Chapter 8

Hermione had pulled together a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs on toast, and now they sat in her kitchen, lingering over tea. Severus stared into his cup, a little out of sorts and ill-at-ease. Everything had felt natural and right – up until breakfast. Though he had rarely spent the night at a woman's home in the past, when he had, it had been all about mutual pleasure and not at all about anything more.

In those previous encounters, however, he never stayed until dawn, much less the morning meal. Breakfast suddenly ventured into a territory that he had previously avoided entirely: domesticity and couple-ness. It implied wanting to see the person during breakfast. It implied commitment and long-term and all sorts of things he had never wanted before. Despite his being certain that he wanted them with Hermione, it was still very disconcerting.

Hermione seemed to have picked up on his discomfort and was quietly letting him be while she nursed her own tea and fiddled with her spoon. "Would you like another cup?" she asked.

Severus sighed and shook his head. He stood and offered his hand to help her out of her chair. Keeping her hand tightly in his own, he walked back to her living room and pulled her down with him onto the couch. He kept his eyes on their joined hands as he worried hers with his own.

Again she kept quiet while he mulled over his discombobulated thoughts. Finally he looked up at her to see her eyes on him, concerned but calm. "I'm sorry, Hermione," he began. "I suppose I hit a bout of nerves. Out of character, I realise, but it happens. I'm – out of my element at this point. I suspect that you have more experience sharing a morning meal with a member of the opposite sex. Hogwarts aside, of course. It doesn't exactly count when the entire staff is in attendance."

Hermione ran her hands up and down his own, up his wrists and down, and finally laced their fingers together. "I would hope that you were getting past the need to be in character around me, Severus. If you need silence, or need to get angry, or need to be happy, it's all part and parcel of being together. If I don't realise what you need, tell me. We can make this – us – work, I truly believe that. But there is work involved."

"I'm a cantankerous sort, you realise. Prone to grumpiness, rudeness, and a short temper. And then there's the matter of my ongoing animosity towards your best friend." He stumbled over the last bit. It wasn't fair to make Hermione choose between them, but he had no idea how to reconcile his dislike of Potter – admittedly, partially Potter's father more than Harry himself – and his love for Hermione.

She rolled her eyes at him and lifted a hand to his cheek, letting his hand to fall free. He immediately reached for her hair and pulled her close, tucking her against his side.

"Severus, you were an absolute terror to us – including me – for six years. I know that side of you. I can see you holding it in sometimes around me. I appreciate that you're restraining it, but I don't expect you to do so all the time."

"I don't want to frighten you, Hermione." His temper was an ugly thing, as she had seen when she was just a third-year at the Shrieking Shack.

"Does your anger change your feelings for me?" she asked.

"Of course not!"

She nodded. "And if I exploded in tears and yelled and screamed, would you realise that I just needed to get it out of my system?"

"Yes, but..."

"No buts. You have your temper and I have mine. Yours may be darker, but that's to be expected. You've had to live as if every day could be your last."

Severus just quirked a brow at that comment. It was rather an understatement, given that during the war he had frequently been in the position where every minute could have been his last.

She flushed. "Right. That was obvious. But you understand my point."

"Yes, I do. I'm not certain I agree with it, but I do understand."

"Good. Then, enough on that?"

He nodded. They certainly seemed to have discussed all the important bits.

"Excellent. Now, how is your knowledge of Muggle popular culture?"

The non sequitur had Severus nearly shaking his head in confusion. "Not thoroughly up-to-date, but passable. There is a working telly in my house, you realise. While I obviously could never watch any during the school year, I did occasionally entertain myself with it during the summers. And do periodically watch it now."

"Ah, I hadn't noticed. It hasn't exactly been something we've needed to entertain each other," she replied with a grin. "Have you ever watched Star Trek?"

"Original Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, or Voyager?" Severus enjoyed the look of astonishment that appeared on Hermione's face at his knowledge of the specific versions of the show.

She blinked and said, "Original Series. And is it overly rude to say that I am extremely surprised?"

