*
Newborn
*

"As wonderful as it's been watching you bugger this all to hell, I've decided to take pity and tell you that you're going about this the wrong way." Ruel was standing over Hermione, who was taking advantage of the fact that every single last werewolf in the ward was ignoring her and getting some work done on the drafting of WERE.

"I'm doing something wrong in your highly esteemed opinion? How shocking. Wait a second, I'll tell you when the world starts spinning again." Hermione didn't look up from the sentence she was working to revise.

"I was bitten when I was thirty-two." Ruel took a seat across the common room table from Hermione.

Hermione set the pen down. "Yes, a werewolf somehow got free in the town of Hollow's Bend, where you were living. You and some friends were coming home from the pub. I've read the files, Ruel."

"Then you know I was working for the sub-section of the MLE dealing with changes in the law at the time of my infection."

Hermione looked up. "They don't consider who you-"

"They think who we were as 'humans' is different than who we are now."

"Tell me how to do this correctly."

Ruel squinted. "That's it?"

"You were expecting something more?"

"I've made no secret of the fact that I don’t like you. I would expect a bit of suspicion on your part, if nothing else."

Hermione brought a hand up to grip the back of her neck. "And what good would it do you to screw this up for me? You'd still be stuck here, and I would still be free to roam about out there, 'sticking my nose in places were it's most likely to be bitten off.'"

Ruel grimaced at having his words regurgitated back at him. "Perhaps I like it in here. They feed me, keep me warm-"

"Treat you like you might pee on the carpets at any moment and deny you the simple powers granted to every eleven year old."

Ruel eyed the wand at Hermione's waist with an expression of such guarded wistfulness that Hermione was forced to close her eyes. When she opened them again, he said, "The anger is easier to handle than anything else."

Hermione knew, remembered yelling at Ginny and Nymph about everything, over the sheer fact of their survival, their togetherness, in the months after the final battle. She plucked her wand from its resting place and handed it to him.

"What are you doing?"

"Take it," she urged. "Repaint the ward, something, just, remember what it feels like not to be angry."

"They'll know." No fear, just sickened acceptance.

"They'll think it's me. Trust me, they're terribly lazy about these things."

His hand shook as he snatched the wand from her. Quietly, as though afraid someone might hear, he cast, "Wingardium Leviosa."

Hermione felt herself rise from the chair and she flapped her arms a bit in a parody of flight, determined to show no fear. He set her down soon enough and moved on, casting small life-giving charms on the plants Redda always requested and could never keep alive without the aid of sun, mending the tear in the sofa that Steven had accidentally made with his claws last transformation, clearing the air of the smell of institutional food. It was no more than fifteen minutes later when Ruel returned to his seat, and handed her back the wand.

"You can keep it until I leave."

"No. It would…I would just-"

Be unable to give it up again if I did that, Hermione supplied mentally. "All right." She took the wand. "Are you going to tell me what I'm doing incorrectly?"

"Is that why you let me have the wand?"

"You were the one who offered your services, pre-wand," Hermione reminded him.

"Yeah, but-"

"I gave you the wand because you're still fucking human. You all are."

"Kieran says Lupin can't take the Wolfsbane."

Hermione went cold. "That knowledge is not for public consumption."

Ruel blanched. "No."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-"

Ruel cut her off. "It's just, I know what we act like, what we are, without the Wolfsbane."

"There were three of you that night, the night you were bitten. You were the only survivor."

"How can you stay with him? Even as a Porlock? Aren't you frightened?"

Without thinking, Hermione said, "I've been more frightened."

"Of what?"

Hermione swallowed hard at the vision of mad-red eyes and Harry and Ron's dead bodies. "Being alone."

"It still doesn't make sense. Choosing to work with us. We're not welcoming creatures. Not even to our own kind."

"It's easier to be angry," Hermione reminded him.

"You're pretty pissed off, eh?"

"Something like that."

"You make a good show of calm."

Hermione gestured to the papers in front of her. "I'm channeling."

Ruel explained, "They hide their fear of us in their anger. You have to divert that anger, make it work for us."

"Make you human."

Ruel took a deep breath. "We are human."

"Yeah," one side of Hermione's mouth quirked in an assessing smile. "You are."

*

Hermione lay down on the floor next to Zev, who was sprawled on his stomach, reading his history text. She watched a picture of the four founders discussing the run of Hogwarts. Helga turned from the meeting to wave at them. Zev waved back. "Professor Snape is in the kitchen."

"Where's Remus?"

"In the kitchen."

Hermione almost asked if he'd checked for signs of life in the last five minutes, then remembered who she was talking to and thought better of it. "How were your classes?"

Zev laid his head down on the floor. "Both Ginny and Professor Snape think my Latin is bad. Professor Snape called it…ab…abby-"

"Abysmal?"

"Yeah, that."

Hermione frowned. "What did Ginny say?"

"That basics are very important to casting the correct spell at the correct time and that it wouldn't do to have me mispronouncing things." Zev hid his face in the carpet.

"Hey." Hermione rolled over to where she was on top of him.

"Minny!" His shout of indignation was more a squeak than anything else.

She rolled off. "We'll work on your Latin this weekend. We'll make it a game, so you can remember."

"Don't you have to work?"

"I'm allowed a day off now and again. Saturday is all yours, all right?"

He turned back to the text, but she could see his grin. "Yeah, thanks."

She got to her feet, determined that there had been silence from the kitchen far too long for her own comfort. "Sure."

There was obviously a silencing ward in place, as when she stepped through the kitchen door, Remus was growling, "If I needed the assistance of a prig, I would have said, 'Why, Severus, come over here and help me.'"

"And what were you attempting to assist with, if I may inquire?" Hermione dropped into a chair and casually crossed her legs.

Both men spun around from the counter they were facing. Remus blushed. Snape snarled. Hermione waited.

Snape finally offered, "I was merely trying to make sure that dinner would be an edible meal rather than a new potion ingredient."

Remus opined, "I was doing fine on my own. Ginny taught me this, step by step."

"Obviously she overestimated your ability. An easy mistake; most grown men are aware of the ways in which a gas stove works."

"Perhaps grown men who spend their days copulating with cauldrons over said stoves as to provide warmth they cannot dredge up themselves."

"Better a lonely life than a wasted one, Lupin."

"I'll tell you what," Hermione stood fluidly, "I'm gonna take Zev to dinner over at Gin and Nymph's place. You two floo me when you're done picking each other apart in a futile exercise of asserting your non-existent self-worth. Sound good?"

She was nearly past the sound barrier when Remus bit out, "Min. I'll…I'll behave."

She waited without turning back for Snape's trademark sigh. "Very well, Miss Granger. I shall attempt to curb my tongue."

Without saying another word on the subject, Hermione walked to the stove. "Now, what seems to be the problem?"

Remus muttered, "Nothing. Severus fixed it."

Hermione rounded on Snape. "You cook?"

"Yes." Snape didn't elaborate, and something in his tone kept Hermione from prying for details.

"I know you can be patient, all indications aside. I've heard you with Zev."

Snape recognized it for the reprimand that it was. "It takes energy."

Courage, rather, if Hermione's suspicion was correct and Snape used his tongue like Hogwarts used its battlements.

Remus leaned back against the counter. "Spare some for us."

Snape looked down in surprise as Gwen tried to climb his robes. He stood stock still until Remus took pity on him, sweeping the kneazle into his arms for a good cuddle. Snape accepted the gesture with a nod of his head and set to preparing the table for dinner.

