For iulia_linnea

Hermione made it as far as the first floor before a firm hand pulled her out of the stream of people and dragged her into the relative privacy of Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.

"Now, spill, Hermione Granger Weasley!" Ginny stood with crossed arms, her best 'mother glare', and Hermione half-expected her to start tapping her foot impatiently.

Instead, Hermione checked her make-up in the cracked and damp-spotted mirror. "Myrtle! Go check out the prefects' bathroom," she called, waiting for Myrtle's departing splash, and adding a Muffliato to be safe, before she addressed Ginny's demand.

"What do you want to know, Gin?" she asked, with feigned composure.

"Are you kidding?" Ginny exploded. "Everything. What the hell is going on for a start? I didn't even know he was alive. I mean, no body, no portrait and all that, but as far as I was aware no one had even seen him since the battle."

"No body, no portrait..." Hermione pointed out. "Minerva's always been sure he was around somewhere, but it was only when Slughorn was taken into St. Mungo's that she managed to contact him."

"So how long has he been back, you sneaky thing?" Ginny asked. "And when did all the hand-holding start? And does it go further than hand-holding?"

Hermione ducked and pretended to rearrange the skirts of her robes to hide the colour she could feel rising to her cheeks. "Thursday. He got here early on Thursday morning. We— Ehm. Well, I guess you could say the hand-holding started last night, and the rest is none of your business."

"You hussy!" Ginny accused with a huge grin on her face.

"It's not like that," Hermione protested.

"Hermione, how long have we been friends?" the redhead asked in a placatory tone.

Hermione gave a tiny snort of laughter. "My whole life, or it feels like it."

"Then don't you think if I was going to set myself up as judge and jury I'd have done it a long time ago? I know you, and I know if you are doing more than holding hands, then it's because you believe you have a future together."

Hermione dared a sideways look at her friend under her lashes.

"Of course, you're still a slapper," Ginny added, as soon as she caught Hermione's eye. Both women began to giggle like the teenagers they had once been.

"Am not," Hermione demurred. "A little impulsive, maybe, but I hardly think a woman in her forties who's had three lovers qualifies as a slapper."

"Alright, I can buy you being impulsive. Snape is another matter entirely."

"I think you may have to get used to calling him Severus," Hermione pointed out.

"That might take a decade or two," Ginny observed. "Are you sure you know what you're getting into, Hermione? I mean, I know you were always more willing to give him the benefit of the doubt than the rest of us, right up to..." She took a deep breath. "Let's say he's no Charlie. I imagine he'll be a lot more high maintenance."

"He's a good man, and he's overdue for some happiness," Hermione replied. "And I guess I worried a little to begin with that he's so different, but the more I think about it the more I think it's right that way. I couldn't go out with someone like Charlie. I'd end up expecting him to be Charlie, and that wouldn't be fair on either of us. Severus... is Severus. And when he loves someone, he does it with every part of his being. That has to be worth a bit of effort."

Ginny's expression turned serious. "You think he loves you?" she asked as softly as if she stood at someone's deathbed.

"Not—" Hermione paused. The evening before she could have honestly said, 'Not yet,' but now she wasn't sure. "Ask him, if you dare," she answered instead. "It feels right, Ginny. It feels like we know each other better than we logically have any right to. I know there are no guarantees, but—"

"There you are!" Ron barged into the room, closely followed by Harry.

Ginny fluffed at her hair with her fingers, as if she'd had no other reason for being in the room than to use the decrepit mirror. "Come on, Hermione. Let's go."

"Heyy! We wanted to talk to Hermione, too, you know," Ron protested.

Hermione sighed as she pulled the door open. "So talk while we walk, or were you really planning on a lecture?"

"Snape, Hermione? Snape?" Ron demanded, though he managed to keep his volume down to a conversational level.

"Your problem?" Hermione asked even more quietly, making no allowances for the fact that the two men had long since got out of the habit of climbing six floors worth of stairs.

"My problem is that it's Snape!" Ron protested again.

"Yes, Ron, Snape. Intelligent, articulate, brave, intellectually stimulating, physically appealing Snape."

"I didn't want to know that," Harry muttered under his breath.

