Chapter Five

"Hermione! Hermione, they're here!"

She shot up from her position on the couch, sending the book on her lap toppling. Behind her, she heard a growl.

"Those books are ancient, Granger," Moody scowled. "Treat them a little better."

That was probably the first time someone had ever had to state those words to her. But she was much too excited to care. "Sir, I would like to go downstairs. My friends are here."

Moody rolled his eyes. She took it as permission and raced down the stairs.

When at last she reached the foot of the staircase, she spotted two figures hovering near the entrance with Mrs. Weasley. Ron had grown more freckled over the summer and slightly stockier to match his height, though it was hard to determine the extent of the change under his too-big Chudley Cannons jersey. Behind him, Harry stood at roughly the same height he had been when he had left for the summer, but a heretofore unseen layer of short, almost indiscernible, hair covered his jaw.

She grabbed Harry's hand, the first limb she managed to make contact with, and drew him in for a tight hug, immediately proceeding to do the same with Ron after. When they finished, they stood at least for a minute in silence, smiling stupidly at each other.

"Oh, come on you," Mrs. Weasley huffed, barely masking the beaming look on her own face. "Into the dining room for supper. Arthur will be bringing Ginny, George, and Fred around midnight, but the Order members that are here will join us—I think we have a fair number in the manor tonight."

She ushered them through the arched entry way to the massive dining table Hermione and everyone at Grimmauld Place had been eating at each day. The normal black table cloth had been replaced with something more festive.

"Take a seat. I'll go gather the others." She vanished.

Harry turned to her again. "So, when did you get here? Mrs. Weasley made it seem like you've been here for a while."

Hermione knew that this was the moment to come clean. Hoping to get it over with like ripping off a band-aid, she let the words flow out of her in a rush. "Actually, I've been here the entire summer. I decided to join the Order."

After gaping at her for at least thirty seconds, Harry was the first to regain his voice. "How?"

The word was uncomfortably accusatory.

"I'm seventeen," Hermione responded slowly.

Ron swallowed, looking a little pale. Otherwise, however, he looked unmoved by the news. "Wicked. I always figured you'd be good at research and stuff. It's worked miracles in the past."

She didn't exactly have the chance to tell him that she wasn't working strictly in 'research' anymore. Harry had stood up, his chair making a loud, abrasive sound as it was forcibly pushed back.

"They let you in?" he demanded. "They're letting you in, when I've been the one to face him all these years. How does that make sense?"

Ron shifted in his seat, looking uncomfortable but not unsympathetic. "Calm down, mate."

"No, Ron. Don't," Harry snarled. The anger that had cloaked him much of fifth year had come to the fore.

Her wrist twitched at her side. And rapidly, Hermione felt her own newfound temper—forged in the confusion and self-loathing and fear of the past few months—rise potently, acutely, a bitter taste flooding her mouth.

"Despite what you might believe," she told him coldly, "there are reasons Dumbledore and the Order allow only adults to join."

"You think I don't know that?" Harry snapped, an ugly, incredulous laugh in his voice. "You think I don't remember Cedric? Or what almost happened to Sirius?"

"Exactly," Hermione shot back at him. "And look at how old they were when that happened. I'm not trying to be an obstacle to you, Harry, really, but be practical. Dumbledore lets you in and then what? You're put in ten times more danger than you already are."

"You know why I need to join," he growled. "If I ever want to fulfill the prophecy, I need to fight."

Hermione bristled at his tone: brash, unthinking, confident that he knew best. It was the first time it had grated against her like this.

"You want the truth? You're not ready for it," she snapped. "If you were—if you were, you would have learned Occlumency last year. You would have taken it seriously."

Harry recoiled like he had been struck. Ron frowned too. "Hey, Hermione, isn't that a little out of line—"

"It's true," she responded sharply. "If he had, we probably wouldn't have gone to the ministry in the first place. Though, at least now everyone from Seamus's mother to Zachariah Smith knows that Voldemort's back."

Harry glared at her. Hermione just glared back. Before the argument could escalate, Mrs. Weasley swept into the room with Moody and more than ten other Order members.

"Harry," Sirius rasped, his voice thick with emotion as his gaze lighted on his godson. The glower slipped off Harry's face like melted paint, his expression transforming into something much warmer and painfully tender. He rushed forward to clasp his godfather in his arms.

Cepheus stepped forward from behind the pair, sneering at the overt display of affection, to join Hermione on the other side of her. "Hungry, Granger?"

She glanced at the feast Mrs. Weasley had orchestrated into existence before them with appreciation. "What do you think?"

Ron scooted forward in his chair on the other side of her to gaze at the table's latest occupant. He reached out a hand. "I'm Ron Weasley."

"Another one." Cepheus looked at the hand with blatant incredulity. "Merlin's beard, how many are there?"