*

The first time Hermione had ever caught Ginny and Nymph in some stage of flagrante delicto had been slightly before the twins' deaths. Hermione had been paroling the seventh floor when she heard something. Slipping into a room that she would only later realize she was familiar with, Hermione spied Ginny sprawled naked on a bed. Nymph was draped over her, equally naked, her mouth working the peak of Ginny's right nipple. Hermione had backed out of the room to the sound of Ginny mewling, her neck arched so that only the slightest of sounds could work their way past swollen lips.

It hadn't been until she was back in the safety of her own bed that Hermione had remembered something: the Room of Requirement only showed itself to those who really needed it.

This understanding and the fact that the picture of Nymph's back, elegant in its slenderness and draped in electric blue curls, refused to leave Hermione's mind, drove her to sneak down into the boy's dormitory so often and with such sexual single-mindedness that Ron was finally given to demand, "What, are you in heat, or something?"

The second time she had "caught" them was right before they made their relationship public, and completely different, although still drenched in memories of Ginny's cries. They had been fully dressed at that time, hidden in the dark of the closet in Molly and Arthur's bedroom. Hermione had come up to use the toilet in their bathroom, to cry out of the sight of others, particularly the last two Weasley children.

She had heard Ginny's sobs emanating from the direction of the closet and was debating whether to go to her, offer her someone to cry with, when she heard Nymph's answering, "That's right, just like that. I'm here."

Hermione had tiptoed the rest of the way to the bathroom and warded it for silence, screaming until her throat needed repairing by way of a wand.

She had drawn away from them after the funeral, when Ginny spent all her time not at Hogwarts, but in the small apartment that Nymph had always referred to as her bachelorette pad. There had been a numb jealousy at seeing how Nymph was the only person who could make Ginny smile, how Ginny sometimes whispered things to Nymph that made her roots go darker.

Ginny and Charlie had split the financial leavings of their parents, Bill, Percy and the twins. Charlie had thrown most of his half into helping with rebuilding efforts, particularly putting together The Weasley Foundation, which helped Hogwarts students of financially strapped families afford books and other necessities. Ginny had given some of hers to help him get the Foundation off the ground and had put another large chunk into helping Nymph buy a house on the rather questionable salary of an Auror.

Hermione wasn't entirely sure if the two of them moving into the house together had been the impetus for project Hermione-Has-Moped-Long-Enough, but the two events always coincided in her mind. She had learned rather quickly that it was harder than it looked to ignore a determined Nymphadora Tonks. Particularly when paired with a hell-bent-upon-her-way Virginia Weasley.

Nymph would commute the two floors from the MLE to The Department at the end of the work day and hang out until Hermione agreed to come home with her. Ginny would send owls to Hermione's apartment asking inane, coffee-conversation type questions until Hermione came over just to stop the torrent of creatures flying through her flat. Nymph would buy the same book for herself and Hermione and then guilt Hermione into reading it so that she would have someone with whom to discuss it.

Eventually, Ginny would bite out, "I'm sorry I'm not Ron and Nymph's not Harry, but we're doing our best and you could at least try and appreciate it."

So Hermione had tried. And had come to find that, actually, sometimes the two women made it rather easy.

She wasn't surprised, flooing into their place during her lunch hour one day, to find Ginny hoisting Nymph onto the back of the couch, Nymph's legs wrapping around Ginny's already bare torso. She had stumbled upon them halfway to intercourse more often than not since they had included her in their personal wards. She didn't watch and then flee as with that first time, instead just snorting, "It's the middle of the afternoon, for Merlin's sake, put your top back on, Virginia."

Nymph craned her neck so that she was facing Hermione, "Ah, if it isn't the modesty squad."

Hermione was relatively sure she had done things with Ron and Harry that would have Nymph scrubbing her eyeballs before figuring out how to adapt it to work with another woman, but all she said was, "Seriously, Gin, I need to talk, and your breasts are distracting me."

"I only wish." Ginny drew back from Nymph and disappeared behind the couch for a few seconds before re-emerging, top in place. She pushed Nymph over so that she fell backwards onto the couch. She stayed there, her head dangling upside down from Hermione's perspective. Ginny came around and sat next to her. "Talk."

Hermione sat down in the armchair next to the couch. "I need someone who thinks like a wizard."

"Why don't you work in that capacity?" Nymph righted herself so that she could snuggle up against Ginny.

"Too much Muggle-embedded consciousness."

"All right." Ginny wrapped an arm around Nymph's waist. "What's your dilemma?"

"Wizards don't see werewolves as human."

Nymph wrinkled her nose. "Not really, no."

"So the werewolves don’t see themselves as human. Social conditioning. Pretty normal. Ruel says I need to make the public see the werewolves as human, and in the long run, of course, he's right."

"But?" Ginny prompted.

"But how can I make the public see them as humans when they don’t see it themselves? No, the first step is to rectify their way of thinking of themselves."

Nymph leaned forward, nearly cutting off her air supply. "What's going on in that brilliant little brain of yours?"

"Ruel was right, I am going about WERE in the wrong way, just not in the sense that he was thinking. I have money, right? Lots and lots of money and nothing particularly worthwhile to do with it. And a house in the middle of nowhere. A house that I can build onto as much as I want. I figure, the wizarding world wants the werewolves tracked or institutionalized, so we can give them that. I redraft WERE to require that the alternative to branding is not Mungo's, it's a school. All children bit before the age of minority must, by law, be dropped at the school. Anything else will be considered murder or neglect and prosecuted as such. The adults have their choice, but the school offers a job, either teaching or in some other capacity, room and board. The children learn to socialize, the adults relearn responsibility to their community…it becomes a working, human collective. Then, if it works, then we see about truly getting things changed."

"Do you want us to tell you the risks, or support you blindly?" Ginny asked.

"I actually think I've covered all the risks, I've been cooking this up for a bit, but throw what you can at me."

Nymph offered, "You'd be letting what was last estimated at seventy-eight werewolves, plus any new infectees, into your house."

"I'm good on the numbers, this is what I do day in and day out. I have to talk with Snape about his contract with Mungo's and getting it transferred, of course. I also want to see what he can offer by way of advice as far as if there are problems with the Wolfsbane, outside of Remus. I'm going to talk to Nora about medical specialists in the area. Mungo's doesn't support any, but I've heard rumors of ones in parts of Asia. We'll see, I have to believe anyone specializing would jump at the chance to be involved in such a large scale community."

"Possibly," Nymph granted. "But there is still the issue of Remus, there can be absolutely no humans around unless you plan on chaining him for the full, which is hardly fair. And have you even spoken to him about this?"

Hermione crossed and uncrossed her legs. "Not…exactly."

"Code for not-even-remotely," Ginny read. "Bloody hell, Min. I talk to that man more than you do."

"Well, you have been giving him regular lessons." Hermione willed herself not to blush.

"Forget all your other problems, you can't go a step further with this without speaking to him." Nymph looked angry.

"I didn't mean-"

"What you did with Harry may or may not have been the right decision. I didn't know him as well as you, so I'll go on believing that what you did was for the best. I can even concede that it may have been the only decision in the case of- In the case of my brother." Ginny took a deep breath.

Hermione tried to draw herself up past the two inches she could feel of herself. "I'm so sorry-"

"We're alive," Nymph cut her off. "And we all know that if you're going to be sorry, you have to be sorry for that too."