Severus chuckled. "Hermione, I was the quintessential – what was the term? – geek during school. Wizards may not have the same technological gadgets, but the role is basically the same in the wizarding world as it is in the Muggle one. My father, as you may have surmised, was sub-par at best as a parent, and he hated the fact that by my very wizarding nature I was more powerful than he was. So he was happy to let me retreat to the telly during the summer holidays, as it was normal to him."

"I see."

The astonishment had given way to a look of disgust that suggested that she did see, as well as she could, at any rate. Severus was fairly certain her childhood had been ideal and sheltered, if a bit lonely as an only child. Still, her parents were dentists and she had always appeared solidly middle to upper-middle class. He filed away the questions for later, though, as she seemed to have a particular train of thought she wanted to follow.

"Star Trek, the Original Series?" he prompted, to get them back on track. "Why are you asking, anyway?"

"The not-Muggle-after-all wands caused plan A to backfire. So I've been mulling over a plan B. We should have had a plan B to begin with, but we didn't, so we'll just have to go from here. In fact, I'd venture to say that the extra elapsed time will go further to guarantee that the twins don't realise what's hitting them." Her smile would have fit in well in the Slytherin common room.

Severus slowly returned her smile. "What do you have in mind?"

"It depends on the requirements for a particular type of potion, as well your ingredients supply, because I'm assuming we don't want to have to go purchase anything special that might be traced back to us," she said with a touch of worry.

"Would you please tell me what it is?"

He quirked a brow at her hesitation. "Can you make a fertility potion for magical creatures?" she asked in a rush.

"Pardon me?" He couldn't possibly have heard her correctly.

"A fertility potion," she repeated.

Severus was completely stumped as to what this had to do with the twins, much less Star Trek. What in Merlin's name could she be thinking? "I've never brewed one, but I know I've seen them in some of my books. I can't say it's something I've ever had need of before. I think all the ingredients were fairly standard."

"Wonderful."

"Can I reiterate how confused I am at the moment?"

Hermione nibbled on her lower lip. "I've long wondered at some of the Star Trek writers, whether perhaps they were actually wizards."

"How do you mean?"

"Did you ever notice that a Tribble bears a remarkable resemblance to a Puffskein – or a Pygmy Puff?"

Severus closed his eyes. It seemed that Hermione possibly should have been sorted into Slytherin. He wasn't sure if he was encouraged or scared by that. "You aren't serious."

"That they resemble each other? Of course they do." A sneaky smile played around the corners of her mouth.

Severus' eyes shot back open. "That is not what I meant, and you know it, my dear. You cannot be serious about what you obviously plan to do with them."

"And why not? It's as good as a detention, since they have to figure out why it's happening. But, ultimately, it doesn't hurt anyone or anything, except perhaps their budget and their time – and possibly their cleanliness – and even that will only be temporary. The Pygmy Puffs are a very popular item. The twins keep complaining that they can't breed them fast enough. We're only fixing that for them. So, we're kind of doing them a favour. Except for the fact that they'll have to clean up after all the little darlings, which is where the worst of the detention comes in. Well, that and the Pygmy Puffs' lamentable tendency to stick their tongues up people's noses to eat their snot."

"I could have lived without that image, thank you very much. However, aren't they likely to assign the care to an assistant, causing the punishment to be inflicted on some other helpless idiot rather than those currently deserving of it?"

"No, they're very proprietary about taking care of them, actually. I believe they once caught an assistant trying to nick one to sell, black market so to speak, and since then they've been extraordinarily careful. So it would definitely cause them headaches personally, but would only be a temporary problem, as it will even out quickly, I would think."

"Please don't tell me you're planning on poisoning the food supply. Or using a Portkey to send the lot of them to some enemy location."

"You really do know your Star Trek, don't you? Everyone remembers the Tribbles, not everyone remembers what happened to them. No, I'm not planning on poisoning them. I just expect the extras to sell quickly."

"Very well, then. Let's see what we can do."

Hermione sat on a stool next to Severus as he quickly and efficiently retrieved various items from his ingredient shelves. He had had to move his current Ministry work off to the side, but fortunately it was at a stage where he could shift it without causing any problems. Apparently he didn't have any other projects underway at the moment; the Hogwarts hospital wing must be fully stocked.

