Chapter 13 - Half an Admission

A/N: For simplicity's sake, titles of books, journals etc are underlined and emphases are italicised.

Beyond Time and Space

Chapter 13 – Half an Admission

The appearance of the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom was tranquillity itself. The same could be said for the rest of the castle, for it was the summer holidays. Harry and Ron's week long visit had improved their spirits and rallied them a little but had not any lasting effects on either young man. This quiet peace was broken by the entrance of a positively wild looking Hermione Granger into the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom.

"Remus, you must help me!" she exclaimed, paler than usual and quite out of breath. She tightly held onto the open door frame for a minute, waiting for the said Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher to invite her in. However, as she stepped forward, she collapsed into a dead faint at the door.

When she recovered, she found herself lying on the settee in the werewolf's office.

"Sleeping beauty has decided to reward me at last," teased Remus as he continued rubbing her temples with ointment.

"Not bloody likely," she growled, examining her surroundings and waving his hands away. She sat up and thrust an old fashioned locket she had extracted from her pocket into Remus's hand.

The fact that the metal locket tingled in his hand startled him. On closer examination, he divined its purpose. "It's an heirloom designed to protect the wearer. It's Severus's if I am not mistaken."

She nodded brusquely and held her breath at what she was about to say. "Remus, listen very carefully; I want you to cast an anima hominem spell over it so that it becomes embedded in the amulet.

He said nothing as he handed her a piece of chocolate and thoughtfully watched her eat it. He was puzzled but he did not show it. "This is highly irregular."

"I know," she answered, her eyes studying the werewolf's as if determining whether he would indeed oblige her.

Remus frowned in disapproval. "Couldn't you have asked Flitwick? The charm is more his area of expertise."

Hermione blushed momentarily. "He..." she faltered, her eyes still fixed on her colleague's. "He refused to; he said it's too much to ask; something about it being dark magic, or some such hogwash."

"For all intents, it could be seen as true," explained the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher as patiently as he could, slowly re-examining the amulet. "It is used to summon and contain a soul. If done with the right intent, it can bind a soul to it so that whosoever possesses it controls the soul there."

"Yes, I know," replied she calmly, regaining her normal colour and folding her hands neatly on her lap.

He eyed her suspiciously. "Why do you want me to it?"

"Because you do not have that intention," she answered simply.

"Why can't you do it yourself?" he challenged warily, crossing his legs with nervous energy and uncertainty.

"You don't want to know the truth," she spat, curling her legs to her side on the settee while she glowered testily at her colleague and friend.

"Try me," the werewolf offered with a smile and a gentle pat on her hands.

"I want to keep him with me," she said quickly in one breath. "I'm afraid that if I help him; I'll lose him. Irrational, I know, but I've become used to having him around. Silly, isn't it?"

He smiled lopsidedly. "No, it's only natural. He's gotten used to having a familiar like you around too."

She snorted contemptuously, popping another piece of chocolate into her mouth. She chewed slowly, uncertain as to how she ought to reply. After all, she lived with the ghost of Severus Snape, she should know him better than Remus. "How can it be? He cannot abide by me."

"He is rather fond of you. He always orders dinner for you," Remus pointed out.

"I don't pay attention to such gestures. You feed me too, plying me with chocolates," she giggled, swatting his leg lightly with her riding crop.

"Watch that thing, Hermione; use it on Severus, not me!" he chuckled. "Seriously, he does care; it's the little things that show it."

"Perhaps," she answered coolly. "So will you help me charm the amulet?"

"What for?" Remus asked.

Hermione glared; she hoped he was not being deliberately obtuse. She rolled her eyes in exasperation. "To resurrect him, what else? To bring him back among the living!"

Realising that he has just aggravated her volatile temper, he quickly smiled. "All right, all right," he said soothingly. "Leave it with me, you can pick it up tomorrow. Just because you're pretty, I'll give you a money back guarantee."

"Thank you, Remus," she said, rising to leave.

"Not so fast, Hermione," he detained her by grasping her hand. "What exactly will you do with it?"

She sat down, deliberating whether she ought to tell him her plan. "I'll have to brew the anima returnum draught first before I can do anything else. The anima returnum is tricky to brew because it seems to be merely a more potent version of the draught of the living death. It's more difficult to resurrect him because he already has an ethereal form. As far as I am concerned, this is quite unprecedented in the literature. I'm also worried about the state of his atrophic body. The process, however, is relatively simple. I'm following Dr John Dee's Necromancy."

The Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher started. "Where did you get that book?"

She gave him a look of utter surprise. Couldn't he put two and two together? She was housed in the dungeons where she had access to almost all manner of books. Wasn't Severus's love for the dark arts an open secret? Give these then, it appeared obvious to her how she had acquired the book. Still, she was determined to maintain her good humour, it was pointless being fractious towards a friend who could help. Thus, she said with a forced smile, "It's in Professor Snape's private collection"

Remus laughed at the formal yet glowing tone in which Hermione had addressed Severus. He wondered if any of Severus's other students practised such manners in private. Unable to contain his general amusement, he chuckled, "Still calling him 'Professor'?"