"As I was saying," Ginny sounded slightly exasperated, "you made the decision you felt you had to make then. But Remus isn't Harry, and we aren't fighting for the fate of our world, and you can't go about your life leaving other people in the dark."

Hermione tugged at a strand of hair. "I really was planning on telling him. I've just been so caught up in the formulation of the idea, and I…I don't want him to leave if he doesn't like the idea. I'm…afraid."

"C'mere." Nymph curled her fingers in a beckoning gesture. Hermione obeyed, settling herself in the middle of the two women as they shifted to accommodate her.

Ginny rested her chin on Hermione's shoulder. "We're still gonna be here. Even if he isn't."

It was comforting, but not as comforting as Hermione would have hoped. Nymph pecked her cheek, "Something's gotta work out for you, luv. Maybe this is it."

*

"They would sooner raise Voldemort from the dead than they would give us wands." Remus had turned away from Hermione at some point in her explanation.

Hermione hugged herself. "Ever read any Muggle history about the civil rights movement in America?"

"The Colonies, you mean?"

"You're joking." Hermione figured she had the right to hope.

"My dad grew up in the second stodgiest Muggle family in the Western Hemisphere, right after the Dursleys. What I know of Muggle history isn't exactly enlightened. Mum was more with the times, but her family had been wizards for several decades, so not much help in the way of Muggle views."

Hermione sat down on the couch, folding her legs beneath her. "For a considerable period of time, blacks and whites were kept separate from each other. Blacks weren't allowed to use the same bars, pools, public toilets, public anything that whites used. The idea was that everything was supposed to be 'separate but equal'."

Remus snorted. "I can imagine."

"Exactly. But I think that reasoning might work on the Ministry, nonetheless."

"You're asking that I allow this place to be turned into just another prison."

"No." Hermione shook her head. "It already is a prison."

Remus turned to meet her eyes.

"Tell me differently, Remus. Tell me you can leave anytime you want and have somewhere to go. Tell me there aren't wards to keep your wolf form in and others out. The bars may be decorated, but they're still bars."

Remus narrowed his eyes, not saying a word.

"I'm asking you to share your prison. Transform it."

"What do you get out of this? You're free. You're…practically the exact opposite of everything we are."

"On a smaller scale? I'm probably going to take Care of Magical Creatures for myself, and that should be grand fun. On a larger? I dunno. The sleep of the just?"

"I don't want-" Remus cut himself off.

Hermione stood up, walking to him. "You don't want what?" She didn't give him time to answer, noticing, "Merlin, you're shaking."

Remus flinched away from the hand she tried laying on his shoulder. "I don't want to share you and Zev."

Hermione frowned. "You don't-"

"I've shared everything that's mattered in my life. Sirius with James, Sirius with Harry, Harry with the entire fucking world, Dumbledore with every other student Hogwarts has ever seen…It was okay, then, to be the one who mattered less, because I was taught that I deserved it, that I was less than human. But you can't look at me, and tell me I'm every bit as human as you are, and give me to two people who believe it and then make me less again. You just can't."

The words were delivered in a tone as sharp as the fingernails he had driven into Hermione's wrists at some point during the tirade, and she kept her eyes wide in an effort not to let tears fall. "If anything, I would be sharing you."

"Don't," Remus warned.

Hermione ignored him. "I know something about sharing, too. I know about being the last one in on all the secrets, I know about having to give someone up for others. I know that right now, you and Zev are mine. You depend on me, he maybe even loves me. The minute I let other people through that door there will be others to claim your time and your need and your affection. But you both deserve that chance. As much as I hate it."

Remus let go of her wrists, swearing at the small cracks of broken skin. He cradled one wrist in his hand. "Min."

"It's fine, I've got some of that healing ointment Snape left for The Walking Disaster." As Zev got more comfortable in the house, he also got more accident prone. Snape had brought the bottle over without being asked after noticing all the minor cuts and scrapes that adorned Zev's body. Hermione had smiled in heartfelt gratitude at Snape and he'd been avoiding her ever since.

"If you want your school, I won't be the one to stop you."

Hermione was the one to shake as she went up on her tiptoes, pressing her lips to Remus' for a second before drawing back. "We could…make a pact."

"Like first years?" Remus's voice was hoarse.

Hermione showed him the blood on her wrist. "Exactly like first years."

"What's the pact?"

"That we won't share each other."

"No sharing." Remus caught her up in a quick kiss, a swipe of his tongue ending the contact. "Better than blood, I think."

Hermione licked her lips. "Not very first year-ish."

*

Hermione kidnapped Charlie over teatime and dragged him to Minerva's office, which boasted two benefits the Ministry did not. The first was nearly guaranteed privacy. The second was Minerva.

Who looked up and commented, "I was beginning to think you weren't going to make it."

Hermione collapsed into a chair, hitting her tailbone. "Ow. It's been a mess this morning. Food poisoning, if you can believe it. Neither Verona nor Gerard can keep a thing down. I've been yelling at anyone who will listen, which is nobody, of course, because it doesn't matter if they get sick. It doesn't matter if they die." Hermione growled. "This has to work, I have to get them out of there."

Minerva rustled through the papers on her desk. "I've read through the basic draft you sent me. I believe you're on to something, but there's still the overwhelming barrier in regards to the fact that you will be training these children to possess magical wiles, something the Ministry fears above all else."

Charlie chimed in, "Even with Kingsley in charge, you know his main concern is international cooperation in case of future Dark uprisings and he can only back one unpopular bit of legislation at a time. If you were willing to wait-"

"I can't," Hermione interrupted.

"I know, but half of politics is timing." Charlie rubbed at his temple. "I'll back you, of course, but I don't know how much help that's going to be, considering that people still think I'm nutters over the whole Mermaid Property fiasco."

Charlie's first act as head of the Department for Regulation of Magical Creatures had been to gain Merpeople dominance over the waters they inhabited. It had made the Ministry an invaluable ally and gained Charlie an uncountable number of enemies.

A fourth voice joined the conversation. "You're forgetting, my children, what the other half of politics is." Albus Dumbledore's portrait-self smiled down at them.

"The ability to twist words like taffy?" Minerva suggested, bitterness lining each syllable.

Dumbledore chuckled. "Not quite, my dear. Historical precedence. I'm mildly surprised Miss Granger hasn't already figured out the way to get her Enactment. Binns would be most disappointed."

"Binns doesn't recognize me when I pass him in the halls on my way up here," was Hermione's distracted answer. "There's barely any recorded history on werewolves. History is written by the oppressors, as you well know."

"You don't need a precedent concerning werewolves so much as one relating to a species that humans feared harm from in some manner," Charlie jumped in.

Hermione bit the inside of her cheek, concentrating on the flare of pain. "A species…oh, Binns, Merlin, the Goblins! The revolts were ended by allowing them an enterprise to which they were bound rather than enslaving or incarcerating them. If I can just mutate it slightly, there was magic involved, but I'm pretty sure that type is no longer allowed, still, there might be something…" Hermione stopped herself, smiling sheepishly up at Dumbledore. "Thank you, Professor."

"You would have figured it out eventually, my girl. Now, if you'll excuse me, Violet's holding a round of poker this afternoon, and my game could use some practice." Dumbledore winked before moseying through the other portraits, greeting his predecessors as he used their homes as a byway.

