Summary: [HG/SS] AU: Neville's nervous twitch causes a really severe potions explosion that hits his lab partner, Hermione Granger. Her life is drastically changed forever. [Completely Crack]

A/N: I blame Mulder AND Scully because… monsters!

Beta Love: The Dragon and the Rose, Dutchgirl01, Flyby Commander Shepard

Serpentkind

Snakes are sometimes perceived as evil, but they are also perceived as medicine. If you look at an ambulance, there's the two snakes on the side of the ambulance. The caduceus, or the staff of Hermes, there's the two snakes going up it, which means that the venom can also be healing. - Nicolas Cage

Neville trembled, his hands shaking as he tried to turn the pages of his potions book. He squinted to read the writing on the board, but he couldn't make out the words.

"Hey, did you need glasses?" Hermione asked, startling him.

"Whu-wha?" Neville meeped, almost leaving his chair.

"Easy, Neville," Hermione placated. She buried herself into her bookbag. "Which potion does the board say?"

Neville squinted at the board. "Uh—the ffff… frightening potion."

Hermione frowned. "I don't remember seeing that on our list for first years."

"That's what it is!" Neville yelled, raising his voice. "Why do you always question me?"

Hermione pulled back. "Whoa! Alright. I can't see the board from here thanks to Crabbe and Goyle's bodies. I just wanted to make sure."

Neville pursed his lips.

"Look, I made the base already, okay, so it's your turn to start the potion off," Hermione said.

"You will make this potion SILENTLY, Miss Granger. Five points from Gryffindor for being incapable of following basic instructions."

Hermione paled, biting her lip. She looked over to where Harry was beating Ron with a book to get him to pay attention. Everyone in the room seemed to be struggling. She'd learned the last time she tried to help anyone, she lost Gryffindor about twenty-five points before Harry and Ron and told her to shut the hell up. That, of course, caused Professor Snape to dock five points more from each of them, and the whole of Gryffindor thought it would be great if they magicked a gag over her mouth for the entire night. Professor McGonagall had found her, eventually, crying and gagged as she hid behind the sculptures.

Of course, when she'd asked what happened, Hermione had told the truth, and that caused McGonagall herself to take points from her own House, and most of Gryffindor hated her even more because of it. Since they couldn't outright beat on her, they'd taken to other sorts of ways of persuading her to keep her mouth shut— like kicking her kitten, trapping the little calico in the suits of armour in the hallway and blaming it on Peeves. Hermione had given her to Minerva, begging her to find her a better home— telling her that she wasn't safe to be around.

McGonagall had frowned, tried to reassure her, but eventually honoured her wishes, saddened that Hermione was so picked on in a way that even trying to punish the wrongdoers was just getting her more grief. Minerva had sought an audience with the Headmaster, and after a lengthy discussion, he had given her authorisation to give her a private quarters to retreat to. The room was connected to her own, so the chances of Hermione being bullied were far less— at least at night. There was nothing she could do about the day-to-day grudges.

Fortunately for Hermione, at least, her best friends were books, but there were times when Minerva did a little cognitive therapy of her own and sneaked into Hermione's lap as a tabby. Thankfully, thanks to an influx of suspiciously identical silver tabbies at Hogwarts, no one seemed to notice her, despite her distinctive spectacle-like markings. That was all fine and well for Minerva, and as an added bonus, Hermione was able to cuddle the Deputy Headmistress without guilt— as long as she treated her professor appropriately in public, anyway.

"Your potion isn't going to make itself, Mr Longbottom," Snape's voice causing all of Slytherin to turn and stare at the boy in question. "And Miss Granger, if I see you doing his work for him, it will be another five points from Gryffindor."

Hermione twisted her hands in her lap and stared down at her book.

Neville nervously reached for Hermione's potions kit.

"Mr Longbottom, if you did not come prepared to class, you will lose more points for Gryffindor. At this rate, every House will be safely above yours, hrm?"

Neville frantically fumbled with his bag to pull out his potions kit, even more panicked as he realised his kit was missing. Hermione noticed that the Slytherin tables were whispering and chortling, passing something around. Her face twisted in conflict. If she said something, they would lose points. If she didn't say something, Neville would lose even more points for not being prepared. But, if she did say something, then Slytherin would have even more a grudge to pay back—

Fortunately, the decision was taken out of her hands by fate, and the pouch of potion ingredients went crashing to the floor when Crabbe impatiently held out the handoff to someone at another table and let it drop before it actually landed in their hand.

Snape's eyes narrowed as he put his hands on the edge of the table. "Mr Crabbe, how kind of you to find Mr Longbottom's potion kit. Do prove to your classmates that Slytherin is not a house of incompetents and fools and give it back to him."

