Dream

Severus Snape bolted upright on his bed.

Groaning, he dug the heels of his palm into his eyes and rubbed the remnants of his sleep away.

Miss Granger. His subconscious had taken the form of Miss Know-It-All Granger. It worried him that his subconscious had taken the form of one of his students. It never had before.

And what a form it had been --, remarked his wry inner voice.

No, he will not think about that.

"Tempus," he muttered, and his wand spun on his palm and indicated that the time was a quarter past 6 in the morning. Well, it was a good time as any to get up.

Intellectually, he knew that annoying 11-year-olds eventually grew up into somewhat mature young adults by the time they leave the hallowed halls of Hogwarts at the end of their 7^th Year. Having taught for 15 years, he had seen his fair share of pupils going through this cycle of growth: starting from the still innocent diminutive child-like look of the 1^st and 2^nd Years; to the often gangly and awkward limbs and pimpled-faced early teens (he personally hated this stage - more potions were botched by clumsy co-ordination than he would have liked in his classes with the 3^rd and 4^th Years); to the more confident mannerisms of the older teenagers of the 5^th and 6^th Years. By the time his pupils got to 7^th Year, their minds have also gain some maturity so that by the time the Leaving Ceremony came around, these young men and women often have very little in common with their 11-year-old self.

Intellectually, he knew.

However, as was often the case with parents and their children, the children's growth happen so subtly, so unobtrusively, that he was usually surprised when he did notice their growth and maturity, in mind and body.

Just like he did with Miss Hermione Granger.

No, Severus, he rebuked himself, don't allow yourself to think this thought through. She's a pupil of the school. Nothing good will come of it.

He had no doubt that Miss Granger had grown up. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but sometime in her 5^th Year, she had behaved with markedly more maturity than her classmates. True, she was almost year older than most of them, having missed the Hogwarts' admission cut-off date by a few weeks, but her thought process was distinctly more advanced than even the pupils of her chronological age.

He did not want to admit it, but he was impressed by her quiet confidence that marked her entry into his 6^th Year Potions class last year. He was a little surprised that she had opted to study Potions - most Gryffindors dropped Potions the minute they were allowed to specialise in 3 subjects for their NEWTs. Of course, Miss Granger had up the ante by being one of 8 pupils taking 4 NEWTs subjects - the lone Gryffindor amongst the other Ravenclaws. It didn't surprise him at all when Dumbledore announced at the staff meeting before the start of this academic year that Miss Granger was attempting 4 S-papers in her 4 subjects - the first time in recent Hogwarts History.

What impressed him further besides her taking up Potion was that she took up the subject despite her two shadows and protectors dropping it. With her 10 straight As in her OWLs, she could have easily picked any 4 subjects apart from Potions. Also, with Miss Granger being a clear favourite amongst his colleagues - her magical abilities and giftedness were praised by all, with the exception of perhaps himself and Trelawney - she would have had a much easier time studying under them.

Typical Gryffindor, thought Snape uncharitably. She just had to choose the subject with the most brutal teacher in Hogwarts' history.

By now, Snape had completed his morning ritual and was buttoning up his trademark black frock coat in front of the full-length mirror, which was cast with a permanent silencio charm.

He frowned at his image.

What greeted him in the mirror was a distinguished-looking man in his early 50s.

He could be happy with that, he supposed, but the sad truth was that he was in his 30s. He was 37, in fact.

When did I get so old?

He had joined the Hogwarts staff as a young man of 22. After his studies at Hogwarts, he had gone on to study Advanced Potions at Merlin University, graduating top of his class. Following that, he had apprenticed himself with a venerable Potions Master who was partial to Voldemort's cause, to attain his own Master status. Through it all, he was involved with Death Eater activities, albeit in "small-time" capacity: harassment, information gathering, and assisting in brewing poisons and other arsenal Voldemort needed. As he mired himself deeper in the movement, his academic achievements, success in his Death Eater duties, and superior intellect brought him to the attention of Voldemort himself. He was taken out of the foot soldier level and made one of Voldemort's lieutenants, a position that required him to be more involved in the ugly side of the war - the actual killings.