"You are correct," Minerva told Hermione, "the form of magic used to bind the Goblins to Gringotts is no longer allowed, but Oath Magic is. In fact, it is only a slight variation upon Oath Magic that holds the House Elves. Therefore the Ministry can't argue that non-humans don't qualify in its use."

Charlie added, "And as long as you manage to arrange for an out in the parameters of the school's response to the Oath, in lieu of the House Elves' clothes, then it wouldn't be impossible to release anyone from the Oath, should something go wrong."

"You didn't eat anything at the hospital, did you?" Minerva was examining Hermione with a concerned look.

Hermione blinked. "What? No."

"You appear queasy," Minerva explained.

"Just…the Dark Mark was Oath Magic." Hermione rubbed at the lightening bolt centered over her sternum and thought about markings and loyalty.

"Ah." Minerva pursed her lips. "That's something you should talk to Severus about. Dark magic can twist even the simplest of spells, let alone those with the power for insidiousness built in to them. He would most likely be able to help you avoid problems in that area."

It was the last thing she wanted to talk to Snape about, but Hermione knew that most of the time, achieving her aims took more than a bit of sucking things up and plastering her lip into nearly useless stiffness. "All right. I don't suppose he's around?"

Minerva glanced at the clock on her wall. Three kittens balanced precariously on tiny pebbles, the smallest one stepping from pebble to pebble to display the seconds, two larger ones moving much more slowly so as to give the minutes and hours. "He should be finishing up in fifteen minutes. I hate to push you out, but I have to meet with a student now, so if you want to walk down and wait for him, that would probably be best. It was good seeing you, Min, give my best to Remus and Zev. Charlie Weasley, if I have to tell you to come visit me one more time-"

Charlie held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Next week, at least once, you have my word of honor as a Weasley."

"In the vein of your father, or the twins?" Minerva asked suspiciously.

Charlie's smile was still too sharp at their memory, but his laughter was loud and real. "I guess you'll see come next week."

The two of them stepped into the revolving stairway, Hermione waving shortly as the door closed between them and Minerva. As they spiraled to the bottom, Hermione reached down to squeeze Charlie's hand. In return, Charlie cut off her circulation.

Ron had never quite realized his strength either.

*

Snape greeted her with, "Whatever the pup complained about, he was lying. I've been a perfect gentleman."

Hermione would have laughed at his evident distaste for even saying the words in conjunction with himself, but it would have destroyed any edge she might appear to have. "Your protestations of innocence are rather suspect in the face of my lack of accusations."

"Surely you didn't leave your pet project to have an afternoon chat with me."

"Deliciously clever, Snape." Hermione had learned a thing or two about sarcasm from the man.

"I have things to be doing. What is it? Her Highness Guinevere ate his homework? Lupin used it for kindling while attempting to light the stove? He had an untimely transformation and ate his own homework?"

"What kind of Oath did Voldemort require at the Marking ceremony?" Hermione was pleased at having wiped the smirk off his face for all of a second. Then he turned a shade of gray normally viewed only in freshly mixed cement.

"Is there a point to this stroll down Snape Memory Lane?"

Hermione seated herself on a desk and ignored the disparaging look he hurled her way. "I'm rewriting WERE. It's a bit long to explain, Minerva has a draft I'm sure she'd let you see, but the long and short of it is that I'm creating a school for werewolves. A safe haven, if you will. Dumbledore suggested that I use the precedence of Gringotts in relation to non-human containment spaces, but to do that I need binding magic, and the type used with Gringotts has long been outlawed. Oath Magic is what's left."

"Perhaps the fact that you are obviously frightened by its propensity to form allegiances with the Dark should be a warning to you." Snape hesitated, "You are wise in that fear."

Hermione was so unused to hearing anything complimentary from him that it was a fight not to slip right off the edge of the desk. "I overheard that time when you told Zev that no potion ingredient was inherently bad, not even the poisons."

"That hardly means I would dose a whole community with strychnine."

"Of course not. You would research the effects of strychnine, figure out what about it made it lethal and how it could be adapted to work with whatever concoction you were creating. I've watched you bang your head against the wall in regards to the Wolfsbane for over half a year now, you're too stubborn to give up just because people think things can't be done. So am I."

"Terribly wordy way of saying I can’t change your mind," Snape fussed.

"Turned on?" Hermione joked.

Snape eyed her as though she was something that wouldn't come off the bottom of his favorite cauldron. It might have affected her if she hadn't been so distracted by the suddenly pink tips of his ears.

Snape cleared his throat. "Theoretically, if there are boundaries laid down on the Oath in question, the Magic should have boundaries as well."

"So if I were to make the Oath renewable every year, say, that would limit the effects of mutative magic?"

"Precisely."

"I was thinking that there has to be some way for the bond to hold to the actual structure of the house, as opposed to me or someone else. I suppose I should stop at the library before I leave," Hermione mused aloud.

"See if Irma can't find a copy of Atlantis: The Confluence of Geographical and Magical Space. If it can be done, that will tell you."

"The Atlantis that figured heavily into the plans for the school?"

"It's been around awhile."

"Evidently."

Hermione was sorting through everything she had been told so far when Snape cut into her thoughts. "Find a way around the use of blood."

She stood, walking to where he was watching the inside of a cauldron, waiting for the signal to go further in his endeavors. "I'm sorry I asked like that. About your Oath."

His, "Don't you ever get tired of being sorry after the fact?" wasn't as cutting as she knew it could have been.

"Don't you?"

"A Slytherin knows no remorse."

"Ah," Hermione nodded. "So you left Voldemort at the height of his power because you like fighting for the underdog. We have more in common than I thought."

"There have been exceptions to the rule," Snape conceded.

Knowing when to quit, Hermione started for the door, "Thank you for your help."

"My colleague sent me some news in regard to Lupin's problem. Is there a good time-"

"Dinner tomorrow evening." It wasn't an invitation, it was a demand.

Snape pretended otherwise. "That should be fine."

Hermione allowed him his delusions.

*

"The active ingredients are Niffler blood and Doxy saliva," Snape was telling Remus when Hermione came back down to the kitchen after getting Zev in his bed.

"And it's going to purge the antibodies?" Remus looked vaguely apprehensive.

Snape seemed only too glad to confirm his fears. "It's not going to be pleasant. The blood will seek out the traces of silver in the antibodies and the saliva will make you severely sick, pulling them out of you by any way possible."

Remus sank down into a chair. "But I'll be able to use the Wolfsbane after, right?"

Snape crossed his arms over his chest. "Assuming it works, yes. You forget this is all theoretical. Even if does work…we'll have to wait and see."

"How long will the purging process take?" Hermione asked, sensing that Remus needed a moment to think.

"It depends on how much is in his system. My colleague thinks a couple of days will be sufficient but he admits that it could go on for a week."

"Awful lot of maybes." Remus put his hands between his legs to stop their shaking. Hermione pulled a chair next to him and took his hands in hers, firmly rubbing her thumbs over the inside of his palms. It was a few moments before he was calm enough for her to look up at Snape, ready to ask the next question.

The odd expression on Snape's face made her forget what it was she was going to ask. "What?"

He recovered himself, detached look of condescension sliding over his features. "If you don’t have any more questions, I would appreciate knowing whether or not I will be needing to make this potion. It is somewhat complicated."

Which probably meant it took twelve cauldrons being worked concurrently and a month of minutiae which needed attending. Snape considered the brewing of Wolfsbane to be relaxing. Hermione faced Remus. "I'll talk with Nora. We won’t leave you alone."

