutely certain of this?"

"Absolutely. Severus, I fail to see –"

"Yes, Minerva, you do. And therein lies your answer." Smirking, he stretched one leather-clad leg before him, perversely enjoying the soreness in his hip – the pain, the act of hiding it, the successful deception, and, most of all, the memory of bruising it against the stair. Oh, yes, he breathed inwardly. So be it, Hermione. Without missing a beat in the spoken conversation, he continued, "It's self-explanatory, really."

Minerva scoffed, exasperated, and Severus supplied, "Your Arithmancy professor has gone farther toward understanding the mechanics of the human soul than any before her."

Something rustled in the vicinity of the ceiling, and Minerva glanced up to see the Baron nodding slowly. Through him, she saw a glint of light on Albus' spectacles.

"The mechanics of the soul," Severus was saying, again setting his teacup on the low table, "but not its purpose. Oh, no. She has quite blinded herself to its purpose." He rested one hand on his leg, running his fingers on the wrinkled leather at his knee. The leather warmed between his fingers.

"And do you know what the soul's purpose is, Severus?" Albus asked dryly from above.

"Do any of us, entirely?" Severus retorted, but the Baron was already speaking.

"It is, in no small part, connection," he said, drifting between the soaring ribs of the arched ceiling.

All eyes in the room sought the Baron and tracked him as he lowered himself, continuing, "It is why she, soul-blind as she is, could see me last of all. I have been dead the longest; it therefore follows that my soul is the least... substantive, for want of a better word."

Minerva said nothing, her mind racing to slot the various mysteries of Hermione's behavior into the possibilities suggested by this new information. But none of them seemed to fit, and she pinched her eyebrows, frowning.

"She cannot see a soul without wanting to break it, Minerva," Severus said quietly. "She does not know, consciously, that that is her impulse, but it is nonetheless fact. She has deliberately blinded herself to the ghosts, first and most of all, to those she knew as living people."

"And at the moment of death, the soul is most vulnerable," Minerva said slowly. And as she said it, she knew it was true, and ice water sluiced her veins, rushing to her headache to stab from within, right between her eyes. She paled, and choked, "Horace..." She turned to Severus, her eyes wide, unable to complete the thought, much less give it voice.

"His vulnerability is what triggered her..." Severus hesitated, "... her actions."

"What has she against Horace?" Minerva asked, her hands rising helplessly in her lap, only to fall. The ring she wore slid halfway to her knuckle, and she clenched her fist to stop it. Its stone fell heavily to rest within her palm.

Severus' eyes caught the small movement, and the corners of his lips tightened. "You should have that resized, Minerva, before you lose it."

The Baron hovered silently.

"It's supposed to size itself magically to fit the Head of Hogwarts," she muttered. "I cannot think why..." Shaking herself, she came back to the present topic. "Whatever her outward personality has become, Severus, I cannot accept that Hermione would do this to a colleague – to anyone."

"The Hermione you once knew, no, of course not. But tell me – or at least ask yourself – how well do you truly know her now?"

Severus' words rang, a quiet challenge, in the air.

Minerva dropped her eyes, and she flipped the stone back and forth between her fingers.

"She has broken Horace's soul, Minerva. Unconsciously."

Without taking her eyes from her ring, Minerva asked, "Why?"

"Without asking her, we cannot know; even then, what explanation could she provide that would bear any resemblance to truth? I surmise that her action stemmed, in part, from pure, unconscious, amoral curiosity – testing her theory outside the confines of what her conscious, civilised mind deems acceptable."

Minerva's eyes narrowed, but she said nothing.

His own eyes deepened. Her lack of response to the more palatable part of his explanation did not bode well for the Arithmancy professor's future. "Additionally," Severus began, but Minerva interrupted, "There's more?"

"Additionally," Severus repeated, his lowered voice demanding Minerva's attention, "she has no defence against the temptation of the Dark Arts. The temptation is simply too strong for her, unschooled as she is, to resist."

Still flipping the stone, trying to see through her headache, Minerva missed the accusation in his tone.

A rustling overhead, however, confirmed that the accusation had landed precisely where he had aimed it.

Minerva finally shook her head. "I confess, Severus, that I don't understand what you say about temptation."

"No," he agreed, too calmly.

Looking up in alarm, Minerva suddenly asked, "Can she be stopped?"

"I already have done."

The headmistress shot him a skeptical look. "Whatever you did, Severus, it wasn't effective. Poppy tells me –"

The sound of Severus' fist cracking the table drove the headmistress' office into deadly silence. Eyes locked on Minerva's shocked face, he spoke carefully: "I stopped her. But 'stopped' does not mean 'ended.'"

The headmistress did not back down. Equally carefully, she said one word: "How?"

The look in his eyes warned her not to ask.

"How?" she demanded, the full force of her personality filling her voice.

To her consternation, Severus chuckled darkly. "The Order no longer exists, Minerva. I am no longer under your command."

Minerva drew herself up stiffly, and her eyes filled with frost. "Can you bring it to an end, then? A reasonable one?"

Severus' hip filled with hot steel as he stood, and he focused inwardly on the pain, before replying, "Far better that she end it herself, reasonable or no."

A soft snort from Dumbledore's portrait.

