Chapter 5: Ogham and Occamy Eggs

Hermione owled Tubersnuf to find out when he would be back. She had reread her notes and Snape's notes and found where they had gone wrong.

Of course, she thought to herself, if the rune inscriptions on the Pensieve are in Ogham, maybe we should cast our runes in Ogham.

Hermione began the process of translating the runes she had used to try to break the curse. It was not as lengthy of a process as the previous translation had been as she became more familiar with the symbols.

Hermione received an owl back from Tubersnuf saying that he would be back the next week. Excitement rose in her chest, the adrenaline making sleep difficult, and the days before Tubersnuf returned seemed to drag. Hermione passed the time practicing casting the Ogham symbols until the movements became as natural as the runes she had been casting since her days at Hogwarts.

When she felt confident, she began casting the runes in the circle pattern she would use to break the curse on the Horcrux, but the runes would not cast in a circle, instead seeming to drift on wisps of air of their own accord and then disappearing. She double-checked her figures with Arithmancy, but she could not get them to work. Hermione knew she was missing something important. She rechecked the books that Snape had sent her, reproaching herself for both asking him for his help in the first place and for picking a fight with him.

Hermione penned a letter to Snape, discussing her translation and how she was puzzled as to why the runes wouldn't form the pattern she needed them to. Sometimes writing things out when she didn't have anyone to discuss them with helped her to come up with a solution. She reread over the parchment...still no insight. She folded it and turned it over to address. Her mind and hand hesitated...she wrote Tubersnuf.

She paced her flat; it could take a day or more to get a reply back from Tubersnuf.

This is ridiculous, she thought, I am being juvenile, and as I clearly pointed out to him, he is no longer my professor.

She re-penned the same letter she had sent to Tubersnuf, and this time, addressed it to the person she felt confident could help her.

**

Snape was not surprised to receive an owl from Hermione, but he was surprised at her matter-of-fact statements on her findings and a roundabout pretext for help again...no apologies, no pleas, just stubborn pride. He smirked...she was more like him that she would ever admit.

**

Hermione received no replies that evening. She had not really expected one from Tubersnuf, but she had expected one from Snape.

Of all the stubborn, ill-tempered men, I have to ask for help from him.

After ranting to the empty hearth for a few minutes, she thought maybe she was being too harsh on him.

Maybe he has left town for a bit.

She followed that train of thought for a few minutes before she pictured him reading her letter and casting an Incendio at it, pouring himself a firewhisky before laughing at her incompetence. (Well, maybe not the Incendio, but I have smelled firewhisky on him.) Then, hopefully, she thought, Maybe he is doing a little research before he owls me back.

Hermione spent a tumultuous evening with the different scenarios as to why she had not received an owl back from Snape.

The next morning, Snape decided she had waited long enough and wrote back a short response:

You have everything you need.

Use your instincts.

Use my instincts? Hermione thought. I'll bloody well use my instincts to hex him to next Tuesday. What kind of answer is that? There was a post-script:

If you have any 'questions,' you may owl me.

What? Hermione crumpled up the paper and threw it across the room. Questions? Why would I ask him anything just to get no answer?

She decided to go to Gringotts and work on her research there, hoping a change of scenery might encourage a solution or, at the very least, get Snape off her mind.

While at Gringotts, Tubersnuf's owl found her. He had hastily drawn several different patterns with brief descriptions that she might try. His post-script informed her that he would be returning in two days. Hermione smiled; she would be glad to have him back, especially as this case had been so frustrating. She took his letter, her notes, and a small box and, sticking two pencils in her hair, she walked down to the rooms (if dusty caves could be called rooms) that they used when working with unknown spells.

The goblins that worked bankers hours up top wanted to be as far away from the curse-breaking as possible. Tubersnuf had said that working with money had made them soft. Hermione picked a larger room that looked sturdy and not too dusty. The rooms were empty, but she had come prepared this time. She Transfigured the box into a table and one of the pencils into a chair and set to work. Spreading out her notes and the letter from Tubersnuf, she began casting runes in the different patterns he suggested, starting with the simpler forms first, and from her readings on Celtic traditions, paid special attention to the directions, beginning facing East.