Remus stared at their hands. "It could not work."

"We'll try something else." Hermione forced enough conviction for both of them into her voice.

"If you'd like," Snape offered, "I could go home long enough for you two to have a tumble and come back when Miss Granger has 'convinced' you."

Remus moved so quickly that Hermione could still feel his hands in hers by the time he had Snape pinned to the wall, one hand at Snape's windpipe, the other twisting Snape's wand-hand awkwardly above his shoulder. "Not that it's any of your business who she or I chooses to sleep with, but that isn't what this is about. I shouldn't be surprised to find you have no concept of human affection without trade. Still, whether you comprehend or not, you will treat her with the respect due a goddess, due Rowena Ravenclaw, due Queen Guinevere. Or you will leave."

Snape's eyes flashed and Hermione waited with an odd emptiness in the hollow of her throat for him to wrench free and flounce out of their lives. Instead he shrunk slightly, wilting just a little in Remus' hands. "You must… It is as you say. I have no concept."

Remus let go, backing up. Snape's arm dropped to his side, but he otherwise stayed still. Hermione spoke up, "We aren't…this isn't about sex. It's something, but not that. And even if it were, Remus' decisions would still be his own. The respect you extend to me must in turn be extended to him."

"I should not have said that."

Hermione snorted. "No remorse indeed."

Snape glared but let the comment go. "There is still the matter of the potion."

"Yes," Remus sighed. "There is, isn't there?"

"The decision can be put off, the ingredients are available year 'round," Snape put forth. Hermione wondered if that was his version of an apology.

"No. No, make it, I'll try it."

Hermione knew that was Remus's acceptance.

"It takes two full months," Snape warned. "There's fermentation involved."

Remus rolled his neck slowly, whimpering at the tiny pops and cracks the motion released. "You'd best get cracking, then."

"If I get back now, I can start this evening."

Remus motioned that he was free to go. Snape started toward the fireplace. With a quick glance at Remus, Hermione followed. As he was reaching up to pinch some floo powder, Hermione grabbed hold of his hand and squeezed, letting go the moment Snape seemed to realize what was happening. "Now you have some concept," she said, and pushed him into the fireplace.

*

She let Ruel see the final draft before anyone. They hadn't spoken since his assessment of her last attempts, but he hadn't drawn her out, attacked her, or shown any hostility either.

He gave the draft back to her three days later. Attached to the top was a note: "You're cracked, this will never work." She took the lack of grammar corrections as his sign of approval.

Minerva quibbled about student safety issues upon reading it; Remus came and slept in her bed for a night, too still beside her; Snape made sure she'd actually tested her adaptations to stabilize the temporary Oaths. Kingsley offered, "I'll get you into a Wizengamot session, but from there you're on your own."

It took a month. Hermione took the time to plan her attack. Overwhelmingly, the British branch of the Wizengamot was comprised of heroes of the Grindewald Wars. Several of them had been good friends of Dumbledore's and were of his mind on the subject of werewolves. Stuart Muddler and Dahlia Northingham, however, were not. Dahlia was the oldest member of the council and by far its most conservative. Stuart was a puppy compared to most of them at a mere eighty-four, but was stuck on a platform of "bringing the old ways back." Hermione was always tempted to inquire if he meant the ways of Salazar Slytherin and forced wizard ghettoization for fear of Muggle persecution, but she wisely kept her sense of preposterousness to herself.

The council required a unanimous vote on any issue to pass new law, but it was generally recognized that unless one or more members felt terribly strongly about a specific issue, they would give in to the wishes of the majority. Hermione feared this was probably one of those issues wherein the strong feelings clause could be invoked.

Due to this fact, she squashed down the reactionary nausea that, for her, came hand-in-hand with pulling any kind of publicity stunt, and asked Zev if he'd accompany her to the hearing.

Zev cocked his head. "Why?"

Hermione had planned what to say, how to craft her words so that he wouldn’t feel like a pawn. His eyes were so trusting that all she could manage was, "Because you're real. I need them to see what the reality of this is."

"What if they say no?" Zev's breaths quickened slightly. "They could take me away from you."

"No, baby." Hermione swiped a hair from his eyes. They had cut it just two weeks before but it was looking to be almost time again. "I have papers that say they can’t do that. They can't have you back. Ever."

"Am I gonna have to say anything?"

"Nope, just sit there and watch me work. You used to do it all the time. It won't be that different."

"They'll be watching," Zev disagreed. "Waiting for me to screw up."

"But you won't," Hermione reassured him.

"How do you know?"

"You haven't disappointed me yet."

Zev opened his mouth to argue. He shut it, straightening up a bit. "I won't now."

Hermione rewarded him with a hug. "Good. Great."

*

The Zev ploy had worked, if just barely. Northingham had still fought viciously to keep the legislation down, and as a result, it had taken nearly a month for a unanimous consensus to be gained.

A month in which Hermione ate only when reminded, and just barely managed to help Zev with his homework without mishap.

Muddler had worked as the catalyst for the decision in the end, so Hermione was later told. Evidently, Zev was roughly the age of his own grandson, and whatever else was true of the man, he loved his grandchildren more than his prejudices. Muddler put his renowned rhetoric to use on Northingham, and gained Hermione her school.

Luckily, Hermione had decided to be optimistic, and by the time the decision was made, she had a magical building company lined up, with nothing left to do but sign the papers. Remus and her both signed, as she had changed the house to being in both their names. Werewolves could still co-own private property (which made it near impossible for them to own anything, as most wizards refused to co-own anything with one), and it made Remus more secure about his place in their home.

Remus had signed on with the provision that they wait until he was able to test Snape's Anti-Silver Potion and see if it actually affected the Wolfsbane. It wasn't much of a wait, since Snape owled them to say he was finished a day before the Wizengamot's decision came down. Remus had refused to start on it until Hermione was feeling more stable, however, in case he should need her attention.

He took the first batch (Snape had instructed that he take one every morning and every evening for five consecutive days) the morning after the building papers had been signed. The full was in two weeks, so if everything went according to plan, construction could start in three.

Hermione was glad Remus had waited when she arrived home that first day to find Nymph holding tight to a hysterical Zev, and Ginny trying to calm the more obviously agitated boy at the same time as Snape, who looked as though he were watching the final battle all over again.

Hermione grabbed on to one of the overwhelming number of questions flooding her head. "Where's Remus?"

Ginny turned to her, "Thank Merlin you're home. He's in your room. Snape tried to get him settled, but…well, I think you'd best see if you can do better."

"Is Zev-"

Nymph tightened her grip on the boy. "We've got it handled. The professor was smart enough to at least call us once things had gotten completely and utterly out of hand."

Hermione was about to ask why she hadn't been called and what 'out of hand' meant when she remembered that she had asked the Mungo's staff that she not be bothered, since she wanted to talk to the ward inhabitants about the school. The things that the Prophet wouldn't print.

She turned to walk toward the stairs, forcing herself to take them one at a time. She reached her room and opened the door. Remus lay curled under the covers, too tiny a mound in the middle of the bed. Hermione shut the door behind her and walked to the bed, lifting the covers and replacing them over herself, sheltering the two of them beneath. "Remus?"

His breaths were coming in short pants, carrying the smell of metallically tinged sickness. He opened his eyes. "Minny?"

"They sometimes call me that, yes." Hermione was careful not to touch him for reasons that she couldn't explain to herself.

"I hurt Snape."

