Hourglass (rewritten as of 16/05/2018)

Chapter Six:

CHAPTER SIX:

"Sometimes I forget what you've lived through," Severus told her, the night before the students were scheduled to return to Hogwarts, a day after her Azkaban 'adventure'. "You seem so... well adjusted."

"Well adjusted?" Hermione asked incredulously, eyeing her lover like he'd just grown a second or third head. "Me? Well adjusted!?"

"Well, I didn't know you before the War, so I don't really know the differences." Severus pointed out reasonably which had her pausing.

"Would you... would you like to see?" She asked hesitantly and when Severus raised an eyebrow Hermione grasped his hands with her own, lifting them so they were cupping her face and met his eyes. It took Severus a moment to realise what she was offering and his expression turned to shock followed by awe.

"Legilimens." He said hoarsely.

Memories flittered through her mind, snapshots of her life shared willingly with the man she loved. And when she cried afterwards, he held her in his arms and rocked her until the tears slowed.

"I love you, Maia," he murmured to her as he pressed kisses to the top of her head, "I love who you are. I love everything about you. We both have our darkness, but together we can get through it to find the light. I know we can."

"I love you too, Severus." Hermione whispered back.

And it was true.

On the Hogwarts Express, all anyone could talk about were the murders she'd committed over the holidays, both the slaughter of the Death Eaters who had escaped conviction and what had become known as 'The Massacre of Azkaban'. Students chattered excitedly about how the person who'd done it had to be as powerful as Dumbledore was and Voldemort had been.

Hermione would have paid a small fortune in gold to have been able to witness how Voldemort had reacted to the news of the culling of his Death Eaters, both in and out of Azkaban— judging by Quirrell's new and seemingly permanent pallor, it would have been quite the entertainment and Hermione was finding a good deal of wicked amusement in the man's suffering.

Other then all the chatter about dead Death Eaters and the students mourning their now-dead parents and relatives, nothing had really changed at Hogwarts. The classes were just as mind-numbingly dull as before Christmas and the kids were just as infuriatingly moronic as she remembered.

She could really sympathise with Severus— dealing with her classmates alone was exhausting, and she didn't even have to teach the brainless dunderheads.

~

It was a few weeks after their return to Hogwarts that Severus and Hermione put into action a break-in that was possibly even more challenging and dangerous then her adventure in Azkaban— the robbing of Gringotts.

To both of their surprise, it went smoothly. With Hermione accompanying him disguised as Maia Wells, Severus had a goblin accompany them to his vault. Along the way, she used the Imperius Curse on the goblin and had him change paths and head down to the Lestrange vault instead.

When the goblin opened the vault, Severus levitated Hermione over to the Cup which she carefully knocked into a leather pouch. He then levitated her back and they put the second part of their plan into action, having the goblin take them back to the dragon they'd passed where Hermione hit its chains with several weakening charms, before setting off a multitude of sharp bangs.

The dragon roared its rage and fear, rearing up and causing the now-weakened chains to snap. A jet of boiling fire narrowly missed them and Hermione hastily obliviated the goblin then hit him in the head with a weak blasting curse, sending him flying from the cart over into the wall of the tunnel. To the best of the goblin's knowledge, when he woke up and couldn't recall the journey to 'Severus's' vault, he'd consider it the result of a head injury.