Chapter 18: Exposure

The Love You Take

Chapter 18: Exposure

Severus sat upon his sofa with his fair torment upon his knees, her confession hanging in the air between them like vapour...but was it a treacherous, miasmic mist or a mere puff of prattle? Did he dare to pass over it lightly, as if she had not spoken?

Her enormous brown eyes studied him fearfully, her lip caught now between her teeth. He did not need to dip into her mind again to know how anxiously she awaited his reaction. One glance into the memory of her realisation of her feelings had sufficed to lay it out before him like one of Dumbledore's cursed knitting patterns: She had been aware of this feeling for some time and had been concealing it from him...and he wished to Merlin he had not felt the mischievous need to bedevil her by Legilimising her. He had not been in pursuit of her feelings about him...he assiduously avoided such knowledge, and had done all his adult life...no, he only followed her so determinedly down that particular garden path because she had so diligently attempted to hide something from him. He could no more not pursue her efforts, knocking down her defences, than a cat could resist the urge to pursue a mouse. Pouncing, it had been as if Severus-the-cat had jumped upon the helpless mouse, only to discover it was, instead, a rapacious wolf, ready to devour him.

He was rattled.

I love you, she had blurted, as if such words could exist in his rooms...in his world. The child was deluded, and she was now in a state more fragile and vulnerable than ever before. His duty in this matter skirted narrowly between two factors: he must not lie to her, and he must not distress her.

How in the fucking hell was he supposed to accomplish that acrobatic feat?

She had looked helplessly into his face, and for all the world as if she were placing in his hands a gift beyond price, she had breathed, I love you.

Now speaking aloud to her, he said, 'So I see,' and carefully watched her face.

She inhaled sharply, as if she had been holding her breath whilst she waited for his response. Hurt seemed to surface, darkening her wide-open eyes, then dignity kicked in, and he could see her spine straightening as her stubborn chin lifted.

'Is that all you have to say?' she said, her voice controlled but rife with indignation.

He remained perfectly still, maintaining eye contact, struggling to hold together through this confrontation. 'It's not your fault,' he said gently, raising a hand to stroke her cheek.

She batted his hand away as if it were a bothersome fly and scrambled up to stand before him.

'Fault?' Her voice trembled with suppressed anger.

Paralysed with an emotion for which he had no name, Severus attempted a recover. 'Surely you don't mean to imply that it is my fault?' he said, striving for a reasonable tone.

'I don't see that it is a matter of fault!' she cried, her cheeks flushed and her just-washed mass of hair beginning to frizz about her face.

He wanted her...wanted to hold her, kiss her, fuck her...wanted her like his lungs wanted air, like his body craved water. For the tiniest moment, his eyes closed against the weakness of being unable to scorn her love...unable to fling her irately from his presence...unable to pretend to be untouched by it all.

'Sit down, and we will have a drink,' he said then, opening his eyes again.

'I don't want a drink!' the impossible girl replied, the threat of tears trembling in her tone.

Screw what she wanted...he bloody well needed a drink. Ignoring her response, he lifted his hand to Summon the tray from the drinks table. She crossed her arms belligerently across her breast and glared her defiance at him...and then it happened: His body broke faith with him, and the hand which he held aloft visibly tremored. Unable to help himself, he glanced at her suddenly still face, and he knew she had noticed.

With carefully schooled features, the girl sat beside him and graciously accepted the glass of Firewhisky which he poured and passed to her. He felt her concerned gaze upon the side of his face, but he did not acknowledge what she had seen. They sipped in silence for a few moments, and at last, he said, 'We have quite enough on our plates as it is, do we not?'

Her affirmative murmur was followed by the press of her warm, reassuring softness against his side as she flowed against him, resting her head upon his shoulder. He breathed an internal sigh of relief...she was going to let it go.

Sending his empty glass back to the tray with a flick of thought, he removed her half-full glass from her hand and sent it away, too. She moved into his arms as he reached for her, their bodies responding simultaneously to the same impulse. His tongue tasted her whisky-flavoured mouth as his hands parted the folds of the green satin dressing gown. Her silken skin begged for his touch, and he lightly hefted her breasts, gently squeezing, as he swallowed her barely vocalised whimper. Then she shifted herself astride him again, her burning lips leaving his mouth to spread kisses down his throat, forcing his head back against the sofa cushion in a form of surrender.

His need flared, matching the momentum of her curse-driven hunger, and she assuaged that need, her passion flowing over him in white-hot waves. She Vanished his clothing without removing her teeth from his flesh, and she encased him within herself, merging their bodies into one. Fiercely, she rode him, driving again and again to impale herself on his full length and rise agonisingly up, only to plunge again, her slick heat engulfing even his bollocks as she paused to grind her hips, wringing a guttural gasp from him. She braced her hands on the sofa back and stared down into his sweat dampened face, her glittering eyes torrid in avidity. Immersed in her, drowning in her, he yielded to the unrepeated words, acceptance gilding the blinding light of completion as he emptied himself, semen and soul, into her, gasping, 'Hermione.'

---

On Saturday afternoon, Severus placed the headmaster's Pensieve upon his coffee table and stood facing the girl, who sat with poorly repressed excitement upon the sofa, waiting to view his memories of his history with Morgen Singer. Straightening, he studied the face of the only person in memory who had ever professed love for him. If either of his parents had ever spoken the words...which he greatly doubted...he had no recollection of it. Morgen had spoken the words a time or two over the years, but Severus had discounted the declarations without a second thought. In the world of sexual relationships, certain words are spoken at certain times...it was expected. He had been guilty of it, in his youth, believing that the statement of irrelevant untruths was a necessary adjunct to getting what he wanted...and he had wanted sex. What man didn't? The hunger had been worse, then, and it had left him susceptible to manipulation.