"Then you shouldn't let Ron lead the interrogation," Hermione pointed out, by now a full flight ahead of her childhood companions. She waited for them to catch her up. "It seems to me that two men who're paid to be observant should be able to work out that a man who stays in that sort of physical shape will be attractive to the female sex."

"But it's Snape!" Ron protested.

"Ron," Ginny cut in. "If that's all you have to say, then shut up! She knows it's Professor Snape, and she was there when you were all growing up. She also knows better than any of you that how a person comes across in the classroom has next to nothing to do with how they come across in a social setting. It's her choice, and unless you have some specific objection that you want to discuss in a rational manner, then leave her alone."

"What about the age difference?" Harry asked softly. "He's old enough to be your father."

Hermione stopped at the next landing, so she could look Harry in the eye when he reached the step below. "I married a man seven years older than me, and I thought we'd have matching Zimmer frames. It didn't work out that way, but I wouldn't change the time we had together for anything. Severus is twenty years older than me. In wizarding terms, it's nothing. Maybe we will grow old and grey together. Maybe we won't, but I'll worry about him being a hundred and eighty to my hundred and sixty when we get that far." She looked from Ron to Ginny. "Your dad had it right. Young and whole men don't stay that way, and I've found someone I think I can care for. I'm not going to give up on him because he's old enough to remember the Bay City Rollers."

"Actually," Severus's voice carried up from the bottom of that flight of stairs. "I preferred T Rex."

Hermione grinned. "Much more manly," she remarked.

"I hope I didn't keep you waiting too long?" Severus asked as he overtook Ron, Ginny and Harry.

"Just long enough," Hermione answered, reaching out to take Severus's hand in hers for the rest of the climb.

---

Severus's eyes scanned the crowded Room of Requirement, like a hawk looking for prey. "Hagrid?" he suggested.

"Huh?" Hermione asked.

"I would rather get those apologies I need to make out of the way, but I assume that if I were to leave you unattended, then Potter and Weasley would mount another attack and my earlier rescue would all be for naught. I thought Hagrid might be a suitable companion to leave you with temporarily."

"If it wasn't for the fact that my parents would take it as a personal insult that I didn't introduce you to them straight away," Hermione added. "I'll probably be reprimanded for not introducing you before the match."

"Your parents?" Severus quickly asked before he stifled any hint of unease. "I didn't believe you were expecting to see them today."

"I wasn't, but Mum and Molly like to gang up and surprise me every now and then."

"Where are they?" Severus asked.

Hermione's laugh was like water burbling from a fountain. "You'll know them when you see them, believe me. They're probably not too far from Molly and Arthur." She led him toward the corner of the room where Arthur was readily visible thanks to his height.

What little was left of his once vibrant hair had faded to a sandy shade, and the laugh lines around his eyes had deepened, but his eyes still sparkled with warmth and intelligence as he watched his daughter-in-law and her escort approach. "Severus! Hermione! Come and join us," he called out.

"See," Hermione whispered to her escort. "Does that sound like he blames you for what happened to George?"

"Arthur was always more forgiving than Molly," Severus answered equally quietly. "Well, I suppose I can at least get those apologies out of the way." He closed the last couple of steps and released Hermione's hand so that he could extend his to Arthur in greeting.

Arthur shook Severus's hand enthusiastically while Hermione greeted Molly and two of the most Mugglish Muggles Severus could imagine. "Arthur, about George—"

"Severus, accidents happen in war. George knew the risk he was taking," Arthur answered calmly.

"But—"

"Severus," Molly cut in. "I won't deny that we held a grudge at first, but Harry saw to it that we understood what happened. Did you really think that after everything you went through we would blame you because the person you were trying to protect our son from happened to move at the wrong moment? Even if we had, the debt would have been more than offset by what you did to protect Ginny the following year. I'm sure if you hadn't intervened, the Carrows would have come up with a far more inventive punishment for trying to steal Gryffindor's sword than a trip into the Forbidden Forest."

"You can't mean that," Severus protested. "I maimed your son."

"George is fine," Arthur assured him. "He's a bit deaf, especially when it suits him, but he's healthy and he's happy, and he has been for a very long time, thanks in no small part to you."