Thus began the longest 6 months of his life. The weight of his conscious bore down on him and one day, after a particularly gruesome invasion of a Muggle orphanage, he felt that Azkaban would be a paradise compared to the screams he heard every night he slept. At his final tethers, he confessed all his transgressions to Dumbledore, who instead of absolving his sins or sending him to hell on earth, condemned him to a life of never ending atonement - teaching in a dark dank dungeon and spying on Voldemort.

He heaved a sigh and shook his head slightly in grimace. Such melodramatic reminiscing will not do, Severus, he admonished himself.

The man in the mirror looked at him contemplatively. Severus Snape did not consider himself a vain man. Prior to waking up this morning, he hardly gave his reflection a second glance. After all, he prized his intellect more than his looks - he'd prefer to remain Severus Snape than that popular frippery buffoon, Lockhart.

However, if he were honest with himself, his looks, or lack of it disturbed him.

He started mapping out his face with his best feature - his eyes. They were framed by the thick masculine brows, which were part of the Snape family gene pool, and underscored by dark eyebags, indicative of many restless nights spent awake. At the moment, his deep-set midnight eyes were narrowed, critically examining itself. If he looked hard enough, he could still see traces of that young man he once was. If he looked hard enough. Otherwise, the twin black onyx were tinted by futile fury and hopeless despair - fury at his boyhood stupidity in obeying the lies of a madman; despair that nothing he will ever do would erase the consequences of his youthful indiscretions.

His beak of a nose was crooked. A gift from Sirius in a brawl they'd engaged in their 5^th Year. He had never gotten round to healing it properly, unlike his vain Gryffindor adversary. Once past the healing stage, no magic could re-set the cartilage in his nose. It didn't matter to him at all, he reminded himself empathically - it was a grim souvenir of what Sirius had done to him.

His skin was sallow. There was no other word for it. Likewise, no euphemism could otherwise describe his crooked yellow teeth. His hair was limp, but by no means greasy. He knew what the students thought of him and his hair - working over boiling cauldrons naturally cause his fine hair to stick together, and since most of his students didn't meet him socially - even if they did, they were too frighten to notice something as mundane as his hair, he mused wryly - they'd assume that his hygiene was questionable.

His was not a face that inspires schoolgirl fantasies, but he was a presence one could not ignore. He enfolded his severe black teacher's robe around him and peered down at his own image. The posture screamed, "I will not suffer fools. And that means you!"

He tilted his head to the left and reconsidered that image of himself. He supposed that if he really wanted to, ridding himself of that sallow tinge and yellow teeth was no difficulty. Was he not ranked one of Europe's top ten Potions Masters?

He allowed himself a moment to consider how he'd look with the changes, but merely snorted as he shook his head. No, Severus, he chided himself, it will not make much difference to how you look to others - they will still be terrified of you. This is a stupid! Control your insipid contemplation! A sigh, and a shake of his head. I need coffee.

Thus the Potions Master, Professor Severus Snape swept out of his quarters, robes billowing, towards the Great Hall for his morning cup of sustenance.

~*~

Hermione looked up from the piles of books she had on the library table and stretched out her stiff back from hours spent sitting in that position. Feeling somewhat refreshed, she turned towards Harry and Ron, who, for the first time in weeks, had decided to study together with her after a quick lunch.

"I gather you're ready to ace the NEWTs?" Harry teased her gently.

"Hmmph," she snorted, "I was ready to ace the NEWTs last year!" she quipped good-humouredly, with a wink. "I was just preparing myself for my Honours thesis."

"Hardy-har-har," grumbled Ron, looking up from the Transfiguration essay he was working on.

"Trouble, Ron?" asked Hermione sweetly.

Ron didn't even deign her a reply, scowling at a confounding paragraph he was trying to make sense of. "Oh I give up!" he slumped back against his chair, "I can't understand the point of studying the Philosophy of Transfiguration or its history! I mean, what's the point? You transfigure an inanimate object to an animate object, or an animate into another animate and all that, but why bother knowing the whys? Who cares?"