He had done what he could to put an end to that.

But would this child understand that? The last thing he needed was for her to be made distraught by the sights and sounds of his youthful pursuit of carnal pleasure. Women, he believed, tended to take such adventures very much to heart, whereas for a man, his heart was usually the least affected part of his anatomy. Morgen, of course, had been a notable exception, but Morgen possessed the mind of a true Death Eater...which left the question of her so much as possessing a heart in serious doubt.

Hermione Granger was, in his experience, unique. Not only was she in possession of a heart, but it appeared that she wore it upon her sleeve and lacked the sophistication to pretend otherwise. She was neither embarrassed nor shamed by her feelings...she seemed proud of them, bothersome chit that she was. And, as a possessor of sincere, intense feelings, she was at risk for having those feelings hurt.

It caused him no end of self-flagellating annoyance that he now would offer himself for immolation before he would permit the girl to suffer injury, whether of body or spirit, if it lay in his power to prevent it.

From the pocket of his robes, he removed a handful of corked phials, each charmed to a different opaque colour, each containing the swirling mist of a memory. He bent and lined up the vessels on the tabletop beside the Pensieve, conscious of the girl's avid eyes following his every move.

'Have you ever entered a Pensieve before?' he inquired neutrally, standing straight again.

'No, but Harry has,' she replied, standing to face him.

He sneered. He would not soon forget the little shit invading the memories he, Severus, had placed out of the way for their ill-fated Occlumency lessons. 'And that is relevant how?' he snarled.

The girl blinked at him, seeming to quail a bit before his tone. 'Only in that he described to me how it is done and what it feels like, sir,' she admitted, subdued.

He glared at her, wondering how much he ought to tell her. Why did he care if her precious feelings were hurt by the sight of him enamoured of another female? She was the one insisting upon acquiring this knowledge; left to his own devices, she would never discover from him what a fool he had been at twenty. Why had he ever agreed to this insanity, anyway?

The girl darted a look up to him, her wide brown eyes concerned, her little white teeth clamped on her lip. With an inward jerk of impatience, he picked up the first phial.

'This date of this memory is June, 1976,' he stated. 'It provides ... context.'

She nodded, excitement showing again in her face. 'Will you come with me, or will I go in alone?' she asked.

'I shall accompany you,' he replied dryly. 'If you have questions, you may ask as we go and not save them up to assault me with them all at once.'

She had the nerve to twinkle at him. 'That's a capital notion, sir,' she said.

He simply growled. 'Lean over and touch the liquid with your face,' he instructed.

---

They fell through space until they landed upon their feet upon the edge of the Quidditch pitch. The day was bright, the sky blue, the grass underfoot verdant green and sweet-smelling. The girl turned to him.

'What is the memory about, sir?' she asked eagerly.

Severus crossed his arms over his chest, wishing to hell he was anywhere but here. He jerked his head towards the Quidditch stands, and they began to walk. There was a solitary figure seated in the stands, at the far end, away from the castle. As they walked, voices came from behind them, and the girl stopped, nervously grasping his arm.

'Someone's coming!'

Severus jerked his arm from her grasp. 'We cannot be seen or heard, Miss Granger...this is only a memory,' he snapped. Dear Merlin, how he hated this.

The girl pivoted, watching the approach of the four young men who loudly made their way toward the pitch, broomsticks in their hands. Two were black-haired, one sandy-haired, and one mousy-haired. The slighter of the two black-haired boys wore glasses.

'That looks just like Harry!' Miss Granger exclaimed.

'Yes,' Severus snarled, unable to prevent the ugly curl of his lip.

'And that's Sirius!' she added, her excitement evident in her voice. 'So, the other two must be Professor Lupin and Wormtail.'

'Well spotted,' Severus sneered. 'Shall we move on, or did you wish to stay here and moon over this lot?'

Miss Granger frowned. 'If this is your memory, sir, where are you?'

Severus strode off across the Quidditch pitch without bothering to answer her. She followed, trotting to keep up with his longer legs, until they stood just beyond the far edge of the stands, past where a girl with dark-red hair sat, reading. Giving a savage nod toward the shadowy area beneath the stands, he said, 'There I am.'

Creeping soundlessly from behind the stands, sixteen-year-old Severus Snape approached the place where the red-haired girl sat, his greedy eyes fixed upon her form like a ship upon a beacon. At sixteen, he had been exceedingly weedy, slight and stringy, having yet to experience the growth spurt which came upon him at seventeen. He wore shabby, ill-fitting robes and his hair hung in his eyes, unkempt and greasy.

Why had he agreed to his? Now she would be privy to just precisely how pathetic he had been when he was at school.

The voices behind them continued their boisterous nonsense as the Gryffindor arse-wipes came closer, and at last, the red-haired girl in the stands lifted her head. A breeze blew across the pitch and ruffled the heavy fall of dark red hair, and the memory girl pushed the hair from her face as she looked toward the source of the sound, the brilliant hue of her green eyes startling in her pretty face. Miss Granger gasped.

'That's Harry's mum!' she said. 'He has her picture on his bedside table...I've seen it a thousand times.'

Biting back the urge to demand why she had been in Potter's dormitory a thousand times, Severus nodded. 'Yes. That was Lily Evans.'

His sixteen-year-old self froze in place when the voices of the approaching group of boys came to his ears. Young Severus looked longingly at Lily Evans, then melted into the shadows beneath the stands.

'Oi! Evans!' James Potter called. 'Fancy a fly? You can use my broom ...'