The book with the correct recipe was open next to them. Hermione had noted that several of the ingredients were long-standing Muggle homeopathic solutions for infertility. Some of them were probably old wives' tales as far as Muggle fertility was concerned, but many of those tales originated from wizarding solutions, so that wasn't a surprise.

While Severus was busy working on the actual potion, Hermione was turning to the problem of distribution. Pygmy Puffs, like full-size Puffskeins, ate anything and everything. Which was great for feeding practicality, but not so good for trying to contaminate their food source. Despite the fact that she was fairly certain that the twins had a specific feed for them – they couldn't be relied on to eat it. The potion needed to be difficult to detect, which meant that, first of all, it needed to not be visually noticeable. It would, unfortunately, become a bright red when it was complete, which meant dosing their water dishes wasn't feasible.

They would take a supply of the liquid with them, but Hermione was trying to identify a way to convert it to a powdered form that could be sprinkled on their typical solid food as well. The ideal situation, of course, would be if the twins provided something red for their food, such as tomatoes, but that seemed doubtful given how likely they were to stain everything in sight. She assumed that they probably got some sort of food like dry cereal, though she'd never seen it. Severus would need to create a very finely grained powder that would be hard to see.

She flipped through a pile of books he had dropped beside her, and hesitated between several books on potion alteration methods. Each was from a completely different time period, ranging from twenty years ago to nearly one hundred years ago. She started to pick up the most recent, then changed her mind and went for the oldest, instead. Before opening the book, she glanced up and saw his fierce scowl of concentration as he worked through the unfamiliar brewing process.

Though Hermione hated that she was the source of his frustration at the moment, it was in some ways a relief to realise that he sometimes struggled, at least the first time through, with potions. Made-up spells aside, his actual potions notes from his copy of Advanced Potion-Making were intimidating to her, as they so frequently seemed to make no sense but were invariably an improvement on the standard method. Hermione knew she was intelligent, and clever, and logical. But Severus was brilliant in a completely different way. An Einstein kind of way.

She gently opened the book to the table of contents. Her eyes skimmed the cramped words, looking for likely sections. Nothing immediately matched her needs, so she set on a systematic method based on a mental calculation of probability of closeness. The first two sections she referenced had nothing, but the third – ah! There. "Severus?" she asked.

"Hmmm?" He was stirring with one hand while the other hand opened up the next ingredient and measured it. Hermione shook her head at his efficiency – only someone thoroughly ambidextrous could manage what he was doing. Useful talent. She fleetingly wondered if he was born with it or if he had developed it as a way to improve his duelling and spell-casting skills.

"I think I found it. There's a method here for charming the essence of the potion into dust – that's what the book calls it, anyway. Reading between the lines, I think it creates micro-suspensions of liquid inside some sort of bubble, at a size that's so small that it looks and acts like powder."

"Read it to me," he responded brusquely. For a moment Hermione was back in his Potions classroom in the dungeons, being snapped at to get on with it. She shook her head to clear the image and did as he had asked.

He started nodding infinitesimally when she was just a few lines in. By the time she was done, he had taken to nodding broadly every time she finished a sentence. "Yes, definitely," he agreed when she finally finished. "That's exactly what we need to do, as odd as it sounds. Nice work, Hermione. You have a knack for knowing how to find information; not everyone can do that, you know. I'm terrible at it."

"But you found the right potion so quickly!" Hermione exclaimed.

"Yes, I did. But I had seen it before. My memory is excellent and once I've found something I'll almost certainly remember where it was should I ever need it again. And you saw my Advanced Potions textbook – I can make up spells, and I have an uncanny knack for potion alteration. But while doing research – finding something unfamiliar is not nearly as easy for me."

Hermione tipped her head to the side. "Do you mean to tell me that the great Severus Snape – hold on, what's your middle name?"

He shrugged. "I don't have one."

"You don't?"

"No. Not everyone does, you know." The teasing note in his voice assured her that he wasn't offended or upset by the question as he continued the potion.