Harry just shook his head at Ron's diatribe. He looked at Hermione, and they exchanged knowing smiles. It was nothing they haven't heard.

The trio were in the library working on their Transfiguration assignment. Since their 6^th Year, they only shared Transfiguration as their common subject, along with Dumbledore's compulsory subjects of Wizard Duel and Unarmed Combat.

Unlike Hermione's combination of 4 subjects, Harry and Ron each took a 3-subject combination, allowing them to pursue their rather heavy extra-curricula responsibilities.

Ron had opted to take up Care of Magical Creatures, with the intention of working with Charlie's dragons in Romania. Harry had taken up Charms to shore up his duelling skills. Those were the only subjects that the boys did not take together. The duo shared Transfigurations and Defence Against the Dark Arts and they tried convincing Hermione to drop Potions to take up DADA with them, but she refused. Hermione believed that DADA could easily be covered as a part of all her other subjects. The Dark Arts was magic channelled for dark intent, but was certainly founded on "normal" magic, wasn't it?

After the Triwizard tournament, she had focussed her extensive readings to include military history and strategies - both Muggle and wizard - in preparation for the coming war. In one of her readings, she came across that of Sun Tzu's The Art of War, written over 2500 years ago. One of his pithy was, "Know yourself, know your enemy, one hundred battles, one hundred victories," which she took to heart. Therefore, she sought to be aware of her strengths and weaknesses, and she knew that her strength did not lie in being in the frontline in the on-coming war, no matter what Harry and Ron said. Although she knew that if needed, she was able to stand up and fight more skilfully than most of her peers. No, her strength lay in her Muggle-born reliance on logic and research. Therefore, her choice of subjects - Transfiguration, Potions, Ancient Runes and Arithmancy covered a broad base of magical foundation that will hopefully enable her to find a better way to engage in the war. As for the knowing the enemy part, she gleaned whatever she could from Harry, whom she knew was receiving special mentoring from various Professors and Headmaster Dumbledore. She kept a scrapbook of cuttings from the Daily Prophet regarding Death Eater activities, and kept herself up-dated on wizarding politics, carefully considering each policy the Ministry of Magic made and how that will affect the coming war.

Besides, Potions appealed to her personally. In terms of magic, it was the most scientific and concrete of the magical arts. There was something about measuring, weighing, experimenting and manipulating potions ingredients that appealed to the science-geek in her. It reminded her of her primary school science laboratory and her happy days spent with her Dad experimenting with her chemistry set.

However, Potions was not merely about the exact mix of ingredients, or its order in going into the cauldron. It was also an Art, involving the creation of possibilities - Bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses, bottling fame, brewing glory, and stoppering death, as Snape's mantra went, she mused - with her own magic mixed in. Not many realised this, but no two potions were exactly the same, even if they worked in generally the same way. After all, when the potion recipe lists "eye of newt, toe of frog", it does not specify the species of newts or frog. Sometimes, it doesn't even specify if the ingredients needed were to be fresh or preserved. Some potion recipes do not even give the quantity of the ingredients needed!

No, the true force behind the potions' power is the witch or wizard creating it. It is the potion maker's magical touch which unlocks the magical essence in the ingredients, as much as in the way the ingredients are prepared or the potion is brewed. That is why even if a Muggle were to follow a potion recipe to its minute detail; the potion would not work at all. It certainly explained how Neville Longbottom fare so poorly in the subject, managing merely to scrape through his Potions OWL. Of course, for some of the potions ingredients, such as herbs or plant essence, there were intrinsic properties in the ingredients that might elevate common ills that even Muggles knew about. But to be truly effective, magic must be infused in the creation of the potion. And naturally, the more powerful the wizard or witch, the more potent the potion created.

"Well, I can only think of one good thing about taking Transfigurations," smirked the redhead, crinkly eyes brightening up, "at least it's not Potions!"

Potions. Oh no! Hermione was suddenly aware that her Potions S-paper class was about to start in ten minutes! Quickly, she stuffed her heavy-laden satchel with her quills and books, gave a quick wave to the boys and ran out of the library.

I just hope I get there in time, she grimaced.