Wizarding Statistics
Hermione sat and waited in a private room at the Wizarding Genealogy Offices. She folded and unfolded her fingers for the thousandth time. She felt like pacing, but that would only make her more nervous. Being alone made it worse. But it had been good that they’d been so cautious, having her go alone, dressing her up in Hestia Jones’ old gown and casting a distracting glamour over her.
Reporters seemed to be lurking everywhere these days. Just yesterday the Weasleys had discovered an American journalist skulking around the Burrow. He’d been exposed when one of the Weasley gnomes had landed on his head during Ron’s latest de-gnoming session and the disgruntled gnome had latched onto the unfortunate reporter’s nose. When Hermione had entered the Genealogy Offices, she was sure she’d counted at least five reporters lurking in the background.
What if the tests said that she’d be able to marry Snape?
She winced. Of course the tests would say that she could marry Snape. She was of Muggle origin, so the likelihood that there was any wizard out there who’d be barred from marrying her because of the new laws was virtually non-existent. And Snape himself was half-blood. As far as Hermione knew, the Prince family did not belong to the ancient pureblood lineages.
So chances were that he had any number of likely witches to choose from. She didn’t know what she’d prefer … having a few hundred candidates to check out in order to persuade one to marry the Potions Master or be stuck with only a handful.
The chosen few – she snorted at the thought. No, she’d always been good at Arithmancy, and she’d kept up with Muggle maths during her holidays. There was no way, really, that Snape could end up with just a few of possible matches.
Suddenly the door opened. A stern, blond witch with narrow, black rimmed spectacles gazed down at her. ‘Miss Granger?’
‘Yes?’ Hermione jumped up, feeling just a little jittery.
‘I have the results for the tests you brought in. Would you come with me, please?’
Hermione swallowed dryly and nodded.
The office she was led to was small and busy. The wall at the back of the room was covered in convoluted, continually shifting family trees. Stacks of parchment, some more than a foot high, piled up on the desk.
‘Please have a seat. Coffee? Tea? Something stronger?’
Why would she need something stronger? ‘Nothing, thanks. I’m fine.’
‘Well, Miss Granger.’ Suddenly the Genealogy witch beamed at her. ‘Your case is really quite extraordinary. I wonder if you’d consider allowing us to run an in-depth arithmantic analysis. I’ve never seen something like that before.’
‘Something like what?’ Hermione felt sick. Did the witch mean to say that Snape didn’t have any – no, she certainly wouldn’t smile in that case. Or would she? If she had to endure his potions lessons at Hogwarts?
The smile of the witch didn’t fit her stern glasses at all. ‘For Severus Snape our tests come up with only one legal match. It’s a statistical anomaly. Very fascinating. We’ve never had an anomaly before. You see, considering that you are Muggle-born, and he is half and half, ordinary Arithmancy suggests that both of you would have any number of possible legal matches. And well, you do, of course. But your fiancé doesn’t. There is only one legal option for him to get married. It’s really quite astounding.’
‘One legal – one? But there is – and – wh—who is, who –’ Hermione gasped for breath, her nerves fraying. ‘Whoisthatwitch?’ she finally managed.
The Genealogy witch beamed even brighter than before. ‘That’s what is the most amazing thing about this case! You are, my dear. You are the only witch that Severus Snape can legally marry according to the new marriage laws.’
Hermione felt her mouth drop open. Her heartbeat hesitated, then started a wild gallop. Shivering, her hands curled around the arm-rests of her chair.
‘I am?’ she whispered.
‘Yes, you are! And isn’t that wonderful? That is certainly the most romantic love story I have ever heard.’ The bony face of the witch softened into a silly sentimentality. ‘You save his life during the war. You fall in love. And now your love saves his life all over again.’
She sighed happily, oblivious to the fact that Hermione was still gaping at her in shock.
oooOooo
‘That’s impossible,’ Ron stated in a calm voice. ‘That can’t possibly be true.’
Hermione winced. She could cope with Ron when he was raging and screaming and being completely unreasonable. A quiet, reserved Ron was really bad news.
Harry was bent over the sealed parchment Hermione had tossed on the low table. When he looked up, he was very pale. The ragged scar on his forehead stood out eerily.
‘I’m afraid it is true,’ he said at last. ‘That document is valid. Sealed and all.’
Hermione sighed deeply. ‘And wizarding statistics don’t lie. Not when the ink has been mixed with Veritaserum.’
Harry slumped down on his chair, weary and defeated. ‘Oh God. There’s really nothing left we can do, is there?’
Ron still stared at Hermione. His blue eyes went dark with pain.
She swallowed hard, not wanting to see herself reflected in those eyes, not wanting to see his pain, not wanting to see that now, NOW of all times Ronald Weasley suddenly understood her, really understood her, and knew what she would do, almost before she knew it herself. She knew what she had to say. She tried to think of SPEW, of defeating Voldemort, of saving Snape, and all she could think of was Ron.
She swallowed again. Then she raised her head and met Ron’s gaze. He didn’t flinch, didn’t rage, just met her eyes, his expression full of grief and regret.
‘Of course there’s something left we can do.’ She heard her voice as if it was coming from far away. ‘It’s really quite simple, Harry. We have to convince Snape to marry me.’
What a great setup! I love the way you’ve modified the Marriage Law enough to make it plausible, as opposed to the ridiculous version of the original challenge. That choice shifts the dynamic, removing the distraction of needing to deal with why the Ministry has become so obviously corrupt. Making Severus the one who needs saving, instead of Hermione, is a great role reversal, and having Severus unaware of the plan is a very nice little plot twist – I anticipate a great deal of suspicion on his part, making things difficult for Hermione.
