"Now, judging by the owl you sent me, you are not pleased with what Miss Skeeter wrote about you in the Prophet. What exactly is it you want the wizarding world to know the truth about?" asked the reporter once everyone had taken a seat in his rather quaint office.

"There are quite a few things Miss Skeeter twisted around just to get a nice story. First off, we want to say that everything that is between us is some sort of friendship at most. We will elaborate on that topic later. 

One major thing she accused us of was an illegal teacher-student relationship. This is definitely not true. We do not have an illegal relationship, we are just colleagues of sorts." 

Severus observed the note-taking man's facial expression and was surprised to find not one emotion clearly shown. This man was obviously way more professional than his colleague.

Once finished taking down the points listed by the potions master, the reporter looked up at his two visitors. "What do you mean by that, Mister Snape?"

"He means that I am not his student any more. I am his apprentice - I have been since the third or fourth day of term. I'd have to look at the contract to tell you the exact date, but I don't think that that is important now. What matters is that I haven't been his student in more than two months. I've been helping him with his classes and even held one or two for the younger years. You could ask any student at Hogwarts, and they'd tell you that I've been present at nearly all their potions lessons," said Hermione before she took a sip of the tea Mister Graves had served them.

"That certainly changes quite a few things. Go on, please."

"Well, concerning our friendship... That topic is a bit more complex to explain. You see, the headmistress decided that those who redo their seventh year won't have regular classes. Instead, they should choose 3 or more subjects they wanted to gain more in-depth knowledge about, and she'd later on make each one of them an individual timetable.

In order to do that, she and I decided that we would just give them some lessons to freshen up some basics until she would be finished with that and that is why they had four lessons on potions on the first day of school. 

I knew that not everyone would choose potions, so I decided to revise some potions from the earlier years. I asked them to brew an ageing potion and as per the usual, Miss Granger's was the first one to be finished, and I had nothing to say against her brew and I told her that. I praised her and that might have been the cause for someone to drop a wrong ingredient in their cauldron, we don't really know. Nevertheless, one cauldron exploded and the potion turned nearly all of my students into babies. I was turned into a toddler, too but somehow a correctly brewed and slightly varied ageing potion turned me into an adult again. However, it didn't work on the others."

"Harry, Ron and the other eighth years weren't in attendance of the ball because they were still children. Neville Longbottom and Astoria Greengrass are the only other eighth years still grown up. While Neville showed up at the ball shortly, Astoria watched Blaise, and we brought Harry and Draco with us. They were the small children we were seen with. 

Ronald Weasley and Pansy Parkinson were sent home to their families right after the incident. The other families are otherwise occupied and so Neville, Astoria and I took them in and cared for them. Professor McGonagall assigned Severus to help me with watching Harry and Draco and due to that, we came to some sort of understanding. 

As for the question of why Severus would attend a social gathering with his student or rather his apprentice, he and I had to. We both did not want to attend at first, but Professor McGonagall reminded us of a paragraph of my apprenticeship contract where it is written, that master and apprentice have to attend any and all social gatherings linked to our school or either one of us, together."

Hermione leant back in her chair observing the middle-aged man eagerly scribbling down their answers.

"One last question, Miss Granger. Why exactly did you run from the Great Hall that night?"

"Well, we were talking about a quite recent private matter that has troubled Severus for quite some time, and he asked me to help him with finding out the truth. As we were dancing and talking, I had an idea and I wanted to check whether my solution would work. We spent the rest of the night brewing a part of the potion required for my idea. And Miss Skeeter really needs to have her eyes checked. I came back not that much later to come and get Harry and Draco. It was way too late for them to be up and running around," said Hermione while looking at Severus as if to tell him that he should just play along.

"Right, I could ask you what that matter was but as you already said it's private, and so I won't intrude. I believe we have everything we need to clear things up. I will put this into a real text, and I am positive that you'll read the article in tomorrow's Daily Prophet."

Zander Graves put away his notepad and quill and looked at the two visitors sitting there in the very comfortable deep red chairs.

"Thank you very much, Mister Graves. You really helped us a lot."

Hermione and Severus stood and bid the reporter their goodbyes.

"It is I who has to thank you. With this, I may have a chance at getting her removed from the Prophet. I hope that now more people speak up to right the things she wrote wrong."

He cracked a smile and shook their hands while showing them the way out.

"You know, these past years many people asked just how she gets some really secret information. I know how, so should you need another article..." Hermione trailed off as she looked at a rather smug-looking Severus.

"I shall write you an owl when the time comes, Miss Granger. I wish you a good day."

Severus and Hermione turned around and started walking towards the lifts.

"What do you think, can we expect Minerva to watch the kids a bit longer in favour of going to another department?"

"What is it that you plan to do, Hermione? I'm not sure whether I should be worried or not."

She smiled devilishly, a smile he never saw a mentally safe woman smile.

"You definitely can be worried but not for us or the children. Just come along, my plan for revenge isn't fully finished yet."

He looked down at her slightly surprised and amazed by how vengeful she actually was.

"Just lead the way."