LAST TANGO IN PARIS
Chapter Twenty-Five

Severus was in a hurry.

The whole situation made him itch. But on the other hand, even Self-Obliviation hadn’t done much to interfere with that admirably galling sense of Granger logic. She was right – being Hermione, she most likely would have kept extensive written notes of her research, and being Hermione, she probably would have saved them, too, even in the aftermath of a mind-numbing, breakdown-inducing personal tragedy.

The question was – where?

Either in Paris or in Cairo. And for his money, he was leaning toward Cairo – after all, Bill Weasley had been a Gringotts employee, and there really was no safer place in the world, unless you counted Albus Dumbledore’s sock drawer. Hermione was bound to have an account there, either under her own name or under her pseudonym, and what made it especially handy was that she didn’t need proof of identification to access the vault, only her key.

Of course, there was the matter of finding and retrieving said key – which had warranted a change in their after-lunch plans; she was still back in Montana, while he’d taken over Niffler duty in Paris. Since she hadn’t had the key on her person, reason followed that it had to be somewhere in her flat. And then – as Sal had pointed out – there was that great buggery cat of hers to contend with; either he’d have to contrive somehow to bring it back to the cabin with him, or someone would have to stop in on a daily basis to feed it. When asked, Hermione had said that she’d rather have it with her. All that might change when she saw how bloody huge it was, but in the meantime he’d have to deal with it.

And then, he didn’t exactly relish the idea of telling that lip-trilling, chain-smoking bodyguard of a painting – two-dimensional, maybe, but no less formidable for that – the bad news; left unprompted in an empty room with her own wand, her brilliant young charge would be more likely to scratch her back with it than attempt a conjuration. Just more proof that Hermione Granger was capital-T trouble, regardless of whose identity she was assuming at the time, and that he’d have saved himself a triple-Motrin headache by not inviting Albus back to the house for chili and strange propositions, that afternoon among the Baja tomato vines.

All that was moot now, though. She needed him, and she had nowhere else to turn, so – Merlin help him – he was bound to do what he could to help her. At least she seemed as quick a study as ever; in the quarter-hour between the end of dessert and his departure for Paris, Sal had taken her out into the back yard and started to coach her on basic wand technique.

Just before Severus had Apparated, he’d seen a stick of firewood rise shakily to the level of the cabin’s windows and hover, and had heard a ghostly but exultant whoop. All distasteful aspects of his current duties aside, part of him just wanted to get back home, as quickly as possible, and see how far she’d gotten in his absence.

Sooner begun, soonest done.

He muttered a perfunctory Alohomora at her terrace door and ducked inside, inwardly cheering when he saw the sign propped on the rickety painted table next to the upright piano: Severus – out on a gig. Leave a note if it’s important. –Maxie.

Better and better.

The caracal flattened its ears and hissed at him from the doorway, which made him feel much less guilty for what he was about to do to it. "Petrificus Totalis," he said, then stepped over its prone, splay-legged body into the hall. Hermione hadn’t added much in the way of a personal touch to the flat in the months she’d lived here, he noticed; some people did more nesting than this in their weeklong holiday rentals.

No matter. He was here on a mission, not to redecorate.

He transferred the neatly stacked contents of her bureau into a trunk he found in the closet, Reduced the loaded trunk, and pocketed it. There – now maybe he could reclaim his own pyjamas. Just one more thing now, as a precaution: "Accio research!" he murmured, and waited.

Nothing happened.

Must still be in Cairo. I assumed as much.

"Accio vault key," he revised, and allowed himself a slight, satisfied smirk as one of her nightstand drawers rattled, then shot open. The key chunked into his hand like a softball thrown underhand. He put it in his pocket next to the trunk.

"Now for the cat," he muttered, "and it’ll be done with."

"Not so fast, if you please."

Startled, he spun around to face the doorway – stupid, stupid, stupid, why had he ever turned his back to an open door? He was getting soft in his old age – his eyes narrowing as he recognised the speaker.