Enough. Grasping Miss Granger's elbow, Severus removed them from the Pensieve.

---

She swayed as she found her feet on the hearth rug, clutching at his robes to maintain her balance. Severus peeled her hands from his clothing and stepped away from her, the worst of his self-loathing activated by his sojourn into the past. This had been a bad, stupid idea.

She looked confused as he pushed away from her. 'Why did we leave?' she asked. 'Nothing had happened yet.'

He busied himself returning the memory to its phial and uncorking the next. Seeing himself as he had been irritated him almost beyond bearing. 'Nothing did happen,' he replied tightly. 'I told you before we entered that the memory would provide context.' He poured the next memory into the Pensieve. 'You do recall why we are engaged in this exercise?'

The girl nodded. 'To view your history with Morgen Singer,' she replied promptly.

He turned his most disdainful classroom glare upon her. 'Did nothing in the memory you just viewed seem relevant to that aim?'

He seethed inwardly as she considered, her unlined brow furrowed with thought. He had given her no background for what she had seen...did she not know his history with James Potter and Sirius Black? Was it possible that Potter's son had not told his friends what he had witnessed in Severus' memories?

The girl began to speak in musing tones.

'You didn't do anything in the memory except to approach Lily,' she said. 'We didn't spend any time watching Mr Potter and Sirius...you just wanted me to see Lily...' the girl's eyes grew wide as she looked into his face, 'and to see her resemblance to Morgen.' Her expression softened, and she spoke with great hesitation. 'You ... fancied her, didn't you?'

Lips thinned dangerously, Severus nodded once. Painful as this might be, it was, yet, not so terrible as speaking the words aloud.

'Are you ready to view the next memory?' he demanded tersely.

She nodded without speaking.

'The next memory is from Easter holiday, 1977...my uncle's wedding.' He nodded toward the swirling mist. 'Shall we go?'

The girl did not answer, but bent and touched her face to the substance of memory, and they fell, to land in the middle of a wedding hall.

---

Gaily dressed wizards and witches abounded; the hum of conversation was cheerful and celebratory. Directly before them, a young and pretty Ava Prince greeted her wedding guests, her face flushed pink with pleasure beneath her bridal tiara.

The girl pivoted on the spot, taking in the scene. 'Oh,' she said, 'your grandmother was so beautiful!'

Severus turned and watched the regal Tatiana Prince working the crowd of wedding guests, obviously in her element as a social hostess.

'But your mother looks uncomfortable,' she added, and Severus glanced to see Eileen Snape standing in a corner, clutching her handbag, wearing finery at odds with her cowering demeanour.

'She was...and is...scorned in this society because she committed an unforgivable social solecism,' Severus explained. 'She married a Muggle.'

The girl looked about expectantly. 'Is your father here?'

Severus snorted. 'One does not bring one's embarrassing Muggle connexions to a pure-blood social event,' he replied.

An orchestra began to play, and the wedding guests moved good-naturedly to the tables ringing the room. Tiberius Prince, resplendent in his formal robes, stepped up to his bride, and they began to dance. Severus noted with a sneer that the girl seemed riveted by the pageantry of it all...what was the fascination females held for weddings?

After a time, a handsome middle-aged couple took the floor, joining the bridal couple in the dance. The man was large and fair, whereas the woman was a stunning redhead.

'Parents of the bride,' Severus supplied, unasked. 'Wilhelm and Rita Singer.'

Next came Madam Prince with a squat, ill-favoured man. 'Semaphore Leclercq,' Severus said, 'the richest wizard in Europe and one of the Dark Lord's greatest financial backers.'

The girl turned startled eyes to him. 'Still?' she asked.

Severus smirked. 'No, he's dead.'

'Look at how he watches Rita Singer,' the girl said. 'He's not paying a bit of attention to your grandmother.'

Another couple began to dance, and the girl grasped his arm. 'There you are!'

Seventeen-year-old Severus was a different animal than he had been at sixteen. An eight-inch growth spurt had given him his adult height, and his grandmother had provided the faultlessly tailored robes he wore. His black hair, worn even longer then than he wore it now, was tied back in an orderly queue with a black riband. And in his arms, looking petulantly bored, was a very young Morgen Singer.

At fourteen, Morgen had already begun to display the promise of spectacular beauty. Her face was still a bit rounded, but she was quite tall, and the hints of womanly curves to come filled out the bridesmaid's robes she wore.

Severus glanced down at the girl and saw that she was riveted by the sight of him at seventeen. Whereas he was looking at Morgen, the girl was looking at him. He felt a touch of pleasure in her absorption. As she watched his memory self circle the dance floor in perfect style, having been drilled unrelentingly by Grandmother's hired dancing master for the week before the wedding, Hermione's arm crept about his waist, and she rested her head against him. At last, she stirred from her reverie and focussed on Morgen.

'What is she scowling about?'

'She does not like dancing with me,' he responded. 'She was the maid of honour, and I was the family member closest to her in age...so it was determined that I would dance with her.' One side of his upper lip lifted in disdain. 'We have just met; it is her first grown-up party, and I do not fit the bill of what she had in mind for her first conquest.'

The girl huffed, and Severus took her elbow, guiding her across the dance floor to approach his younger self. The song ended, and seventeen year-old Severus said gallantly, 'Shall we dance again?'

Morgen stepped out of his arms with unconcealed distaste. 'No,' she snapped and turned away. Belatedly, she glanced back over her shoulder and added, 'Thank you.'

Undeterred, Severus stepped up behind her, bending to murmur, 'Let me get a glass of lemonade for you.'

Suddenly, they were joined by Madam Prince and her dance partner, each carrying goblets of sparkling liquid.