"I didn—"

This time he was prevented from further protest as Hermione placed her fingers on his lips. "Severus, don't you realise that it was your memories that gave Harry the information he needed? Without you, Voldemort would have won. By now, there wouldn't be a Muggle-born left, and if families like the Weasleys survived..."

"We'd be homeless, or in hiding or in Azkaban," Molly finished with a noticeable shiver. "Or worse."

"I— Excuse me." Severus turned abruptly on his heel, heading rapidly for the door.

"Hermione?" Her bewildered mother looked to Hermione for an explanation of Severus's abrupt departure, and her father stepped up to place a reassuring hand on his wife's shoulder.

"Don't worry about it, Mum. I'll check on him in a bit if he doesn't make it back on his own."

"Who is that man, Hermione?" her mother persisted. "The only Severus you've ever mentioned was your old teacher, but in my day we didn't touch our teachers the way you just touched him."

"I didn't touch him like that when I was his pupil, either, Mum, but I'm not a student any more. I'm his colleague and his equal, and some day, if things go as well as we'd both like, I may be his wife."

"Hermione!" The shocked chorus came from Molly and both her own parents, but it was to the one person who had remained silent that Hermione turned her attention. Arthur knew Severus. Her parents didn't, and Hermione trusted Arthur's judgement.

Arthur met her gaze steadfastly as always. He said nothing for a long couple of seconds, simply looking her in the eye while he considered. "Severus is a good man," he finally pronounced. "I hope you'll both be very happy."

Hermione threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around his waist and hugging him tight. "Thank you, Arthur!"

"You're welcome, dear," Arthur assured her as he stroked her hair. "You know Molly and I think of you almost as if you were our own daughter. We just want you and the children to be happy."

"Mum? Dad? I know you don't know him and, well, I know it was a little weird the way he rushed off like that, but..."

"Severus is a very private person," Arthur observed, "and his role in the war meant he was treated with mistrust more often than not. I suspect he thought we would be less than sympathetic."

Hermione smiled her appreciation of Arthur's understanding.

Her mother's smile was far more hesitant, but it was there nonetheless. "If you think he can make you happy. You've always made the right choices up until now."

"What about Pip and Will?" her father asked.

Hermione gave a small silent laugh. "I know it sounds like a strange thing to say about a teacher, but he's not used to dealing with children. He's really trying, though. He gave Pip his memories of her dad's Hogwarts Quidditch games. I think she's willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, but Will will take a bit of convincing before he's prepared to step down as 'Man of the House'. It's early days."

Molly gave a wistful sigh. "It might seem hard to imagine now, but in three years both of them will be making their own way in the world. Will knows that just as well as you do. He'll come around if he sees Severus makes you happy."

Hermione rolled her eyes. "I wish I was as sure as you are. He's got Charlie's stubborn streak."

"And underneath all that teenaged angst, he's as soft-hearted as either one of you," Arthur added.

"Who's soft-hearted?" Ron asked, as he, Gabrielle, Ginny and Harry joined the group. "And don't tell me you're talking about Snape."

Harry passed Hermione a glass of white wine and then took a sip from the glass he retained.

Gabrielle shook her head slightly, and Ron's eyes took on a lightly glazed expression as her long platinum tresses caught the light. "Ron sees things always as a man."

"How else am I meant to see them?" he asked.

"Well," Gabrielle began. She spoke slowly, as was her habit when speaking English, and her phraseology was occasionally a little off, but, unlike her sister, she no longer had a readily discernible accent. "I think your Severus is very brave, and quite... ehm, dashing? Not a pretty man, perhaps, but handsome like the hawk. In France, women are educated to appreciate the mature men."

Ron opened his mouth, but quickly closed it again. As so often happened, Gabrielle had closed down his objections effortlessly. If his wife said she appreciated mature men, the last thing he would think of doing was pursuing a juvenile argument, at least in front of her.

Ginny lifted an eyebrow and treated Hermione to a teasing smirk.

Hermione turned to her oldest friend. "Harry? I take it you have something to say on the matter since you were tagging along after Ron."

