Draco was silent. He had no idea what to say to this. He didn't want to think about why he shouldn't want to go back. Malfoy Mansion was his home. Had been his home for the first nineteen years of his life. And only because he had spent a few months living with someone else didn't make that his home. Just because there had been moments living with Mrs Callaghan that he felt absolutely at ease with himself and the entire world didn't mean that he should leave his home and call a hovel in a Muggle district the same. Just because he had been happy there for a while and just because he had been able to earn his own living, just because he had thought Aideen was the one person for him, didn't mean that he could...would...should.

He stared at his godfather. "Would you stop the car, please?" he asked solemnly.

For a brief second, he looked at him, then indicated left and stopped immediately. Draco had not expected that. Draco had expected him to keep driving, to stop him from apparating but his godfather was — if all else failed — unpredictable. Severus was Slytherin incarnate and no time spent in the Muggle world would change that. If Severus stopped, it was because Severus had a plan. Because Severus wanted to achieve something with stopping but Draco was prepared and he turned sideways on the seat, looking at his godfather.

"Just because I was happy there doesn't mean that I can be happy again," he said very, very quietly.

His godfather took a deep breath and sighed then. "Just because you once called Malfoy Mansion your home doesn't mean it still is home."

"Then I have no home," he replied tiredly.

"You could have one if you wanted and you know it. Now tell me, Draco, do you apparate out here or do we keep driving?"

She sat up, rubbing her aching, tired eyes and tried, for a moment, to find out where she was and why it was still dark outside. Hermione ran fingers through the tangles in her hair, then quickly hid her face in her hands. She had been drunk. She had got drunk in the middle of the afternoon on Irish coffee and the killer-headache she experienced, and that was most certainly not improving by her combing her fingers through her messy hair.

"Shite," she muttered to herself, her throat dry and scratchy. There had been...Ted had been on her lap and Harry had been there. She knew that Harry had the idea with the Irish coffee. Because she had been angry with Mrs Weasley. And then...then there was a blur. Nothing. Well, she would remember. And she would either have to remember to not drink anymore at all, or drink so much that she was used to it. She hadn't had so much as a glass of wine in the past...two long. And thinking about it hurt her head. And her stomach growled and she felt queasy. Maybe food would help. And knowing what time it was would help as well. Slowly and in her slept in clothes (the same stuff she had worn to the Burrow), she trudged down the stairs, rubbing her eyes and her face and still not feeling quite alright in her head. It hurt and her eyes weren't quite right and it felt like she was cross-eyed.

She pushed the door to the kitchen open, somewhere in the haze of her mind hoping that Harry wasn't there, that she hadn't said anything embarrassing during the time that she now couldn't remember. Ron? Had Ron been there? Somewhere in the back of her hazy mind, she knew that yes, he had been there. Ron had been there and she had...what had they talked about? Ron had said something about his mother. Ah, yes, Mrs Weasley was an insufferable cow. That was what they had basically agreed on. She thought. Or seemed to remember. Something like that anyhow. And then...what had happened then? Ron had been there and he had looked all grown up.

"Slept well?" she heard a voice behind her. Harry. Spinning around would be the right thing to do. Spinning around would hurt her head and would probably make her vomit — and so she just turned slowly.

"Don't know," she replied groggily. "What did I do?"

"You drank Irish coffee," Ron was coming out of the pantry, a massive bag of crisps in his hands.

"How much? A barrel full?"

"Just about," grinned Harry. "Nah, it wasn't so bad. But you were, erm, tired..."

"And I thought you'd be more comfortable on the bed," said Ron with a crooked, boyish smile.

"Thanks, yeah," she grabbed the bag of crisps from his hands and poured herself a glass of water which she gulped down as quickly as she could. It was cold and tasted like nothing and it soothed her stomach a little and she felt strong enough to open the bag of crisps and without another word, grabbed a large handful and stuffed the crumby crisps in her mouth. The boys were watching her and she knew they were watching her.

"What?" she asked after a moment, the crisps not quite in her stomach.

"Erm, you..."

"Don't you want some real food?" asked Ron, interrupting Harry who, she was sure, wanted to say something entirely different. "I'm sure Kreacher could make you something or we can go to the yellow Mac-thing that we haven't been to in ages and it's open all night, says Harry."