'Young ladies don't want lemonade,' Semaphore Leclercq said, his voice booming as his eyes raked over the young witch. He pressed the goblet into her hand. 'They want champagne, don't they, pretty?'

Morgen's expression cleared miraculously. 'Yes, thank you!' she said, smiling coyly up at the old man.

The girl made a choking noise, and Severus glanced down at her. She said, 'Why is she flirting with him?'

'Because she believes he is harmless...just another old man, like her father's friends, who make much of her and pet her and are courtly and complimentary...she feels much less threatened by that than by me.'

'But he's looking at her like ... well, it's creepy!'

Severus gave a sardonic smile and pulled her with him out of the Pensieve.

---

The girl sat on the sofa, as if to regain her balance. 'She didn't like you much, did she?'

'No,' he agreed, changing out one memory for the next. 'She was overheard to tell her mother that I was "greasy and ugly and obnoxious."'

'Overheard by whom?' the girl asked curiously.

'Overheard by me,' he answered, his eyes trained on the contents of the rune-inscribed basin.

'It's not true!' she said hotly. 'You looked quite dashing, and you were very gallant. She deserved a good slap for her rudeness!'

Severus set the empty phial on the coffee table and studied the girl's flushed indignation...on his behalf. Why should she care so fiercely about something that happened before she was born? It didn't make sense to him, but he could not deny that her outrage soothed him. Oddly enough, her ability to be emotionally connected with events of his past made the process less onerous for him.

'The next memory is during Easter break, 1978,' he said. 'My cousin's naming. Are you ready?'

The girl stood and together they fell into Prince House.

---

They stood in the great marble-floored entrance hall, the stained-glass representation of Merlin and Nimüe glowing like a multi-faceted jewel upon the landing, casting fractured light of a thousand colours upon the wall. The drawing room to the right was open and full of well-dressed people; the second drawing room to the left had been opened for the occasion, and the overflow of guests milled about there, as well, sipping from delicate china teacups and nibbling delicacies from matching plates.

Severus urged the girl up the stairs to the first floor, where his eighteen-year-old self was disappearing down a hallway to the left. They followed him to a door which he opened without knocking, and he leant insolently against the door jamb, his arms crossed over his chest. Severus led the girl through the wall into the room, where Morgen Singer sat. The space was very small, containing a delicate writing table, two matching armchairs, and a well-stocked bookshelf. Morgen had her legs tucked up under her, and she had a book in her hands.

'I never took you for the bookworm type,' young Severus said to Morgen.

A year after her sister's wedding, Morgen Singer was more assured than she had been at fourteen.

'Why don't you run along and find some other Hogwarts types to talk to?' she replied haughtily, dropping her green eyes back to her book and dismissing him.

Her tormentor stepped into the room and snatched the book from her hands. 'Oh, deep reading, I see,' he taunted, smirking at the prettily indignant girl in the chair. 'Gurke's Guide to Gentry and Gentility in Wizarding Britain. How ... illuminating.'

Morgen demonstrated her youth then, by rising and holding out an imperious hand. 'Give that to me and get out, you git!'

The memory Severus chuckled. 'What were you doing...making a wish list of boyfriends?' He tossed the book onto the recently vacated chair. 'Forget it...these blokes want a girl with some substance.'

The next sound was of the flat of Morgen's hand impacting Severus' face; a miscalculation on her part caused the heel of her hand to catch his lower lip, bloodying it against his teeth.

The smile he gave to her was all the more disturbing for the smear of blood showing on his uneven teeth. 'And did I mention class?' he continued, as if she had not slapped him. 'Just a word to the wise, Miss Singer.'

'Get out!' the now red-faced Morgen screeched, and Severus tugged the girl out of the Pensieve.

---

Noting her clenched jaw with some amusement, he repeated the process of changing out the memories.

'Did you heal your lip before you went back downstairs?' she asked tightly.

One side of his mouth quirked up. 'I was pants at healing charms then,' he said. 'Scampy would have done, but I made her leave it alone.'

'Why?' She sounded genuinely distressed.

He smirked. 'It made Morgen much more uncomfortable that way,' he said. 'She was on pins and needles for the rest of the holiday, worrying about when I would choose to tell her parents how their precious child had conducted herself when not under their eye.'

The girl leaned suddenly into him, pressing her breasts against his arm as she reached up to run her thumb over his lower lip. 'But you didn't tell anyone, did you?' she said, the manic light of the compulsion in her eyes.

His lips parted at the touch upon his mouth, and his tongue darted out to lick her thumb. 'No, I didn't,' he agreed.

Wasting no time on niceties, she reached out and cupped his balls before reaching for his fly.

'Like that, is it?' he said.

She did not speak, too busy seeking out his cock with one hand and laving the palm of her other hand with the broad flat of her tongue before studiously applying a slick fist of encouragement to his readily responding shaft. He grabbed the bottom of her jumper, pushing it roughly up her torso and baring her breasts to his eyes. In the ambient cold her pink nipples crinkled at once, calling for the ministrations of his tongue, the warmth of his mouth. Swinging her up, he crossed the room and went through the door to his bed, depositing her there and following her down, his hunger for her driving all other considerations from his mind.

She had learned...or perhaps devised...more disrobing spells than he had ever known to exist. Whilst he was busy suckling and fondling her breasts, she managed to bare the bottom half of her anatomy, and he willingly travelled down her abdomen, leaving the purple marks of suckled love bites in his wake, until he buried his nose in the drenched cleft of her womanhood.