Hermione flushed. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to sound so dense."

He sent her an inquisitive sidelong glance. "Hermione, I wasn't indicating that I thought you did. It was a reaction, nothing more. You're a talkative person, so your reactions tend to be verbal. There's nothing wrong with that."

"I'm sorry," she repeated.

"Would you stop apologising?"

"I'm sorry." But she smiled as she said it.

He made a face at her. "That was deliberate."

"Of course it was. But what I had been trying to say was that I am sorry I'm being touchy about it. I seem to be having flashbacks of Potions class and feeling a bit inadequate and unequal."

He shook his head. "We're definitely not in Potions class, love. I do understand, though. But I assure you I'm not thinking about you as anything other than my lover and my project partner."

"In that order, I suppose," she said, grinning. "Typical male."

"Hmmpf. I don't think I should answer that."

"Good plan. But I think that 'partner in crime' would be a more appropriate moniker than 'project partner'. Disturbingly accurate, actually, given that I'm about to suggest that we sneak in at night to distribute the fertility potion."

He narrowed his eyes. "Why?" he asked. "You can easily say you can't find something and want to know if you left it there, or come up with some other excuse. Actually, I suspect you barely need an excuse. They're not likely to see through anything you come up with anyway. Clever in a twisted sort of way, but frequently seriously lacking in common sense."

"Very true," she agreed. "But even the twins won't miss the fact that I show up after weeks of absence and shortly thereafter the Pygmy Puff population explodes. And since it's possible, even likely, that word has made its way 'round to them about us, at least the dinner where we ran into Ron and Susan, I suspect that might raise their suspicions. They may appear a bit on the ne'er-do-well side, but they're innately suspicious."

"Excellent point. I hadn't taken into account the effect of potential gossip. I must say, I'm very glad to have your assistance on this, ah, project. You do have excellent insight into their minds. Though I am rather proud of the fact that I can distinguish between them."

Hermione nodded. "Me, too. They haven't figured it out yet, and I still refuse to tell them how I know. They're confounded by the fact that anyone can, yet Mrs. Weasley can't."

"Molly Weasley is a wonderful woman, but is slightly blinded by dealing with seven offspring. I don't think she's been able to distinguish between them in years, but if you spend enough time with them, deliberately watching for differences, you can spot them eventually. I suspect that Molly knew when they were infants, but eventually gave up and decided it wasn't worth it, given that she had to pay attention to all the rest of her brood anyway."

"I suspect you're correct. And I imagine that as a teacher, and in particular as a teacher who knew they were using information from your class to create all their pranks, you made a point of keeping tabs on them?"

"Indeed."

"Nice to know I'm not the only one who's figured out their shades of freckles."

His eyes glinted. "Who said anything about freckles?"

"So while 'researching topics' is apparently a weakness of the great Severus no-middle-name Snape, observation is not. Though this doesn't come as a surprise. Tell me," Hermione demanded. She was curious; after deliberately studying the twins for months, she had realised that George's freckles were a bit lighter in pigment than Fred's. If you knew what to look for, you could differentiate between them quickly, but if you didn't, it was nearly impossible. It was also more difficult to recognise one twin by himself. She hadn't realised there were any other noticeable differences.

Severus unabashedly grinned at her – a very rare sight, indeed. "The other way to see differences would be to be present when something caused one. Madam Pomfrey is very skilled at what she does. When she's allowed to do it, that is. For minor cuts and scrapes, there's no reason to send someone off to the hospital wing, is there?"

"Nooo..." Hermione had a feeling she knew where this was going.

"Of course not. Any Hogwarts teacher could fix a basic cut in moments. But if it just conveniently was a tad too deep to heal without a scar, well, that would just be a shame, wouldn't it?"

"Where?"

"Fred, left hand, index finger, between the first and second joints, alongside the middle finger. It should come as no surprise to learn that he got it while attempting to prank someone. Jordan must have done something significant in order to have them risk it in my classroom. They never did that again." His malicious smile told Hermione all she needed to know about how unpleasant the results undoubtedly had been.

"And what did they do for detention?"

