Chapter 2 - In the Crypt

Beyond Time and Space

Chapter 2 – In the Crypt

There was a general sense of lethargy in the air at Hogwarts. Truth be told, the Headmaster found it disquieting to see the students and the general British wizarding public resume their former lives as if nothing had happened. The Ministry's tagline for the new post-Voldemort era was 'Rebuilding our World for your Tomorrow'. How trite! Dumbledore sniffed indignantly at that thought as he walked past chattering students. He shook his head in a manner that hinted at both the kind comprehension and sad realisation at his students' innocence. They need no longer fear for their lives or worry for their families. They need no longer stare blankly at an empty seat in shock. How quickly the young forget! He shrugged mildly to himself as he strove to unstick two lemon drops; it was just as well the young were what they were; after all, they have their whole lives ahead of them. It was only the older set and those former students who had directly participated in the extirpation of Voldemort that harboured some regret of what might have been; only these individuals still remembered and mourned; only these would never forget. For the first time in his life, Dumbledore truly felt his age. He sighed as his thoughts flew to Ronald Weasley unhinged at St Mungo's; the psychological scars carried by his staff; Harry's unusual taciturnity and frequent incoherent mumblings as he rocked himself; Hermione behaving like Severus, wearing her bitterness on her sleeve like a badge of honour. Dear Severus, he thought, shutting his eyes briefly in anguish as he recalled the closest thing to a son. And he had lost him. Severus, who ironically received the recognition and acceptance he had so craved, when he lay cold and unaware of his true merit. He would never be acquainted with the full extent of his contribution to the Good. Only three of them – Minerva McGonagall, Hermione and Dumbledore himself truly felt his loss keenly. Dumbledore knew that she was beginning to adopt all the hallmarks of the late Potions Master's unsociable and reticent disposition. He hoped with all his heart that he would not have to deal with another individual who brooded on losses and harped on the past.

For all intents, Dumbledore was right. Hermione Granger, though physically young and handsome, had acquired a certain cold hardness in her eyes, which gave her an overall shrewd and tired look. It was a look that went beyond her years. While to the untrained eye, she still appeared to be the bushy haired young lady with a studious nature; the remaining Hogwarts staff and students felt that she had taken to the fashions of middle age too soon. She had never been beautiful, that was true – but she had an intelligent air about her, and an intently curious gaze that rendered her striking. Despite this general consensus, she had insisted on adopting an almost spinsterish look in choosing to live insulated in her chambers. Dumbledore sighed at the young recluse in her 'hermitage'. She had been both unwilling and unable to tame her frizzy mass of bushy hair; as such, she no longer wore it loose. Her hair was now permanently knotted into a large severe chignon at the back of her head. Though the volume and mass of her tightly wound chignon led to much student speculation as to whether Hermione's hair was as long as it was thick and bushy, they did not know for sure. Only Minerva, Harry, Dumbledore and Ron (if he had his senses) knew that she had vowed before the final battle that if any of their number died, she would never cut her hair. The last time any of the Order had seen her hair was the day before the final battle. It was waist length then and Minerva had taught her how to kink her hair without braiding it; for all Dumbledore knew, her hair could be so long that she could sit on it.

Poor dear, he thought, she had not been the same after the battle. The truth was none of them were. It was a shame (as was generally acknowledged) that Hermione had lost her habitual benevolent streak. Her innate bossiness was no longer tempered with a gentle smile; rather, it was delivered with an astringent dose of logic. Her hair bangs on her forehead framed her face becomingly and the angles of her cheekbones were more pronounced without her hair flailing in her face. However, instead of appearing neater, she came across as severe. Her fastidious neatness belied the resentment with which she now came to view the world and life.