Realising perhaps that Snape had just given him an out, Crabbe picked up the potions kit and set it down in front of Neville before going back to his seat.

Snape scowled. "Five points to Slytherin for returning Mr Longbottom's potions kit."

"But—" a voice started to say toward the back of the classroom and was immediately hissed silent by their classmates.

"Did you say something, Mr Finnegan ?"

"No, sir," Seamus said, gritting his teeth.

"The formula is on the board. Do try not to hurt yourself reading," Snape growled testily.

Hermione, who sought to position herself to better see the board, ultimately failed. She had to trust her partner to read the board, only— she didn't trust her partner. She was pretty sure that Neville desperately needed a pair of glasses.

Neville pressed his entire face into the book, confirming to Hermione that they were utterly doomed. If she said anything again or even tried to help him, Professor Snape would dock her points into the next year into the negatives, and the entire House would want to lynch them both.

Want? More like would— they would definitely find a way to feed the pair of them to the giant squid.

And, much like a self-fulfilling prophecy, Hermione watched as Neville picked out a packet from his kit and fumbled clumsily with the strings. She scanned her book quickly, flipping the pages frantically. Suddenly, the ball beside Neville began to glow bright red, and Professor Snape stood up, looking like he was going to say something.

Neville, seeing Snape striding quickly towards him, panicked, fumbled with the parcel, and down it went into the bubbling cauldron—along with his entire kit, the glowing red ball (was that his Remembrall?) and—

"No, Neville! Watch out for Trevor!" Hermione cried, lunging to push Neville out of the way in order to keep Trevor the toad from leaping right into the boiling cauldron of fatality.

Her hands wrapped around Trevor, keeping from hitting the boiling cauldron by mere inches, and whirled around just as Trevor hopped right out of her hands to land smack on Millicent Bulstrode's face.

The young witch screeched in disgust, beating on her head and chest to get the frightened toad off of her, sending a sizeable cloud of assorted potion ingredients flying into the air. A brightly coloured piece of shimmering— something—flew off Vincent Crabbe's hands as he pried the toad off Millicent's face and drifted as if in slow motion down into the cauldron.

Burble.

Burble.

KABOOM!

Her cauldron blew up, sending it splattering onto the rafters above—

And down on everything else below.

Plop.

A large splat landed in Neville and Hermione's cauldron.

Everything seemed to slow down in the ensuing panic, Hermione saw her potions professor send out a spell to shelter his students from the secondary explosion. At first, he tried to shield the cauldron and vanish the contents, but the spell fizzled as the cauldron seemed to resist any attempt to control it from that end.

Professor Snape quickly cast another spell and a wave of his magic, like a glistening bubble, moved from the outside of the room in, enveloping each student within a bubble of protection. There was a bubble coming towards her and Neville, but Neville was panicking and trying to run away from it.

Hearing her father recite the quote, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing," she reached her arm out, grabbed Neville by the waist, and flung him toward the protective bubble even as she, too, tried to make it.

BOOOOOOOOOM!

Everything for Hermione Granger went black.

Hermione opened her eyes and realised she had a problem.

She couldn't see.

She frantically tried to touch her face and realised there was something covering her eyes. Was she burned? Had her eyes been damaged?

Instinct told her to rip it off of her face and find out, but her parents would have told her that if a doctor told you to shield your eyes, it was for a very good reason.

What reason? Did the potion explode and burn her face?

"Easy now."

"We're here."

"Don't hurt yourself."

Hermione froze. The voices were close, but soothing. Who was that? She didn't recognise the voices.

Despite knowing her eyes were covered, she could make out blurry vision, like one of the heat cameras that her father had shown her— only it was disjointed and in multiples like she was doing a vision test at the opthamologist's office.

"Tell me when the images line up, little miss," her doctor would say. Ultimately, her vision did not require correction, but she always thought it was a fun test and tried to read the fine line of micro-print as an amusing challenge.

"You should ssssleep," a soothing voice said.

"Yesss, sssleep."

"We'll be here when you awake."

"Resst easy."

Feeling the exhaustion hitting from all sides, she did as she was told, sleep claiming her almost instantly.

"Severus, I fear you are going to have to be the one to assist Miss Granger."

"Me? Why are you looking at me like that, Albus?"

"Because it wasn't a potion that petrified Mr Finnegan and Miss Brown, Severus," Dumbledore said meaningfully.

"Well, I certainly didn't do it!"

"I'm not saying you did, Severus," Albus said placatingly, his blue eyes widening as he gave Severus the stare over his half-moon glasses.

"What are you saying, Albus?"