"They had to clean up after Peeves for a week. I thought it . . . appropriate."

She rolled her eyes in response. "And I suppose you conveniently mentioned said detention to Peeves?" Her voice was wry.

"Of course," he agreed.

Hermione shook her head, but put her book down and crossed to circle her arms around him. He hesitated, then hugged her back. Clearly he wasn't accustomed to random acts of affection. She'd have to work on that. And in the spirit of not discomfiting him further, she changed the topic of conversation.

"I'm still feeling as if we should do something about the joke wands. Have you thought about the issue further?"

He sighed. "Yes, and have come to no further conclusions, either. Every time I become absolutely determined to send an anonymous message to the Ministry about them, I see Arthur Weasley's grinning face and realise I somehow can't crush their memory of him – he deserves so much more."

"I have the same problem," Hermione agreed. "Perhaps we should discreetly return to the Muggle joke shop and enquire further. Suggest that we were impressed with the quality of the product and wanted to see what other items they offered. Based on the results of that enquiry, we can decide on a course of action.

"In the meantime, shall we get back to work on our revenge . . . I mean, their most recent detention?"

"Definitely."

All their planning, and brewing, and forcing Hermione to learn to Apparate near-silently – all of it had come to this. The following Friday night Hermione crouched in the alley behind Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, underneath a window that still shone brightly in the darkness. "The best-laid plans of fuzzy little things and men," she misquoted in a whisper.

Severus, looking decidedly grumpy in an undignified crouch beside her, murmured his agreement. "Annoying, unreliable, flaky idiots," he muttered. "Tweedledum and Tweedledumber strike again."

They had watched the shop for several nights in a row to make sure that Hermione's knowledge of the twins' night time routine wasn't out of date. While Fred and George had left at slightly different times every evening, it was always in the six to seven o'clock timeframe. Tonight, though, when they were planning to break in, the twins were still there at ten o'clock at night. Thankfully, Severus and Hermione had deliberately Apparated nearby rather than making a long-distance attempt to get through any anti-Apparation wards.

"What do we do now?" she asked quietly.

Hermione couldn't see his expression in the dark, but by the wry tone of his voice, she trusted that was a good thing. "This was your plan, Hermione, why don't you tell me?"

"Since you were the spy," she hissed back, "it seems that you would know better than me how to proceed when things go awry."

She felt his hand come up unexpectedly to rest on her back, and she flinched. Damned black robes, she thought. She glanced down, as useless as that was, at her own dark clothing, which Severus had insisted upon. She turned her head back in his direction and took a deep breath. "Well?" she continued. "Ideas?"

"As much as it pains me to try to explain this to a trouble-seeking, rushing-forward-into-peril, reckless Gryffindor," he began, rubbing his hand on her back at her snicker, "the best option is to just wait. The twins go out the front door every night, or just Apparate from inside, and it's dark and quiet back here. We could leave and return another night, but there's no guarantee it will be different."

"Very true," Hermione agreed reluctantly. She carefully scooted closer to him, still along the back of the building but slightly out of range of the shop's rear windows. "I suppose we're just lucky that they're only paranoid about the Pygmy Puffs. Much easier to avoid a small radius of alarm spells than a large one. Let's hope they haven't removed my magical signature from the inside spells."

"Best not count on it, Hermione. Rule number one for counterintelligence: never count on anything."

Hermione leaned against his shoulder and nodded. "I'm glad I could come up with an idea, Severus, but the execution of a plan that requires . . . ah . . . counterintelligence skills, also known in layperson's terms as breaking and entering in this case . . . well, let's just say it's a bit beyond me."

"This from a member of the trio that got into some of the biggest, and potentially deadliest, I might add, mischief ever seen at Hogwarts?" She could hear the disbelief in his voice.

She shrugged, trusting that he could feel it even if he couldn't see it. "I spent most of my time trying to be the Voice of Reason, and failing that, tagging along to attempt to help minimise the disastrous results."

