Girl to Woman

Hermione swept onto the platform of Nine and Three Quarters, her tempestuous curls falling in untamed cascades about her ivory face. She was dressed all in midnight black, her dark eyes fixed on the dark horizon against which the Hogwarts Express was darkly silhouetted.

"Mione!" Ron squealed, running towards her. "How was your summer? Me and Harry played Quidditch all summer!"

Hermione sighed. "You are so immature, Ronald. And I've asked you not to call me Mione. Oh, and it is 'Harry and I'."

"Aw... don't be such a party-pooper, Mione!"

"HERMIONE, HOW COME YOU HAVEN'T BEEN PAYING ATTENTION TO MY EMOTIONAL NEEDS!" yelled Harry from behind Ron.

"I should think Ron would have that well in hand," Hermione replied, though inwardly she winced. I should have never lent Harry that pop psychology book.

Ron and Harry blushed a shade of deep and livid crimson. Ron had wanted more than Harry's emotional needs in his hand, but he'd never admit it whilst there were girls to look at.

"Ronald, you may cease ogling me," said Hermione sharply. "I am womyn and your equal in all things. Or your superior."

"YEAH. WELL YOU DON'T HAVE VOLDEMORT ON YOUR TAIL!" Harry said, glaring at her.

Ron sniggered at that. "Is that why you're trying to kill him, mate?" Hermione shot him a glare that could have froze cocoa.

"I see Mr. Weasley can afford to make jokes about an evil which he could never fathom let alone face," came a soft silky voice from behind them. "Ten points from Gryffindor."

Severus Snape was standing there, face pale and haggard, but his eyes glistening liked jeweled stars in the dark heavens. He gave Hermione a keen glance, their eyes locked for a second, and then a sneer overcame his pallid face.

Hermione felt a stirring inside of her soul, like a dead car struggling to start. After a few gas splutters in her chest, the engine roared.

She lifted her head proudly. My car drives better than theirs, her fine jawline said. "I was just going to say that."

"Were you, Miss Granger?" he asked quizzically, a thin smile playing about his bloodless lips. "Were you, indeed?" His eyes took in the fullness of her blooming physique with precise exactitude and found it not wanting.

She looked like the flasks of potions in his classroom; how he wanted to hold her and fill her contents... a fine hand must do that, a dexterous one.

Hermione mustered up her courage. She could feel his mental powers seeping through her. "I am a Prefect, Professor. It is my duty to watch after..." her eyes fell upon Ron and Harry again. They suddenly looked so young to her. "My peers."

Disappointment overcame her. My peers? But I'm better than them!

"Miss Granger, you have another duty," said Snape, taking an unconscious step towards her. "It has always been Hogwarts tradition that the Head of Slytherin and the Head Girl share the same compartment on the beginning of the year trip to Hogwarts. Surely, one so educated as yourself must know this."

Hermione blushed. "Of course, Professor Snape. It has dated back from the time of the founders."

Harry and Ron exchanged puzzled looks.

"So you'll want to find Professor McGonagall, of course, Ron," Hermione replied briskly. "Unless, of course, you didn't get the badge?" Her tone seemed to indicate that this was all too likely.

"Draco Malfoy got it," Professor Snape's sleek voice cut in, as he looked down over his regal nose at the boys.

Ron looked embarrassed. "HE CHEATED! I JUST KNOW IT!"

"That'll be another ten points from Gryffindor," said Snape with boredom evident in his voice at the inanity of Ron's exclamation. "Miss Granger, your arm?"

Hermione braced herself. She had read the Valley Girls series when she was younger, and the girls had been made homecoming queen and prom queen and they had had their handsome dates with their charming American football jerseys... this was something like that. She tucked her sigh away on the inside, but she knew that he could feel it, too.

She was surprised to see him wince when she rested her arm upon his, then realized that he must be suffering the after-affects of the Cruciatus curse, as he so often did.

Poor man. Why do Harry and Ron hate him so much?

The Head of Slytherin looked down at her, and the Head Girl thought that she saw a smile on his face. However, he simply sniffed and looked up again.

Hermione imitated his sniff, lifting her nose higher than his.

"Someone should lend them a tissue," Ron muttered.

It distinctly reminded Harry of Petunia's craning neck. "YOU'RE BRINGING BACK MY CHILDHOOD TRAUMAS, HERMIONE! IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT I CAN'T GET A DAMNED NIGHT'S SLEEP WITHOUT DREAMING ABOUT DUDLEY!"

Ron looked a bit hurt. "You dream about Dudley?"

"Shall we go, Professor?" asked Hermione demurely. "I don't know the way to the compartment. You must show me."

"Oh, I'll show you the way to the compartment." Severus's silky tones (which so perfectly matched his hair, they both glimmered in the light like well-tuned harpstrings) turned those words into the most beautiful music anyone had ever told her. She closed her eyes. "Oh, Severus."

And then she remembered who she was, a vile useless Mudblood, and that Severus was the scion of a pureblood family of impeccable in-breeding. And that, no matter what she had thought those tones meant, she would always be a worm at his feet.

To put him off, she stalled for precious time. "Oh Professor, surely we should wait for Professor McGonagall and Malfoy to show the lead?"

