Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

...

Horace Slughorn was a menace. It wasn't that he was status-conscious; he still was, but Hermione knew that from her sixth year, when she had first learned to deal with the elderly man. It didn't help that both she and Severus were on his list of Must-Know people, for their role in defeating the Dark Lord and connections to many of that war's other heroes. No, his greatest crime was that he was nosy. Which meant he was always in the lab when she and Severus--whom she was forced to call Professor Snape in such chaperoned moments--were attempting some Potions-based experiment.

Worse, Slughorn's constant presence meant Severus was constantly in teacher-mode. At least they still had the Sunday afternoon teas in which to relax their scholastic distance, but not in the Potions lab. By late February--after a spectacularly ruined Valentine's Day wherein Slughorn played a decidedly sour-note gooseberry all afternoon long, preventing either of them from attempting anything even the slightest bit romantic--Hermione had suffered enough. Only the fact that Severus insisted upon instructing her on a certain advanced brewing technique using a fifth year recipe, Floo Powder, kept her coming back down to the dungeons on the last Saturday of the month.

Worse, she didn't know if Severus had meant to do something vaguely, remotely romantic on Valentine's Day. Not that she herself was the type to lounge about in Madam Puddifoot's Tea Parlour, also known in her private thoughts as the Pink Tearoom From Hell, never mind someone as pragmatic in mindset as Severus Snape. Upset and unable to do anything about it, Hermione entered the Potions laboratory in a snitty mood.

Not even the touch of her former Potions teacher's hand, cupping her own and guiding it in gently stirring the evaporating sludge in her cauldron, rather than vigorously as her mood tried to demand, could soothe her irritation. It was their first lengthy physical contact since the Sorting Hat had paired them, and she couldn't even enjoy it.

She lost it when Slughorn tut-tutted and bustled over to their side, jostling away his colleague's hand. "You're doing it wrong, Severus! It evaporates best when done in a pattern based on the--"

"--Don't touch me!" Her harsh yell startled both professors. Both of them backed away, eyeing her in alarm, but Hermione couldn't help it. The feel of Horace Slughorn's flabby, callused fingers, cold and uninvited, had her shuddering in overwrought revulsion. Abandoning her work, Hermione hurried brusquely to the sink in the corner, grabbing the scouring powder so she could get the feel of those utterly unwanted fingers off her skin. The fat, spidery idiot had ruined what little scraps of enjoyment she had been trying to feel.

Slughorn spluttered for a few moments, then moved to follow her. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of Severus snagging the older wizard by the elbow. "Do not be a fool, Horace. Your presence is clearly unwelcome right now, and if you press the matter, she will most likely respond by hexing you senseless."

"She will not! I am her teacher, and as such, I will not toler--"

"--As such, you are a fat fool," Severus castigated him, cutting him off. "You are old and slow, whereas she is young and quick. You may claim to have plenty of battle experience, but so does she. I have seen her fight, and I know she has killed some of her foes in the course of the war. You are not dealing with a mere half-tutored child, but with a witch full-grown. You are also merely a nuisance to her right now. Do not compound the problem by making yourself a threat."

Thank you! Hermione thought with relief, slowing the actions that were threatening to scrub her hand raw. You know me well enough, I would hex the obnoxious twit if he came anywhere near me right now! Of course, I'm tempted to hex you, too, for being so damned prim and proper all the time!

I am never going to be kissed, at this rate...

"Make yourself far more useful by stirring the Floo potion, before it adheres to the cauldron. I'd rather not ruin something I paid for and intend to use," Severus added. He lowered his voice, making Hermione strain to hear him over the water splashing over her hands. "...I'll get her a calmative draught from the supply cupboard, so we don't have to tiptoe around her like some brooding Welsh dragonness."

"Oh! Oh, right...you do that," Slughorn said, acquiescing to Snape's command. Adjusting his bulk, he settled in front of her cauldron, deftly stirring the thickening, dehydrating sludge so that it could turn into the ash-grey granules necessary for opening a proper Floo connection.

Puzzling over their exchange, it took Hermione all the way to the drying of her hands to realize what the two men meant. Wait...they think I'm...they think I'm having my period! That I'm cranky from being PMS-y! Oohhh...MEN! I'll show them cranky--!

A yell startled both her and the Potions professor. It was rapidly followed by three crashes and shoutings of, "Vitria Leviosa! Evanesco! Evanesco!" coming from the little corridor between the laboratory and Professor Slughorn's office, where the potions storage closet was located.

"Severus? Are you alright?" Slughorn called out quickly, though his hands didn't stop their fanciful scraping of a spoon through the sludge in the cauldron.