The way she fisted his hair in her hands, rendering him immobile, clearly demonstrated her wishes, and he endeavoured to explain without the doubtful benefit of words exactly how much he preferred her society to that of the red-haired termagant from the Pensieve, in this or any other incarnation. He was an accomplished orator, regardless of his means of communication, and he did not cease his distinctive articulation until her grip loosened, and she encouraged him to seek other employment by turning slightly to one side, disengaging his mouth from her quim.

He rose up on his knees between her thighs, looking down at her nakedness...save for the jumper bunched up beneath her armpits...and his cock twitched with urgency. Pausing only to unfasten his trousers and to push his clothing off his hips, he pressed into her body to complete the delivery of his all-important communiqué.

---

When they woke from their nap, they partook of tea and scones before going into the Pensieve again.

'What is the date of this memory?' she asked him, reaching to bind her hair out of her face with a scrunched-up bit of fabric.

'It is Christmas of the same year, 1978.'

She expressed her readiness to press on, and they entered the Pensieve, falling into his grandmother's drawing room.

---

It was evening, and the room was aglow with candlelight and firelight, made festive by the myriad bunches of holly and ivy, bound with crimson ribbon, which decorated the room. Eighteen-year-old Severus sat in a leather armchair in a corner, unquestionably bored. His grandmother, mother, and Aunt Ava sat together with baby John in their midst, discussing matters of childrearing, and Tiberius Prince sat in the matching armchair across from his nephew, drinking wine.

Severus led the girl to stand beside his memory self and waited for the knock upon the door. It came, and a house-elf scurried out to open the door, permitting a small group to enter the foyer. Grandmother and his mother rose to greet the guests, but his memory self kept his seat, even when the Singers and their companion entered the room.

Wilhelm and Rita Singer were first, each resplendent in holiday finery, and behind them came Morgen and the rotund Semaphore Leclercq, a grotesque parody of a smile on his gargoyle-like face. Tiberius Prince abandoned his wine glass and rose to shake hands and kiss cheeks before relaying drink orders to a house-elf; through it all, young Severus remained silent and disinterested.

The men settled in chairs pulled up to surround the fire whilst the women exclaimed over baby John. Morgen, obviously bored by the adoration of her nephew, hovered behind her father's chair, listening in on the conversation.

'How does the English Ministry feel about the rising popularity of the new Dark Lord, Prince?' Semaphore Leclercq said in a thick French accent.

Severus bent his head to whisper into Hermione's ear. 'Uncle worked for the Ministry of Magic then, in the Office of International Cooperation.'

Tiberius Prince picked up his wine glass from the table upon which he had left it, as if to stall for time. 'There is strong opposition to the Dark Lord in the English Ministry,' he said.

His father-in-law cocked his head to one side. 'Whatever for?'

Leclercq snorted. 'Undoubtedly, the Mudblood-lovers are responsible.'

Severus' uncle inclined his head slightly. 'There is a large contingent, led by Albus Dumbledore, which denounces the Dark Lord and his followers.' His eyes darted nervously toward the silent figure in the corner.

'Dumbledore!' Leclercq exclaimed. 'That fool!'

Hermione huffed impatiently. 'I'll bet you weren't calling him a fool when he was saving your arse from Grindelwald!' she said.

Severus ghosted a smile at her. 'Actually, old Semaphore was one of Grindelwald's lieutenants...but he claimed the Imperius Curse when it was over, of course.'

The memory Tiberius Prince and Wilhelm Singer nodded in agreement with the statement of Dumbledore's character. Leclercq downed his glass of wine, snapping his fingers impatiently for a house-elf to refill it. 'His Lordship would do well to step up his efforts, if you ask me,' he said darkly.

'I will be happy to carry the message for you,' a dangerous, silky voice promised.

All three of the older men jerked their faces then to Severus, who continued to lounge insolently in his chair. Even by the firelight, it was easy to see that Semaphore Leclercq's face flushed an angry brick red.

'Who are you to speak that way to me, you impudent pup!'

Tiberius Prince sat forward anxiously. 'It's my nephew, sir...he's actually ...'

But memory Severus was on his feet, confronting the old man with a horrible sneer on his face. With a violence of motion at odds with the cold emptiness of his black eyes, he ripped his left sleeve up to his elbow, clearly showing his Dark Mark, red against the eerily pale flesh of his inner forearm.

The three older men froze in place, all seemingly riveted by the spectacle of the horrible tattoo. Hermione touched him. 'Why did you do that?'

'If a Death Eater reveals his Mark to another Death Eater, the second Death Eater must reveal his Mark, as well. I was forcing his hand.' Severus shook his head as he watched his younger self behave with such brash confidence, sure that nothing too dreadful could happen to him.

Swearing in French, Semaphore Leclercq stood, dwarfed by the height of the younger wizard, and with a flourish of his wand, caused his cuffs to roll neatly back just far enough to reveal an identical Mark on his own left forearm.

In that instant, Severus' grandmother stepped into the firelit space and a sure wave of her wand covered the Dark Marks again with their respective owners' shirts. 'If you can behave with no more courtesy to a guest in my home, young man, you may take your supper upstairs in your room,' she said with cool authority.

Teenaged Severus Snape swept a deep, mocking bow to the infuriated old man by his grandmother's side. 'My apologies, sir,' he said, managing to make the honorific sound like a filthy swearword. Then he stalked past the gaping Morgen Singer and into the hallway, with Hermione and Severus following.

'Aren't you a bit old to be sent to your room without supper?' the girl asked as they walked up the stairs.

'She did it to protect me from Leclercq,' he said. 'That old bugger was a nasty piece of work.'

She slanted a glance at him as they moved along the hallway. 'Then why on earth did you provoke him?'

He shrugged. 'For the same reasons I acquired the Mark itself,' he said starkly. 'I was bored, and I wanted to show off my consequence.'