From the other carriage, Hermione could hear a sudden thundering roar, pierced by the mewling of a cat, and the gush of bodily fluids exiting swiftly. There was a deathly silence that seemed to fill the room.

"Or perhaps not," said Hermione, trembling.

"Oh," Severus purred at her, "I think they have shown us all the lead we could desire."

Hermione gulped and let him lead her away from Ron, who was making judicious use of his middle finger at her.

Harry sighed loudly. "NOBODY LOVES ME!"

"I love you, Harry!" Ron said. "Er. Since we're best friends and all, of course."

Meanwhile, Severus had seated Hermione upon the green velvet cushion of the compartment in which they were lodged, his delicate white hands trailing over her cheek. An accident? Hermione did not dare to ask.

Severus ran his tongue over his teeth, trying to remember if he had brushed his teeth or not. Oh, well - nothing tasted worse than a Mudblood. Except... as he opened his mouth and asked "Are you comfortable?" he discovered that she was not merely a Mudblood to him, but a Queen...

She reminded him of another girl he had once known, as beautiful as her, but always scornful of his amorous suit. The imperial Bellatrix Black, who had taken his heart and given him despair in return. Bellatrix, for whose sake he had joined the abhorrent service of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, only to see her fall into the undeserving arms of Rodolphus Lestrange. They had made him best man at their wedding. The memory still haunted Severus's nightmares.

And in this very compartment, years previous, he had lain sweating in her lovely arms, having just lost both his maidenhead and his heart to her, pleading with her never to leave him.

And she had laughed, and said, "Maybe."

Maybe? He had never understood 'maybe'. A wise old philosopher from Greek - or was it Roman? - times had always said... rage bubbled in him like stew on a stove. Bellatrix. Hermione. Their tresses hung just the same.

Professor," said Hermione timidly. "What are you thinking about?"

"The past," he replied softly. "The discovered country, in which no man may stay."

"But..." Hermione visibly trembled. "But what about... women?"

"Woman delights me not," he said, staring down at his customary suit of solid black. "No more."

The gasoline in Hermione's engine soul gushed to her eyes; she hoped her brown-black tears wouldn't hurt that gray-black soul of his. Black... Blacky black. "Did we once cast pleasure upon your heart?" Do you have a heart? Yes, you do. Before she knew better, she found her arms wrapped around him and her ear against his chest. Her soul would attach to his no matter what anything else said.

"I beg of you, Miss Granger! Let me go!" He searched for words to wound her, to drive her away. "Take your filthy Mudblood hands off me!"

She fell spurned to the floor.

Her first initial reaction was to let those black, brown-black tears of her fall; then she wanted to stop them, but she had lost the key to her engine somehow... he held it in his heart. She scanned him up and down, trying to find it. It was there, somewhere. It was Tradition.

"Sit down, Granger," he told her. "And do not trade in idle fantasies of things beyond your ken."

Hermione was at a loss for words. "You used a... I don't know... what a ken is." She meekly stumbled to his side. "I don't understand this, any of this, you must be brilliant..." Her eyes widened. "You are."

"Thank you, Miss Granger for that heart-felt compliment. Unfortunately, your blood is not as pure as your admiration, or I might be tempted to stoop to your lowness."

Hermione winced, as if struck. "It's because I'm female, isn't it?

"And a Mudblood, yes," Snape allowed. "Pity all the Pureblood males seem to be like your friend Mr. Weasley, though." Somehow the term 'friend' in description of Ron had taken on an air of obscenity unmatched by even the hated 'women.'

"Ron and I aren't seeing each other," said Hermione quickly. "We both discovered that we weren't right for each other after Ron started talking about the Chudley Cannons while we were making out in this closet. It was very distracting, so we decided to call the whole thing off."

"I wasn't contemplating his suitability for you," Snape sneered.

He turned from her, as an owl flew into the carriage. He stared in amazement at the crest upon the letter it bore. Malfoy? Now?

He tore open the letter and a dour look overcame him. Then he thrust it towards Hermione.

"Read this, Miss Granger."

Hermione gasped. "What does he mean, 'virgin sacrifice'? And how does he know I'm a... if I'm a virgin."

"Look into my eyes," Snape demanded. She followed his instructions meekly.

"Yes," he said, a smirk appearing. "You are one. And when they ambush the train in half an hour, you will die as ritually proscribed."

Hermione's mind went wild; but it thought, which made it different from Ron's mind when it went wild, or Harry's, or anyone who ever stood in her general proximity, except the professor. "Unless you cured me of it."

"If I were to do so," said Snape, "you must follow my directions religiously, Miss Granger."

"Give me your instructions, Professor," said Hermione, standing before him with dignity. "We are both sensible modern people. There is no need to get emotional about this."

Severus sneered at her. Coldly. It added brimstone to Hermione's bad engine.

"Let me do..." He touched his finger to her torso. Potion master's fingers! She became a pile of gooseflesh. His tongue slithered out of his mouth. He cursed to himself. He had forgotten the next line.

It was her hair; it was ruining everything. For a few bittersweet moments he had thought he could imagine she was Bellatrix, instruct her...