Hermione groaned, then shoved down another handful of crisps. "Why not, but only if you tell me what I did or said what I can't remember."

71. Repetition

'Rhetorical' or — to use at once a wider and a more intelligible term — 'significant' repetition is a valuable element in modern style; used with judgement, it is as truly a good thing as clumsy repetition, the result of negligence, is bad. But there are some writers who, from the fact that all good repetition is intentional, rashly infer that all intentional repetition is good; and others who may be suspected of making repetitions from negligence, and retaining them from a misty idea that to be aware of a thing is to have intended it. Even when the repetition is a part of the writer's original plan, consideration is necessary before it can be allowed to pass: is is implied in the terms 'rhetorical' or significant repetition that the words repeated would ordinarily be either varied or left out; the repetition, that is to say, is more or less abnormal, and whatever is abnormal may be objectionable in a single instance, and is likely to become so if it occurs frequently.

The writers who have most need of repetition, and are most justified in using it, are those whose chief business it is to appeal not to the reader's emotions but to his understanding; for, in spite of the term 'rhetorical', the object ordinarily is not impressiveness for impressiveness' sake but emphasis for the sake of clearness.

(Fowler, Fowler, 1922)

With gusto, Hermione bit into her burger and for good measure, stuffed three chips into her mouth. At once. She knew she looked more or less like Ron during every meal at Hogwarts but she didn't care. The greasy, fat food soothed her stomach and made her head clear. Made her thinking straight and made her stare at her two boys and the toddler who had, naturally, accompanied them, with barely concealed suspicion.

"So?" she said after she had swallowed the gooey mess.

"Nothing," said Ron quickly. A bit too quickly for her liking. "You were only a bit down because..."

"Ron left you and Teddy didn't want to stay with you when you reprimanded him," shrugged Harry straight after, feeding the boy a chip as well.

"Oh God," she groaned. "And nothing else?"

"Nothing else," Ron shook his head, and he still ate like a pig. He definitely still had worse manners than her.

"Nothing? Absolutely nothing else?"

"Well, there was one bit we didn't understand," said Harry pensively, trying to feed Teddy some Big Mac.

"And what was that?" she asked, happy that her mind was clearer now.

"Counter-curse," said Harry and grimaced, suddenly after which he shot an angry glance at Ronald. Oh. She was quick after all. They had decided, probably, that they wouldn't tell her what she had said while being out of it and Harry was too curious not to ask. Which was odd. Truly odd. She would have figured that Ron was the one bombarding her with questions, not Harry. But maybe, maybe she was wrong.

She popped another chip into her mouth and closed her eyes. So they knew about the counter-curse. She had talked about the counter-curse. Well, it could have been worse even if she had intended to keep this a secret. She groaned. They would probably want to keep her away from Draco and from working on the curse and they would think, especially Ron, that she was wasting a lot of effort. Ron despised Snape. Or...she actually didn't know. She didn't know what Ron thought about Snape. She didn't know what he thought about most things at the moment. She only knew that he still ate like a pig. She screwed her eyes shut tightly and thought for a moment, chewing. So they knew that she was working on a counter-curse and maybe even that she worked on a counter-curse with Draco. Did they know though what kind of counter-curse it was?

"Yes?" she asked innocently.

"What kind of curse?" asked Ron, his mouth full.

"Ronald, can't you swallow before you speak?" she groaned.

"Sorry," he mumbled around a bit of chip.

"What kind of curse?" Harry asked, bouncing Ted on his knee.

"Ah," she said. So she hadn't told them. Had probably just told them that she would have to meet Draco again soon. Or maybe not even that. Maybe she had just said that she was stressed out from working on the curse and on her uni-stuff. She probably wouldn't get them to give her a memory of her drunken self, even though that would be best for her. Ah well, she would have to outsmart them. Somehow. "What did I say?"

"You only said that it was too much and that you can't find a way to counter that curse. Whatever that curse is," Ron said, mouth empty.

She sighed, putting the burger carefully down. She knew it was a bad idea since it would fall apart, it would be impossible to be picked up again but she had to pay her full attention to the boys. And had to be careful what she answered. "Yes, well, we have found a way, we have found the words, that wasn't difficult but it's combined with a chant and we can't figure out what kind of chant it is," she shrugged.