W00t! Great to see you here. 😀
The original MLC the lawyer in me stimply couldn’t stomach. But at the same time the *idea* absolutely intrigued me. And didn’t let go until I figured I’d try to twist it and bend it a little and see what happens …
Having Severus unaware of the plan was a lot of fun. And yes, he’ll be definitely a pain in the behind. But that’s his job!
What a great start. Lots to like. Luna being smarter than everyone thinks. Hermione marching off to a fate worse than death, feeling honor bound to do so. The sneaking suspicion that Luna is really getting Hermione out of the way so she can become a Weasley. She’d fit right in.
Mwahahahahahah!
mk
PS: It needs classic soap opera cliffhanger organ music.
Hi,
I really love your story so far, and I can’t wait to read on!
Just wanted to let you know that the link to part 2 does not work, either you get a warning that it “Cannot modify header information”, or the page closes down… *sobs*
Budgie
It should work now. I’ve been trying to get a caching plugin working to speed up the performance of the site, but the dratted thing won’t work and even worse, as you’ve seen, BREAKS stuff. *ARGH!*
Happy you like the story so far! 🙂
I love your whole plot. I am so excited to keep reading. You take things at an absolutely perfect speed– the characters developing bit by bit is perfect. The whole idea is brilliant.
I don’t think I’d be able to rave enough about your work. *claps*
Thank you very much for spending time with my story and even more for taking the time to leave a comment. 🙂
I’m very happy you like the story so much so far!
I think I’m going to love this! I’ve been an avid reader of SS/HG since 2003, and I especially love when an author does a post-DH fic. 🙂 I followed the link from some artwork on DeviantArt and am so glad I did! I’m also happy to see that this is a completed fic, so yay! I can read to my heart’s content and not worry about it being abandoned! 🙂
Thank you for spending time with my story and even more for taking the time to leave such a kind comment. I hope you will enjoy the rest of the story!
Followed your link from ff.net, and am so glad I did! I read this when you were first putting it up, and loved it then. I love it even more now that I have actually gone back and re-read the gloriousness that is Abhorsen. 🙂
Also, may I say that I absolutely love the site. There’s something about reading a wonderful story in a functional, beautiful setting.
You have always been one of my favorite fan fic authors for your skill, unexpectedness, the way you deftly take a story I think I know and turn it upside down and inside out while remaining true to the spirit of it, and this story is no exception.
Thank you for your kind words. That means so much to me! 🙂
Iv’e just read this entire fanfic in a few days, it was AWESOME. Of course, I didn’t take the time to write reviews then, I was too enraptured with the story. And when I saw you had a sequel, of course I had to read that first too. I did resolve to come back latter and leave a review on every tenth chapter, so here I am.
So, starting with chapters 1-10:
Really well done. I like the tension in Ron, Hermione, and Harry’s relationship. Especially that Harry and Ginny foresee the coming doom of Ron and Hermione’s romantic relationship.
I like the cute nicknames you give Harry, like ” the Boy-Who-Could-Use-Cusswords-Without-Being-Scolded.”
The healer at Mungos is a treat, extremely likable. 🙂
And best part: Arthur Weasley mentions that Snape’s sentence has some similarities to muggle theories of rehabilitation and Hermione just has to express her frustration. Her hitting her head on the desk is like a facepalm X 10.
And last but not least, I am definitely looking forward to seeing how the sequel develops. My only hope is that further maiming of our beloved main characters is limited. If the pace of terrible injuries maintains itself from this fic, by chapter 200 of the next one they’ll all be sitting around in Mungos each of them in a “johnny got his gun” kind of situation.
Intriguing setup. I’m not quite sure how I feel about Ron’s characterization, but after the summary, he has to get out of the picture. Even after finally reading all the books, my feelings for Snape are not overly friendly ;-).
You just totally and absolutely MADE my day. *dances*
Now, your comment: Yes, obviously writing SS/HG Ron must disappear. Mostly. 😉 But also, I never liked him (much) in canon, so … Otoh, I always adored Snape. In HBP I *knew* without any doubt that he hadn’t killed Dumbles … Also, one thing about “Apprentice” is definitely that I’m not always sharing the characters’ opinions. I have them being stupid and making mistakes, and being beastly, and doing things that made me go “DON’T DO THAT!” even as I was writing the relevant chapter. It’s pretty wild and sometimes even *gasp* controversial. But I had tons of fun, and I hope you’ll enjoy it, too — even if you don’t really like Snape. 😉
But you make him likeable. Through Hermione’s eyes, no longer a child, some of his choices make more sense.
I tried hard not to whitewash or bash any character. I’m happy the characterisation works for you so far! 🙂
I was referred to your story as a “must-read” and I’m happy that I followed this recommendation. Thank you for sharing such a wonderful idea. I especially enjoyed the way you made them behave “real” and how smothly you added Alina and her mother to the known characters.
I hope you will some day continue with the sequel.
Thank you for spending time with my story, and I’m thrilled you enjoyed it — especially my OCs. I know many people are dubious about OCs, so I’m always very happy when readers like the additional characters I created. I really, really want to finish the sequel (it’s all plotted out!). But offline life has been utterly awful since 2010, each year in its own way, and 2013 is less than fun so far, so I doubt much will happen this year. 🙁
I’m excited to start your story–I stumbled across it through a “favorite story” link on FF.net. I’m not sure how I feel about Ron and Harry’s characterizations so far, but then again I don’t particularly like either one of them in canon, either, so you’re probably spot-on.