The memory Morgen Singer swept by them at that moment, in hot pursuit of her quarry. Hermione growled her indignation. 'Oh, so now she finds you interesting?'

Just ahead of them, Morgen impetuously opened a door without knocking and entered; Severus and Hermione followed her in. Memory Severus looked up from the chair in which he sat, reading. The corner behind him housed two small bookshelves, each overflowing with leather-bound volumes. The young Death Eater showed no surprise to the beautiful girl who burst in, uninvited.

'You needn't stand on ceremony with me, Miss Singer,' he said, his voice dripping with mockery. 'Feel free to just barge right on into my bedroom.'

Morgen didn't respond, other than to reach behind herself to push the door closed.

Severus stood and took a step towards the red-haired witch whose height had not yet reached her adult growth; he towered over her, using his bulk to threaten her. 'Perhaps you've come to borrow a book...I know how you enjoy reading.'

Morgen stood her ground, straightening her spine and lifting her face to return his gaze, but she did not speak.

Severus made a rueful sound and shook his head in a parody of regret. 'Oh, but I don't own any books about how to find a rich, powerful lover.' He bent closer to her, bringing his disdainful sneer within scant inches of her face. 'So sorry.'

Hermione took a noisy lungful of air, and Severus smirked down at her.

'Do you want her to hit you again?' she said, unable to tear her gaze from the two teenagers facing off a few feet from them.

'Yes,' he said simply, then quieted, for Morgen finally spoke.

'Are you really a Death Eater?' she asked, wide green eyes unafraid, making no move to distance herself from the intrusive intimidation tactics her adversary used against her.

Instead of answering, teenage Severus jerked the girl against his chest and kissed her as if he were administering vicious punishment to a nefarious enemy. The girl answered him by yanking the riband from his shoulder-length black hair and twisting her fingers in the strands. As young Severus pulled away from the kiss, Morgen made a sound like a hissing snake and bit his lip. He responded by backing her against the nearest wall and trapping her there with arms on either side of her, an unholy light in his eyes. Morgen lunged at him and kissed him again, taking one of his hands and placing it on her breast.

Severus wrapped a hand around Hermione's upper arm, and they exited the memory.

---

She found her footing on his hearth rug and gaped up into his face. 'How old were you there?'

He raised his eyebrows. 'I was eighteen; she was fifteen.'

The girl swallowed. 'Did you ... did you sleep with her?'

He sneered. 'It's a foolish wizard who lowers his guard to sleep with that witch.'

Hermione set her jaw. 'You know what I mean.'

He rolled his eyes. 'She was the virgin daughter of an influential pure-blood family...of course I didn't fuck her.'

The girl bristled at his terminology. 'Couldn't you tell that she was only interested in you because you were a Death Eater?'

He turned from her and began the process of changing out the memory for the next one. 'Couldn't you tell I didn't give a damn why she was interested?'

He straightened from his task to find wide accusatory eyes trained on him. 'I was eighteen,' he reiterated. 'What, in your experience, is topmost on the list of priorities for an eighteen-year-old boy?'

The girl's lips, tightly pursed in displeasure, relaxed to a rueful grimace. 'All right,' she said resignedly. 'What next?'

He surveyed her through narrowed eyes. 'Suffice it to say that we saw one another over the next couple of years on holidays with much the same interactions. The next memory is from Christmas, 1980.'

He waited only for the girl's nod that she was ready, and they entered the Pensieve.

---

Severus braced himself for her response, and she did not disappoint his expectations. When the girl found herself in a dark, cavern-like space, surrounded by cloaked, hooded, and masked Death Eaters, she uttered a small cry and turned to him, eyes wide with fear.

'We're in a memory,' he reminded her, using the soothing tone to which she always responded. 'No one can see us; you are in no danger.'

She gave her head a shake, a look of embarrassment on her face. 'I realise that...I don't know why I reacted that way.'

He did not respond, but urged her forward to view the group of figures. The Dark Lord stood upon a rocky ledge, illuminated by thousands of floating candles. Two others flanked him upon the ledge, but the greatest number of people stood in a semi-circle before him, their attention focussed on the group of kneeling figures between them.

He who had once been Tom Riddle spoke aloud, his voice high and cold, and all eyes turned to him. 'What better way to celebrate Christmas than to welcome the newest Death Eaters?' he asked rhetorically, to murmurs of general agreement from his followers. 'Let the revels begin!'

A small group of the standing Death Eaters moved forward, taking one of the supplicants kneeling upon the rock floor and moving with the newcomer in their midst to the far end of the room, where they climbed up a set of stairs hewn into the very wall of rock and disappeared. This action was repeated several times, until only four people remained in the room: The Dark Lord, the figure at his side, one kneeling person, and a lone masked Death Eater.

'Come to me, Severus!' the high voice called, and the Death Eater strode forward, past the supplicant, to kneel and press his lips to the Dark Lord's cloak.

When memory-Severus touched the Dark Lord's garment, the two of them Disapparated to a warm, quiet bedchamber, and Severus and Hermione went with them.

'Where are we now?' the girl whispered.

'We were in a cavern below Malfoy Manor,' Severus responded, 'and now we are in the room given over to the Dark Lord's use when in residence at the Manor.'

In the new room, the Dark Lord sat in a gilded, high-backed chair reminiscent of a throne, whilst the younger Severus continued to kneel at his feet.

'The female amongst the new recruits is a member of your family, is she not, Severus?' the Dark Lord asked.

Young Severus replied without lifting his face. 'She is the sister of my uncle's wife, my Lord.'

'She bears a startling resemblance to the Mudblood, does she not?'