This was slightly worrying, but as Snape hadn't looked to be terribly injured, she countered with, "You scared Zev."

"I know." Remus tried to curl up tighter. "The medicine…I thought Snape was trying to hurt Zev. It screws things up in my mind. I forgot that Snape wasn't one of them. I forgot…"

"That Voldemort is dead?" Hermione tried.

"That the others are dead. Even Sirius. It was like time disappeared. Except I knew I had to keep Zev safe. I stole Snape's wand, casted an Excoriate on him."

Hermione barely had time to be grateful that it hadn't been one of the Unforgivables. "Did he throw it off?"

"Zev kept screaming at me to stop it. He finally stole the wand from me and practically threw it at Snape. The moment the hex was broken, Snape Petrified me. I probably would've been impressed by the recovery and power in it all if I hadn't been scared out of my mind."

"You been up here ever since?"

Remus nodded. "It took about twenty minutes for the deliriousness to fade, and I spent another thirty getting to know the toilet rim. I crawled into the bed a bit ago. Hope you don't mind, I don't think Snape knew which room he was depositing me in. He cast a reverse warding that I haven't a prayer of undoing, and honestly, it felt less scary in here."

Knowing that whatever had been playing with his mind wasn't doing it for the moment, Hermione brushed a strand of hair out of Remus's face. "It's fine. You can stay here whenever you like."

"Is Zev okay?"

"Snape called Gin and Nymph once you were out of the way, they've got things under control."

"Is he going to kill me once I'm well enough?"

Hermione caught on to the change of pronoun reference. "I don’t think he blames you. He seems a bit surprised. I think he would've told us about this side effect if he'd known. He'll probably bluster a lot and use this as ammunition in fights for the twenty odd years, but really, how is that different from anything else with him?"

Remus allowed a small smile to cross his lips, recognizing the truth of that assessment. "I'll apologize when I've finished on the meds and I can trust myself around him."

"We're gonna have to find a way to make Zev understand."

"It's my mess, I'll take care of it. Just let me sleep, right now, yeah?"

Hermione extracted herself from the covers, reforming them around Remus so that they sheltered him, but no longer covered his head. She leaned down to kiss his forehead. "Want me to stay in your room tonight? Give you some space?"

"Please don't," Remus mumbled, already half asleep.

Hermione whispered, "I'll be here when you wake up."

*

Zev was sleeping with his head on the table when Hermione snuck downstairs, quite sure that Remus would be asleep for some time. Ginny explained, "We found your Dreamless, put a drop in his hot cocoa."

Hermione ran a hand over Zev's back. "Did you get him to eat anything first?"

"Little bit," Ginny sat Zev up and was about to lift him out of the chair when Nymph elbowed her way in. Mobilicorpus worked just as well, but none of them liked using magic on him if it wasn't necessary. His parents had kept him Petrified for large amounts of time after he'd been bitten. Which was probably part of why this afternoon had freaked him out so much.

The thought reminded Hermione of why she'd come downstairs in the first place, "Where's Snape hiding?"

"Probably his dungeons," Nymph grumbled. "We tried to get him to stay, but he wasn't even responding to food bribes."

"All right." Hermione ran a hand over the top of her head. "I hate to ask but can the both of you stay a bit longer? I need at least one of you with Remus. Zev shouldn't be able to wake up for at least eight hours, but-"

"It's covered." Ginny pecked Hermione on the cheek. "Go."

"Thanks," Hermione called, already on her way to the fireplace. She flooed into the teacher's lounge, since that was where her fireplace connected to, and made her way to the dungeons, stopping only for cursory greetings with Firenze and Terry. Snape wasn't in his labs or his classrooms and Hermione followed the path that the Baron had revealed to her earlier that year toward Snape's quarters.

It took ten minutes of solid knocking to get him to answer the door. The expression on his face would have sent her scurrying three years before, but she wasn't afraid of him anymore. At least, not in that way. "You could've waited for me to come back down."

Snape stood back from the door. "This isn't a conversation we're having in the hall."

As loathe as she was to agree with him about anything at the moment, Hermione stepped into his quarters. She was deciding whether to make sure he was all right or ream him a new one when he spoke up, changing all of her plans.

"You have to know I didn't know. I would have said something if I'd known. I most certainly would not have allowed him to be around Mr. Granger. I've owled my colleague to inform him of this rather unexpected side effect." Snape met her eyes, his own hesitantly trusting.

She wasn't sure exactly what he was putting his trust in, but she sighed. "I know. I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

Snape drew himself up. "I'm fine."

"Have you been to Poppy?"

Snape threw her an insulted look, but said nothing.

"Self-medicating, then?"

That broke his silence. "I'm not, as you suggest, a drug addict. I spent four years directly serving Voldemort, another three running in his circles. I know a little something about healing. Myself as well as others. I wasn't even under the hex for that long."

"Yes, well, when something is scraping your insides up from the top down-"

"Miss Granger. I promise you, I am fine. How is your pet beast?"

Hermione gave him a warning look. "I shall let you get away with the name calling this once, and only because of circumstances surrounding. He's sleeping, completely upset at his actions, and worried that Zev is going to hate him. He's relatively sure that next time you see each other there will be words on your part, particularly two, followed by a lot of green light."

"While this is most likely beyond the grasp of your Gryffindor mentalities, I like to think that those two words and everything they imply are something I have left behind me." Snape's tone managed to convey extreme anger, uncertainty and hope all at once.

Hermione silently agreed. "It was a joke. A poor one, I apologize."

Snape neither accepted nor refused her apology. "Mr. Granger wouldn't let me near him when I came back down from locking Lupin up. I had to call the harpies to get him to breathe."

"The harpies go by Ginny and Nymph," Hermione informed him absent-mindedly. "You had to Petrify Remus. Zev's parents kept Zev Petrified and locked in a cage until they were able to drop him off at the Ministry. He came in the cage."

"Ah." Snape's voice was even, but the skin around his eyes paled to the color of mold. "I would suggest throwing off a Petrificus be moved to earlier in his curriculum."

"Way ahead of you," Hermione told him. "But that's a fourth year trick in the best of situations, and he doesn't even have a wand yet. Nor will he until he's eleven. I won't stunt his natural magical abilities by having him channel them before they've fully developed."

"I was using my mother's by the time I was seven. I hardly think my magic has been negatively affected," Snape argued.

"For whatever reason that choice was made, either on your part or the part of others," Hermione could sense the tensing of his shoulders, "I'm glad it worked out. It doesn’t make me any more willing to risk things in Zev's case. Perhaps it was necessity in your case. There is no necessity with Zev. Not immediately, anyway."

Snape inclined his head. "Would you prefer I waited before coming back? Allow him some time to recover?"

"I expect you back tomorrow afternoon, same time, same place. What's more, I expect you to stay for dinner."

Snape looked as though he were considering arguing. For whatever reason, he decided against it. "Keep Lupin away from me."

"Until he's finished with the Potion, of course."

"Tomorrow then, Miss Granger."

The wards let her out without a fuss. It wasn't until she was down the hall that she realized he had set them to recognize her.

*

Back at the house, she flooed Mungo's to tell them she wouldn't be in for a couple of days. Ginny and Nymph offered to stay in Remus's room until things cleared up. She took them up on it, unsure of her ability to take care of both a severely sick Remus and a hyper-nervous Zev.