"I'm saying, Severus, that you need to go behind this screen. Then, I believe, you'll understand."

"I am not a healer, Albus," Severus said.

"A healer is not what we need here, Severus," Albus said. "Please, just— walk around the corner and look?"

Snape curled his lip with loathing. "Fine," he said. He stormed around the corner like a petulant child being told to clean his room or pouting that he didn't get ice cream.

Silence.

Snape walked back around the corner, his face looking far paler than usual.

"Do you see the situation, Severus?"

"How did this happen? When I brought her up here, she was— well, she wasn't like that!" Snape said.

"Apparently the physical characteristics didn't, erm, grow in until later," Albus said with a sigh. "Poppy has done as much as she can, but as you can see, all she can do is as long as she has a blindfold on."

"I've contacted my people over at Mungo's, Severus," Pomfrey said, breaking into the conversation. "This isn't the sort of thing that happens. There is no treatment— no kind of therapy that can truly help her. There is—" Poppy made an odd face. "This could be rooted within her very genes, Severus. That potion may not have turned her into this. It may have simply accelerated it."

"Poppy, you do realise what you are saying?" Dumbledore asked. "That would make her—"

"Mythborn," Poppy said. She rubbed her nose. "She will need training. Emotions as well as magic. It runs in her blood. It is her blood. Without control, without someone to help guide her, she will like a feral dragon. Powerful and destructive but most definitely not to be reasoned with."

"What are the chances," Albus muttered. "That Hogwarts would have two of them?"

Severus shot Albus a scathing glare. "Must you make it sound like you are cursed in some way?"

Albus held up his hands. "Surely you see the similarities, Severus? That prank they threw on you—"

"That was not a PRANK, old man," Severus hissed. "They meant to kill me. Only they did me one worse and right in front of Lily. She died, believing me to be pure evil on top of everything else—a beast come in the night to kill her and her unborn child. What they did cannot be undone. I will be this—this—forever!"

Dumbledore waved his hands. "Please, Severus. I do not say this to get your ire. I want you to see that you are the only one that will be safe around her until she is fully trained. That could take years. I will owl Amelia at the DoM, but she will want to teach her as an Unspeakable, change her into a Ministry assassin. She should be here, allowed to have a childhood. What little there is left and can be with the threat of—please, Severus."

Severus narrowed his eyes. "I have certain conditions, Albus."

Albus let out a sigh of relief. "Whatever you wish, Severus."

"She is to be my apprentice, officially," he said. "Her chambers connected to mine. She's Slytherin. Gods only know what the Gryffindor will do to her. Make an announcement. Have the damn hat change his mind. Do what you have to in order to convince this school that she belongs with me. I've already seen what those imbeciles say and do to her, and they are supposed to be her own House!"

"Fine, I'll do it," Albus said.

"As my apprentice, she goes with me. Everywhere. She sits with me. She eats with me. You want her safe, Albus, you will agree to this, because all it will take is one stupid boy or girl to fling a spell at her or make her cry, and if I'm not there to shield her—"

"Yes, Severus, that is acceptable. That is what the olden time master and apprentices did anyway. It will not be that hard to arrange."

"Remove the Trace on her, Albus," Severus said in steely tones. "She will be solely my responsibility. No Trace. No interference from anyone."

"Severus, yes," Albus placated. "I want her to be safe here. Whatever you need to make that happen.

"And I need access to adjust my quarters to suit our needs, add rooms, and whatever else. I have no idea what that will be until it happens."

"That's fine, Severus," Albus said.

"One more thing, Albus."

"Yes?"

"You get to explain why Hermione doesn't get to come home to her Muggle mummy and daddy."

Albus sighed deeply. "I will take care of it."

Severus' lips pulled back from his teeth in a sneer. "And if— when— her parents run screaming into the night and thrust custody of Miss Granger into your face, she will become a ward of Hogwarts, or Minerva, or someone who gives a sodding fuck about her as long as it is understood that she is under my care regardless of what is on paper. We will have access to the grounds all year round instead of the usual summertime evacuation idiocy."

Albus' eyes widened at Severus' use of profanity, having been able to count on one hand how many times he'd ever heard him swear with anything other than colourful descriptions of Merlin's various body parts, blood, or sod. He wasn't one to usually descend into the more vulgar vernacular, so when he did, he couldn't help but notice. "Yes, Severus. I want this to work. Please believe me."

Severus straightened his posture and squared his shoulders. "I will be in my quarters making all the necessary arrangements. Send word when all the paperwork, official wrangling and glove slapping with the governors is done." With that, he abruptly turned on his heel and swept from the room, his robes billowing impressively behind him. He halted halfway out the door. "And I want a bloody raise, Albus." And with that, he was gone like a black spectre into the night.