"Yes! One of the damned shelves broke," Severus called back, disgust lacing his tone. "I've lost one of my boots to the corrosive properties of Nightwing spit, and two of your bottles of Nihou Dze also fell and were destroyed, but I managed to save the rest. I need someone come here and either repair the shelf or levitate the other bottles so I can do it."

Glancing into the cauldron, Slughorn grimaced. "I can't leave the brew at this stage. Miss Granger, go help him. But no shenanigans! If this is just some excuse to get the two of you alone together...!"

So he was deliberately playing gooseberry, ensuring we'd never have any privacy together, Hermione thought, vexed by how accurate the need had been and by Slughorn's stupid teacherly instincts.

"Horace, if I wanted to get the woman alone, trust me, I would not do it by ruining my best pair of dragonhide boots, not when they cost me a hundred galleons! Now get in here, Miss Granger, before I lose the other pair to the damned Swelling Solution that's tottering on the next shelf down!"

Having heeded that commanding growl for several years now, Hermione obediently scurried for the storage room. Severus was indeed standing on one boot-clad and one sock-clad foot, holding a shelf's worth of jars and bottles aloft above a sagging shelving board, though there were no further signs of broken potions or even threatened vials.

She had no more time to take in details, however, for his free hand snagged her by the back of her head, digging into her upswept curls. Hauled close enough to bump into him from chest to knees, Hermione found herself kissed, and kissed hungrily, by her former Potions professor. In the potions storage locker, which had featured only fruitlessly in her daydreams these last few months.

There was some awkwardness, some accidentally pinching teeth, a couple bumps from his long, thin nose, and a hint of coffee from the noon meal at the back of his mouth. But the lattermost was acceptable because it meant that not only was her tongue permitted entry beyond his lips, the rest of his tongue was busy exploring the hidden flavours of her own mouth. It didn't last long, though he did draw out the suckling of her lower lip.

His cold growl was at complete odds with the warmth in his dark, dark eyes. "Not like that, you idiot! Like this..."

His wand-hand flicked, repairing the shelf. She didn't get to see him resettling the bottles on the restored furnishing, because he kissed her again as he did so. This time it was her lips that lingered on his, sucking on his thin upper lip until it popped free, both of them panting heavily.

"Your wandwork is abysmal, Miss Granger," he told her, freeing his hand from her hair long enough to reach into his pocket, then press something into her palm. He had to nudge it off his black-clad chest to do so. A glance showed the name on the label, and comprehension dawned. "You had best practice your upstrokes before Filius catches sight of such sloppy imperfection."

Nihou Dze? The Chinese Contraceptive Draught? And done in such a way that no one will realize it's not destroyed, just gone?

I'll show him sloppy imperfection, Hermione thought, grinning. She tucked the bottle into the pocket of her skirt, grateful for the precaution he had sneakily produced. Her free hand slid from his waist down to his hip, then to the placket of his trousers. "Does this satisfy you, Professor?"

She rubbed. It wasn't the same as the one time Ron had pressed her hand to his own trouser placket, which had left her with an awkward impression of just not being ready for such things. No, this lump she wanted to feel engorging. And it did.

But though he pressed himself into her palm, he simultaneously sneered, "Certainly not! Two points from Gryffindor for an abysmal performance--and I'll see you practicing your upstroke when you clean up the lab. You'll not be leaving a mess for your Potions Master to attend. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, Professor," she said, her tone sarcastic and her touch lascivious.

She gave him a squeeze, flushed with feminine pride at her daring, then stepped back and left him alone in the confines of the storage closet. Firmly schooling her face into a scowl rather than the lusty grin she felt like beaming, Hermione strode up to the lab table she had been using and started flicking her wand at the various ingredients still resting on the stone surface.

"Upstroke, upstroke...I'd give him an upstroke," she muttered, pretending she was upset with both men. "I'd like to give him one right on his pointy little chin!"

Wisely, Horace Slughorn said nothing, just continued stirring and scraping as the boiling Floo brew reduced itself to the requisite powder.

...

Sunday, there was no sign that he had expected her to take the Nihou Dze for a reason...and no chance for him to give her a sign. Instead, McGonagall and Hooch corralled Severus and Hermione into playing a game of bridge together. They couldn't even play footsies, for the table they sat at was the pedestal kind, and any sort of attempt to detour to one side or the other would have alerted the other two witches that something was literally afoot.