She showered longer than she had planned. Between talking to the werewolves about her plans for the school and asking their help and the whole situation she'd come home to, her normal sixteen hour day had felt more like a good thirty. She was wrinkled and soft when she stepped out, and she had to wait while she brushed her hair and her teeth and picked out a robe for the next day before putting on her pajamas, letting the heat leech off of her body.

She was startled by Remus's voice as she crawled into bed. "Smell good."

"Hey." She wriggled closer to allow him the full effect. "You're supposed to be asleep."

"Wanted to know how it went with Severus."

Hermione played for some time. "Tell me how you're feeling."

"Like someone is dragging barbed hooks through me, snagging prey, and taking it back out the hard way." He added as an afterthought, "Oh, and I'm a bit queasy."

"Lay flat on your back." She got out of bed, rustling through the chest of drawers against the opposite wall. "Mind if I make it a little lighter in here?"

Remus made a sound of assent. Hermione Charmed the lamps to burn at a low level. She approached the bed again, "Take off your shirt."

It was testament to how truthful he was being about the way he felt that he didn't even murmur a protest, just dragged the shirt up over his head and threw it to the side. Hermione did him the courtesy of not staring at the jagged long-healed scars gracing his torso, only just managing not to make a face at the entry wound of Malfoy's knife, still pink and infected-looking. It was where she started. "This might hurt a bit, but it should make things better rather than worse."

Hermione dipped her fingers into the bottle of peppermint oil. She allowed some of it to drip onto the three-inch not-quite-healed cut before gently rubbing it into the actual surface. Remus sucked in a breath. "Peppermint?"

"It was on the list of things you could ingest while taking the Potion, so it shouldn't hurt to have it rubbed on topically. It'll probably take a while to start working. Just keep breathing."

When Hermione had finished with the wound and was swirling her fingers over less sensitive areas, Remus repeated, "Tell me about Severus."

"He's coming for dinner tomorrow."

"If I wasn’t suspect of the state of his soul, I would guess him positively besotted with you."

"Shut up, you. You owe him an apology, but you can't give it until you're off the Potion, because I'm not allowing you near him a moment before."

Remus sniffed haughtily. The effect was somewhat ruined when he choked on a nasal intake of peppermint. He pretended not to notice. "I'll have you know, I knew that without you having to tell me."

"I do know. All the same, he's had as hard a day as any of the rest of us. He didn’t even want to come back. Thought Zev would hate him."

"Can't imagine anyone doing that." Remus's sarcasm was muted.

Hermione screwed the lid back on the bottle and helped Remus into his shirt. "Better?"

"Starting to be. Thanks."

"I'm staying home tomorrow."

Remus blinked. "You don't have to."

"I don’t like the thought of you being alone."

"I'm quite-"

"I don’t like it." Hermione squirmed to center of the bed, extinguishing the lights with a whispered Nox.

Remus laid down, moving his forehead carefully to connect with her. "Me neither."

When she was sure he was asleep, she moved to hold him, not so that he couldn't get loose, but nearly. Exhausted, she stayed awake.

*

Hermione watched Snape and Zev dance around each other -- Zev caught between terror and embarrassment, Snape unused to having to own up to his actions in any arena that wasn't death defying -- feeling more ineffectual by the moment. Just as she was about to leave them to their own misery and go check on Remus, Snape offered, "I'll teach you how to make a muscle rub. For…after."

"Without a wand?"

"I'll be taking care of that part."

This didn't bother Zev much. "Where?"

Snape looked up at Hermione. "Is the kitchen free?"

"For the moment. Gin'll be back in an hour or so to make dinner."

Snape nodded at Zev to rise. "We should be done by then."

She watched as they walked through the doors, Zev still skittish, if momentarily distracted by his excitement. She made sure Remus was still asleep and caught some rest lying next to him. She woke to a knock on the door. Remus stirred and she pressed a kiss to his forehead, "Shh."

She opened the door, blinking at the greater concentration of light in the hallway. Ginny apologized, "Oh, hey. Go back to sleep."

Hermione ignored her. "Dinner time?"

"Yeah, but I can save some for you."

Hermione stepped into the hall, closing the door softly behind her. "I'm up. Honestly, I wanna see how Zev is doing anyway."

"What the bloody hell were they making in the kitchen?"

"Why?"

"It smells like you let Remus sick up in the sink all day."

Hermione rubbed at her temples. "Fantastic. We can eat in the dining room."

"Nymph already set the places in there."

They reached the dining room and Nymph motioned Hermione into the seat next to Zev. Hermione reached up to mess with his hair. "Hey."

His smile was small, a secret between the two of them. "Hi."

She took that as confirmation that no unmet disasters had occurred while she was upstairs. Just to be sure, she peered over at where Snape was serving himself a piece of the shepherds pie. The set of his shoulders was just a fraction looser than it had been earlier that day, but it was enough.

When he had assembled his plate, he asked, "Lupin?"

Hermione gave him as much as she could. "Sleeping. Sick for about four hours total, on and off, today. It seems to be worst about an hour after he takes the stuff. All he can really get down is fluids, and they only stay down if he takes them after he's done being sick, which we're never quite sure if he's really there or not. Is there some way to tell if it's working?"

"My colleague suggests you keep an eye on the scar from the original wound. It should clear up."

The tips of Hermione's fingers warmed with remembered sensation of rubbing the oil into said scar. "All right."

"I've been thinking," Snape began, and Hermione was tempted, oh-so-sorely tempted to make a crack. She didn't. "Your Act went through, and I assume it only a matter of time before whomever is taking care of your building needs is out here to alter this place satisfactorily?"

Hermione's heart skittered. "Don't tell me that bothers you. You sold the house to me, Snape."

There was a moment wherein his lips drew back, aiming for the kill. Across the table, Nymph tensed, and Ginny cut another piece off her pie with unnerving precision. Instead, he waved a hand. "Hardly. I was inquiring as to the time frame in which you see all of this occurring."

"The school should be fully functional by fall term."

"Staff and students will be arriving before then, however?"

"I'm hoping for June, at the very latest." It was late March.

"Then you will need your Potions cabinet stocked come May," Snape guessed.

"That was on my list of things to talk to people about." Slightly lower than getting the school built, slightly higher than finding someone to cook for all its inhabitants.

"I've spoken to Mungo's, they have absolutely no issue with transferring my contract in regards to werewolf welfare."

Zev made an angry noise which Hermione voiced more coherently. "Shocking."

"I'm willing to extend and rework the contract, if you so wish."

Hermione was just about to nonchalantly schedule a time for them to do this when it hit her. She hadn't asked for this. She hadn't approached him, or hinted, or even really thought about this. It made her dizzy to realize and she put her fork down. "When…when is it good for you? To meet with me."

There was something Hermione couldn't quite hear in his, "I'll find something that works for both of us."

Hermione told Zev to finish his broccoli. She didn't tell Snape that things were already working out for her.

*

Emmett, who had never yet stopped avoiding Hermione at all costs, was the first of the ward inhabitants to approach her. "I don't know of what use I would be in a school."

Hermione did her best to appear nonplussed. "What was your occupation before you were bitten?"

"Cursebreaker. Free lance."

Hermione worked frantically to push thoughts of Bill being locked up to the corner of her mind, where they wouldn't impede this conversation. "I'll assume you're well-versed in hexes also, then."

"I would've put my skill up against anyone's." There was a sliver of lost assuredness around his eyes, but a promise of competence that Hermione had never before seen seemed to settle around his neck, as though waiting to filter the rest of the way through him.