"Just shake his hand," Hermione hissed. Sending her a look, the auror-in-training deigned to delicately grasp Ron's hand.

Ron grinned amiably at him. "So, you work with Hermione, do you? What kind of, uh, research have you guys been doing lately?"

"Research?" Amelina drawled, interjecting into the conversation. She slid into a seat opposite Hermione with Dorian and Alcon on either side of her. "Aurors-in-training do a lot of information gathering, but that's not really what we're up to here, Weasley. Certainly not what those two are doing."

"Oh," Ron said simply, looking somewhat confused. Then, realization flashed across his face. "Aurors in training!?"

"Please take a seat, that should be all of us," Mrs. Weasley announced sternly, interrupting the ongoing conversations. Harry looked relieved when Sirius sat opposite him, next to Lupin. Other wizards and witches reluctantly followed, Mr. Weasley himself falling prey to his wife's reprimanding gaze when he was slow to take his seat.

A loud pop sounded from the hallway, effectively managing to compel them all into surprised silence. Mrs. Weasley didn't even blink. "Come on in!"

There was a long pause. Then, light, even footsteps neared them in perfect rhythm. Within seconds, a tall, dark cloaked man stood at the arched entrance to the dining room, cutting a dramatic silhouette against the lighting of the hallway.

"Severus," Lupin said, smiling politely, "I'm glad to see you could make it."

A disparaging gaze shot with lightning quickness over the contents of the room. "Believe me, I had little choice in the matter."

The only available seat left (the table was charmed to provide only as many seats as were needed) was next to Sirius and Moody at the head of the table. An unreadable expression on his face, Snape walked toward the seat with his robes billowing behind him.

Ron groaned beside her. "That's not going to end well."

He wasn't wrong.

Hermione had scarcely begun cutting into her slice of shepherd's pie, when a loud clang sounded throughout the room. Sirius had violently dropped his silverware back onto his plate, a furious look on his face.

"Problem?" Snape drawled disinterestedly.

"Yes," Sirius hissed, ignoring Lupin's warning glance. "I don't think I'll be able to stomach my meal sitting next to a murderer."

The pumpkin juice that had just gone down her throat soured instantly.

"Severus is an Order member, Sirius," Arthur said tiredly.

"And what about before?" Sirius challenged loudly. He turned to Snape with his teeth bared. "How many innocent people did you kill when you were You-Know-Who's loyal pet? How many fathers, mothers, and children did you torture?"

Snape put down his fork and knife slowly, his face deathly pale but expressionless. "Are you finished?" he asked tonelessly.

"Don't think you can fool any of us here," Sirius snarled, eyes sparking. "You don't care about any of this: saving muggleborns, innocent people. Do you think we didn't notice? Any moment now, you're going to be running off again to join—"

"Could we eat, please?"

Belatedly, when eyes all across the room snapped to her with shock, Hermione realized that the interruption had come from her. Sirius met her gaze with slight bewilderment. Harry and Ron both gaped with disbelief. Snape didn't even bother to look over at her.

Hermione tried to smile. "It's been a long day for some of us. I think I can speak for the others when I say that we're starving."

"I'm hungry," Cepheus intoned helpfully, though his riveted gaze darted between the two black-haired men like he was watching a tennis match.

Sirius's expression betrayed his utter incredulity. "How can you eat next to someone who's killed—"

"Really?" The forced smile fell off of Hermione's face abruptly.

Understanding slowly filtered into Sirius's face; then, defensiveness. "You know what I meant."

Mrs. Weasley looked like she had had quite enough. "I don't know what's happening here, but we are all going to dine, silently, no arguing. Or I swear, I will hex you all into silence. Is that understood?"

No one answered, but the rest of dinner did in fact pass silently. None of the food tasted quite as it had previous nights, though. And when she climbed the five flights of stairs later that night to her room, the meal weighed heavily in her stomach.

As she reached the fifth landing, she saw another figure a few meters ahead of her. She recognized him immediately.

"Professor."

He turned sharply on his heel, and it was immediately clear that the events from dinner had left Snape in a thunderous mood. When voices neared them from below the staircase, she stepped away from the landing and into the corridor to stand beside her professor in the shadows.

Snape's expression darkened further. "What do you want, Granger?"

She gritted her teeth at the annoyance on his face. "To talk. Obviously."

Snape's eyes flashed in warning. "I see no reason for a conversation between the two of us."

Hermione's eyes narrowed. "You gave me a reason."

"And when did you hallucinate that?" A harsh, sarcastic retort.

She smiled unpleasantly. "You didn't pretend like I hadn't said anything at all, professor, during that detention. And then you helped me into the Order."

