melusin (melusin) wrote in melusin_la_fey, @ 2009-09-30 14:27:00 |
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Entry tags: | merlin's_amulet, ss/hg |
Merlin's Amulet: Chapter 3
The third prompt: Hermione and Severus at the Harry Potter exhibit in Chicago. I've not seen the exhibition, so I was very grateful for the kind help of geminiscorp, machshefa and lulabelle who all have. I also cribbed off the Leaky Cauldron's report for the order in which the exhibition appears.
For lynelucas.
Rating:M
Many thanks as ever to septentrion for the beta and to sylvanawood for some much needed cheerleading.
For once, the bathroom mirror remained silent as it contemplated its owner shaving—the old-fashioned way, with his father’s cut-throat razor at five o’clock in the afternoon—a fact for which Severus was profoundly grateful.
He tilted his head, stretching the skin on his neck. It was still new, this lack of pain, the absence of a wound that refused to heal. Gingerly, he scraped away his day’s growth of beard. A pleasure, now, shaving. Something to be appreciated, not hurried. Not even today when... He grinned at his reflection, having something to smile about for a change.
Severus Snape had a girlfriend, and he was meeting her in an hour.
‘Who’d have thought it, eh?’ He dipped the razor in the hot water and shook it. It seemed there was hope for him yet.
And not just any old girlfriend, either. Hermione Granger. No one in their right mind would call her run of the mill. She was good looking, intelligent, witty—the sort of witch capable of minding your back in a wand fight should the need arise. And an Unspeakable to boot, whose meteoric rise through the ranks was causing something of a stir in the higher echelons of society. Impatient to get to the top, the indomitable Miss Granger was cutting a swathe through the Department of Mysteries with her high-handed reforms, discarding long established procedures and traditions along the way fast enough to make any pure-blood politician tremble in his handmade Italian shoes. But she had Kingsley’s ear and was the Saviour of the Wizarding world’s best friend. Not only Unspeakable but Untouchable. Oh, yes, Hermione Granger was top totty, all right, with many an eligible wizard vying for her attention. And yet, for reasons still unknown, she seemed to have chosen him.
Pinching his nose, Severus brought the blade to his top lip and paused, giving the matter some thought, before continuing. Perhaps it was because he’d taken the trouble to look past the Erumpent-hided facade she put on at work? Maybe he was the only one who noticed the straightening of the shoulders every time some low-ranking official called her a hard-nosed bitch within earshot? Or maybe it was because he recognised that, inside that shell, she was still the same, insecure little Muggle-born swot he remembered waving her hand around in his classroom, desperate to gain his attention, determined to make her mark in an alien world that treated her kind with suspicion. The fact she hadn’t stopped in her struggle to be recognised, and to prove she was as good as the next witch, was only a credit to her fortitude.
Severus rinsed the soap residue from his face and grabbed a towel, wondering what the afternoon and, hopefully, the night would bring. This would be their third date, and this time, it was he who had chosen the venue. The second one, while it had ended most satisfactorily, had got off to a shaky start.
‘Do you have a DVD player?’
‘Naturally.’
He’d lied, of course, sooner than admit he had no idea what Hermione was talking about.
There had followed a rather frustrating morning in a depressing out of town industrial estate, firstly trying to identify said contraption and subsequently purchasing one—together with a state-of-the-art television set. In the process, a spotty-faced youth, bearing the name-tag “Darren” (presumably so he wouldn’t forget) came within a Kneazle’s whisker of being hexed for his impertinence. Unfortunately, despite his Herculean effort, when Hermione had arrived and he’d switched it on, the ancient electricity supply at Spinner’s End, which he hardly ever used, had refused to co-operate and set fire to the fuse board instead.
So much for ‘The Ladykillers.’
Then there was the takeaway ‘pizza’ she’d brought with her, if that’s what you could call it. Severus shuddered at the memory. There was probably more taste and nutritional value in the cardboard box it had arrived in, and he’d told her as much, which hadn’t gone down at all well. He smirked at the mirror before healing a small cut near his ear; he’d found some inventive things to do with the olives afterwards, though, which had gone a long way to salvaging the evening.
Severus was still smiling a few minutes later when he was putting on his shirt. It was very strange this... lightness of being. It took some getting used to; he had, after all, lived in a state of almost permanent melancholia for most of his adult life. It was not unwelcome, however. And it was the amulet he had to thank for this improvement to his temperament.
The animals, in their wisdom, had made it quite clear: all or nothing. Physical healing could only be accomplished if his mental and emotional state was given equal consideration. And so, one by one, they had made him face his worst fears and stripped away years of mental anguish and guilt. The last had been the most difficult to deal with: Unicorn’s purity of spirit was almost unbearable to behold, and he’d tried to shrink away, afraid that the darkness within could only taint such a beautiful creature. But the mare had been insistent in her pursuit, finally bowing her head and touching her horn to Severus’ heart.
He’d wept then, for the mistakes of his youth and the life he should have lived, eventually waking up on the floor of Hermione’s office, red-eyed and embarrassed. She had handed him a box of tissues but made no comment.
‘It is over,’ he said, removing the amulet from around his neck. ‘Take it. I never want to see it again.’
‘Thank you for all your help, Severus.’ Hermione walked to her desk and pulled out a bottle of firewhisky and two glasses from the bottom drawer. ‘Drink? You look like you need one.’
And somehow he knew that life was about to get a whole lot better...