Satisfaction

Disclaimer: Mine, all mine! Not.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Clouds had rolled in overnight and lay low and heavy over the castle and the lake. A thin but steady rain was falling now as Hermione let herself out of the sally door.

The first, predawn cloudbursts had drenched the school grounds, and Hermione's chosen path, which ran along the edge of the Forbidden Forest and down towards Hogsmeade, was already slippery with mud when she reached it.

Grudgingly, she cast spells to shield her trainers from the wet and mud and give them extra traction. But she left her tracksuit unspelled and her head unprotected.

Somehow she couldn't bear to run in a bubble this morning. She wanted to feel the damp air and drizzle on her skin. She wanted to smell wet earth and plants and hear the rustle and murmur of the rain.

But she didn't want to see Severus. Well, yes, she did want to see him. And she would, later: in the Great Hall at mealtimes; in class; after the end of lessons when she went to his classroom to pick up papers to mark...

What she did not want was to accidentally-on-purpose run into him before or after his morning bout with Professor McGonagall. That would just be so obvious. And risky. Glamour or no, McGonagall would not be easily fooled.

No. Today was going to be challenging enough as it was. Right now, Hermione just wanted to run, and breathe, and think. So when her path took her close to the games building, she picked up her pace and kept her eyes averted.

* * *

There she was, not twenty yards away, on the path that edged the forest before merging with the lane to the village. She was wet with rain and running quickly.

Severus flicked his gaze up to the castle. Had she come out through the sally door or the main door? Where would she go back in? Could he intercept her on her way?

No. Too risky. He would see her at the expected times, and in public places...in the Great Hall and in his classroom. Last night in the Restricted Section had been bloody amazing but one couldn't make a habit of such meetings.

The door behind him opened and Minerva emerged and collided with his back. 'Oh, Severus, pardon me. I thought you'd have gone on already.'

'Hmmm,' he replied.

Could one, though? Make a habit?

'... don't you think? Severus?' Minerva looked at him sharply. 'Severus, I have a suspicion I am talking to myself.'

'Quite so.' He repressed a smirk. 'I'll see you at breakfast.' And he strode off in the direction of the greenhouses, encased in rain-repelling charms.

* * *

There was a minuscule parchment-wrapped parcel wedged into the sally door's latch.

That had not been there when she left, three quarters of an hour ago. It was dry.

Hermione picked it up. There was no writing on it. She opened it and plucked out the contents: a single sprig of some sort of herb. She broke one of the flat green leaves and inhaled the clean, citrus scent.

Lemon verbena. The scent of her own shampoo.

Oh.

Hermione

* * *

'Wha's that?' asked Ron, spraying toast crumbs.

Hermione glared at him and wiped the envelope with her serviette. 'Muggle post, Ronald, surely that's obvious.'

'Wha' d'y' do wif Muggle posht?' He'd reloaded his mouth.

She bit back a deeply sarcastic reply. 'An owl will take it to the post office in Hogsmeade and it goes on from there.'

'Huh. What's that little picture on the corner for?' He tried to take the envelope for a closer look but she snatched it back.

'Stop it, Ron. Honestly!' She signalled to one of the school owls that had just made a delivery at the Ravenclaw table.

Ron's face closed down, the way it did when his feelings had been hurt. 'Honestly, yourself, Mione. I was just curious. No need to bite my head off.'

She sighed. 'Sorry.' Hermione fed the owl a scrap of bacon, and while it was gulping the treat, she held up the envelope and pointed at the stamp. 'It's called a postage stamp. It means I've paid in advance to have the letter delivered.' She stuck the letter in the owl's beak and said, 'Hogsmeade post office.'

'Jill Fletcher. Ah, your Muggle girlfriend. Not a bloke, then.' Ron's hurt expression had turned smug.

Hermione felt her mouth fall open and blood shoot to the surface of her skin. 'Well spotted, Ron. Jill is not a bloke. What, is that why you wanted to look at my letter? You thought I was owling some, uh, some boy?'

'Nah, I didn't really think you were, but I promised Seamus I'd find out if you were, ah, if you had any, er, if there was someone, uhm...'

Wisely if belatedly, Ron stopped saying words. His hand fumbled for another piece of toast to stuff in his mouth.

'You. Can go. To hell. Ron,' Hermione leaned across the table to hiss. 'Friends don't spy on one another. If you have something to ask me, ask it. Well? Do you?'

He gulped down his toast. 'Ahhhh, no. No, Mione,' he muttered. 'Sorry... um, sorry.'

'Fine.' Hermione rose from her seat and stared down at him, looking, Ron thought, quite a lot like McGonagall did when you said something daft in her class. 'Apology accepted.'

She made the words sound more like, 'You have a reprieve from your blood-soaked death. For now.' Not really the tone to make a man feel at ease.

Before she was halfway to the door, Seamus swung into the seat beside Ron. 'Well? Did you find out anything? Is she seeing someone?'