Monday was no better, for it was the Slytherin-Hufflepuff Quidditch match. Naturally, Professor Snape had to attend promptly after class to show support for his House, so there was no chance to linger and discuss things with him. Tuesday was a Room of Requirement day, and one look at the dark, dank stairwell they had to descend told Hermione this was not going to be the location for a discussion of an assignation. Not when descending that staircase with her fellow students led them into the foetid, labyrinthine depths of some sort of catacombs, only to have the stairwell vanish, and their teacher ominously tell them they would not be able to leave until they either found it again, or the hour-long session came to an end.

Given that they were studying the habits and attacks of ghouls, ghasts, and other undead creatures, it was an appropriate place to practice their defensive spells, but hardly the place for an assignation. Or so she thought. As the others scattered into groups of threes and fours to search for their elusive, dangerous quarry, Hermione followed Ron, Harry, and Ginny deeper and deeper into the impossibly large maze.

Halfway through the exercise, right in the middle of reducing a Room-conjured ghast to a smear of ashes on the worn stone floor, Hermione found herself snatched off her feet by strong, imprisoning arms and whirled through a hidden door. The wall-shaped panel closed soundlessly behind them as she struggled with her captor, but rather than a deathly hiss, the ramming point of her elbow elicited a pained grunt and a gasp of her name. Released, Hermione spun around in time to confront her scowling Defence professor, who was gingerly rubbing his offended ribs.

"Is that the thanks I get, for arranging to meet with you in private?" he demanded, straightening from his protective crouch.

"You grabbed me in the middle of an attack! You're lucky I didn't hex you half to death--I thought you were a wandering ghoul," she countered. One look at his expression, which on anyone else might've been labeled a brooding pout, made her relent. "I do appreciate the effort. And it's about time, too."

"Well, we don't have much time. Your cohorts will miss you soon enough. I may have the spells to modify the Room's parameters, but as soon as class ends, it will return to its normal malleability," he warned her, moving closer. There wasn't much to the room they were in, just a loveseat-sized couch, some oil lamps on the walls, and the door, but she wasn't about to move away. Not when she'd only had two kisses so far, and it looked like he was going to give her a third. Lifting his hands to her face, Severus cupped her cheeks, smoothing wisps of her hair back from her forehead.. "I never thought I'd find someone to...to fall for, ever again.

"That you're half my age is an uncomfortable thought at best. That you're one of my students...reprehensible, whenever I think about you as I do," he murmured, glancing briefly at the hands she slipped around his waist. "Yet our compatibility, the way we tolerate and even enjoy each other's company...and how lovely you are..."

"Kiss me," Hermione ordered. "I've only had two, and a good researcher collects at least a dozen samples before formulating an hypotheses."

"A dozen?" he challenged, lifting his brow. "I should say a good researcher collates the results of at least forty samples."

"Forty samples?" she repeated, liking that prospect.

"If not more," he agreed, closing the distance between their mouths.

Severus was a tall, thin man, but Hermione wasn't small herself. He didn't have to stoop just to kiss her, though she did lift onto her toes and lean into him, increasing the pressure of her lips. The hands that cupped her head slipped down around her back, then lowered to her buttocks, lifting her further into their kiss. Like the first two, it wasn't polished, but it wasn't tentative either.

Hermione felt the stone panel of the door thudding against her back, and hitched up one of her knees, wrapping her calf around his hip. Severus groaned and stooped, thrusting his fully clad self against the rumpled folds of her student skirt. It was wrong, it was naughty, it was utterly lascivious--if this had been anyone else, she'd have whalloped him one, as she had a certain ham-handed lout during the Halloween festivals of her sixth year, two years ago. But this wasn't some fumble-fingered boy trying to get his hormonal self into the nearest girl's knickers. This was Severus Snape, bastard by temperament, teacher by profession, Slytherin and spy by nature.

For a man just turning forty, yet not all that experienced in love, he was doing a damn fine job of arousing and pleasing her. Particularly when he sucked his way to her earlobe, a previously unknown hotspot. Biting her lip, Hermione strangled the urge to keen at the pleasure. She shuddered under his suckling kiss, clinging to him with arms and legs, nails digging into the black finespun of his robes. A twist of her head allowed her to return the amorous favor, latching onto his own earlobe with passionate hunger.

A bell chimed in the small chamber, interrupting them. Hissing an expletive, Severus forced the two of them apart, panting with the effort. With his hair mussed and his normally sallow cheeks flushed, he looked a little demented. Seeing it, Hermione flushed with a sense of her own feminine power; she had mussed his hair, and reddened his earlobe, and rumpled the lay of his teaching robes.

Breathing heavily, he turned from her, squinting at the wall until a mirror appeared. Adjusting his hair and clothes briskly, he gestured for her to take her turn. "Hurry up. The others are actively looking for you, and you mustn't be gone long--here, take this."