With an icy glance at the portrait, Severus shot his words upward. "At one time, Albus, I was willing, even eager, to die for your Order. But your short-sightedness sentenced her to something far worse than the redemptive death we both believed was my fate. She has resisted, alone, a temptation worse than any you ever knew, for twenty-two years. I know what she has endured, better than she does herself. How it has shaped her. Twisted her. She sacrificed her innocence to preserve the world, Albus – for everyone except herself."

Albus sighed. "Sadly, it is sometimes thus. But what she did was beyond unforgivable, Severus, and–"

Severus looked the portrait full-on, his eyes glittering dangerously. "Yes. Pragmatic of her, wasn't it?"

"Hermione saved the world?" Minerva interjected.

The former spy did not turn as he answered, still fixing the portrait under his unblinking gaze. "Young Weasley handed her the sword; she used it. And, unlike your boy hero, Albus, she at least had sense enough to keep quiet regarding actions she cannot explain."

"No one would believe her," Minerva said quietly. "I scarcely believe it myself."

"Indeed not," Albus concurred. "But still, her loyalty to our world should nonetheless –"

Severus' voice cut smoothly into whatever accession Albus was about to make. "Very pretty, Albus. But I assure you, her loyalty is not to 'our' world."

Albus blinked, his mouth still open to speak.

"And why should it be?" Severus continued, before the portrait could collect its wits. "Whatever magic our world holds for Muggle-borns is gone for her, replaced by a world of convenience and bureaucracy which she, of all, can see is little more than a conspiracy of blindness. No, Albus. I refer to her loyalty to Potter."

Minerva fussed with her hands, and the rasping of her stiff robes caught Severus' attention. "Potter?" The conversation had once again gone over her head.

He turned to her. "You said yourself her problem with the Weasleys began with the wedding."

"Yes, but..."

"Minerva. Think."

But her face was blank.

"The children, Minerva. The children."

The look of dawning comprehension on Minerva's face was almost too private to watch. The Baron sighed himself out through the wall of the headmistress' office.

"Your question about Ginny's N.E.W.T.s?" Minerva ventured.

"Yes. She had no problem with the girl when she was still Ginevra Weasley."

"And - and about Lily Potter... her daughter. Oh... oh, dear...."

Severus nodded once, sharply, then demanded, "Do you know how souls work, Minerva?"

"She... she can't believe... that..." Minerva faltered, unable to bring herself to say what she was thinking.

Severus turned on her, a black silhouette against the shards of light slanting through the window. "She doesn't know what to believe, Minerva. How could she? She knows that the Dark Lord inhabited Harry's mind through the Horcrux, but only while he still had his own body, his own consciousness. Do you know how much consciousness resides in a soul? Do you, Albus? How a soul fragment functions when its body has died?"

Silence.

Opening his palms in mockery of a request, he asked, "Pray, enlighten me – and let us put an end to her torment."

More silence.

"You don't know, then. No more does Hermione, who has been living with the question for twenty years. And it's not as though she – or anyone – can ask the one person in the world who might have an answer. What form would such a question take? 'When you're touching your wife, Potter, can you tell if your best friend is watching? Can he feel it, Potter, when you make love with his sister?'"

"Enough!" Albus roared.

Minerva sat in shocked silence in the echoes of Albus' anger, the skin around her eyes growing pale. "You're mad."

Severus' eyes bored relentlessly into the portrait above. "Not I. But she may be. And if this is how those who should be closest to her think, then I, for one, don't blame her if she is."

Minerva looked away, at her hands in her lap, at the ring of office too loose on her finger. She touched the stone, and said quietly, "She must leave the castle, Severus. Before the students return."

Severus' lip curled. "Can't risk having such a potential danger on staff, Minerva?"

Staring at him wide eyed, it took Minerva a moment to find her voice. When she did, it was hollow. "My first responsibility is to the school and to its students." But her eyes were filling with an undeniable awareness, and, closing them before he could see what would pain her later, in private, she finished, "as you well know."

Severus exhaled; he had glimpsed the return of her conscience. His tone was strangely gentle when he replied, "Of course; the innocent must be protected at all costs... all but one. Never mind that all that has changed is that you are no longer blind to her despair. No, Minerva," he said, when Minerva started to protest, "your loyalties are perfectly placed within the strict limits of your responsibility. But who, I ask you, who will be loyal to Hermione? You? The Ministry?"

Something in his tone brought Minerva's eyes to his, and in them she found the answer to his question.

Severus nodded once, finally, before leaving her office, closing the door quietly behind him.

Despite the bleak feeling weighing in her chest, her mouth twitched. She couldn't help herself.

But then Albus' judgment fell softly from the wall: "That boy has ever needed a cause."

"You should know, Albus. You used it well enough." Still stinging from the slap of truth she'd not seen for over twenty years, the headmistress of Hogwarts spoke sharply, more sharply than she had spoken in her life.

When Albus started to protest, she held up her hand. "Not now, Albus. For the love of Merlin, not now."

Feeling himself dismissed for the first time since the defeat of Grindelwald, Albus Dumbledore looked out over the Forbidden Forest and found he had nothing to say.

Nothing at all.

Note on sources: Minerva's line "You should know. You used it well enough" is a nearly exact quotation from Ernest Hemingway's story, "The Sea Change."