Ron puffed out his cheeks. 'No joy, Seamus, and I'm not going to try again. She'll murder me. She's in a mood this morning. Completely scary.'

'Ah, damn.' Seamus frowned. 'So no clue if she fancies someone? Lavender says she does, but you know Lavender. She probably thinks the Whomping Willow has a thing for Professor Sprout, or whatever. She's mental.'

'Yeah, I know Lavender,' Ron muttered, wishing he didn't. 'But like I told you, if Hermione was seeing someone at Hogwarts...or Durmstrang, or wherever...I would know. She's my best friend, and she'd tell me. Or Harry. She absolutely would. No question.'

* * *

Hermione spent her nine o'clock Arithmancy lesson disregarding Professor Vector's lecture. She was composing a letter, and it took her a while to hit the right tone.

12 May 1997

Hermione Granger

There. Not a single outright lie in the whole sneaky, disingenuous letter. Thank Merlin for the passive voice, and for her own impeccable, above-suspicion reputation.

If she judged Lupin right, he would take her request kindly, seriously, and at face value. Please, she prayed as she tucked the final draft into her bag, let him reply by owl, and soon. I do not want to have to lie to his face.

The bell rang for the end of the lesson. Right. Not yet ten-thirty and she had already engaged in emotional bullying, academic malfeasance, and three kinds of deceit, just trying to keep this new... thing with Severus private.

Hermione put her head down briefly on her desk. I wish I found this part of it fun. This is sooooo not fun.

She raised her head. Not fun, but necessary. She didn't care...or thought she wouldn't care...what gossip might say about her. She was not ashamed of loving Severus, and she'd defend him to the end to Ron and Harry, if need be. But Severus could possibly lose his position over what had already happened between them...never mind what they were planning.

She hugged herself tightly for a moment. Then she stood up and marched out of Professor Vector's classroom. She was due at her Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson.

* * *

The man had not been making it easy for her to survive the day.

And the more she thought about it, the more it brassed her off.

DADA had been excruciating. It was bad enough when he stood up there at the front of the room, acting as bored and disagreeable as ever, and looking as cool as you please while she blushed and fidgeted in her second-row seat.

Worse was when he moved around the room, pacing the aisles while the class read a few pages on the uses of contagious disease in warfare and wrote a short essay. It was very distracting.

Worst of all was when he stopped and stood in the aisle one row behind her for a full minute and a half. He was right there. Was he looking at her? Was he thinking about... that? She could feel him there...the skin of her neck and scalp was buzzing with heat and magic. The sound of his boot leather creaking as he shifted his weight electrified her. Helplessly, she thought of how he tasted when she kissed him.

Then, when he finally brushed past her desk on his way to the front of the room, he managed to drop something into the crook of her right arm. She palmed it and peeked at it in her lap. Another sprig of verbena.

She looked up. He was looking right at her, a tiny smirk playing around his lips.

What the...? Is he...? He's TRYING to wreck me!

She glared at him and frowned, all her hazy, hypnotised, lustful feelings gone. Grinding her teeth, she bent over her essay. She would have to have a talk with him about this sort of behaviour.

Soon the essay topic took hold of her, allowing her to get through the rest of the hour tolerably well. At the lesson's end, she turned to her neighbour. 'Neville, will you take my essay up to Professor Snape with yours? I need to dash.'

Her final, defiant glance at Severus fell flat...he wasn't even looking at her. She swept out of the room, bound for the Owlery.

* * *

Even with its southern exposure, the late afternoon light in the DADA classroom was the subdued grey of a rainy day, barely warmed by the feeble light of the wall sconces.

The last student left just as Hermione arrived. Severus was sitting at his desk, sorting papers. He looked up.

'Hello.'

She swung her bag off her shoulder and set it on his desk.

'Hello, sir.' She pulled out a sheaf of parchments. 'Where shall I put these?'

'Just there will do.' He pointed. 'Here are yours.'

'Thank you.' She piled them into her bag.

She glanced back over her shoulder at the classroom's open door.

'I need to talk to you. In private.'

'Of course. Shall we adjourn upstairs?' He gestured towards the staircase behind him, which led up to the mezzanine room that some of his predecessors had used as an office.

'Certainly.' Stiff-backed, she marched up the stairs ahead of him.

Fairly crackling with irritation, she was.

Good. He trailed his fingers lightly along the bannister, eyes fixed on her swaying arse.

* * *

'... and that display in the Great Hall was outrageous. Why did you do that?'

'I agree. It was quite a show. You looked as though you'd been dipped in some sort of dye.'

Indeed, she looked rather like that now, standing rigid and red-faced in the soft light.

'Really? So would you, too, if you were sitting at a table full of people, trying to eat a normal lunch like a normal person, and you got a secret message asking if you were wearing any knickers under your skirt, and then the person who sent it licked his finger.'

He looked down at his forefinger and rubbed it slowly with his thumb. He wondered how soon he'd be able to kiss her.