"You," he said. "I remember you; you’re that cheeky little witch who’s managed to make an absolute muck of my storeroom in less than half the time it took me to get it properly organised. What are you doing here?"

"We might ask you the same thing, Professor."

Another miscalculation on his part; there was a wand pressed to the back of his neck. How had that happened? "Drop your wand," the voice behind him directed, and Severus let it clatter to the floor. There was something familiar about this second voice – shaky, charged, oddly determined – but he couldn’t quite place it.

"What business do you have in Paris?" the wizard behind him demanded. "And what have you done with Kate?"

Severus relaxed slightly at this: Ah. Not enemies, outraged friends. "I assure you," he said stiffly, "that Miss Gr—ah, Billings, is far safer in her present location than she would be here. For what it’s worth to you."

If he’d meant this to be consoling, he’d missed the mark. Joséphine Dessources’s eyes narrowed suspiciously, and in response, the wand-tip dug more insistently into his nape.

"What do you mean, far safer?" his assailant demanded. "What danger was she in before? And what do you know about it, anyway?"

One of the dubious benefits of having lived through his particular chequered past, Severus reflected, was that he’d gotten the recognition of danger down to a science. Forget that simple-minded fable about the Lady and the Tiger – put him into a room lined with doors, ten of which opened to certain death and one of which was the exit, and he’d choose the safe door every time. Danger vibrated at a high, immediately distinguishable frequency to those who knew to listen for it, as did madness and rage – and try as he might, he wasn’t picking up those signals from the man holding the wand.

If anything, he’d say that his unseen adversary was afraid of him.

Rather reassuring, really. Ten to one, he was a former student; after all, he had called him ‘Professor’, a title Severus was no longer entitled to. Severus took a deep, low breath and shifted into Teacher Face. It felt a little stiff, but it would do.

"Enough questions," he snapped, and brought his hand up behind him without turning, to seize the wand. As he’d expected, the grip on the other end of it trembled reflexively at his tone, then slackened. "Who wants to know?"

And then, twisting around to look: "Oh. Longbottom. I should have known that this day could only get worse."

**

"So," Hermione said. "How well do we know each other, anyway? Well enough that you’ll tell me secrets?"

They were taking a break. For not having been at it very long – the three hours in between one o’ clock and four had flown, just like that – they’d gotten a lot done; according to Sal, they’d touched on most of the Charms she would have learned in her first year at Hogwarts, and a fair amount of the Transfiguration as well.

"You’re a quick study," he’d said at one point, watching the beetle she’d just conjured from a button scuttle down the cabin’s back steps toward the safe obscurity of the yard. "But then, it’s not like you need teaching, as much as just reminding. Behind the Memory Charm, all this is second nature to you."

"Think it’ll help me remember?" Hermione queried, and watched his ghostly shoulders rise and fall in a shrug.

"Could be. Not sure." He pulled a face. "You did a real number on yourself, girlie, that’s for sure. But keep going like you are, and you’ll be as skilled a witch as ever in no time."

"You’re a good teacher."

"I am, rather, aren’t I?" He’d had such a self-satisfied look on his old face that she’d laughed. "Was always handy with Transfiguration and Charms. Hexes, too, though I’ll let Severus take over there; studying the Dark Arts is always more satisfying if you’ve got a body to study them on." He squinted slyly at her. "Imagine you won’t need much reminding in that department, either. History being what it is."

Hermione decided to play dumb. "The Dark Arts, you mean?"

He laughed at the hot flush riding her cheeks. "No."

Which had gotten her to thinking. The problem with thinking was that it raised a bunch of questions she should have been able to answer but couldn’t – luckily, Sal didn’t seem to need much prodding to make him talk.

"Well?" she prompted again, and he cut his eyes sideways toward her. They were gleaming with humour.

"Depends on the secret."

She took a deep breath. "I already know that we were lovers," she said. "He and I, I mean. But he seemed pretty anxious to change the subject. I didn’t get many of the details."