To her surprise, Harry grinned at her before he took another sip of wine. "Mostly I just wanted to hear what you had to say, but I get the impression that this is one of those female things. If I was still young and stupid, I'd probably pester you anyway. These days, it's enough that you think you know what you're doing and Ginny agrees... Just so long as he knows that if he hurts you, you've got five brothers-in-law who'll hunt him down."

Ron grinned broadly at this suggestion, the gleam in his eyes verging on manic until Gabrielle nudged him and asked where he'd put Pip's present.

Ginny gave a snort of laughter. "Men! He trained you all."

Hermione nodded her agreement. "She's right. It'd be like setting Dawlish on Dumbledore. If I thought there was any need to threaten him so he stayed on the straight and narrow, I wouldn't be... seeing him in the first place. And Molly's way scarier than the five of you." She crinkled her nose as if considering. "Okay, maybe Bill could be vaguely intimidating..."

"Heyyy!" both Harry and Ron protested.

"What are they complaining about now?" a youthful voice interjected, and Pip cut into the group at her mother's side, drawing Severus with her.

Ginny grinned as Severus wrapped his free arm around Hermione's waist. "We were just debating which would be more intimidating to someone who knows them, say if it was a matter of protecting the family; your Grandma Weasley or all your uncles?"

"Grandma," Pip answered without hesitation.

Ginny looked Severus in the eye and lifted an eyebrow.

Severus took a moment to watch Bill across the room and consider. "Molly. Bill may have learned some nasty curses over the years, but knowing them and using them are two different things. Molly fought Bellatrix and won. That not only needed skill, but the ferocity of a mother defending her own." He inclined his head in Molly's direction. "Only a fool would think of hurting someone you call family."

Ginny laughed out loud at Ron's crestfallen look, but her husband didn't care particularly about the slight to his masculine pride. Severus had made it plain he understood the implicit warning.

No one commented further, and Severus dove in to take advantage of the lull in conversation. "I'm very sorry about my abrupt departure before, Mr Granger, Mrs Granger. I'm afraid I haven't completely got over the nausea from the long-distance Portkey, yet."

"Mum, Dad, this is Severus Snape. I know you've heard me talk about him before. Severus, this is my mother, Tracey, and my father, Alan."

Severus nodded his acknowledgement. "A pleasure to meet you both."

Pip stepped around Severus to place a peck on her mother's cheek. "I'm going to go see what the rest of the team are up to." She hugged all four of her grandparents before she delivered her parting bombshell. "I just thought Mum would want Sev back." She took the austere teacher into her arms, and held onto him for long enough that he had time to get over his shock and hug her back.

"Sev?!" Harry and Ron chorused.

Pip turned and grinned at her uncles. "You only get to call him that if you have special permission," she announced in a teasing tone. "See you all in a bit."

"Sev?" Ron demanded again.

"Weasley, didn't you just hear Charlie say that she has special permission to call me that? You may call me what you always have, unless you're frightened your mother will reprimand you for bad language."

Hermione swatted gently at her escort's arm. "Behave," she admonished gently.

"Hoi! Hermione!" George's voice carried over from the far corner of the room. "'M'ere, will you?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Come on, you," she told Severus, who bowed again in the direction of her parents.

"Perhaps we'll get a chance to talk more intimately later," he suggested as Hermione towed him in her wake.

"Am I escorting you for my sake or your own?" Severus asked as they wound through the crowd.

"As punishment for scheming with my daughter," Hermione told him. "Do I get to call you Sev?" she teased.

"Only if you want me to call you Herm?" Severus suggested. "I rather like the way that Severus rolls off your tongue."

Hermione turned to face him and stood on tiptoe to kiss him in a not entirely chaste way. "I know."

As she turned back in the direction they'd been going, Severus cast a glance back over his shoulder to see if Hermione's friends had been looking. Potter stared in their direction with his mouth hanging open. "Oh, yes, and she says the Slytherins are scheming."

---

Though both George and Angelina greeted the couple affably enough, Severus was unconvinced by George's desire to discuss his daughter's dropping grades in Defence Against the Dark Arts with her Head of House, and when Hermione and Angelina began to discuss reasons for the apparent decline, Severus took the opportunity to make his last apology.

