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“Should we… stop them?”
Ron doesn’t even need to look up to know who his new girlfriend is talking about. He sighs. “Doesn’t do any good.”
“Doesn’t do any—What if he hurts her?”
The table at large snorts. It is Ginny who takes mercy on the other girl’s befuddlement.
“Listen, I know you probably only know the rubbish that’s in the Prophet, and the ex-Death Eater thing is a bit off-putting, but he’s different now.”
“Still a harsh git most of the time,” Harry adds. “But not with Hermione. Never Hermione.”
“Are we seeing the same thing,” Viola asks, gesturing over to the quarreling… couple? Were they a couple? It was very unclear.
“That’s a tame Snape,” Ron says reassuringly. “He’s not even looming. Hermione’s the one getting a bit too heated, honestly. You can tell by how big her hair is getting.”
Viola considers it. Her hair is getting bushier.
“Should we place money on the outcome,” Ginny asks.
Harry rolls his eyes. “A useless bet. You already know how this will end.”
At that moment, Snape storms away from the corner where they’d been arguing. Hermione strides back to the table. Her cheeks are red, her eyes are bright, and she’s… smiling? Smiling. Viola blinks. She sits down with the pronounced sigh of ending a hard day’s work.
“Don’t keep us in suspense, Mi, what’s the deal with the bookshelves?”
Bookshelves? They’d been rowing like that over bookshelves? What in Merlin’s name…
“Wait, wait,” Ginny interrupts. “I want to make a prediction.”
Hermione arches a brow in eerie imitation of her… Well, he had to be her partner of some kind if the argument was about bookshelves, right? Yet boyfriend seem like not enough and Hermione wears no ring. Viola refocuses on Ginny.
“First remind me—the two options were to create aisles of books rather than having them just line the walls of the library or to leave the library as is and place the rest of the books on shelves lining every other wall in the house, yes?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. The overflow was only into the common areas.”
“Yes, of course,” Ginny says carelessly. She purses her lips. “We all know that you two never concede defeat. It’s always some crazy solution no two sane people would come up with sooooo I’m going to say that you are going to leave the shelves as is but charm them to swap out so that you can always get to the book you want.”
“And keep the books where exactly? Oblivion?”
“Building a private library on your property?”
“We live in a Muggle neighborhood, Harry, we can’t just erect a massive tower for my books.”
“You’d love that though.”
“… Irrelevant.”
“Ooo, an enchanted room like your bag!”
Hermione pinches the bridge of her nose. “You can’t enchant a room of that size—the runic matrix alone would be—” Her lips purse. “Hmm, actually there is some merit there. I think Sev and I could manage it.”
“Manage what?”
Viola startles. Somehow Snape had simply materialized behind Hermione. Given how he’d stormed off, she expected him to be irritable upon his return, but he’s… soft seems wrong for such an austere man, but it’s the closest term she has for the way he looks down at Hermione who smiles and leans into his touch as he sits.
“Our friends have decided to guess at the solution to our shelving problems. Ginny suggested charming the bookshelves to swap with one another—”
“And lose a book to the ether? Absolutely not.”
“That’s what I said. Then Harry suggested we might build a separate building to house the books.”
Snape frowns. “You would love that. Perhaps we—”
“The Muggles, Severus.”
He waves the objection away with his hand. “Easily confunded.”
“The whole neighborhood?”
“Why not if it’s what you want?”
Hermione rolls her eyes, an indulgent smile on her face. “If we’re going to switch to an excessive magic solution, I quite like Ron’s idea. He suggested an enchantment like I did for my bag.”
“We’d have to get a third party to set up the runes properly and I can’t think of anyone I’d want integrated into our wards like that,” Snape says immediately.
“Oi!”
“Cheers, mate.”
Snape pays the men no mind. Hermione shakes her head.
“Well then, I guess we’ll stay the course.”
Ginny leans forward expectantly. “Which is what?”
“We’re buying a bigger house,” she announces excitedly. “Sev sent off an owl right away to contact a realtor.”
“Oh, that’s so exciting!”
“Congrats!”
Ron snorts. Viola looks at him reprovingly.
“No, listen,” he defends. “I’ve been telling her they need to get a bigger house for ages with the way their place is overflowing with their work, and she’s always telling me ‘the house is fine for the two of us, Ronald’ or ‘We don’t need all that frivolous extra space, Ronald.’ Making it sound like they wouldn’t consider expanding until they’ve got kids, but of course she compromises on all of that for books.” He shakes his head fondly. “That’s classic Hermione for you.”
He laughs.
Harry laughs.
Hermione’s mouth falls open as her cheeks turn pink.
Snape looks… It’s hard to read him, but if Viola had to guess, she’d say smug.
Ginny gasps. “Hermione Jean, are you—”
Hermione nods, pressing her lips together as her eyes shine with happy tears. “I’m nearly twelves weeks along. I was waiting until then to tell but—”
“It’s not my fault you lot forget how observant I am.”
Snape mutters something but it’s drowned out by Ginny. Probably for the best Viola is learning.
“They’ll be in Hogwarts together,” she exclaims, pressing a hand on her small, but evident bump.
Snape releases a long-suffering sigh. “Hermione has informed me that I am not allowed to forbid my child from becoming friends with your spawn.”
“I’m also going to insist that you not call our godchildren spawn,” Hermione adds.
“You’re determined to take my every joy, aren’t you?”
“I believe I supply as much as I take.”
“Far more, duck, far more,” he murmurs softly, kissing her hand.
And suddenly Viola can see exactly what her companions had seen all along. If a man looked at her like Severus looks at Hermione—she tampers down the irrational urge to pick a fight with Ron. Her boyfriend is really very wonderful. But the utter devotion… she catches Ginny’s eye and the other girl gives her a knowing look, gesturing at Harry with a ‘what can you do?’ gesture.
“We don’t wear rings because we did a soulbinding,” Severus says.
Viola’s eyes widen when she looks up from Hermione’s hand to find that he’s addressing her. Her cheeks flush. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s a natural curiosity,” Hermione says, glaring at her bondmate.
“Then one should ask. Or be far more subtle about staring.”
“Ignore him,” Ron mutters, grabbing her hand. “Like Harry said, he’s a git to everyone that isn’t Hermione.”
“Doesn’t mean he doesn’t like you though. If he doesn’t like you, he doesn’t talk at all.”
“How do you explain me suffering through these dinners with you two then, Potter?”
“By two do you mean Harry and I or Harry and Ron,” Ginny asks, amused.
“You’re tolerable.”
Her jaw drops. “Becoming a father has softened you already, Snapey.”