VI - Hermione Comes Home

AN: Heartfelt thanks to melusin for her valiant effort dealing with commas, misuse of British English, ellipses, and all the other nasty surprises that came with this chapter.

And a disclaimer: I made no denarii from this. My only reward is your review!

***

***

When Hermione returned home after her vigil, she was greeted with drunken whoops and the smell of burning wood and poly-blend fabric. Rose rushed around the house to greet her exhausted mother,

"Mum! Welcome home! Phew, what's that smell?"

"Five days of cleansing charms and fresh grave. Give your poor, tired, old mum a hug, will you?"

"No, I smell something else. Something ... Is that sandalwood?"

"No! Drop it."

"Fine, Mum, whatever you say." Rose grabbed Hermione's hand and led her into the house. "The gang's all here, by the way."

"I'm thrilled. Right now, I want a shower."

"Right. Here you go, then. But hurry, there's a party in the back garden, and you're the guest of honor. Mum, you can tell me, what is that smell?"

"Nothing, and speaking of smells, what's the pong?"

"Oh, that. Stephan brought over Dad's gear the other day. He was pretty broken-hearted about the whole situation. I invited him to put it on the bonfire with all of Dad's Quidditch crap. Really round out the whole experience." Rose grinned impishly.

Hermione's heart swelled with pride. "That's my girl."

"I knew you'd be happy. Now hurry up, Mum. I want to get you blotto so you can spill nasty secrets about us to Stephan and Severus."

"Severus is here?" Hermione's heart stopped.

"Oh, yes! I invited him after I saw you two snogging last night outside Dad's bloody ugly mausoleum. I'd come by to see if you were still alive. You looked fairly happy, so I left."

Hermione's heart started beating again, grudgingly, and she climbed the stairs to shower.

Refreshed and rejuvenated, Hermione wandered to the back garden where the bonfire was burning merrily. Around the huge pyre were gathered Harry, Ginny, her children, Stephan, two Aurors with whom Hermione had got along, and Severus Snape. Hugo rushed up, his eyes shining, pulling Severus behind him.

"Mum, Mum! Look who came to your party! He's teaching me how to hex people, and he does it so much better than you! Watch this!" Hugo raised his wand preparatory to casting the hex, but Severus grabbed it.

"Not now, Hugo," he said. "We'll show your mum later."

"How did you manage to swing this?" asked Hermione.

"Oh, that was my doing," replied the younger of the Aurors. Hermione recalled vaguely that his name was Danny, and he was in his very early twenties. "Your Rose came round our office the other day and asked to see her dad's old case files. It seems she recognized the gardener from a photo your Ron brought home one night. We weren't going to allow her access, but she sat in the middle of the floor and refused to budge until she had gone through all of the old case files."

"And then I found him, Mum!" Rose exclaimed, attaching herself to Hermione. "The man in black that you were snogging the other night!"

"Rose Weasley!"

"Aw, leave off, Mum. Everybody here knows about Dad; we all support your right to snog whomever you choose! Besides, when I found him, I went to Danny here and had him help me go through the file. We discovered Dad's ridiculous probationary conditions and Uncle Harry's testimony and decided that the time had come to right some wrongs."

"After that it was simple," Danny chipped in. "Your Rose is a scary girl, Ms. Weasley: she all but dragged me and the file into Mr. Potter's office and yelled at him for a good hour and a half. I was impressed."

"Danny! How could you say I'm scary?"

"True, isn't it?"

"Hugo! That's not true!"

"Anyway," Harry cut across the bickering, "Rose sat herself down and showed me just what Ron had done. I made some Floo calls, and the next thing we knew, Sn-Severus had his parole ended, back pay awarded, is eligible for an Order of Merlin, and was free of doing menial labor! It's about time, too!"

"Thank you, Mr. Po-Harry," Severus ground out, looking like he had swallowed a frog.

"So, you're a free man," Hermione said.

"Indeed."

"What are you going to do?"

"I am uncertain. Mr. Po-Harry assures me that there are several institutions of higher learning that wish to employ me in their research laboratories, both for Potions and other practices. Apparently, they feel I have certain experiences and connections that would be beneficial. Right now, however, I am going to do something I should have done fifteen years ago."

"Oh? What's that?" Hermione asked.

Rose, Hugo, Danny, and Harry discreetly slipped away. Hermione noticed that Rose and Danny were holding hands. Then she noticed that Severus was holding her hand.

"Hermione Granger, will you marry me?"

Hermione frowned. "Severus Snape, have you lost your mind?" Severus' countenance began to darken, but before he could say anything. Hermione continued, "I've been married. I've been married for fifteen years. I don't want to be married anymore. I want my name back, and I want my life back. However, I also want something else even more important than that."

"What's that?" Severus voice had just a hint of sulkiness.

"Severus Snape, I want you in my bed. Right now. That pallet may have been romantic, but it's hell on my knees and your sciatica. So you just march your shapely arse upstairs. I'll bring the Ogden's, and we'll get pissed and take sexual advantage of one another. And then we'll have breakfast. After that, you're going to interview with those institutions, and I'm going to beat the shit out of Danny until he agrees not to touch my daughter until she turns eighteen. Rose is a sensible girl, so her lecture can wait, but she isn't that sensible. And then we're going to return here, and I'm not going to put you down again until at least next Thursday. Is that understood?"

Severus sucked in his stomach and saluted, "Yes, ma'am!" Then he grabbed the love of his life around her waist, and the two of them manhandled each other into the house and up the stairs.

***

***

One final AN: this story is based on a fable from Phaedrus, and adapted from the "Satyricon," published in the late 1st Century AD by a satirist named Petronius who was the Emperor Nero's chief adviser on the arts - a dangerous job!