"I'm sorry about your ear," he began. "It was an accident."

"Fair enough," George answered, steering Severus just a little further away from Hermione. "Now, let's discuss why I really wanted to talk to you," the former twin said in a lower tone. "You spent last night in Hermione's quarters." He held up a hand to cut off Severus's protests. "That's entirely between the two of you. I don't give a damn... unless you hurt her. Hurt her, and I'll make sure that every joke in the shop gets sold for cost price, provided the purchasers swear it's for you."

"I have no intention of hurting her," Severus assured him. "Bu—"

"But accidents happen."

"They do, though hopefully I won't be guilty of anything too heinous," Severus said, not letting George cut in this time. "However, if you did feel compelled to have such a promotional offer, you might find that certain of your more lucrative back room imports would no longer be available to you. For example, you might find that you were no longer the sole British distributor for Och-Kan Products."

"What—"

"What do I have to do with Och-Kan Products? Nothing at all, except for the fact I own the majority holding. A few of the employees have shares, but I have the controlling interest. Check your Mayan mythology, Mr Weasley, and you'll discover that Och-Kan is one of the names of the Vision Serpent. Of course, this entire discussion is purely hypothetical. My intentions regarding your sister-in-law are honourable. However, we cannot come to any formal agreement until such time as I win approval from her children. In the meantime, I would be grateful for your discretion."

George cocked an eyebrow in Severus's direction and met his eyes, taking a few seconds before he replied. "Like I said, none of my business."

"And your offspring?" Severus asked.

"Know when something should be kept within the family," George assured him.

---

Afternoon passed into evening, and aside from a growing ennui with the many threats of dire consequences should he fail to treat Hermione well, Severus was surprised to find that for the most part he enjoyed himself. Will was conspicuously keeping his distance from the couple, though Severus knew that he was seldom letting them out of his sight. All too soon, the pupils' curfew approached, and Fred and Roxanne herded the entire party out onto a staircase that led from the Room of Requirement to a flat area of roof that was not normally there.

George took position by the wall that edged the roof and aimed his wand at the astronomy tower. With a silent incantation, he loosed a ball of fire to land dead centre on its roof, where a tangle of fuses met.

Seconds later, wave after wave of fireworks began to fill the sky. Silver serpents chased green dragons. Blue Catherine wheels, all the varying shades of the eyes Charlie had inherited from her father, careened across the darkening sky. Sparklers danced in the air, writing, "Happy Birthday, Pip!" Rockets arced upward, leaving spiralling trails of red and orange, that somehow combined to precisely match the auburn of Charlie's hair, but Severus didn't watch the sky.

He found, instead, that he preferred to observe the reflected light spilling over the delighted faces of two women he thought he was rapidly beginning to love; of all ironies, two Weasleys, one by marriage and one by birth. Two fiercely intelligent women, who both seemed prepared to accept him for who he was, and damn what the world thought.

And as he watched them, Hermione glanced in his direction, and took her hand from around her daughter's waist, stepping to one side to leave a space between them and beckoning him over, despite Will's forbidding glare from Hermione's other side.

And when he moved into the space that Hermione had created and put an arm around each of them, Charlie looked up at him and smiled. Astoundingly, it seemed like the most natural thing in the world to press his lips to her forehead, and quietly wish her, "Many happy returns."

Too soon, the children returned to their dormitories, and he and Hermione escorted their guests to the school gates, with a parting promise to her parents that they would call on them in the morning.

Severus walked her back to the door of her quarters, where he took her face in both of his hands and pressed his lips to hers. "I'm afraid it is my turn to stalk the corridors tonight. Perhaps, you will join me for a nightcap before I retire?" he suggested.

"Perhaps," she replied, though her eyes promised a more definite response. "When?"

"About an hour. In the meantime, might I suggest that you add an Unplottable Charm to your private rooms? It appears that someone noted our location last night. I suspect that Potter's map is still in use. I'll let you know when I'm ready for you."

Hermione smiled mischievously and stood on tip-toe to whisper in his ear. "I've been ready for you for hours."

"There were many times over the years when I believed you and your confederates would be the death of me. I never thought I might actually enjoy it," Severus crooned in return.