He nodded against the top of her head. "Yes, I can see that. You did, however, prove eminently valuable once in the midst of those adventures, I believe. I fumed for days about the fact that you got past my potions logic puzzle to reach the Philosopher's Stone. Exceedingly annoying that you were able to do that. Especially as a first-year."

"As I mentioned to Harry, many wizards have no logic in the traditional Muggle sense at all. They don't have to, given that their very existence is illogical in the traditional Muggle sense," she replied. "Muggle-borns have an advantage there, I think. At the time, I wondered at it, actually, as we all assumed you were pure-blooded."

She sensed rather than saw his raised eyebrow. "I see. And now?"

"At the risk of inflating your ego even further than it usually appears to be, now I know it's just that you tip the scale towards brilliance."

His arm came around her and tightened into a hard hug as he rested his head against her own. "Hermione, love," he whispered. "You can't know . . ."

At his trailed-off response Hermione wrapped her own arms around his waist. "I can't know how much it means to hear that from someone other than Professor Dumbledore?" she guessed, wary of treading on painful memories.

He let out a breath. "Exactly."

"I suppose that everyone else just saw 'Dark spells' and didn't see your brains for what they were worth independent of that," she speculated.

"That is the short version of it, yes."

She nodded again. "Short-sighted idiots." The lights went out in the shop. "How long do we have to wait now?"

"A little while, at least, I'm afraid, to be absolutely safe."

"I'm following your lead on this," Hermione said before returning to the previous topic. "I'm glad you found your way out of that, Severus. You're a better man than you give yourself credit for."

"Only you see–" He was interrupted by the sound of the back door opening.

Damn!

Hermione focused on breathing the way Severus had taught her. Not holding her breath, but shallowly and evenly inhaling and exhaling. She tucked her head up under his chin, knowing that her hair was probably their biggest risk of detection. She felt Severus slide his robes up over her head. And presumably his mouth and nose, as suddenly his breathing seemed louder to her. He was keeping watch with as little of his face showing as possible.

Encompassed in black cloth, Hermione had nothing to do but ponder what was going on and why someone – the twins, she assumed – had exited the shop from the back.

"Are you sure you want to do this, Fred?"

Obviously, that was George.

"I'm sure," Fred replied. "I know it's a nasty thing to sneak out and do, but we really want to avoid being found out until it's too late."

They were getting closer, and Hermione prayed they were far enough away from the wall that there wouldn't be an actual collision, at least.

George sighed loudly. "If you must, you must. But don't expect me to hold back Mum once she learns what you've done."

"Once it's done, it doesn't matter. Thanks." The twins were right in front of them now, but seemed to be too engrossed in their conversation to notice anything out of place around them.

Both twins suddenly Disapparated with loud cracks, and just like that, the risk was gone.

Hermione froze and waited for Severus to tell her what to do. Theoretically, only the twins had been in the shop and they were now free to go in, but the adrenaline pumping through her system made her think of all sorts of terrifying scenarios of getting caught.

Severus lowered his robes from her face and squeezed her gently. "All clear," he said.

Her deep breath was noisy in the quiet night, and she glanced around to confirm for herself that there was no one nearby to take notice. The alleyway was empty, and all the windows around them were dark.

"Give me a minute for my heart to calm down," she said, nearly panting as her adrenaline levels started to subside. "Or at least my breathing. How are you so calm?"

"Practice. And live experience," he replied dryly.

She slipped a hand up over his frockcoat to his chest. And frowned. "Yes, but even your heart rate is still slow and steady!"

"Practice," he repeated. "It's very difficult to keep your heart rate down, and it takes a lot of practice, but it can be done. Controlling your breathing is much easier – nice and even, there." He rested his forehead against hers and led her through controlled breathing.

A few minutes later she was calm again. Her heart was still beating faster than normal, but it wasn't the thumping double-time that it had been before. "I'm ready now."

She felt him pause and look down at her, but all she could see of his face was a shadow. His fingers came up to caress her cheek. "Very well. Let's move quietly to the back door."

He stood and offered his hand, enjoyably but unnecessarily sliding her along his body as he pulled her up. She grinned. "Naughty Severus."