'There is a similarity,' the younger man agreed warily.

'I cannot give you the Mudblood now, Severus, though I shall spare her for you, if I can, for you have been of great use to me.' One white, spider-like hand moved over Severus' head, and his mask disappeared. 'Lord Voldemort knows how to reward those who serve him well. I shall give you this girl for your wife, instead.'

Severus' head rose as he gawped at his lord. His thin lips parted, but no words come from his throat. Lord Voldemort chuckled, and at last, Severus found his voice.

'But she has not yet left school, my Lord...how am I ...?'

'The details shall be arranged for a summer wedding, at her home in Germany. But for tonight ....' The Dark Lord let his voice fade as he watched the expression upon the young wizard's face. 'Tonight, my son, you shall have her for your own.'

The door to the bedroom opened, and a young and voluptuous Bellatrix Lestrange entered. She walked past Severus as if he were not there, and she, too, knelt down, pressing her face into the Dark Lord's thigh. 'She is ready for him, my Lord,' she breathed, rubbing her cheek along the great man's leg like a cat.

The tiniest motion of the Dark Lord's hand had Bellatrix up and in his lap, her face buried against his neck. The Dark Lord took the hem of her robes and lifted them until the woman's shaven genitals were in plain view. With no ado, he plunged the handle of his wand into her, and a spoken incantation set the wand to vibrating and the witch to moaning as she clung to him.

Hermione's gasp of disgust was drowned out by the Dark Lord's voice. 'Go to her, Severus...she is in the room next to this one. You may have free of her until morning, when she will have to be returned to her parents. Do nothing to her that will leave her ... unfit for her family to see...if you understand my meaning.'

Young Severus wrenched his gaze away from the squirming Bellatrix to the older wizard's face. 'Yes, my Lord,' he said obediently, and he rose to leave the room.

Severus touched Hermione's arm, and they left the Pensieve.

---

Back in his sitting room, the girl excused herself to the lavatory, and Severus asked Winky to bring fresh tea, with sandwiches. It was past the supper hour now, and there was still one memory to view, but he felt both he and the girl could do with some refreshment.

When she joined him on the sofa, she smelt of the Muggle face cleanser she kept in his bathroom. She sighed thankfully when he handed her a cup of tea, and tucking her feet beneath her, she took a long sip.

Severus ate a sandwich which he did not taste and waited patiently for her questions. He had not long to wait.

'You slept with her then?'

He raised a sardonic eyebrow. 'Even in my brash youth, I was not so foolish as to disregard a direct order from the Dark Lord.'

The girl made a face at him. 'But you wanted to do it, didn't you?'

'Yes,' he answered truthfully. 'I wanted very much to do it.'

She nodded and reached for a sandwich. 'That was Christmas Eve, 1980?' When he acknowledged it, she said, 'That's the date she engraved on the pocket watch she sent on Valentine's Day...how romantic.'

He shrugged. 'It was a significant date in our relationship,' he replied flatly. 'It was my first time, as well.'

She turned startled eyes to his face, and Severus could have kicked himself. Why had he felt the need to tell her such a thing? It was entirely irrelevant to the conversation. Obviously, he was getting tired.

'Did her family acknowledge your engagement?'

He abandoned the half-eaten sandwich and poured another cup of strong tea. 'The families knew, but it was not to be announced until she left school in the summer.'

'Does You-Know-Who give people to one another like that often?' she asked, sincerely curious.

'No,' he answered. 'Any marriages arranged by the Dark Lord are to his benefit. He did not give Morgen to me...he gave me to her.' Severus privately appreciated the look of shocked indignation this pronouncement produced in his auditor. 'Morgen had come into a small inheritance when she had come of age, and she gave the gold to the Dark Lord in exchange for his agreement to our marriage.'

The girl placed her dishes upon the table with a clatter. 'She must have wanted you pretty badly to buy you like that,' she said sourly. She turned her large brown eyes upon his face. 'Did you ... love her?' she asked in a small voice.

'I was infatuated with her,' he replied steadily, holding her gaze. 'She was not any more pleasant of a person just because she wanted to be allied with someone in my position amongst the Dark Lord's followers. But she was a willing bed partner.' ...and those were few and far between for someone like me. He left the last bit unspoken, trusting her to understand.

'Did you want to marry her?' she asked him, fidgeting with a loose strand of her hair.

'I never questioned it,' he said. 'Others from my year at school had married...it was what one did. My grandmother was pleased about it...the Dark Lord was pleased about it.' He put aside his teacup and stood. 'Let's view the last memory, and then you can ask the rest of your questions...and then we can put this behind us, yes?'

She murmured her agreement as he put the last memory in the Pensieve. 'This memory is from Easter, 1981,' he said. 'Are you ready?'

---

They landed in a room they had visited once before; it was the wedding hall where Tiberius Prince and Ava Singer had been married three years before. The double entrance doors were right before them and memory Severus came through them. He wore a heavy travelling cloak, and his hair was disordered, as if he had been outdoors on a windy day. Standing near the door was a young Lucius Malfoy, his blond perfection a stark contrast to Severus' dark ugliness.

'Severus!'

Malfoy stepped forward with some urgency, obviously surprised...and somewhat alarmed...to see him.

Severus halted, pulling off his gloves and tucking them into his cloak pockets. 'What's toward?' he asked. 'I arrived back early and found only house-elves at the Manor...Dobby told me all of you were here.' He looked around. 'What an odd place for the Dark Lord to call a gathering.'

Malfoy placed an arm about his shoulders. 'It's not a mandatory meeting,' he said. 'Tell me about your mission...how were you received in Athens and Constantinople?'