"We?" asked Harry. Oh. So she hadn't told them that.

She sighed and picked a bit of pickle from the leftover burger. "Yep, we. Draco Malfoy and me. We work on this together."

"Why?" asked Harry.

"Because he has the most extensive library and...since it's the counter-curse for the curse Snape was hit with..." she trailed off with a shrug.

"Hm," mumbled Ron around a mouthful of food.

"I think what Ron wants to say is why," Harry all but growled. And he was apparently a little angry. Or not but the bouncing of Ted on his knee had stopped. And he took the chip from the boy's chubby fingers.

"Why what?" she asked and handed Ted one of her chips who grinned toothily at her.

"Why are you working on a curse with Malfoy for Snape? And why don't you talk about it to us? Why all this secrecy?"

She shrugged. "The Ministry will never get to a solution soon and it's the question whether they want him to have his magic back at all but after Aideen and Draco split up, he needs someone by his side who is not quite a Muggle and Snape is that kind of person. It was as much Draco's idea as it was mine. We decided on it together," she fibbed. "And it wouldn't have been right to turn him down when he wants help with solving this for his godfather. I can let bygones be bygones."

Harry grumbled. "It's not that we mind you working on it but you haven't taken care of yourself and we didn't even know why," he said.

"We thought it was because the workload at Muggle uni was too much," added Ron thoughtfully.

Hermione could only stare in shock. This was — weird. Something was truly fishy about this. They were happy with that bit of information? They would...support her in her quest to bring the magic back to Snape? Even Harry who had not truly seemed angry after that short moment? And Ron was okay with her doing something for Snape? Fishy. Truly, honestly fishy.

She watched, half fascinated and half disgusted how Ron swallowed a huge gulp of burger, then drank rather a lot of coke all at once, then wiped his mouth at the back of his hand and then looked intently at her.

"We could help, you know. We've figured out worse things together," he smiled.

Fishy. Honestly fishy.

Severus watched in silent fascination how his godson wrinkled his nose in mock-disgust at the mess in his living room. So he hadn't put away all his books, and he had forgot to take his mug this morning back into the kitchen and there was a jumper hanging over the chair but it was certainly not looking like the pigsty Draco pretended it to be.

It had been the boy's own choice. The boy had chosen to fasten his seatbelt again and Severus had only kept on driving. He could have apparated out. At every traffic light. And he had just sat there, staring straight ahead.

And had suddenly turned back into the perfect, last pureblood scion. The last one holding up the candle, so to speak. It was unnerving and if he continued to turn his nose up at his, Severus's perfect living room, he would most certainly drag the arrogant boy under the ice-cold shower. Or douse him with the garden hose. Well, he would have to buy a garden hose first but that shouldn't be a problem.

Yes, he knew what it was. He knew why Draco was doing this but that didn't mean that he had to like it. This building of walls, of sneering, of revulsion upon everything. He had used the same tactics again and again. But they didn't work. They only turned people into lonely, empty shells. And Draco would most certainly not end up like him. Under no circumstances.

"You can sleep on the couch," he said coldly. "The shower is upstairs and of course you're still free to just apparate. I'm not holding you captive."

His godson nodded only and with an angry look, he left Severus standing and hurried up the stairs. It would probably be like that for a while. At least until he had prepared Aideen. Or Eleanor could draw him out of this. Eleanor — the miracle woman. She could. If someone could, it was her. He would have to tell her first anyhow and...

as much as he dreaded it, he knew that Granger was working with Draco and he would have to inform her. Sighing, he shrugged to himself and opened his laptop. He could always go over to Eleanor's while Draco was upstairs and showering or if he was truly quick, he could disappear next door before he was finished. But if he didn't email her now, he would forget and Granger would storm Malfoy Manor and that couldn't be good — for her to see Lucius that way and for Lucius to see that Granger was concerned over Draco. He would owl him as well even though he doubted that Lucius minded much. Was too busy seducing his Viscountess. And he would probably draw the wrong conclusions about Granger seeking Draco out. Except — Lucius knew about what the two of them did.