But the once-tamed tresses were asserting themselves once more, expanding as if with a life of their own, as part of him had almost begun to do. It distracted and repelled him. And yet, it was his duty to protect her; he couldn't let a student suffer the fate planned for her....

In desperation, he raked his hands back through his own glossy hair and then snatched at hers, spreading the honey-textured residue down its length and caressing it into submission.

Hermione bit her lip. Did she have dandruff? She had had it the night before... hopefully her recent wash had gotten rid of it, but there were all of those hard-to-reach places...

"Turn around, Granger," he ordered her, without looking at her face. "Turn around and let me unbutton you."

"As you wish, Severus," she said. She trusted him to unbutton her as skillfully as he handled his potions. No button need fear in his skilled hands.

As she turned her back on him, he reached under the weight of her hair for the first button; and snapped it off. That was the trouble with trying not to look at her. He slipped the orphaned object hastily into his pocket and proceeded with greater attention and dexterity.

His hands upon her back. She was ready to swoon. But she stood there, still. She must not let on that she wanted this. She must preserve her independence at any cost.

"Do it quickly," she said. "I want to get this over with."

"I believe I know far better how this works than you," he sneered in reply. He pulled the gown down off her, leaving her bare and beautiful before him. He gasped in wonder. And then he took a hold of himself. "You'll do, Granger," he told her.

Was he - had he - just pronounced her... adequate? Delight warred in her heart with pride that told her she ought to be insulted and ashamed.

Before she had time to come to a conclusion, he took her roughly by the shoulder and spinning her around, pushed her down onto the velvet cushions. "This is your last chance to go back," he warned her, placing his hand on his zipper.

"No," Hermione breathed, her voluptuous breasts heaving. "You must take me now." Feminism and independence be damned. She wanted to succumb to the Patriarchy!

"Yes," Snape hissed, his eyes glittering like black beetles encased in jet as he sank down on top of her, his immaculately trimmed nails raking over her skin. "You're mine," he snarled, pressing himself into her core. "Mine to do with as I please."

Oh yes," Hermione breathed against the skin of his neck. "All yours, my love. Always. Thy Shekinah."

He was smiling down at her, a curious odd smile that Hermione had never seen before on her dour professor. "Rodolphus was never this good, was he?"

Hermione's throat went dry. Of course, he could never love her. His heart was still Bellatrix Lestrange's. But she could give him these moments of happiness after so many years alone in his dungeon. And though her heart bled, she steeled herself to that noble cause, and murmured back, "No, Severus, never like you."

Understanding now that the noble Potions Master's heart had never ceased beating for the beautiful Bellatrix, Hermione knew exactly what it was she had to do. She had read about these things, you know. She began to make the noises that were expected of a woman being immensely pleasured.

Unfortunately, Hermione had only ever read about these things. . . . The resulting sounds were something akin to a small motorboat running aground on the banks of the Thames.

Snape blinked and stepped back, his face falling as he was jolted out of his Bellatrix fantasies. "Granger. Precisely what sort of sound is that?"

"I tried to please you, Professor," sobbed Hermione, tears running down her face. She was bleeding and looked very small and vulnerable lying naked on the cushions. "I didn't want to hurt you."

"You didn't," he said, remorse filling his tortured soul. "You did well, Hermione. It won't always be so hard."

A smile came to her face. "Will you show me then, Severus? You've begun to teach me to be a woman. You can't leave me like this now. You must continue."

Snape dropped his eyes to her. "Just please," he said, "please don't make that noise again."

"Yes sir," Hermione murmured docilely, her eyes averted. She felt strangely empty and alone without this dark stranger filling her and piercing her to the core.

"Just lie back," Snape whispered in her ear as he finally- finally!- re-established himself within her. "You don't have to do anything, sweet. Leave all the hard work to me."

"It is hard..." Hermione cried, her voice breaking as she knew herself to be filled. Her voice grew heavy with languor. "So... hard..."

There was a coughing sound behind them.

"When you were invited to participate in a lifetime of rape and torture, Severus, it was made quite clear that there would be occasions when only one is acceptable." Lucius's drawl was chilling in its drawlingness.

"Diddling a Mudblood, are we, Severus? My, how the mighty have fallen." It was blasphemy how that sordid gin and silk voice could still send him over the edge, even with another woman.

"Well, she won't do for the sacrifice," said Lucius. "We'll have to use Avery." He turned to Bellatrix. "Kill them."

Hermione leapt to her feet, and grabbed Severus's wand from him.

"Ooh, what does Sevviekins's little Mudblood think she can do with that wand?" cooed Bellatrix.

"This!" cried Hermione, and summoning that memory of perfect ecstasy in Snape's arms, she shouted "Expecto Patronus!"

A silvery unicorn sprang from her wand and trampled the Death Eaters down. Then returned triumphantly to her and licked her hand while the Death Eaters lay sprawling there unconscious.

"Thank you, Severus," she said, pulling Snape to his feet. "It is a far, far better thing you did today than you have ever done before."

He gazed at her with new respect. "You're a woman, Hermione. Don't ever let them take that away from you."

"Trust me," she said. "I won't."