Poppy massaged her scalp with her fingers. "That went rather better than you expected, Albus."

Albus let out a long, weary sigh. "He was up for a raise anyway."

"You do realise you're going to have to cover his potions classes until he gets things situated with Miss Granger?"

Dumbledore stroked his beard. "How hard could it be?"

Hermione woke into darkness, and her hand went up to touch the cloth over her face.

"You may remove the blindfold, Miss Granger," a familiar voice said, "but only when we are alone."

"You can trusst him!" a warm voice whispered.

"Yes, he's been taking care of you for days."

"We like him."

"He has soft hands."

"Respectful hands."

"How— how long was I out for?" Hermione whispered the question.

"Almost a week," the voice answered her.

Hermione nudged the blindfold off slowly, squinting into the gloom, suddenly thankful that the light was not bright. Again she had multiple layers of vision at once, some moving and some not, and she winced as her brain tried to focus it all into one clear image.

The image she got was that of her potions professor.

"Aiieeagh!" Hermione pulled the blanket over herself. "What did I do? I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

"Miss Granger!" Snape snapped, closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and tried again. "Miss Granger, you have done nothing wrong."

"But, you're here! I must have done something terrible!" Hermione cried.

Professor Snape sighed deeply. "I regret that our first experiences were not ideal, Miss Granger."

Hermione stared at him, and her tongue flicked outward without her permission. She slapped her hands over her mouth. "What did I just do?"

"Tasted the air, most likely," Snape replied, deadpan.

"But— why would I DO that?!"

"Miss Granger, there was a very good reason why you were out of commission for almost a week. Reasons that were not in any way your fault. If it was anyone's fault, it was Longbottom, but it was more the simple randomness of fate." Snape shifted in his chair beside her bed. "There are things you must know before you can be seen in public again. Important things. Vital, even."

"Oh, god, am I contagious?" Hermione moaned. "Do I have mononucleosis?"

Snape made a face, levelling her with a glare.

Hermione slapped her hands over her mouth again, "Imshorry!"

Snape's sigh filled the room. "Are you quite through?"

Hermione nodded her head.

"Here, drink," he said passing her a mug that had a disturbingly cute kitten on it and the words "I love Scotland" printed on it.

Hermione's eyes went wide.

"It was a gift," Snape grumbled. "Just drink your tea. I put your medicine in it to keep your strength up."

Hermione kept staring at the kitten mug, but when Snape gave her another glare, she quickly downed the tea. She stared at her lap.

"Miss Granger," her professor said after some silence. "There are going to be a lot of changes in your life. More than what the normal magical student has to face, and it is not because you were born Muggle, so get that out of your head right now."

Hermione flushed guiltily.

"This— place will be your home," Snape said quietly. "This here will be your literal home. These chambers are yours. Much like the one Minerva gave to you, but these are connected to mine. If there is any trouble, large or small, that door leads to my private chambers." He pointed with one long finger to a door that might as well been the Gate to Hell itself by the expression on Hermione's face.

"I have taken you on as my apprentice, Miss Granger," Snape explained. "It is something; I'm sure you read of in your Hogwarts: A History, yes?"

Hermione nodded emphatically, suddenly more interested.

"Our relationship will be, must be, close," Snape said. "We will be closer than friends or family. We will know obnoxious details about the other, but at the end of the day, my job is to teach you, protect you, and guide you. Yours is to learn— and to trust that I will know best for you."

Hermione swallowed hard. "But you don't even like me."

"Miss Granger," Severus replied. "There are very few people I like, and even less than I can trust, but regardless of whether I like you, and for the record I do not— hate— you, you will be able to trust that from this point on, I will have your health and wellbeing at the top of my very short list. There will be things I cannot tell you. There will be things I will insist that you keep to yourself, but there will also be things you are privy to that no one else in this entire school will know but you and me."

Hermione stared down at the mug again and back at him.

"Like that mug. You will tell no-one of it."

Hermione swallowed yard. "Yes, sir!"

"Now, there are—" Severus turned his head to stare into the hearth, watching the embers glow and churn, "formalities. In public, you will address me as Master. I, in turn, will call you Apprentice. Your classes have been cancelled."

Hermione gasped in horror.

"As you will be learning everything from me," Severus finished.

The relief on Hermione's face was palpable just before the weight of the realisation she would be learning everything from the dreaded potions master.

"Miss Granger," Snape said without the disdain that generally peppered his voice, "you will find that there is a public face and one kept in private. The one in public must always be different, mine more so than most because people are watching me very closely. Then, there are times like this, in rooms I have warded very carefully, to be private, where you may speak your mind. In public, an apprentice does not question the master— not in front of others, so save your questions for when others are not there to read your interruptions as obstinance. Do you understand?"