Turning from adjusting her clothes so they looked more presentable than passionate, Hermione found him holding out a vial filled with an ash-grey powder. "What's this?"

"Floo Powder. The same which we brewed. Professor Mundane's classroom is the nearest to Gryffindor Tower. It connects to the hearth in my private study," Severus told her, moving behind her so he could gently scrape his fingers through her curls, tidying them. "The password is 'frogs in winter' should you care to visit...provided you remember that my patrolling nights are Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and take pains not to get caught."

Dropping his hands to her shoulders, he met her gaze through the looking-glass. "The choice is yours...whatever you choose to do. You may come to just talk...or to explore more of this hands-on experimentation."

At the words "hands-on", he slid his fingertips down just far enough to brush the peaks of her breasts through her school sweater. She turned to face him and he caught her shoulders, gently holding her still.

"Be sure of what you want, Hermione. I am not an easy man, nor naturally inclined to be a kind one; not with most of my life spent being sour and solitary, set in my ways. I would like to change, and I am finally now free to change...but I am also a possessive man. Have pity on me and know your own mind, should you wish to take this further than a mere kiss. And do be discreet. The last thing either of us needs is to be caught."

Removing his touch, he stepped back, then lifted a hand. The door opened. Hermione took that as her cue, slipping back out into the conjured catacombs. A moment after the door swung shut, vanishing into the wall once again, Ginny cautiously rounded the corner to her left. Spotting Hermione, the redhead gasped, then rushed forward, hissing her name.

"Hermione! Thank Merlin you're all right! We thought another ghast might've gotten you," Ginny said. Behind her, Ron and Harry came into view, hurrying to catch up. A moment later, Ginny frowned and stared hard at Hermione. "...Is that a bite on your neck?"

"Erm...not quite. Professor Snape's thrown a wringer into the Room. Turns out I was ambushed by a vampire. I'm alright, really," she quickly reassured them as the boys and Ginny exchanged worried looks. "The safety spells didn't even have a chance to kick in. I acted so hard and fast, last I looked, he was still burning up."

"I can admire the man for his creativeness, even if he's still a bit of a bastard in temperament," Harry told her. "It's just like him to throw something like that in. I swear, if I pass my Defence N.E.W.T.s with anything less than an Outstanding, it won't be for lack of instruction. I'll have let him down, and not the other way around."

"Yeah, things like this is like old Moody's stories of Auror training," Ron agreed. "He's still a sarcastic git--no offense, Hermione--but Professor Snape really knows his defences."

"Let's keep moving," Ginny offered. "I'd rather not be a sitting duck for a whole group of undead fiends, and we're supposed to be finding the exit before the class ends."

Nodding, the other three followed her deeper into the tangled stone maze.

...

She wasn't Head Girl, but she was still a prefect, and seventh-year prefects could be out of their dorms past curfew, if they were assigned a patrol. Her evening patrols were Thursday, Friday, and Saturday...so Thursday, after a cursory set of rounds that sent a pair of fourth-year Hufflepuffs scurrying for their Astronomy observation class up in the tower, rather than canoodling in a corner of the east wing, she made her way back up to Professor Mundane's classroom.

Since the Muggle Studies wizard kept his Muggle devices locked up in individually warded cabinets, he never warded his classroom. And, being quite elderly and thus prone to chills, he had convinced some Headmaster of the past--probably the late Dumbledore--to install a fireplace right behind his desk, as much show his students how Muggles would keep themselves warm as to actually keep himself warm, since he was a wizard and could simply cast a warming charm on his robes. So there was no need for Hermione to break into his office.

Best of all, the paintings and photos on the walls of Professor Mundane's classroom were the non-moving, non-living Muggle kind. No eyes to spy upon her and no ears to hear her destination when she vanished from view.

Carefully drying her nervous, sweaty palms, Hermione tossed the little pouch of Floo Powder onto the fire. It roared green and she stepped inside the verdant flames. "Frogs in winter!"

Whirled around twice, the fire released her to stumble out onto a thick oriental carpet that looked brand new. Having seen something of his quarters in his Pensieve of memories, Hermione swung around, taking in the little touches that had changed since his revival at the end of the war. No longer did it look like Severus Snape was punishing himself with less than comfortable surroundings--there weren't a lot of comforts, not on a teacher's salary, but there was the rug, and a new divan with thick cushions, and a couple of faded but still colorful tapestries hanging on the walls of his front room.