It took her well over an hour to get through the easier patterns. She took a small break to read over Snape's small scrawl interspersed within her notes. Hermione had read over them numerous times by now and did not expect to see anything new, but felt the need to feel as if she had consulted him. Finding nothing different, she returned to Tubersnuf's letter and casting runes. As fate would have it, the last pattern she tried held, the runes softly glowing and amber floating around her...she stared at the sight with slight disbelief. Hermione was so excited, she did not know if she could wait the two days for Tubersnuf to return. She sent him an owl on her progress, hoping that he might return a day early. Next, she sent an owl to Snape not really knowing what she expected, but in her own way letting him know that she did not need him to answer any 'questions.'

Hermione began to worry when she had not received an owl back from Tubersnuf by the next afternoon. Her excitement too much for her to try to pretend to be patient, she traversed the upper levels of Gringotts to find her superior and inquire about Tubersnuf and his pending return from Egypt.

**

Snape read through Hermione's letter several times. He knew her to be impetuous and was not sure she would wait for her partner to return. Against his better judgment, he decided to make the trip to Gringotts...just to ease his own mind, he told himself. He entered Gringotts on the pretense of drawing money from his account...an amount sizable enough to merit a trip to his vault.

Snape knew enough about the goblins to know that he would not be able to freely roam about, but thought that the more area he covered while there, the more chance he would have of finding Hermione. As a last resort, he thought he may even inquire about her in a vague manner as a passing interest in a former student.

Oh, who am I kidding, they will never believe that I would have an interest in anyone.

With that thought, he boarded the cramped cart and began his journey into the depths below Gringotts.

**

Hermione found her supervisor and received distressing news regarding Tubersnuf. A large crate of Occamy eggs had fallen on him. There would be no lasting injuries, but they were keeping him at the wizarding hospital in Egypt for at least a few more days for observation. Hermione was beside herself, not with worry, but with aggravation. She sat down in the lobby to think.

Do I dare venture to that old house on my own? No, too risky. She looked around. What about asking another curse-breaker to assist? Would they feel disloyal to Tubersnuf? Who is available to even ask?

Hermione thought about Bill, who himself was still out from his injuries. She watched the foot-traffic of goblins, wizards, and a few Muggles go through Gringotts as she tried to find a solution to her dilemma.

**

The harrowing cart ride proved too fast for Snape to adequately see in the few doors that he had seen open. Now, with his pockets abundantly full, to his chagrin, he proceeded to the exit. Snape took one last look through the lobby, squinting up the three levels that had hallways overlooking the ground floor. He turned to leave and there was Hermione, sitting within ten steps of where he stood, looking distressed, staring blankly at the daily commotion going on around her. He had closed half the distance between them when her eyes met his. She saw the solution to her problem. She had not sought him out; he was standing right in front of her. Snape gave her a slight nod as he walked past her.

Hermione started to follow him, but knew that was not wise. No one at Gringotts was supposed to know he had been helping her. She turned and purposefully walked back to her office that she normally shared with Tubersnuf, gathered her notes, and Flooed home. As she came out of her own hearth, she heard a knock on her door. She opened it to Snape.

"I seem to have timed my arrival about right; I only had to wait a few minutes. You must have stood there deciding whether or not to follow me longer than I thought you would."

Hermione shut the door behind him a little harder than necessary, wondering how he could be so condescending in so few words. She thought she would have been immune to his remarks by now. Deciding she couldn't exactly ignore him while he was in her flat, and she could use his help unless she wanted to wait for Tubersnuf to return, Hermione briskly walked past him to the couch, hoping he would resign himself to follow her the short distance to the sitting room.

As Snape sat down opposite her, she briefly recapped her letter and explained about Tubersnuf. Snape did not want to return to that house, but knew that he could not let Hermione go alone.

A/N: A house-elf to my beta GinnyW so that she does not have to carry her own Occamy eggs.