Hermione nodded.

"During my classes, you will be there," Severus explained. "Often, I will give your own work to study. Sometimes, I will have you help prepare the class for the next task. Later, when you are more experienced, you will assist me in overseeing classwork, but that will be later when you are more familiar. I may have to run tasks for me, errands, or things that make no sense to you. Trust me that they do— but at no time when you feel threatened or fearful can you not come to me. It is my duty to be there for you until you can face such things without unease."

"Sir?"

"Hrm?"

"Why me? Why not Draco or someone you get on with better?"

Snape rotated his shoulders and rubbed one side, massaging the muscles. "Believe me when I tell you that having watched Draco grow up, that neither he nor I need a closer relationship."

Hermione's eyes widened. "Oh."

"The truth, Miss Granger, is that we are alike, you and I," Severus said. "I was once the focus of ridicule and torment so very like yours. I learned quickly that Gryffindor chivalry was not honour and it was Slytherin that protected me. And it will be Slytherin that protects you now, too. While you are welcome to renew such bonds as you had with a certain tabby, your home is now here, and Slytherin is all of here."

"I'm living with Slytherin?" Hermione squeaked.

"You ARE Slytherin."

"Whaa?" Hermione's voice cracked.

"But they hate me!"

"They hate people who are not fellow Slytherins," Severus said with a sigh. "And you are Slytherin. There will be no more issues, save that you must try not to murder Crabbe and Goyle for being utter imbeciles."

Hermione set her mug on the nearby table and wrung her hands together.

"The thing about Slytherin, Miss Granger, is that in public, there can be no conflict between other Slytherin. If there is an issue, it comes out behind closed doors, but you may be surprised to know that there are far fewer conflicts in Slytherin even in private than ever there are in other houses. Most of the people in Slytherin are, as you know, from pureblood families. Rules of behaviour have been ingrained since they could first wave a baby rattle. As my apprentice, you outrank them, so keep it civil to preserve everyone's honour. They will appreciate not having rank pulled, but, as I said before if anyone gives you grief, you are to tell me at once. It is not your job to defend your honour. It is mine."

Hermione nodded. "Okay."

"Now, we have one further thing that must be discussed," Snape said, straightening. "Two if you count what has to happen after."

Hermione blinked.

"There are people born in the world that seem very normal. Some are Muggle. Some are magical," Severus said, sipping a long drink of tea before continuing. "At a time of great stress, usually life-threatening, and usually when one is an adult or very close to it, certain latent genes become dominant, and these people become more than what they thought they were. We call these people Mythborn because all of them take on forms thought only to be a myth. Some may go their entire lives never knowing. Their lives were never in such desperate need. Your incident with the exploding potion— woke up your latent genes. You are more than you were. Or, if you prefer, you are now more what you were intended to be from the start."

"I— I'm a myth?"

"Mythborn."

"Wait… you said we were alike," Hermione said. "Does that mean—?"

"I, too, am Mythborn."

"But— you look completely normal?" Hermione said tentatively.

"You mean how can a horrible man such as myself possibly by Mythborn since I don't look impressive?"

Hermione shook her head adamantly. "No! I mean… You look like any other human!"

Severus closed his eyes. "We all learn to conceal our natures, Miss Granger. Just as you would pick out the proper thing to wear in public versus running around the grocery store in your knickers."

Hermione flushed. "Oh." Her face wrinkled. "I don't feel any different."

"I'm going to show you something, and I want you to try your very best not to have an emotional breakdown."

Hermione nodded.

Snape gestured with his hand, and the curtain across a floor mirror pulled back to expose the mirror itself. Hermione approached it slowly, perhaps wondering if something would reach out to grab her. The room was dim, but the strange sensation of colour over her vision had faded, at least when she looked into the mirror. She saw her ever familiar face and her unsightly buck teeth, and her giant mess of hai—

Wait.

Her hand touched her head, and her hair moved, slithering around her fingers.

"Oh, she sees us now," one voice said.

"About time."

"Shush, you."

Different coloured serpents rose up from her head, wobbling back and forth as their eyes peered back at her through the mirror. Each snake seemed to have a different species going on. There was a white and a black cobra, a red and orange viper, a coral snake, a black mamba, a cottonmouth, a sea snake, an inland taipan, a kingsnake, a rosy boa, an emerald tree boa, and others that she had no idea what they were.

Hermione's eyes widened.

"Hallo!" a brightly-coloured, almost radiant sapphire blue serpent said.

Hermione's hand slowly touched the snake, and it rubbed up against her hand quite affectionately.

