Title: Vet Your Ingredients… Characters: Severus Snape, Hermione Granger, Remus Lupin Rating: G Warnings: Erm. Cat Fancy? Implied slash Summary: Hermione had a plan, but she shouldn't have gone for the cheap moonstone. Notes: Happy Halloween, Cordy! I hope you like this (and that it makes sense!). I took my inspiration from your witches brew prompt. ♥
Severus slammed the lid onto the cauldron, craning his prodigious nose up as if he could rise above the colewort stench billowing through the room.
"What hellbrew is this, Granger?" he growled through narrowed lips, trying not to inhale. "As if I had to hypothesise!"
Hermione had enough good grace left to stand tall under Severus' pointed glare at Crookshanks, who was still wrapped around her leg, rubbing his face incessantly against her knee. "It had to be the Moonstone, it couldn't have been real-"
"Of course not!" Severus started the sentence with a roar, but swallowed it quickly as the cauldron burped another noxious plume despite his death-grip on the lid. "Why would you do this? You have Weasley wrapped around your little finger tighter than that feline!"
"You've been alone since the war! I thought-"
"Hermione." Remus had smelled worse, although he was grateful for his late arrival to her suspicious Halloween Party invitation. A moment's concentration banished both fumes and cauldron.
Stepping fully into the room, Remus wound an arm around Severus' waist and enjoyed both the uncomfortable squirm the other man gave and Hermione's shocked expression at the same time. "Severus has never been alone."