"You have to expect that when you've put thoughts in my head by asking me to brew – and deliver – a fertility potion, my dear. Regardless of the fact that it's not designed for wizards, it puts this wizard to thinking of certain related activities."

Hermione snorted. "I'm quite certain it would put any wizard to thinking of those certain activities. It just puts you thinking about those activities with me."

"I believe the Muggle expression is 'caught me'," he replied sardonically. "Come, we're wasting time. And I would much prefer to get this over with."

The rest of the plan went off without a hitch, despite their earlier scares.

"Child's play," Severus harrumphed as he avoided the magical alarms and sensors, Hermione simply slipping by after testing to confirm that Fred and George hadn't removed her from the 'approved' list. While Severus carefully sprinkled the fertility potion powder over the dry food that was indeed in dishes of the Pygmy Puff cages, then moved onto the storage container for the rest of the food, Hermione slipped over to the counter and stuck her hand beneath. She found exactly what she was expecting to find and quickly produced a small sealable jar from her pocket to nick a bit – well, maybe more than a bit – in. Severus was busy paying attention to avoiding Pygmy Puff tongues and didn't notice what she was doing. Within ten minutes they were back outside and Apparating to the house on Spinner's End.

"Going by the normal reproduction cycles of the Pygmy Puffs, we should see the results in about a week, I think," Hermione theorized. "It's a little uncertain, as it took a while for Fred and George to work out a strain that could reproduce independently rather than being sterile. The gestation time is much shorter than that of a Puffskein, but despite that, the Pygmy Puffs don't seem to be able to reproduce nearly as often. This, presumably, should help cure that."

Severus looked at her questioningly. "Indeed, and the fact that this particular variation of the potion has very mild aphrodisiac properties won't hurt. But that brings me to something that I didn't think to ask you. Is it possible that the twins will see them in more-frequent acts of reproducing, so to speak, and therefore the element of surprise will be lost?"

"Oh, no," Hermione said with a devious smile. This was one of those times she was immensely proud of the research and record-keeping she had done for the twins, and she was quite sure the smugness carried through to her voice, but she simply couldn't help herself. "While it is possible for Pygmy Puffs to mate, I'm fairly certain they are primarily parthenogenetic and therefore generally reproduce asexually. And they do typically only 'reproduce' at night, anyway. So I don't think the surprise is likely to be ruined."

"I see."

"Now, Severus, you've been very patient tonight. Obviously, the implementation of my plan had all sorts of potential pitfalls, but you didn't complain. I think you deserve a bit of reward."

Severus quirked a brow at her.

She smiled back. "While you were busy contaminating the food supply, I was busy collecting . . . evidence . . . of their past transgressions."

"You were, were you?" he asked, eyes narrowing.

"I was indeed. And just to make sure that the efficacy of this can still be proven," Hermione continued, taking the small jar out of a pocket and holding it in front of her, "I thought we might experiment with it. Just to show that it still lasts for hours, of course."

Severus stepped forward and took the 'evidence' out of her hand. "I think we could find some excellent proof of past transgressions with this. Particularly if we adjourn to my bedroom now."

"That was exactly what I had in mind." Hermione turned and dashed up the staircase ahead of him.

Author's Notes: (At the end this time, because they're unusually long.) Once again, I must thank Scabbyfish for leading me out of my erroneous Americanism ways and polishing up my prose and grammar at the same time. It's also been a while since I've acknowledged Elfarren for her initial plot read-through, which was (and still is) greatly appreciated.

In addition to my thank yous, I also need to note that this chapter had several sections that were inspired by other sources. In retrospect, I believe the section about Severus' ambidexterity was subconsciously inspired by Quillusion's Soul Searching. And I'm quite sure that the segment about controlling heart rate and breathing was inspired by Jo Beverley's Devilish, though, once again, I didn't realize this as I was writing it. Finally, to be scrupulously honest, the entire "counterintelligence" scene, in particular the breathing lessons, likely had a smattering of inspiration from Suzanne Brockmann's Navy SEALs stories.

That sums up the inspirations that I am aware of. If there are more, and it's quite possible that there are somewhere, then I haven't realized it yet!