She reached up to tuck a stray strand of hair, which had escaped the band she'd put in for him that morning, behind his ear. She let her fingertips brush the line of his jaw as she withdrew her hand and reached behind her to open her office door. "Soon... Sev-er-us," she promised as she slipped through the doorway.

---

Severus called in at the kitchens on his way to his quarters, allowing Sylvie to choose a bottle of wine for him. "The best, Sylvie."

"Once McGonagall deducts the cost of the best from your salary, you'll have no salary left. What about this one?" the elf demanded.

"The best," Severus re-affirmed.

"More money than sense," the elf muttered under his breath as he gave a snap of his fingers and disappeared. A few seconds later there was another pop, and he handed Severus a dusty bottle. "That harridan wouldn't know the difference between vintage elf-made cabernet sauvignon and paint stripper. They used to get the decent stuff, but he must have been the one with taste because she buys fizzy screw-top rubbish."

"She isn't a harridan, and even if she wouldn't know the difference, and I suspect that you're wrong, I would. This isn't a night for cutting corners, Sylvie."

"I'll remind you you said that when you complain about not seeing a Galleon until September," the elf insisted.

"I'm sure you will, my friend, if you hear me complain."

---

He shed his outer layers as soon as he reached his private quarters, stripping down to trousers and shirt sleeves. Another five minutes saw the rest of his preparations made, including casting an Unplottable Charm on his private rooms. Then, came the moment of truth.

For the first time in over two decades, he cast a Patronus Charm. Unconsciously, he held his breath as the creature took shape, willing his spirit familiar to find Hermione and pass on his message.

It streaked toward the fireplace before he had a chance to observe its form fully, but he was sure of one thing; no deer had wings.

---

Hermione sprawled on her couch. She had a book in her hand, but she had long ago given up on her attempts to read it, having found herself repeating the same paragraph over and over as her attention wandered to the events of the last couple of days.

She had debated over how she should dress for her assignation, whether she should go as she had dressed for the party. In the end, she had decided that she needed to erect no pretence, and she'd prepared for bed as usual, stripped of make-up and teeth brushed and flossed, though she'd chosen one of her favourite robe and nightdress combinations, a calf-length set of cream-coloured silk.

She pondered the moment that had set all this in motion, the single memory she had seen in his mind. It was, she was sure, inaccurate. She doubted that she had looked as radiant as his recollection, but it was obvious that in that moment, something in her look or her smile had caught his attention in a way she would never have believed possible.

Still, his momentary attraction might have passed unremarked and remained unacted upon, if not for their mental communion and its underlying message of a deeper connection. The book on her shelf called it 'Magic of the Mind', but Hermione preferred to see it as two hearts and souls calling out to each other. Yes, they connected on an intellectual level, but so much more. She smiled to herself at both the thought of the svelte body Severus customarily hid under layers of robes and Harry's squeamishness when she mentioned it. On some levels, she thought, no matter how old they got, all men would always be teenaged boys.

Which brought her to the biggest potential problem, her teenaged boy, and the fact that he was acting like a teenaged boy. Of course, she would never have believed that Severus could win over and apparently be won over by her teenaged daughter in the space of a day, so maybe, just maybe, there was hope. Perhaps, she should arrange for Will and Severus to share a detention...

And as she pondered how Will would react if Severus made him disembowel horned toads, the translucent bird arrived. It perched on her coffee table and tilted its head to one side as it looked at her. "Come to me, please," it requested in Severus's sultry smooth tones.

In a matter of seconds Hermione had acceded to his request. His sitting room was lit by candlelight rather than lamps, and, as if he were making a point of letting her see him at his most relaxed, Severus had his arms draped over the back of his leather sofa, with his legs propped up on a footstool, ankles crossed. A study in black and white. As she stepped clear of the fireplace, he held out a hand to her.

She took it, lifting it over her shoulder as she tucked herself in against his side and draped a leg over his.

"Wine?" he suggested, gesturing with his free hand to the end table where the bottle he had received from Sylvie waited with two glasses.

"Do you mind if I pass?" Hermione asked, reaching up to free his hair from its band. "I have to admit that, as attractions go, the nightcap came a very poor second to your company."