Dumbledore watched her stalk noiselessly past him, her flowing skirt and robes trailing after her like a muggle bridal train. He shook his head – she looked far too drawn in black and her prolonged desire to sit alone indoors rendered the pale pink of her cheeks to fade. The headmaster sighed with the realisation that Hogwarts' two brightest students were thoughtfully insular and wilfully withdrawn. It was a terrible shame indeed. While Severus dressed to reflect the state of his mind, which was perpetually straight laced and buttoned, Hermione dressed with the intent to kill – literally. Dumbledore popped another lemon drop into his mouth as he stood at the door to a disused third floor classroom, leaning slightly as if to maintain his balance. His eyes swept across the room lighting on the bodies of Alastor Moody, Diotima Vector, Arabella Figg, Mundungus Fletcher and Sybil Trelawney. Following another sigh, he trained his eyes on a slim black figure bent over a rosewood coffin. He watched her silently as she discarded the precious day's floral offering and replaced it with a simple stalk of black tulip that she conjured. She murmured something to the body and kissed its lips as one would in a traditional Russian funeral. Dumbledore examined her closely as she repeated her ritualised flower offering to each body. She did not dress in an overtly sexual manner – Merlin Forbid! She portrayed herself as strictly androgynous and asexual, as Severus had. Her clothes, he noticed as she placed a ruby red carnation in Sybil's hands, were similarly buttoned from the throat, like Severus's. The buttons traced down the bodice of her basque ending at her hips. She did not dress in the simple Edwardian day dresses so favoured by Minerva; instead, she made her clothes in the manner of the late 1890s' hunting habits. It could not be denied that her figure and erect carriage were shown to the best advantage in the cutting, especially when her skirt trailed behind her whilst her robes billowed away from her now frail looking form. He sighed at the remote solitude she emanated as she made her way back to Severus's body. She touched the tulip lightly and murmured something. Dumbledore shook his head with something bordering onto regret; he would not likely hear any élan from the young lady for the rest of his days.

Instead of adding to her natural grace and charm, the severe cut of her mock riding dresses seem to have sucked out her vitality and vivacity. She was not totally vapid as she was still an interesting study who charmed music boxes into playing the most doleful Mahler and Wagner pieces while she worked in her office. No, in place of the liveliness that once characterised her open manners, she now became intensely private. Her clothes now gave her a stern unapproachable demeanour, which was thought of as haughty yet pitiable in her misery. Dumbledore sighed aloud when he recalled Hermione's parents' worried letter. The Grangers did not know how best to lift their daughter's depression; they thought that if Dumbledore were to give her a position in an academic environment which she so loved, she would recover and be her cheerful self again. "None of us will ever be ourselves again," he thought sadly as he stepped into the makeshift crypt. Hermione looked up at him emotionlessly eliciting a start from him as she cast her unassuming penetrating gaze at him. It was a gaze that Remus Lupin had called 'cautiously careless' and he had been right. Returning her curt nod, Dumbledore greeted her with a small smile. He watched her gently sweep her fingers across Severus's face as if trying to capture his likeness before he faded into dust. She gave Dumbledore another brief nod before taking up her riding crop as she left the room. It disconcerted the older wizard somewhat that Hermione had ordered riding crops with her dresses. It seemed that she always carried one in her robes. She had been thus ever since the battle ended and it became clear that Severus was dying. Dumbledore could not curb a tiny shudder from flitting over his shoulders as he thought of Hermione armed with both a wand and a riding crop. Two dangerous items, two potentially dangerous items in the hands of an emotionally and psychologically traumatised woman – it was a discomforting realisation that she would not hesitate to use either on anyone who crossed her. Dumbledore rubbed his eyes, stung by the war's impact on his students. He felt that he was indeed getting too old for it all. Minerva had been right – it was the end of an era of sorts and what a ghastly era it was – fraught with gratuitous anguish, persistent mental exhaustion and a pyrrhic victory. So the Order had prevailed. But at what cost? He looked at the bodies around him in poignantly; this cost was almost too much for his old mind. If having Hermione with them at Hogwarts mitigated her pain against what had happened to her friends, then he would keep her as far away from the Ministry as possible.

"Ah, Severus, my boy – why did you have to leave when you now have everything you ever wanted in your youth?" he muttered, patting the body's hands. Severus's hands were as they had been when he lived – cold and callused. Dumbledore smiled in spite of himself; Poppy had done a good job of preserving the bodies. There would not be any decomposition for a good long time. He was about to leave the crypt when a certain herbal scent infused with hellebore assailed his senses.

"Oh my!" Dumbledore exclaimed, mildly taken aback. "Does it mean then that..."

He frowned in incomprehension and at the improbability of the situation. Then, as if thinking better of it, he smiled quietly to himself. He would speak to Professor Granger; she would be better equipped to handle this state of affairs – that is, if his suspicions were founded. He only hoped that he would be able to accost Hermione before her lessons commenced. With that final thought, he followed the scent out of the crypt, stroking his beard in deep contemplation.

A/N: I know it's not terribly good a chapter. It's short, tedious and nothing really happens, for that – I apologise. It will be more exciting (somewhat) in the next chapter.