"Feeling better?" the serpent asked.

"Yes, thank you," Hermione replied automatically, and then seemed to realise she was talking to her own living hair.

Hermione quickly sat down on the chair and stared at her lap. "I'm a— I'm—"

"A gorgon," Snape said, his voice surprisingly soft.

Hermione trembled. "Do my parents know?"

Snape's expression softened. "Yes."

"Do they—" She turned her head away.

He looked into the fire, rubbing his hair as though he had an itch. "I fear they did not take the news as well as the Headmaster had hoped."

Hermione closed her eyes in misery. "How will I pay for school now? Supplies?

"As my apprentice, I take care of your supplies and whatever fees you will incur for testing or whatever," Snape said with a sniff. "If there are events you must or wish to attend, and they do not conflict with our work, I will, of course, provide whatever monies you require for such things."

Hermione swallowed and nodded her head, dislodging some of her snakes, who gave a soft outcry of protest at being jostled.

"I'm sorry!" she cried, trying to tuck them back and then realising she had no idea how to do so. She gave Snape a desperate, almost out-the-door panicked look.

"Be still," he hushed, spreading his hand out.

Hermione froze in place, trembling.

Snape very carefully untangled her snakes and soothed them back into place. They hissed happily, rubbing their heads against his hand, and Hermione's eyes drooped close as a soft hiss of pleasure escaped her mouth, her forked tongue flicked out in blissful pleasure.

Her professor shook his head. "Are you feeling better, Miss Granger?"

Hermione nodded, eyes wide. "Yes, master."

A small tug pulled the sides of Snape's mouth. "Come, put on your blindfold. I have someone I need you to meet."

"Severus! We weren't expecting you until—"

The woman quickly lunged forward with a pail as Hermione vomited rather violently.

"Oh dear, first side-along Apparition?" she cooed.

"Yes, ma'am," Hermione moaned. She relaxed a little as the woman pulled a warm cloth out and gently wiped her face.

"There now, that's better, dear. We're well-prepared around here," the woman said with a voice that seemed to smile for her.

"Severus, you terrible man," the woman chided. "You bring her here first on a side-along?"

"Amelia did the same to me," Severus muttered.

"Well, don't be taking it out on this poor dear," the woman tutted. "Okay, love. My name's Eleanor, and let's get that blindfold off to get a proper look at what you need."

"No! I mean! Bad! Er—" Hermione stammered nervously.

The woman's warm laugh filled the room. "No worries, love. Let's just say it would take more than petrification between friends to get on my bad side." She tugged off the blindfold, and Hermione looked up at her.

Hermione gasped when she saw that the woman's beautiful face was rimmed with writhing boa constrictors for hair. She had a sort of headdress pulled back. Hermione reached out, drawn to touch the woman.

The woman smiled at her, filling Hermione with a radiance like a sun. Eleanor smiled, her fangs unfolding from her mouth slightly as she flicked her tongue out to "taste" Hermione's scent. "I'm from a different branch of the family tree, but I think we might be distant cousins, little love."

Hermione could only nod dumbly, her face filled with wonder. Eleanor's boa-hair greeted Hermione's and they hissed and wobbled and rubbed up against each other in greeting.

"Around here, we carry all the secrets that most people out there would prefer to forget exist," Eleanor said. "But we also keep each other safe too. Now, your snakes have already debriefed me as to what you know, so I will answer your questions by saying 'very, very carefully,' eh?"

Hermione giggled and nodded.

"Now, don't you worry. Severus will take excellent care of you. You just be sure to listen to him, okay? He's one of our best, and if he tells you to jump, you'd best be jumping."

Hermione nodded. Even her serpent hair nodded their heads in agreement too.

"Okay, let's get you in the only robes you'll never need," Eleanor said. "They're exceptional. They will protect you, but they will also protect others from getting an accidental snake to the face, alright?"

"Yes, ma'am," Hermione replied.

"Oh, Severus, she's so precious. I want her as my apprentice."

Snape crossed his arms and glowered.

"Now, once we get you fitted and the crystals suitably attuned, you'll have two sets initially. One, which you should always be wearing unless you are sleeping— trust me, don't do that, you end up with crystals embedded in your face. It's horrible— and one to wear when you are washing the other one. As Severus' apprentice, we will craft them to look just like his, so be prepared to billow wherever you go like an angry stormcloud."

Severus muttered something unmentionable in Latin.

Hermione giggled as Eleanor's snake-hair hissed laughter towards the brooding potions master. Eleanor winked at Hermione, and the stress causing Hermione's body to tense like a coiled spring swiftly melted away.

"Ok young lady," she said. "Rules because we love our rules here. Are you listening?"