"Damn you, woman," Severus replied, managing to make the curse sound like a caress. "Are you always so direct?"

Hermione brushed her lips against his jaw before nibbling gently at his earlobe, a tactic she had discovered was guaranteed to make him squirm. "When I want someone, yes. Gryffindor, remember?"

With barely a twist of his upper body and a push of one foot against the chair arm which slid them both along the slick surface of the leather, he was poised above her as they lay along the sofa's length. "How could I ever forget?" he purred as her hands pulled his shirt free from his trousers. "No plan survives contact with a Gryffindor."

"Was it a good plan?" she asked as she pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it to the floor.

"I can't remember," he replied, the tip of his tongue tracing the line between her sternum and the tip of her chin while his hands pushed her robe down her arms.

She tugged her arms free of the restricting fabric, and reached up to cradle his face, her eyes meeting his. "Severus, tell me this is real for you, too. Tell me your heart beats faster when I walk in the room. Tell me that you're falling so hard and so fast that you don't know if you're ever going to come up."

"The answer to those questions is in my trouser pocket," he answered.

"Severus!"

"Yes, yes, yes, and I said in the pocket, you penis-obsessed hussy," Severus answered in an amused tone, pushing himself back into a seated position, perched on the very edge of the sofa. He reached into the front of his pants and took something small between his fingers. "This was part of the plan you derailed so effectively." He took her hand in his and placed the object on her palm.

Hermione stared uncomprehendingly at the worn band of white metal and diamond. "Severus? This is an engagement ring."

"It belonged to my grandmother." He held up a hand to stop her interrupting. "Just listen. This morning you thought I was pushing you away, and since I am who I am, it occurred to me that this was unlikely to be the last time you came to that conclusion. I wanted you to have this, so that you know that you're important to me. Whenever you doubt my feelings, I wanted you to have something concrete, something meaningful that you would be able to use as a touchstone. Think of it as an eternity ring if you feel that's appropriate.

"I don't expect you to wear it on your left hand. Possibly some day, but I doubt I'll convince Will any time soon. You don't even have to wear it at all, just remember that I gave it to you, and why. It and the wedding band, they were the only things my mother managed to keep. Everything else was sold, everything that belonged to the Princes. Most of it went before I was even born, but no matter how bad things became, Mother wouldn't part with these. When she was dying, she gave them to me. She said they'd brought her mother happiness, and if I ever found the right woman, they would bring me happiness, too."

"Severus..." Hermione's voice was roughened with emotion.

"Hermione, I want you to have it."

Hermione turned the ring over in her palm, admiring its ornate setting. Then she slid it onto the ring finger of her right hand. "Severus, you had me at yes."*

She took his nearest hand in hers, as if the feel of the band on her finger would make it more real for him. "Severus?" she asked slightly hesitantly. "Did you know your Patronus had changed?"

"Know? No. That was why I said nothing when Will challenged me this morning, but I hoped it might have." He gave a wry laugh. "Either way, I thought you had a right to know where we stood before I offered you the ring. Of course, I also hoped it might be something more impressive than a mangy old crow, but beggars can't be choosers."

"It wasn't a crow, idiot," Hermione responded, with an indulgent smile and a slight shake of her head.

"Really? I thought—"

"It's a raven. According to Native American myth, the first man-god and shaman. In some cultures it's seen as a symbol of good fortune. Okay, in others it means the opposite, but proud, noble, intelligent and you." She took her hand from his and used it to push back the wing of ebony hair that framed one side of his face, savouring the silken texture of the strands as they slid through her fingers.

She drew her legs up and swung them out from behind Severus's back. Then, pulling her nightdress off over her head as she moved, she padded toward the open bedroom door.

In a second, Severus was on his feet, and shedding his remaining clothing. By the time he reached the bedroom, Hermione was stretched out in the centre of the huge four-poster, her hair a wild corona against the dark green velvet of the bedspread, and though he needed no encouragement, she whispered an invitation. "Severus, make love to me."

"For the rest of my life," he promised.

The End

*Slightly altered quote by Hermione from Jerry McGuire.