Severus has been dragged here as unwilling as ever to engage in social interaction; he doesn't wish to deal with the fallout of an outright refusal to attend these absurd get-togethers. So he makes use of it and picks out his ex-student at her table and slipping away from whatever inane conversation he was pretending to appreciate.

Since her arrival in Baedal, it's the first time Severus has seen Hermione Granger in person. She looks far older than he remembers her, and it does leave him feeling rather wrong-footed. After all, the last he saw her (without the barrier provided by the CiDs), she was peering down at him as he bled to death. It seems strange to him to think that life has, indeed, gone on. The world didn't simply come to a halt when he died.

Children grow up.

Well, good. He needs her intelligence and the sense of maturity that has hopefully accompanied the addition of a few years. He doesn't sit beside her, but instead stands at her elbow; it's familiar to loom over her, and it takes him a moment to remind himself that he is not her teacher. She is supposed to be his ally.

"Miss Clearwater." Dry tone, dismissive and disinterested in her alias. He has come to find aliases are pretty well useless here in Baedal.