Plus a new black velvet dressing gown, she discovered, as Severus appeared in the doorway that presumably led to his bedroom. He lowered his wand--reflexes as ready as ever, it seemed--and...and...smiled at her? It was a shy, lopsided smile, but it was still undeniably a smile. Hermione felt her heart melt.

A moment later, he recovered his dignity, tightening the folds of his dressing gown and clearing his throat. "Well. You've caught me at a disadvantage. I would have been fully attired, but I was two minutes from retiring for the night...though your presence is welcome. Would you...erm...like some tea? Or...did you come for me?"

Seeing him trying to act self-assured despite his uncertainty made her smile. Crossing to the sofa, Hermione dropped onto it and padded the cushions next to her. "No tea, thank you, but I would like some of your company. Erm...that is, if you wouldn't mind a little, well...pre-bedtime cuddling? We don't have to get to the rest until later, no need to rush."

One of his brows rose at that, but he crossed the room and seated himself next to her. Then scooted a little closer, carefully tugging on his dressing gown so that it covered the grey nightshirt that fell halfway down his calves. Hermione scooted as well, until she could comfortably lean against him. A happy sigh escaped her when he tucked his arm around her shoulders.

"This is what I wanted," she murmured. A hint of petulance entered her voice. "We never get to touch when we're having tea. There's always something missing, and I think it's that we never just touch. You know?"

"This is pleasant, I will agree," he admitted. A moment later, he asked, "...A vampire, am I?"

Hermione giggled. "She saw the marks you left on my neck. I had to come up with something to throw them off the scent."

"You were rather vampiric yourself; my earlobe was still blushing from your lips when I went to the staff meeting after class, two days ago. Poppy wanted to know if I was developing some sort of rash."

"Well, it's not that far off the mark," Hermione said. At his grunt of inquiry, she explained. "You used to treat me and the others like some sort of communicable disease. I don't blame you; we were rather obnoxious little twits, weren't we?"

"Considering I myself was a bastard, I'd say the blame was mutual. Hermione...a question," he said, the seriousness of his tone making her lift her head from his chest. He was frowning thoughtfully. "Am I still that much of a bastard? Discipline must be maintained in the classroom, of course...but Minerva never had to be a raving bitch to maintain hers, if you'll pardon my language."

Thinking about it, Hermione considered how he had been acting these last several months. "Well...you're still a little tougher on the Gryffindors than on anyone else...but you have hardened up against the Slytherins, so there's not as much of a disparity, there. And you haven't been nearly as, mm, forceful outside of the classroom. Nor as feared.

"Some of that may be because you're now viewed as a war hero by many, though some still hate what you had to do. Actually, come to think of it," she amended, grinning, "you mostly have the student body puzzled, as do I. You and me, together? They can match our brilliant minds together, and our bossy temperaments, but there's been bets laid heavily against you and I ever getting...well, laid!"

Her admission made him laugh. "The only thing stopping that from happening is that you're the one setting the pace." It was her turn to make an inquisitive noise. He gestured at his lap, drawing her attention to the lump under his dressing gown. "I am a man. The moment I kissed you and you didn't resist, I could've taken you right there and then, Horace be damned."

Hermione shuddered at the thought of Professor Slughorn witnessing that. "Urgh. Let's not talk about him. I'd rather only ever associate pleasure with my sense of sexuality, thank you."

"Which does bring up an important question, if an indelicate one. Hermione...you lived for several months in the forest with your two friends..."

He trailed off as she shook her head. "No. Nothing like that ever happened. Ron did try to get me alone a few times, but I found myself putting him off. I'd had a crush on him for years, but it always warred with the fact that we fought so much. We really don't have enough in common to be more than just friends, and I finally wised up to that. It took the Sorting Hat telling him his best choice for a mate would be Hannah to get him to wise up, too."

"I see. And...Potter?"

"Eww!" It sort of amused her that he still couldn't bring himself to say Harry's name without the sort of hesitation one gave before saying "manure" but Hermione knew that was a battle he himself would have to fight. Instead, she quickly laid to rest any of his doubts on the thought of her and Harry...eww. "No, never, not in a thousand years. Harry is very much like a brother to me. I was an only child, you know, and he was a neglected child. Once we made friends, we sort of latched on to each other like a sort of honorary brother and sister. We don't always get along--more so than Ron, but not always--but we're always there for each other. Erm...that isn't going to bother you too much, will it?"

Free hand lifting to his face, Severus rubbed at his forehead, massaging the bridge of his nose. "When the Sorting Hat called out its confirmation, I spent the whole of the night struggling with what that meant. Not just the second chance at happiness--for which I am a grateful bastard--but the fact that it was you, a woman half my age...and the woman who was best friends with the boy who...who should have been my son, but was instead the living symbol of the chances that I had stupidly destroyed. Part of me still struggles with these things..."

