Chapter 4: More Owls and Runes

Snape stared at the Pensieve. Hermione noticed it took him a few minutes to get his bearings. Without speaking, he went downstairs. Hermione followed him after a minute to find him sitting in the kitchen.

"I'll take your notes and have a look at them," he said callously.

"Don't you need to look at the Horcrux more closely?" Hermione asked.

"I have seen all I need to see." He stood. "Do you have the Portkey?"

Hermione held it out to him.

**

Back at her flat, Hermione gathered up the copy of her notes for Snape. She was not sure what had happened back at that house, but she took as much time as she dared, watching him out of the corner of her eye.

Snape stood by the door, anxious to leave. The old Muggle saying about curiosity and a cat struck him as ironic. He would study her notes and see how far she had got on breaking the curse and then nudge her in the right direction, but after seeing it today, he knew that he would not be able to help her actually destroy it.

**

Back at Spinner's End, Snape poured himself a firewhisky, beat the dust out of a once cornflower blue, wing-back chair, and settled in for a long read. He found Hermione's research quite thorough and was impressed with the steps both she and the goblin had taken in their attempt to destroy the Horcrux. He double-checked the runes she had used and noted her placement using complex Arithmancy. Scrutinizing her notes, he found that she was still depending heavily on knowledge she had learned at Hogwarts; he thought she needed to read some different materials, branch out, and start using her instincts.

Methodically, Snape gathered some books from his own shelves and had them delivered to her flat. He had stayed up most of the night going over her findings. In his dank, dark surroundings, he lost all track of time. He poured himself another firewhisky, downed it, and tried to get a few hours of sleep.

**

Hermione was awakened at dawn to a persistent tapping...or as she became more awake...a banging on her window. A rather large owl was balancing on her ledge with a package dangling from one of its talons, pecking at her window. Hermione rubbed her eyes, trying to focus, as she made her way to the window. The owl hopped in as it surveyed its surroundings.

Hermione tried to get the elaborate knot untied, but after a few moments gave up and went into the kitchen to find a pair of scissors; the owl followed. There was no note, just a stack of books wrapped in plain brown paper, but she gathered they were from Snape. She began to absently thumb through the books until a hoot brought her attention back to the owl. What? she thought. The owl was eyeing the toaster.

"OK, now that I'm up, I might as well make something to eat. Would you like some tea as well, I suppose?" Hermione knew she was not fully awake to be talking to an owl. She set the kettle on to boil and put some bread in the toaster and went back to the books.

Most of them seemed to be old Celtic writings. One book was very thin, with a worn crimson cover. She opened it; the strange symbols inside didn't make sense to her, an alphabet, but like no other she had ever seen. Another book was on Norse runes; those were slightly more familiar to her since they had briefly been covered at Hogwarts in her Ancient Runes class. She picked up the small, tattered book again, studying the symbols.

Just when she thought she recognized something, the toaster dinged, and the owl hooted. The water was not quite boiling, but she made the tea anyway. After she had fed the owl and set a plate out for herself, she went back to her reading, eventually setting the slender book aside to examine the books she could read.

Hermione spent the afternoon at Gringotts, combing through the library, looking for anything similar to the unusual writing system. After four hours, she finally found something, a tiny book crammed in a corner of the top shelf. Hermione almost fell from the ladder with the exertion of pulling it free of the other books. But retrieving it revealed to be worth the effort.

The book concerned Ogham, an ancient alphabetic system of the Celts. Slowly, she descended the ladder as she read; the feeling of something familiar struck her again. She needed to go back to the house and take a closer look at the Horcrux. She owled Snape, asking him to meet her at her flat again.

**

Snape had been hoping that he would only have to continue his assistance via owl post, that Hermione would figure out the solution, and then she and Tubersnuf could destroy the Horcrux when the goblin returned from Egypt. But, it seemed Hermione was ready to go ahead full-force with Snape's assistance. He was hesitant, but felt a niggling somewhere in the back of his head that told him it was his responsibility to travel with her to the Horcrux site while Tubersnuf was gone. It was unwise for her to venture there on her own.

**

When they arrived at the house, Snape excused himself to the kitchen. Hermione cautiously approached the Horcrux. She had noticed the inscriptions on the basin, but as most Pensieves had runes inscribed on them, she had not paid them much attention, as she was not planning on entering what it held. She stayed outside the charred circle, but got close enough to examine the writing.

Her suspicions were correct; the writing matched the Celtic Ogham symbols. She berated herself for not noticing the strange runes on her previous visits here while Snape had noticed them after only spending a minute or so in the room. Quickly, she copied the markings on a piece of parchment; she would try to make sense of them later.

Anxious to get back to her flat and work out this newest development, Hermione went downstairs to find Snape, practically sliding down the banister in her haste. She was surprised after they returned to her flat when he picked up one of the books he had sent over and began to read. They sat there in an amiable silence, Snape reading and Hermione writing.

The next few weeks developed a pattern. Snape would read while pointing out pertinent information to Hermione and marking specific pages for her to read. Hermione spent the days reading and adding notations to her research, always aware of his silent presence.

Hermione let out a small squeal. She had finished translating the inscription on the Pensieve. Snape looked up.

"Oh, sorry," she said, "I just finished translating the Ogham."

Snape walked over to her, standing behind her chair to peer over her shoulder. He leaned over her to take a closer look, his chest slightly touching her back. Hermione didn't move, afraid to breathe, not wanting to bring attention to their bodies touching; she closed her eyes.

Snape straightened as he said, "Yes, you did."

"It seems it is just the regular Pensieve inscription, but in a different alphabet. I don't think it has anything to do with the curse on the Horcrux. There is also the symbol for serpent in Norse, but by the placement of it, I don't think it is part of the original inscription but maybe a mark by the owner, a Slytherin perhaps... Wait, how do you know if it is translated correctly?"

He turned and went back to where he had been sitting, the movement stirring the air around her, making her more aware of where their bodies had been touching. As he sat down, he picked up a small book with a crimson cover. Hermione felt foolish. Of course, he had originally sent her the book. She had been so busy trying to find out what those symbols meant, first looking through the library at Gringotts and then doing the translation herself when she could have just asked Snape.

Then the realization hit her; he had been sitting in her flat watching her struggle over learning this new alphabet and translating the inscription. Her faced flushed, half out of anger and half out of embarrassment. She lashed out at Snape.

"Why, you could have just told me what it said, instead of letting me waste my time. You knew what it said all along."

"But then you would not have learned anything."

"You are no longer my professor," Hermione said, then added in anger, "nor anyone else's for that matter."

"I've looked over your research and added a few notations," he said coldly. "You should be able to break the curse and destroy the Horcrux now without my help." Snape left.

Hermione locked the door behind him. She took out the rest of her anger on the books and her notes...stacking, organizing, laying them out, re-stacking them. She tried to go over her research, but she was painfully aware of the emptiness without Snape there.

A/N: Thanks and chocolate to GinnyW for beta reading.