Severus felt a lot like a master who came home to find his dog jump up at him, waiting for the stick to be thrown, as Hermione always greeted him joyfully when she saw him.

The problem was that now that she didn’t have to attend classes anymore, she was following him everywhere. He had had a heated discussion with her when he had forbidden her to visit him during his lessons.

“But you need some company,” she had tried to persuade him. “You will grow lonely and then I am the only one left who ever wants to speak to you.”

But he had not given in and now Hermione was in his private chambers, hopefully not getting into mischief. If he was lucky, she was sleeping; if not … well, let’s hope he was lucky. He had put spells on his rooms to make them undamagable, but in her state, who knows what she thought up while he didn’t watch over her.

After he had chased the Slytherin fifth-years from the Potions classroom he quickly went to inspect his rooms. He needed to check on Hermione a lot lately. When he opened the door he saw her dancing around the room to music that came from the u-bend.

He cleared his throat and her attention shifted from the music to him. “Oh, you’re back. I’m so glad nothing has happened to you. I had terrible visions of some cuddly toys invading your backyard.”

He refrained from informing her that he didn’t have a backyard as she would happily ignore that piece of information. “What have you been doing while I was teaching?” he asked instead.

“I found a book!” she screeched.

“A book.” He raised an eyebrow.

“Yes, a book! Do you want to see it?” she asked.

“No, I know what books look like.” He had enough of books since they had started to search every corner of the library.

“But it’s a really nice one. It has a midnight-blue cover and talks to me in rhymes!”

Something clicked in his mind. This was the book they had been looking for in the past weeks! “Give me that book,” he demanded. “Where did you get it from?” he inquired when she handed him the book.

“I found it in my school bag. It told me I had put it there.”

“The book told you.”

“Yes,” Hermione said. “If you talk to the book in rhymes, it talks back to you.”

He turned the book in his hands, unsure whether he should or shouldn’t open it. He was afraid that he could go mad like Hermione. Suddenly red-glowing words formed on its front-cover.

If you have a question,
My greasy-haired child,
Put it into rhymes
That are amiably styled.

“Why should I talk to you in rhymes?” he asked the book.

The book, however, didn’t answer. A red arrow appeared below the stanza and pointed at it before it vanished again. Great, Severus thought. Just what I need.

“Alright,” he sighed. “Here comes your stanza:

Bloody book,
Please tell me now
Why I have to rhyme
Like a pregnant cow.”

He didn’t have to wait long for the book’s reply:

Your rhymes are abysmal
And your talent’s wretched,
Perhaps the idea of rhyming
Is, for you, too far-fetched.

But to answer your question
Why you have to rhyme:
It is just a game
That I play all the time.

Severus groaned inwardly. A book that forces to reader to rhyme just for the fun of it. But he needed to know whether he could open it or not:

“Will your hexes affect me
if I open you now?
Please answer, ‘cause my
Rhymes are bad, somehow.”

The book seemed to take some time to contemplate this, while Hermione was laughing madly in some corner of his room. She seemd to find it very funny that his rhyming abilities were even worse than Neville’s abilities to concoct a potion. Finally, a stanza with the reply appeared on top of the book.

I am the Midnight Book,
Affecting only those
Who have a feeling for rhymes,
In highs and in lows.

He supposed that meant that he ran no danger of being hit by one of those uncanny spells within the book. He wanted to know another thing, though:

“Are you sure I can trust you,
Insulting book that you are?
You see, my mind and my rhyming
Are not on a par.”

Severus had the funny feeling that the book was laughing.

My dear child,
Do you really think
That I lie to people
Who are dim as a kink?

Severus thought it best not to inform the book of his opinion on that matter; but, on the good side, he was fairly sure now that the book wouldn’t harm him. And if .. well, one crazy person more or less at Hogwarts wouldn’t stand out.