Hermione nodded.

"In public, you will always have your robes as proper apprentice fare. Nice and black. Too many buttons and your apprenticeship pin on the collar. Here's the rub. If you are attending formal events here, you wear the Unspeakables uniform. Full white like you're going to a wedding, full headdress— now, I'm sure you realise that for people like us, the headdress is full time unless we are around known like company. Yes?"

"Yes, ma'am!" Hermione said.

"Good girl," Eleanor said with a smile.

Hermione looked at her master with wide eyes. "Even my master?"

Eleanor winked at Severus. "Even Mr Stormcloud."

Severus curled his lip but said nothing.

"Now, after we fit you all up, you're going to have to sit in a room with a bunch of people who have to ask you way too many questions, poke you, prod you, and then fill out a bunch of paperwork for you. Just try not to get too irritated by them. Then, you get to meet the big boss of us all."

Hermione's eyes widened fearfully.

"Don't worry, love," Eleanor reassured her. "She has a reputation of being a manticore, but she's really a puffskein."

Hermione gasped. "Is everyone here—"

"Mythborn? No, love. Just a lot of us. No safer place to live and work, yeah? Far better than hiding away in a cave somewhere waiting for the torches and pitchforks."

"Wow," Hermione boggled.

"Let's go," Eleanor said. "We'll meet you after she's been put through the gauntlet, Severus."

"Goody," came his reply.

"Sure you don't want to do it again?"

"No, non, and nyet, thank you very much."

Eleanor stuck out her forked tongue at him and shuffled off with Hermione.

Hermione itched her head, her fingers running into her headdress. She was wearing the "in house" headdress that covered her eyes, but it allowed her "hair" to be free. There was no one in the DoM that wouldn't know who she was, so so Eleanor said, as there were only two of them in the entire Department of Mysteries. Eleanor was distinctively python, and Hermione was distinctively a rainbow cornucopia of serpentine species. The outside apprentice robes would have a different headdress that covered her eyes, but it glamoured her head to appear as bushy as she remembered it when in reality she was still a Gorgon, and her hair was still a writhing nest of vipers. Literally.

Still, she felt so much better. After meeting Eleanor, the panic of being totally alone had faded. She'd met a sphinx, a real honest-to-goodness manticore named Joe, a gryphon named Riley, a cerberus named Adonis, and a siren named Aglea. She'd giggled when Joe had shared his name, and he had flushed saying his parents just wanted a nice, normal boy. They got a manticore instead.

She could relate.

Her master was in one of the rooms being put through the official third-degree Spanish Inquisition. She was glad she wasn't in there with him. Her own interrogation was bad though. Name, birthday, family, family tree, did she have any special powers that she knew of, and the list went on. Most of them were a bit silly considering she'd just figured out what she was—If she had any special powers, how was she to know? Save for the obvious having snakes for hair and a literally stony gaze.

"Piss off!" she heard a voice saying.

Hermione looked up.

That did not sound very happy.

BLAM!

The sound of something heavy slamming into something else— a wall perhaps?—broke Hermione out of her thoughts completely.

Hermione looked around. No one was breaking down doors to check out the sound, so maybe it was perfectly nor—

THUMP!

The sound a door opening and slamming followed the dull thud and Hermione heard man's voice yell, "I'm not sure what your problem is today, Socrates, but you need a serious time out!"

A man in green robes and an armful of scrolls stormed past Hermione as he ripped some sort of goggles off his face and stomped down the hallway.

Torn between sitting on the bench and amusing herself by reading the rather dry collection of expired magazines that ranged from Wizarding fashion to "What is a Car, Anyway?", Hermione felt her serpents perk with curiosity.

Twitch.

Twitch.

Hermione stood and walked towards where the sounds had come from. The voice had sounded irritated, sure, but maybe they just needed a hand? She passed by a few windows to what looked like various habitats, but there was nothing inside but plant life as far as she could tell.

She wondered how she was even going to tell where she was going just as a large WHUMP struck the nearby wall. "Don't even come back, Piers!" the earlier voice yelled.

Hermione knocked on the door. "Um, hello? Did you need—"

"WHO THE FUCK LET YOU IN HERE?!"

Hermione's eyes widened under her headdress. "The door was actually wide open, but I knocked."

"Oh, you knocked, did you? Come to visit old Socrates and try to get him to behave himself? Do a little trick? Maybe translate some old serpent text? Well, FUCK YOU!"

A huge tail whipped out of the darkness and sent Hermione flying into the habitat, slamming into a mass of vines and sliding down them with a thump.

"Ow."

"That wasn't nice."

"Not nice at all."

"You okay?"