This was an important confession, she knew. Gently, Hermione asked, "And the other part?"

The arm around her shoulders hugged her closer. "Part of me is a selfishly pleased git, that I could be blessed with a second chance at happiness, and blessed to have that chance with someone even brighter than Lily Evans."

"Brighter?" Hermione questioned, not quite sure he was serious. "Really?"

Severus snorted. "Of course you're brighter than her! You already knew what kind of a bastard I was, yet you still gave me a chance. She only had a glimpse of what I could become, and dumped me because of a stupid slip of an overly-embarrassed, frustrated tongue. I'd definitely say you're the brighter woman, finding whatever was left of the pearl I've trampled into my self-inflicted pigsty."

The comparison made her want to giggle, but she settled on a smile, gesturing at the room. "It's heartening to see you're no longer living in austerity."

"Yes. I'm no longer punishing myself. Minerva...insisted I get some counseling, this last summer. One of her witch friends married a Muggle psychologist, and since he knows about our world, he's been able to understand some of the things I've..." He shifted a little, then sighed. "I have slowly been learning how to forgive myself. I still go, though only once a month of late."

"I'm proud of you," Hermione told him, covering his thigh with her hand. She gave it a squeeze. "I always knew you were brave, but it takes a special kind of strength to admit you need help, and to admit you need to change...and to strive for that help and that change. You're the strongest man I know, really."

She squeezed him again and he shifted a little. The movement of his hips drew her attention downward. The modest lump under his dressing gown was turning into a distinct peak. Experimentally, if thoughtlessly, she squeezed again.

"Hermione, I am not going to be that strong, if you keep doing that, woman!" he warned her, squirming again. He glared at her, but she could tell it wasn't a truly angry one. "Stop discovering miscellaneous erogenous zones, if you don't intend to follow through on them!"

Stilling her hand, she thought about that. Thought long and hard about...a yawn interrupted her. Lifting her fingers to cover her mouth, she sheepishly apologized. "...Sorry. I would like to stay, but...it's been a long day, we both have classes tomorrow, and, well, Friday might be a better night. Especially since I haven't set things up to hide my absence for more than a half hour at most. Discretion, as you said."

"Quite. You'd, erm, better go. Now. Without a kiss goodnight," he added as she shifted to face him a little more.

Disappointed, Hermione conceded his point. She had taken the Nihou Dze back on Saturday, but she really hadn't scheduled a way to cover her absence for more than half an hour at most. There were only so many times she'd be able to use the excuse, "Peeves locked me in a closet," after all. Rising, she smoothed out her clothes. "Then I'll drop by on Friday night, shall I?"

"Yes--you'll need more Floo Powder," he warned her, following her off the divan. "I couldn't pass you a large amount on Tuesday because you hadn't brought your infamous book-bag to Defence Practice. I do have more for you, though. Take that pot, there, and conceal it somewhere close to the Muggle Studies hearth. Let me know when it gets down to a quarter-full. I'll make more for you.

"Know that you are welcome in my quarters, Hermione," he added quietly. "Always."

Touched by his generosity, his willingness to let her invade the privacy of such a private, closed-off man, Hermione impulsively wrapped her arms around him in a hug. Startled, he resisted a moment, then wrapped his own around her, returning the embrace.

After several seconds, his hand slid up into her curls. Grasping her hair, he gently pulled on her head. Once it had tipped back, his mouth descended, kissing her with the same intensity from before. Desire rose in her, but before she could to more than start to cling to his shoulders, he pushed her back.

"--No. Not tonight. Make suitable arrangements, for discretion's sake. I may be a bloody war-hero, but I cannot guarantee I'd be able to get employment elsewhere," he muttered, raking his hands through his hair as he turned away from her. "Not to mention your own job prospects would be sullied. Discretion, above all else. I learnt that much, as a spy."

"Would you, erm...rather I didn't drop by?" Hermione offered, hesitant since she didn't really want to stop, herself.

"I'm not that much of a masochist!" he snapped, whirling to face her. His hands slashed down at his velvet-wrapped hips. "It's bad enough I'll have to deal with this, tonight!"

A giggle escaped her. She choked it back quickly, but not quickly enough. At his pained look, Hermione offered, "...Well, it's not every day that someone likes me gets to drive a man mad with lust, you know! I can't help being pleased with my effect on you!"

"It would be less of a sting to my pride if I knew I had the same effect on you," he retorted.