Severus snorted. 'The Greeks were uninterested, and the Turks wanted too much control.' He shrugged Malfoy's arm from his shoulders and began to walk across the reception room towards the inner chamber. 'I'll give my report to my Lord, if you don't mind.'

'Well, Severus, he wasn't expecting you back so soon,' Lucius said, beginning to sound a bit desperate.

Rabastan and Rodolphus Lestrange strolled together from the doorway at the far end of the room, and when they saw Severus, they sported nearly identical expressions of shock. Rodolphus recovered first.

'Sev!' he cried, coming forward with hand outstretched. 'We weren't expecting you! You're supposed to be in Greece!'

Severus ignored the proffered hand. 'Why does everyone keep saying that?' he demanded. 'I finished the Dark Lord's business.' He swept past Rabastan, only to be held up by Rodolphus.

'Wait up, mate,' his former classmate said lamely. 'You don't want to go in there...what do you say we pop down the pub for a few pints?'

An orchestra began to play in the next room, and Severus pulled his wand and snarled, 'Out of my fucking way, Lestrange, or I'll hex your bollocks off.'

Both Lestrange brothers fell back out of his way, and memory Severus strode into the next room with Severus and Hermione following him.

Just as it had the last time they had been in this room, it was full of formally dressed witches and wizards. Tiberius and Ava Prince took the dance floor, joining the other two couples already dancing, Wilhelm and Rita Singer...and Morgen, ethereal in her bridal finery, dancing in the arms of Semaphore Leclercq.

Lucius Malfoy entered the room behind Severus and scurried to the table where the Dark Lord was ensconced in solitary splendour. At a nod from the great man, the Lestrange brothers each took one arm of Severus Snape and frog-marched him over to the Dark Lord's table.

'Did you not see fit to carry out the instructions I gave you?' the cold voice demanded, and Severus executed a stiff bow, the only obeisance the Dark Lord demanded in public.

'I spoke to the contacts you provided for me in both Greece and Turkey,' he replied, sounding strained, having a difficult time keeping his eyes from Morgen, floating like a fairy across the dance floor as she towered over her dance partner.

'Sit, Severus,' he was commanded, and he complied, accepting from the Dark Lord's own hand a glass of champagne.

'So, you will accord the bride and groom your congratulations,' the Dark Lord said. 'I did not mean for you to see this,' he added in what passed for a kind tone in Lord Voldemort. 'I would not have caused you pain...but my plans changed, and it became desirable for my dear Semaphore to marry Morgen. You understand, do you not, Severus?'

The memory Severus let the crystal champagne goblet fall from his fingers, and it shattered on the table. The pain on his face was plain to see, and Bellatrix Lestrange approached, laughing.

'Look at Snape!' she said gleefully, turning to include her husband and brother-in-law in the joke. 'He looks as if he were kicked by a Hippogriff!'

Hermione grasped Severus' arm, and he tore his eyes from the pathetic drama to glance at her. 'Yes?' he asked.

'Please, can we leave now?' she said. 'Haven't we seen enough?'

He looked at the tears tracking down her cheeks, and without another word, they left the Pensieve.

---

Safely back in his sitting room, he guided her to the sofa and pulled his handkerchief from his pocket. Why was she crying?

'Why? Why did he do it?' she whispered, taking his handkerchief.

He frowned, wondering at her violent reaction, and said, 'Semaphore Leclercq wanted her. He had wanted her mother, Rita, but she had chosen to marry Singer. So he went to the Dark Lord and offered a large sum of gold for Morgen. Later, I was told that the Dark Lord offered him other women, in an effort to save Morgen for me, but Leclercq was interested in no other witch. I was sent on the mission to Asia Minor to get me out of the way for the rush wedding, but because I took no part of the whores and drugs provided for my entertainment, I was back much sooner than expected.'

'How could he do that?' the girl cried, bounding up from the sofa. She began to pace the room, so Severus sat down on the sofa and watched her. 'How could he tell you that Morgen would be your wife, then send you out of town and marry her to that horrible old man!'

'You should calm yourself, Miss Granger,' he said, feeling both confused and disturbed by her behaviour. One would think she was ... moved by the sight of his foolish reaction to Morgen's marriage.

'It was so unfair!' she said, her tears evolving now into anger. 'You-Know-Who manipulated you and lied to you and humiliated you! He let that crazy Lestrange woman laugh at you!'

'She was far more in his favour than I,' he told her.

The girl stopped her pacing and stared across the table at him. 'The way she behaved with him in the previous memory ... is she under the same curse I am?'

Severus nodded. 'He put her under the curse when she was fifteen years old,' he told her.

'But she's married to Rodolphus Lestrange!' she objected.

'The Dark Lord needed the gold ...'

The girl let out a sound between a growl and a howl. 'That terrible man! He shuffles people around as if they were pieces on a chess board!'

Severus relaxed a bit and smirked. 'It is the way of great men to do so, you know. It's how wars are won and governments are formed.'

Impetuously, she came over to him and knelt at his feet. 'How can you bear it?' she asked, tears shining in her eyes again.

Moved, he cupped her face with one hand. 'It has been a part of my life for so long that I no longer think on it,' he admitted quietly.

'We'll just see about that,' she said fiercely.

Relieved to have the ordeal of relating his sordid history behind him, he did not reply, but stroked her cheek. She crawled up onto the sofa and curled against him. Amazed that such a small thing as her warmth at his side could make such a difference, he turned his face and buried his nose in the top of her sweet-smelling hair. He would not think on that, either.

---

A/N: Beta reading thanks, as always, to DeeMichelle, and Beta reading kudos to MagicAlly. Sshg316 alpha read.