The potions professor's face contorted with silent rage at those words. "And you think I have some sort of obligation towards you now? This war exists beyond you, you insufferable—"

"I know that," Hermione snapped.

"Understand this, Granger," Snape hissed, his face paling, "I don't know what it is you want, but you are not getting it from me. Go somewhere else."

When she spoke, her voice was brittle. "Where? My friends? Believe it or not, I think I want to strangle Harry right now just as much as you do. Should I tell Dumbledore, then, professor? Have him tell me that what I did was okay, that it was self-defense, but look at me like—with pity, like I'll never be the same again, that I'm lesser now?"

Snape's lip curled. "I see you've succumbed to irrational fear, now."

"You and I both know the only reason I haven't seen that look yet is because Sirius is too grateful and you're the only other person who knows," Hermione hissed.

"I didn't drop you on Moody's doorstep for my own private amusement, Granger," Snape bit out.

The implication that she was supposed to have confided in Moody made her feel uncomfortable. Not that there was anything wrong with the auror. Pointedly, however, Hermione didn't want to tell another person what she had done for as long as she lived.

"He reports everything to Dumbledore," Hermione responded after a moment. She didn't actually know if that was true. But Snape's lips thinned—so maybe it was. "Look, I just want to know if you've heard anything about…Nott."

The name threatened to choke her on its way out. After it had been released, she swallowed reflexively a few times, eyes stinging.

Snape's face was suddenly unreadable. "He and his mother have left the country."

Hermione's jaw slackened in horror. "Because—"

"In part," he answered tonelessly, "But the Dark Lord has played the largest role in this decision, I imagine."

Her mouth opened and closed soundlessly a few times, before she a chilling thought struck her. "He was going to make Nott replace his father."

Snape did not give any indication regarding whether or not that was true. But she knew, somehow, that it was true.

"Did—" Hermione asked, expression tightening, "Did Black get punished for what happened at the ministry?"

Snape's head snapped to her sharply. "Why are you concerned with Black?"

She pursed her lips, unsure how to respond. She settled with, "No particular reason."

He surveyed her nonetheless, expression razor sharp.

Hermione felt her mouth twist. Finally, she said, "At the ministry. She was the one who fired the killing curse. At Hogsmeade, she remembered my name."

She didn't know what Snape saw on her face, but his gaze shifted away from her when he answered, stoic. "There are some that the Dark Lord considers too valuable to punish."

Hermione contemplated that for a moment. A strange intuition struck her, and she raised an eyebrow. "Like you. He doesn't punish you, does he? Every time you're here—I've never seen you injured."

Snape smiled. It was not a nice smile. "Potions-making is a subtle science and an exact art. The slightest tremor, as often occurs from prolonged exposure to the Cruciatus and other torture curses, would nullify my value."

Not for the first time, Hermione wondered how Snape had ended up teaching at Hogwarts. There were wizards and witches who had pursued potions mastery for years beyond their Hogwarts education, who had devoted their lives to studying the discipline, and yet, Voldemort had chosen Snape to be his potions-maker. Clearly Snape was a prodigy in the field—and it was clear that he had no love for teaching.

"And Black?" she pressed.

She knew she paled as soon as she posed the question. Her fingers trembled with a frenetic, unnamable energy.

His answer was cryptic. "Black isn't like other death eaters."

"Of course not," she muttered.

Hermione's jaw tightened when Snape began to peer down at her with narrowed eyes.

"What?"

His mouth lifted in a sneer. "You are hiding something, Ms. Granger. For your sake, I hope it is either unimportant or it outs itself before it is too late."

She rolled her shoulders back, striving for nonchalance. "There's no such thing, professor. Anyway—nice talk. I'll be sure to reach out to you the—"

"Don't."

"—next time I need advice," Hermione finished with a wide, unfeeling smile. She spun on her heel and headed toward her room to turn in for the night.

It took her what felt like hours to fall asleep. When she did, unconsciousness slipped over her like a wet blanket—uncomfortably, jarringly. Her dreams started as they normally did: dark, vague, non-specific.

Then, they fractured.

Wind blasted past her. Suddenly, there was a her in the dream, she could see herself in her mind's eye. The gales rendered whatever her dream-self wore obsolete and raised goosebumps on her flesh.

Eyes watering, she blinked rapidly and found a dark treacherously mountainous landscape before her. In shock, she took a staggering step backward—

—and gasped when her back met a taller, heated form.

When her head jerked back, her eyes locked with a charcoal, mocking gaze.

"About time," Black's hoarse voice hissed against her ear, "I've been waiting for you, Hermione Granger."

A hand grasped her chin, tilted her head up, and then a pair of lips landed ruthlessly on hers.

Author's Note: Thanks so much for reading! This is probably the most "niche" fic I'm working on right now, so please, please let me know that there is active interest! I would love to hear your thoughts :)