She gave the werewolf a scathingly disapproving look, hoping that his words had stumbled out by accident. She disliked premeditated questions on her private life. She always went about her business openly; anyone could see that, why should anyone question her when they could see for themselves? Pushing this unpleasant thought from her head as she had no desire to offend Remus, she replied, "It is a proper mode of address for him. I must be professional with him if I am to help him."

"Where does the amulet come in?" asked he thoughtfully as he recalled Dee's procedure for resurrection.

"After a little anima returnum in his throat," she explained slowly to him while mentally recounting it as a means to review her own work. She formed her hands into a steeple at her lips, her eyes brightening considerably as she catalogued her work progress. "The amulet will be placed in his hands; I will summon his soul back to his body and Professor Dumbledore would help detain his soul or ghost, call it what you like, in his body. Then, I will perform the ritual, with your help of course. It will be the usual draw of pentagonal circles and the incantation. With any luck, the potion should work to bind his soul to his body again and the incantation would hopefully bring him back."

Despite the fact that Remus was impressed, he frowned at a reservation, which he voiced, "And the preservative that Poppy used with the body won't interfere with your resurrection attempt?"

"Far from it," she insisted, her ire rising at the doubts against her credibility, "The preparation of his body will enhance the transition of his soul from this physical plane to his body."

"Prudence, as always dictates a contingency plan. What is your contingency plan if you fail?" he questioned gently.

She glowered and rose from the settee, one arm firmly on her hip and the other shaking angrily at Remus. "I do not fail! I will not fail!"

"Hermione!" he pleaded apologetically. "I didn't mean it..."

"Oh? You didn't?" she shrieked. "I've never failed a test yet. My calculations have proven that it will succeed! This interview is ended," she announced in a huff. "I'll be back tomorrow for the amulet." She took one last look at the contrite werewolf who was unassumingly shaking his head with a sigh. Then she strode off to the dungeons.

On the way down the stairs, she paused, seized by a sharp pain in her head. The voice of the woman in the black toga returned to haunt her. "Temperance, my dear, exercise temperance. You lack a virtue still. You have dikaiosynē. Yes, andreia you have in plenty. You have intelligence, yes, but that does not mean you have phronēsis. Nor do you have a legitimate sense of sōphrosynē. There must be moderation, dear child. For him, young lady, acquire true phronēsis. Your phronēsis is sorely lacking Do not forsake phronēsis."

Hermione immediately sank down at the stairs instead of proceeding to her chambers. She was momentarily stunned and mentally fatigued. In spite of the fact that she would only need to walk half a kilometre to her dungeons, she found herself unable to move. Thinking for a moment, it became apparent why the woman had been familiar. Hermione had seen her in her dreams when she was little, before she ever stepped into Hogwarts. What was her message? Could she invade her mind at any moment? Was she a legilimens or a seer or both? Just who was she? The woman or Oracle or whatever she was, warned Hermione about her phronēsis. Phronēsis referred to wisdom tempered with good sense, judgement and above all, prudence. Remus had just spoken to her on the same. Why was she lacking in it? Did she not double-check all her calculations to ensure that the potion, amulet and incantation would work in tandem with one another in restoring Severus to life? Why was this woman haunting both her dreams and waking hours? Was she just a figment of Hermione's imagination? Was she dead? Was she alive? If so, where was she? Why was she so decidedly insistent on Hermione, of all people, to help Severus? Did she have any links to Severus?

Hermione smiled wanly at herself. If the woman was linked to Severus, it would explain his penchant for Greek political philosophy. What struck Hermione as odd was the fact that she had seen the woman constantly in her dreams when she was a girl. Hermione started, as she grew horrified with a thought – What if the woman and Remus were right? Was this so-called Oracle something within her sub-consciousness that somehow invaded the sinews of her mind and divined that she had miscalculated something? Hermione mentally reviewed her calculations. She felt that she had explored every factor in the viability of the amulet, potion and spell. She laughed; of course she had – she had even taken into consideration how long he had been dead. For simplicity's sake, Dumbledore had agreed to have Severus's body moved to a private room in the infirmary. When she was ready to resurrect him, they were to attempt it in the dungeons away from prying eyes. Dumbledore had kindly released the news to the press that a long lost cousin had claimed Severus's body. She had made provisions for his soul to be released from the amulet should the procedure be too much for him. That thought, however, implied a chance at failure. She shook her head firmly.

"I will not fail!" she exclaimed, drawing herself up to her full height, not noticing a figure clad in black descending the stairs.

"Of course you wouldn't, Professor Granger," purred the object of her speculations. "Shall we return to our rooms?" asked Severus, as he arrived at the step where she rested. She smiled at his tacit encouragement and signalled her assent by suppressing a shiver and taking his proffered ethereal arm.

Footnotes:

My classical Greek is still very shaky, so forgive me if this glossary is lacking:

Dikaiosynē can be taken to mean justice.

Andreia can be taken to mean courage.

Sōphrosynē can be taken to mean self-control.