"Know anything about ward creation and maintenance?"

"I've always been the one trying to break them down."

"Should give you a unique perspective. At least you'll know what not to do."

Emmett snorted. "I broke a curse this one time, the creator had left a backdoor to it. On top of the password. Easiest job I ever came across. I was surprised they bothered to hire a breaker, but wizards get intimidated by magic with shocking ease."

Hermione had never thought of it that way. "So you think you can do it?"

Emmett tucked a strand of hair behind his ear. "You have access to the Ministry library, right?"

"Um, well, I have friends who do."

"Would it be a big thing for you to ask them to see if there are any books on the basics of large ward construction? I'd wanna have a step-by-step overview, just in case."

"I can probably do one better and ask Zach Smith to loan me a few out of his personal library. He does this stuff professionally, enacted the wards I have up right now, but a contract this big means a lot of money, even with a friendship based discount, and I'd rather have someone in house take care of it. Quicker response time if something goes wrong."

Emmett hunched his shoulders. "Does your friend…would he be willing to talk me through stuff, if I needed it?"

For one utterly lovely second, Hermione couldn't figure out what he was talking about. Then she remembered. "Oh. Zach's been over to check on the state of the wards and eat with Zev, Remus and me at least five times since we moved in. He's a bit of an arrogant prick until you get to know him, but other than that, there shouldn't be an issue."

Emmett ducked his head. "Yeah, I was probably a bit like that myself. Before."

"I wouldn't mind seeing that again," Hermione whispered. She picked up the volume again with, "Tell me something."

Emmett brought his face up. "Hm?"

"What do you think of Kieran as a headmaster?"

Emmett paused. "He's a bit…odd, isn’t he?"

"I went to Hogwarts under Dumbledore."

"Well, right, so did I. But Dumbledore wasn't a werewolf. Quite respected the old loony was."

"Actually," Hermione paused for effect, "so was Kieran. He mentioned that his wife had worked for the Ministry and that he still had contacts because of that, which I thought was a bit odd, but didn't question until I started getting more and more curious as to why, exactly, Kieran would have chosen Mungo's on top of registration. So while I generally try to respect people's privacy, I did some discreet poking. I asked Minister Shacklebolt if he knew anything. Turns out, he knew Kieran and his wife. Kieran's wife was the personal assistant to the head of the MLE for nearly thirty years. Kieran trained Unspeakables. He retired when he felt he could no longer stand behind the Ministry's hypocrisies, but he remained one of the most respected trainers known to that division. Here's the interesting, part, though: Kieran was bitten when he was thirty-four. He was employed by the Ministry for upwards of forty years, twenty-five of those while infected. I've never asked, but I suspect that Kieran came here out of a responsibility felt toward other werewolves, people he did nothing to protect while he supposedly could." That, and without his wife, Kieran was alone. Hermione hoped his motivation was a bit more complicated than wishing for some company. "He's a teacher, he has a sense of community, and he has some amazing connections to the non-infected community. Tell me where I'm going wrong."

Instead, Emmett asked, "What if he doesn't want it?"

"I'll just have to draft you into service."

"I'll get right on making him see that he's the only person for the job."

Hermione laughed. "You do that."

*

Everybody involved in the situation was so used to things going horribly and utterly awry that it was almost beyond them as to how to feel when the week of Remus sicking up all over the place worked to a purpose. The dose of Wolfsbane that he took before the rise of the full moon worked as it was intended. As a plus, Remus transformed with only the pain of a no-longer-young-body twisting and molding itself into another form.

When he had slept off the worst effects of the transformation, Remus pleaded to her without decorum, "Stay with me while I tell Snape I'm sorry."

"Because I'm the world's most effective referee when it comes to him."

"A sight more effective than me," Remus responded, unmoved.

Despite herself, Hermione could see that was probably true. She came home from work the next day, early enough to ensure Snape staying for dinner.

Remus cooked to show off his growing skill. He made chicken and dumplings, the dish he had the most practice and finesse at, and one that he knew Snape enjoyed. Hermione wondered if Remus's mum had taught him as hers had that almost anyone could be mollified by the presence of a good meal inside them.

Remus crowned the meal with chocolate biscuits. Hermione cut Zev off at an intake of three and ordered him to go do homework. He went off sulkily, but not so much so that he forgot to thank Remus for dinner and Snape for his lessons. Hermione almost wished he would take things for granted, like a normal kid.

Remus put another biscuit in front of Snape. "I'm sorry that I attacked you."

Snape methodically broke the biscuit into four pieces.

Remus tried, "I'm sorry that I forgot you were one of the good guys."

Snape raised an eyebrow. "Forgot?"

Remus scowled. "Yes, forgot. I was on heavy medication, lest you were unaware. My mind got a bit scrambled."

Snape didn't respond to the sarcasm. "It's hard to forget something you've never believed in the first place."

Suddenly, Hermione wished she hadn't eaten that second biscuit. "We know you were on our side, Snape."

"One would think that a girl as bright as you might have mastered the correct usage of pronouns. While I have no doubt that you have reconciled yourself to this -- no doubt distasteful -- fact, in which case the called for pronoun is the singular 'I', my old school chum here remains less than convinced, I'm most certain."

Remus sneered, "Turnabout's only fair play."

Snape pressed the tips of his fingers together. "Beg your pardon?"

"Well over twenty years pass and you refuse to forgive me when I never once intended you harm, at least not the kind of harm that would have befallen you. I've never once asked that you forget, or rethink your blame, but I have begged your forgiveness, the chance for your friendship and you've thrown the gesture in my face time and time over. Don't presume to lecture me on belief and forgiveness. I've recognized that you were one of us from the moment Albus interfered in the proceedings to send you to Azkaban." The words spilled from his lips in an oddly coherent keening and Hermione would have bet he was remembering how Dumbledore hadn't protested Sirius's lack of a trial; how nobody had protested it. "Your problem is that you mistake dislike for misunderstanding and while the two are closely linked, my attitude toward you has been most distinctly the former for well over a decade."

Snape hissed, "Your dislike is based on misunderstanding, you Gryffindor simpleton."

"So explain it to me, you dungeon-dwelling Slytherin."

For just a second a look of purest frustration and deepest longing sabotaged the smooth features of Snape's emotionless scowl. "Nevermind."

Remus's laugh held no amusement. "Hardly."

Snape's finger drove itself into Remus's shoulder. "You're the Little Werewolf Who Could. School prefect, Gryffindor hero best friends, eventual upstanding member of the Order of the Phoenix. She's the Mudblood Who Can Do No Wrong. Saving our world, crusading for those less fortunate than her, loved by all and sundry. I would not expect you to understand, even were I to draw it out in simple pictures representing single-syllable words."

"Allow me to get a pen, you'll never know until you try," Hermione suggested flippantly.

"If you haven't noticed, that werewolf thing pretty much deems me as much an outcast as your sterling personality," Remus commented lightly on the tail of Hermione's words.

Snape blanched. "Yet you have a community of people who have overcome their prejudice to maintain their relationship with you." He paused. "You have her."

"I don't-" Remus started.

"I'm not-" Hermione spoke over him.

Snape stood. "I accept your apology Lupin. I am sorry in return for having Petrified you and locked you in a room. I have no doubt I will be seeing both of you in the indecently near future. A good night."

Hermione heard the near-angry roar of flames before her legs had remembered what it meant to unbend and chase after.