He opened the book and flicked through it, but couldn’t find the page where the poem Hermione had told him about was on. He turned back to the cover, formulating another stanza:

“I know I’m annoying,
but please tell me this:
I want to know on which page
your latest curse is.”

The book suddenly started to leaf through itself, stopping at a page that contained a poem called “The Midnight Curse.” Severus put a silencing charm on Hermione, because she was squaking delightedly, and read the poem:

The Midnight Curse

Good day to you, dear reader,
I hope you have some time,
For whatever lies within you,
Will soon be in its prime.

Whatever lies within you
Has to be placed there twice,
Go back to where you ingested
This terrible device.

To undo the spell
upon your mind
You have to find the source of all,
The trigger of some kind.

When midnight strikes
And nothing is reversed,
You are lost, my soul,
And deeply are you cursed.

(You don’t know what’s wrong?
Turn to page two hundred and two,
A recipe’s included there
To tell what’s befallen you.)

So all he had to do was find out what that mysterious thing was, get another such thing and make her eat it at the place where she had eaten it before. Great, so no problem in helping Hermione, because in her state Hermione would voluntarily tell him what and where she’d eaten. Of course. Simple task. As simple as surviving a day without coffee.

He read the last stanza of the poem again and turned to page 202. He found a recipe for a potion there. If the book spoke (wrote? rhymed?) the truth, this potion would tell him whatever Hermione had eaten.

He looked up because Hermione was tugging at his sleeve. “What?” he snarled. Hermione opened her mouth and mimed talking, but no sound came out. He remembered the silencing charm he had put on her and lifted it.

“Do you have a paper ship for me?” she asked.

“Why would you need a paper ship?” he asked, annoyed.

“Because there’s a great lake in your bathroom and I want to play with the ship there!”

Severus conjured up a ship and gave it to Hermione because he couldn’t affort any disurbance in the next hour, as that was the time the potion he would have to make claimed to take.

It was a simple potion and he had all the ingredients it needed in his store-room. Unfortunately for him, Hermione kept coming from wherever she was playing at the moment and threw other things into the bubbling cauldron. Because of this Severus was forced to brew the potion a total of four times before it was finished.

“Miss Granger?” Severus called into the bathroom. “Come here please, I have a drink for you.”

In an instant, Hermione was at his side, looking eager to drink whatever he had in store for her. He gave her a cup full of the potion and she drank it. It seemed to taste well, because she asked him if she could get more of it. After ten minutes, she started to emanate a yellow light and after ten more minutes, that light was gone. Severus gave her another paper ship because hers had shipwrecked.

He opened the “Midnight Book” again and looked for the verses that told him what the yellow light meant.

If the drinker emits
A light white as snow,
Nothing’s wrong with him,
As you surely know.

Light green, however,
Tells you the tale
Of spinach that hexed him;
And that’s why he’s pale.

But if the colour is red
That lights the room,
A herring’s been eaten,
I presume.

But if he pops up in yellow,
The colour of many crops,
You know that the drinker was hit
By The Curse Of The Lemon Drops.

Lemon drops? Severus thought disbelievingly. Not lemon drops! After he had managed to ban all lemon drops from the castle this manic book told him that what he needed to cure Hermione were LEMON DROPS? Fantastic. Great. Marvellous.

But there was another thing that nagged him: Albus Dumbledore and his lemon drop addiction. He was a ticking time bomb. Never ever must the Headmaster lay his hands onto this book, or what had happened to Hermione would also happen to him, provided that he could rhyme to the satisfaction of the book.

Or …

No.

But perhaps?

No.

But maybe ..

There was another possibility. Maybe the Headmaster had already had a good look at that book. Maybe he too was cursed by The Curse Of The Lemon Drops. But no, that was ridiculous. Although it would explain certain things... Maybe he was less affected by the curse than Hermione.

But Severus’ primary problem at the moment was the one of getting lemon drops. Especially now that they were nearing the time limit. Hermione had a total of five sane minutes left a night.