Sal laughed. "Bold as ever," he said approvingly. "Well, what is it you want to know?"

"Everything," Hermione said, and meant it. "I mean, I look at him and he’s so – I don’t know. Closed off, I suppose that’s the word for it. Suspicious. Was he always like that? And if he was, how did I ever get past it?" She looked away. "It’s just strange. He doesn’t seem the sort. He doesn’t seem my sort. But when we look at each other –"

"Yes?"

"This is going to sound strange."

Sal just raised one eyebrow. Hermione fidgeted, embarrassed. "Well, I wonder," she said. "Was it just the potion? Or was there more to it than that?"

Her cheeks were hot, and she couldn’t look at him – though out of the corner of her eye, she could see that he was studying her, his pale grey eyes intent and shuttered.

"Not just the potion," he said finally. Hermione frowned.

"You’ve got the same look on your face as he did," she said. "Like you’re wondering how much you should say, but you don’t really want to say anything at all. And here I thought I could count on you for the real scoop."

Sal hesitated.

"It’s not a matter of the real scoop," he said. "There’s more to it than that."

"What do you mean?"

"Basically," he said, "that it’s not what you should be thinking about right now. You’ve got more on your plate than the renewal of old acquaintances. You’re looking on the romance shelf, when you ought to be over in the mysteries."

"I don’t follow."

Sal closed his eyes, pursing his thin colorless lips. "You loved your husband, Hermione," he said tiredly. "You don’t remember him now, of course, because there’s no one here now to remind you of your life together. But whoever killed him threw a rock into your pond that’s still making ripples; you were a witch who prided herself on her knowledge and her skill, and you sacrificed both of those on the altar of your grief."

He wiped one hand across his lined brow. "If you want your identity back," he said, "you’re going to have to take the grief back, too, and deal with it the way you should have in the first place. Jump-starting an old love affair is just going to confuse an already cloudy issue – and if I may be so bold, that’s the last thing either of you needs."

Hermione, stung and shamed by his words, drew her knees up to her chin on the wooden deck chair and wrapped her arms around them. "You’re right," she muttered. "I didn’t think of it that way. I didn’t think at all."

"He loves you," Sal said quietly, and met her look of surprise with his own steady pale gaze. "He hasn’t ever stopped. But the two of you have never had a moment together that wasn’t stolen from someone else. Before you go to him, first lay your ghosts to rest."

She dropped her eyes. "Okay."

"And while you’re at it," Sal said, "you might give a bit of attention to this."

He waved his wand, and a thin, battered book skidded across the porch railing toward her. Hermione picked it up curiously and squinted to make out the title.

"Reclaiming the Magic: My Life in My Own Words," she read, then looked up at him questioningly. "What’s this?"

"It’s a memoir," Sal said shortly. "Wizard named Phineas Sturbridge. Cocky little bastard. Died about two hundred years ago."

"Phineas Sturbridge?" Hermione frowned. "Should I know that name?"

"No reason why you should," Sal said. "This book was self-published and only disseminated within a small circle of Sturbridge’s followers. The fact that we found one at all was a happy accident; they’re not to be found at any reputable bookseller’s." He paused. "Severus told you about the Knights of the Golden Wand, right? Well, this is as close as they have to an unofficial handbook. Sturbridge was the leader of their movement for nearly fifty years. The movement was never the same after he died – not even under Voldemort."

"Oh," Hermione said, and stared at the book as if it might bite. "Oh."

Sal, who had started for the back door with their empty iced-tea tumblers floating along ahead of him, paused in the doorway and looked back.

"The old adage is a lie, you know," he said. "Revenge is very seldom sweet. But sometimes it’s necessary. I’ll leave you to it."

The door closed behind him. Somewhere in the depths of her subconscious, a dark finger of anger uncurled and beckoned.

Barely hesitating, Hermione opened the book and began to read.

**