"Are you all right?"

Hermione's headdress had been knocked free, exposing her entire head, and she rubbed her scalp and some of her serpents with a wince. The cobra heads rubbed up against her cheek, flicking their tongues out to caress her skin. Hermione touched them tenderly. "I'm okay, thanks. You all okay?"

One snake rattled his head, tiny stars circling.

Hermione pulled it closer as she'd seen Eleanor do, pressing her lips to his snout.

The snake manifested a tiny red heart over its head.

"I think he hit his head too hard," one of the other serpents said with concern.

Hermione stroked the black mamba snake, frowning as it wobbled, its tongue sticking out limply. Her shoulders straightened as her magic flowed to her command. The magic rippled down to the wounded snake, and its body mended. The other snakes nuzzled it until it hissed and rocked back and forth, seemingly ready to strike. Hermione stood, cracking her neck as her lips pursed in her anger. Her fists clenched, bolts of magic crackling between her fingers.

Her serpent hair rose, every snake with fangs bared, mouths open wide to strike.

Hissssssssss.

Her eyes filled with black as if oil was moving across the whites of her eyes. She stormed into the middle of the habitat, magic crackling around her with sharp pops and hisses.

Images of taunting kids swirled around her.

"You see her?"

"Know-it-all bint."

"Look at her wave that hand like she knows."

"Bet it's all in that book!"

"She's a nightmare, no wonder she hasn't any friends."

"Who would want to be friends with that!"

"Why wasn't she sorted into Ravenclaw with all the other know-it-alls?"

"Her hair! Doesn't she know how to brush?"

The insides of her eyes began to glow, and the eyes of her serpents glowed with them.

"You. Will. Apologise." Hermione's voice seemed to come from many voices, echoed in the hisses of her serpents, even as the fangs of the giant basilisk came roaring down from above to devour her whole.

The basilisk froze in place, the bright red feather on his head rising in wonder. He flattened his head on the ground before her, eyes turned up in devout worship.

"Please forgive me, Mistress," the basilisk hissed, prostrating himself against the ground of the habitat. "I am but your humble servant."

The writhing serpents calmed as the dangerous, wrathful glow of Hermione's eyes faded into a somewhat less intense gold. "I could really use a cuppa."

The basilisk abased himself on top of her dragonhide boots. "I know where the tea is."

Hermione's hand gently touched the top of the great basilisk's head as a warm rush of magic sealed them together.

"Mason, have you seen my apprentice?"

"You have an apprentice?"

Snape glowered at the man who was polishing crystals at a long table. "The one you're shining crystals for?"

"Oh! Uh—" Mason looked around. "She was right there. The magazine is gone, maybe she went to find a more comfortable chair? Socrates was being a pill for Piers. She might have left to, uh—shut out the screaming."

Severus paled. "Why didn't you tell me they were trying to bring down Socrates today?"

"Well, it hardly matters what day—"

"Come on, let's go," Eleanor said. "I can help with Socrates if he gets wind of her! Coming Amelia?"

"Bringing up the rear," the witch said rushing behind them. "Just putting on my anti-petrification goggles." She pulled something out of her robes and sealed them across her face, so her eyes were protected.

As they rushed down the hall, it was eerily quiet. They scanned the rooms and saw the open door. Sending out a spell to detect anything hidden, they shook their heads and ran down the hall, robes fluttering behind them only to screech to a halt as they heard someone reading aloud.

"The Muggle automobile is a curious thing. They use them to get from place to place very fast, but usually end up going very slow instead. Since they do not Apparate and cannot use a proper Floo, nor do they use a broom for anything but cleaning, it's amazing Muggles can get anywhere— are you sure you want me to read this to you, Socrates? It's really boring."

Low hissing replied to her.

"Really? That wasn't very nice of Piers. Have I met him?"

More hissing.

"Oh, him. Well, I wouldn't take it personally. He seemed to have a lot on his plate."

"Do you normally have flying teaballs here?" Hermione's voice asked.

"Oh! Thanks! Oh, my favourite tea too. How did you know?"

Severus, Amelia, and Eleanor burst into the break room which was filled almost to capacity with the bulk of a giant basilisk holding a teapot and a bright pink tea cosy in his mouth. Hermione was sitting in the middle of his coils with a copy of What is a Car, Anyway? open in her lap. All of Hermione's head snakes whipped around to stare at the interlopers. Each one had a biscuit in their mouth.

Amelia suddenly broke into a broad grin. "You're HIRED!"

Severus facepalmed loudly as Eleanor grinned and slapped Severus on the back.

A/N: Sorry, but the image of all of Hermione's head snakes guiltily having nicked biscuits cracked me the hell up.