Hermione smiled and turned to pick up the pot of Floo Powder. "Oh, you do. And I'm going to have to use a silencing charm on my bed curtains, tonight. I'll see you in class tomorrow...and tomorrow night."

"--Bollocks! I have patrol, tomorrow night," he swore, scowling. "Monday, Wednesday, and Friday."

"As do I," Hermione reminded him, "Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Makes it all the more convenient, should we 'bump' into each other, don't you think?"

Folding his arms across his chest, Severus glared at her. "You will not tempt me into an assignation tonight. Be gone...and schedule your route to wind up by about nine thirty-five. The little blighters can snog themselves silly, after that. It's my turn to get snogged. Go on. Off with you. Alone."

Grinning, Hermione used a bit of the powder to whirl herself away.

...

Despite the fact that they were still exploring catacombs and blasting the undead during Friday's practice in the Room of Requirement, Hermione didn't find herself alone with the Defence Master until the requested time that night. Arranging things so that an illusion of her sleeping self would appear in her bed five minutes after everyone else in her dorm room had fallen asleep meant she had slacked off on her Potions and Arithmancy homework in order to research the necessary spells, but she knew she could make all of that up easily on Sunday after their appointment for tea. Once again, she had to dry her palms before casting Floo Powder onto the hearth; two spins, and she was there.

This time, Severus was dressed...at least in his normal boots, trousers, shirt, and jacket, but thankfully no teaching robes. He looked much as he did whenever they were sharing their afternoon tea, though from the spicy scent wafting up from the two steaming-hot mugs on the coffee table, tonight's drink offering was mulled cider. Gesturing for her to sit, Severus settled beside her, offering her one of the mugs.

Accepting it, Hermione sipped carefully at the hot liquid, searching for something to say. A rueful smile twisted her lips after a few fruitless moments. Setting down her mug, she reached for his and set that down as well, grateful when he didn't protest. He did give her a curious look, however.

"I'd like to do the normal things two young people do when they first date. You know, kiss and cuddle a bit, at first."

"Young? I may try to forget it, but I am twice your age," Severus pointed out.

"Piffle." At his arched brow, she repeated herself. "You heard me: piffle! Wizards can easily live into their hundred-and-fifties, if not longer. That makes you at least thirty years away from even the merest thought of mid-life, and that means you're still a young man. Now come here, young man," Hermione ordered bossily, if teasingly as she clasped his hands, "and give us a kiss!"

" 'Us'?" he questioned.

"Me, myself, and I. That's three kisses, one apiece," she stated, lifting her chin with mock-impudence.

"Ah, but I can only give you a kiss for you, and a kiss for yourself. Now I, on the other hand, need a kiss for all three, of me, myself, and I," he countered, daring to play along.

Hermione grinned. "Then that's ten kisses! Three for me myself and I, two for you and yourself, which from my perspective makes five...and from your perspective makes another five. Five and Five makes ten, you know."

"Your so-called logic..." Severus started to say, then paused; she could see him calculating her words before he finished smoothly, "...is absolutely impeccable."

"It had better not be impeccable, since I'm sitting here, waiting to be pecked," she joked.

Obligingly, he leaned close and touched their lips together. It wasn't as intense as the ones from before, more delicate if not quite hesitant. In fact, it was a soft, sweet kiss, two adjectives she hadn't thought could be applied to this particular man. I think...I think I'll have to spend many decades getting to know him. A thought which doesn't deter my enthusiasm in the least.

Pulling back and narrowing his eyes, Severus studied her for a long moment. "Hm. It seems I have found the ultimate way to shut you up. A pity I cannot apply it in class."

"...Come again?" Hermione asked, lost and missing the rest of his kiss.

"A kiss will put a stopper in your know-it-all lips." Leaning in close, he demonstrated again. Unfortunately his joke made her laugh, and what had started out as a smooth press of his lips quickly became a muddled jiggle that evolved rapidly into a more heated, open-mouthed exchange.

Somehow they ended sort-of sprawled on the divan, which really wasn't long enough for such things, but between nibbling lips and roving hands, tangling legs and thrusting hips. Until, with a tortured groan, Severus rolled off of her, half sliding off the couch before he could get his heels set on the oriental carpet solidly enough to hitch his backside onto the couch. But he still slouched, blatantly unable to sit upright. Not when his jacket had been unbuttoned and shoved off to the floor along with her jumper, half the buttons on his shirt were also undone, and there was nothing left but a bit of black wool and whatever passed for undergarments to restrain his obvious arousal.

Feeling rather overheated herself, Hermione couldn't calm down Intellectually, she knew he was right to try and slow things down between them, that she was getting close to being ready for going all the way...but carnally, she wanted to see him lose control. To please her man in the most basic, base way a woman could please a man. Rolling onto her hip so that she half lay against him, Hermione covered his erection with her hand.

