Chapter Three

Disclaimer: They belong to JKR, not me.

Chapter Three

“Master Professor Snape, we is needing your help!” Severus had dropped the Daily Prophet and drawn his wand before he recalled he was sitting in the breakfast room at Malfoy Manor awaiting the presence of its lord and master.

“What is it, Kippy?”

“Is the master, sir. He will not leave his bed. He told Kippy he was staying there all day long. Please, Master Professor Snape, he is having a schedule!”

“Perhaps he is unwell. Have you sent for a Healer?”

“No, sir. Master is not being sick. Master is being... lazy!” With that, the elf squealed and started banging his head against the table edge. “Bad Kippy! Must be punished for speaking so about Master.” Kippy wailed his distress as he thumped the table.

Severus seized the house-elf’s head and held him still. “Cease that infernal racket, elf! Go back to the kitchen or wherever it is you need to go, and I will attend to your master.”

“What’s this I hear about you lazing around in bed all day?” Severus strode into the master’s bedchamber without knocking and threw open the curtains. He turned to find Lucius stretched out on the bed, clearly nude, with a sheet barely covering his groin. His hair was tangled, and the shadows under his eyes told of a sleepless night, but Lucius refused to acknowledge any distress remaining from the previous evening.

“Maybe I fancied a day in bend wanking myself silly. You should try it sometime, Sev, would do you the world of good. You need a little loosening up.” Lucius slipped his hand under the sheet, clearly stroking himself beneath the thin covering.

Severus, eyes riveted to where the material had begun to lift, smothered a gasp behind a bored expression. “Suit yourself. I can wait. Your ten o’clock appointment may be a little less forgiving, however.”

“Fuck him. Or her. I don’t bloody care.” Lucius met Severus’s eyes and deliberately dragged the sheet lower, exposing his fully developed arousal and the hand working it. “Watch if you must. Perhaps you’ll enjoy it?”

Severus spun on his heel, but not before Lucius had noticed his flush. “Don’t be ridiculous, Lucius. I shall be in the breakfast room when you’ve finished entertaining yourself.” He stalked out, stopping only after the door had closed behind him to lean heavily against it and take a deep, ragged breath. He brushed a hand over his own straining crotch and resolutely returned downstairs. Knowing Lucius’s outrageous behaviour was merely his way of disguising his distress did not mitigate the delectable images now painted in his imagination to torture him for the rest of the day.

Appearing downstairs half an hour later, showered and dressed to impress, Lucius joined Severus at the breakfast table.

“I must offer my apologies, my friend. My behaviour upstairs was reprehensible. I was... well, I was not myself.”

Severus nodded, shoulders stiff and avoiding eye contact. “Nothing to forgive, Lucius. I should have knocked.” He poured himself some tea and drained half the cup without pause. “I must go. I have a great deal of work to catch up on today.”

“Will you be back for dinner?”

Despite his intention to allow some distance between them, Severus succumbed to the desperation in Lucius’s question and nodded again before leaving him to finish his breakfast alone.

Many hours later, sitting alone at his desk in the dungeon of Hogwarts, lists of ingredients for the next year’s classes long abandoned to fruitless fantasies of pale skin and intimate caresses, Severus let his head drop into his hands and rubbed at his eyes. “Gods, Draco, I don’t know if I’ll survive this.”

Back at the Manor, Lucius sat in his own office, shuffling parchments from one pile to another. His cheeks reddened as he recalled how he had displayed himself, erect and wanton, before his best friend, but somewhere inside his brain, the memory of the other man’s curious reaction had piqued his interest.

If the conversation that night at dinner was a little stilted, neither man emerged from his contemplation enough to notice. Even the platter of fresh fruit and unsweetened yoghurt laid out for dessert failed to rouse them from their innermost thoughts.

A week later Lucius’s second-best brandy was the chosen method of oblivion for the two morose wizards sprawled on the leather sofa in the drawing room. The change of venue had done little to inspire enlightenment for either man despite a somewhat inspired rant earlier in the evening from Lucius on the fickleness of women in general.

Severus was staring at the bottom of his glass, wondering who had drunk all his brandy, when he felt a hand on his knee. He frowned for a moment, then looked up at Lucius, who had moved a fraction closer.

“Whassa matter, Luc?”

“You know, Sev, you’re my bes’ friend. Always have been. Even when I was foolish enough to believe Voldo... Vodlo... Volli... that evil git, you stood by me and saved me in the end. I’d be in a cold, damp cell now if you hadn’t...” Lucius wiped a suspiciously damp spot from the corner of one eye and moved even closer.

“I wish I fancied men. I’d shag you in a heartbeat.” He grinned and slid his hand further up Severus’s thigh, dangerously close to where a tell-tale thickening had developed despite the half bottle of brandy. “What about a snog then, see what it’s like? Never know until you try.”

Severus tried in vain to move away, but the arm of the sofa prevented his escape. Shaking his head, he found his lips captured by Lucius’s mouth, and before he knew it an inquisitive tongue was thoroughly exploring his mouth. Hints of coffee and brandy and the unique taste of Lucius himself was an intoxicant far more potent than alcohol. With a sigh of inevitability, Severus relinquished his hard-won control and returned the kiss, threading his hands through the blond’s silken hair as he drew him closer.

As the last vestiges of Severus’s restraint collapsed, Lucius pulled back, eyes wide and lips swollen. He watched the younger man visibly struggle to regain his composure, cheeks flushed and expression, for once, unmasked.

Severus brushed Lucius’s enquiring hands away and stood abruptly. “Satisfied?” His voice was hard, but with a broken edge to it Lucius could almost touch. Stalking stiffly to the door, Severus left the room without looking back.

If he had, he would have seen his friend sitting motionless, fingers touching his lips in wonder.

A/N: This was written for the 2012 Lucius Big Bang. Thanks to karelia for the promptand linlawless for the beta work.