He hissed and clutched at her wrist, clearly torn between pushing her touch away and pulling it closer. "Her...Hermione..."

"Shh, shh," she soothed, choosing bravery over discretion. "I put you in this pain, now let me ease it."

Her words made him blink in shock at her boldness, then relax a little as her fingers hunted for his trouser placket buttons. One of his hands came around her shoulders, cupping her close in the curve of his arm. The other clutched at the far armrest. The clutching became a clawing, accompanied by an indrawn hiss the moment she made her way through the flaps of his undershorts, grasping his warm, hard, satin-soft flesh.

Working him into the open, Hermione admired the reddened head, the pallid yet straining shaft, and the way he clutched her shoulder a little more whenever her fingers shifted in a way that he liked. With the hissing of his breath and the flexing of his fingers, and soon enough his hips, as her guide, Hermione stroked, rubbed, kneaded and teased the dark wizard at her side. The dark, powerful, helpless wizard.

At the end, the only thing he seemed capable of saying--or panting rather--was, "Her...Her...Her...Herrrrrrr!"

Body bowing, hips snapping, fingers clawing, he came in startlingly vigorous spurts. Hermione wasn't ignorant; she'd read the same glossy wizarding porn periodicals that all the other girls had passed around the dorm rooms over the years. Having had a taste of ostracism in her first few months, and on other occasions throughout the years, she had learned the value of fitting in with her fellow females. Even if to begin with she had felt rather prudish about such things, she had still studied them, self-acknowledge swot that she was. But this was real. This was Severus coming undone literally by her hand.

This was so much more exciting than anything she'd even merely thought of doing with the boys in her past. Gentling her touch--which the magazines suggested was a very good idea--she crossed her legs, pressing her thighs together in the attempt to handlessly alleviate some of her own need. Severus roused at her restlessness, blinking open his eyes and glancing at her movements. One brow quirked up, and though his face flushed, the corner of his mouth quirked up once again in that rare, lopsided smile of his.

Twisting onto his side to face her, Severus shifted his free hand to her knee. Pushing up the hem of her pleated skirt, he explored for the waistband of her knickers. When she started to remove her hand he shook his head quickly, lifting his hips enough to press himself back into her fingers. So she continued to hold him, though she squirmed a bit in assistance, helping him to lower her winter-thick tights. A sigh escaped her when he rubbed his palm over her knicker-covered mound, and a gasp when he hooked the fabric aside, allowing his fingertips their own opportunity to explore.

It didn't take him long to have her sprawled in a slouch, her hand grasping the edge of the divan instead of his half-revived flesh, her thighs splayed as wantonly as the tights tangled around her ankles would allow. Nor did it take much longer than that, what with him murmuring lascivious, base encouragements in her ear, his breath hot against her flesh, before she shuddered and keened, falling deliciously apart.

Holding her close, pressing soft kisses to the side of her face, he gentled his own touch, eventually withdrawing his hand from her clothes. A hesitant, inquisitive sniff was followed by a tentative lick of his fingers, then a sigh and a thorough tonguing suckle reminiscent of someone cleaning a tasty sauce from their fingers. At her inquisitive noise, he removed the last digit from his mouth.

"Another time, perhaps...but the hour unfortunately grows late. Besides, I find I am like a starving man presented with a feast. I know that if I try to...eat...too much of it at once," he murmured, glancing down at the curved of her breasts, visible through her partially undone blouse, "I will likely choke and feel sick. And we do have the rest of the year."

"With discretion as our topmost agenda," Hermione sighed, agreeing. "I haven't the slightest clue how I'll refrain from drooling at you during class on Monday. Particularly now that I've come to associate that low, murmuring voice of yours with all this pleasure. But you're right. I think I'd like to have a lot more to look forward to...and it's clear you have a lot more to show me, don't you?"

He smirked, then kissed her. It was a short kiss, the kind meant to express fondness, she thought, and the fact that he continued his lopsided smile afterward, urging her to join him in righting their clothes, only made him--Severus Snape, who was still at times a sarcastic, ill-tempered git--all the more endearing to her.

To reward him, once they were fully clothed, upright, and standing by the green-lit fire, Hermione kissed him thoroughly in parting. Not to arouse, though that was something of a side effect. No, she kissed him to show him she most definitely agreed with the Sorting Hat's choice for her mate, as well as for her House.

From the way he kissed back, holding her close like some rare treasure fallen into his lap, Severus Snape agreed.

THE END