'I'm trying,' he said, 'to imagine myself in the scenario you describe...wearing a skirt in public and imputing lascivious motives to my male acquaintance. I rather think I'd be inured to embarrassment.'

'But I'm not and you know I'm not. Stop joking about it.'

'You didn't have to read the Galleon then and there.' He shrugged. 'As for me, I had a little mayonnaise on my finger. From the pommes frites. Excellent mayonnaise.'

She actually stamped her foot. Adorable.

'But I've been angry with you since this morning! Is that really how you want it? Because I don't. Your antics...no, let me finish...your antics are confusing and annoying and distracting. You're being really... unkind. I don't like it.'

'Obviously. But answer one question. What, exactly, were you being distracted from?'

'From my schoolwork! From my attempts to act normally! This does not come easily to me. I mean, yes, I managed to keep my feelings about you to myself for a long time, but that secret and this secret just don't compare. I can hardly think straight when I'm around you.'

He was delighted to hear it.

'I find...don't you?...that in many of its forms anger focuses the mind beautifully.' He dropped his voice and rolled the words out deliberately. 'Irritation, annoyance, exasperation, displeasure. They're like a good, strong wind. Everything else just falls away, hm?'

She stared at him.

'I saw you floundering in my classroom. I thought you could do with a jolt of pique. And in the Great Hall, I decided we might test that glamour of yours. It appeared to work quite well...none of your friends seemed to notice your distress. Of course, that may be attributable to their negligible powers of perception, but...' He dismissed her friends with a gesture.

'Furthermore, I wanted to know if you were wearing knickers under your skirt, and I had the means to ask you. The answer was inconclusive...perhaps you could clear up the matter for me now?'

'There!' she burst out. 'You said it. You decided to test the glamour. You thought making me angry would be a good idea.'

With each 'you,' she stepped closer to him until they were toe to toe and she was squinting up into his face. 'You're making light of my objections and, again, belittling my friends, which you know upsets me.' Now her forefinger was jabbing at his chest.

'You made those decisions without consulting me. Yesterday, you said you did not want to play nasty master and naughty schoolgirl with me. Well, I don't want that either. That's not how I think of myself, and it's not what I want from you.'

He couldn't help it: 'What do you want from me?'

Hermione rolled her eyes. 'You know what I want. You saw it all. But right now? And in general? I want... parity,' she said. 'I want you to act like my l-lover, not my master.'

My lover. The hairs on his nape stood on end.

He took hold of her finger-jabbing hand and pressed it against his waistcoat. 'Yes. Parity. Quite.

'However, let us be clear. In public I am a teacher who can barely tolerate you, and you are a student who would never dream of doing this.' He brought their hands down and placed hers against the front of his trousers.

She gasped.

'This is what happens to me when I see you, hear your voice, or think about you,' he murmured. 'I am simply more skilled than you at hiding my feelings. Today, I used my... expertise... to help you show the world only what it expects to see: student.' He put one hand on her chest. 'And teacher.' He pressed her hand firmly against his cock. 'Indifferent to each other.'

His mouth was now hovering beside her ear. 'I was also wooing you, a little.' He rubbed his hand over her breast in a slow circle. She moaned, pressed in to him, began tentatively to move her own hand on the cloth that covered his cock. 'Did it work? Shall I kiss you now?'

For answer he got an armful of girl, two hands on his face, and an open, eager mouth on his.

For a while, they didn't waste any breath on words but kissed each other with all the day's pent-up hunger, hands in each other's hair, eyes half-shut, mouths venturing out to explore ears and throats before returning to feed deliriously on those lips.

Finally she pulled away to look at him, sliding her arms down to encircle his waist. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes had never looked blacker. Her heart thudded. 'Yes,' she said.

'What?'

'Yes, it worked. The wooing.' She was silent for a moment, thinking of the tiny parchment package, the Galleon flashing its shocking messages.

'But I wish you'd told me what you were doing. I know!' She put a finger on his lips to silence him. 'It wouldn't have worked if you'd told me. I know. But I still...' Still what? What was she trying to say? She wanted to pay him back for his high-handedness. She wanted to be the one pulling the strings.

She lifted her chin and gave him what she hoped was a cool stare. 'It was a very trying day, and I, I require satisfaction.'

He replied with one eyebrow.

She looked down, pinning her gaze on his top waistcoat button. 'Yes. Satisfaction. You've had things your way today.' Her fingers were on the button. 'Now I'll have them my way. Will you ward this room, please?'

'Already done.'

Her fingers, on the fourth button, barely faltered. 'Good. And you are, um, free... for a, a little while now?'

'I have no other engagements before dinner.' His voice was low and rough.

The waistcoat was open. She started on the shirt buttons. When he made to shrug out of his robes and frock coat, she stopped him. 'No.'

'Hermione. What are you doing?'

'Hush,' she muttered, pulling his shirttail out of his waistband. 'I'm opening your shirt. Beyond that, well, you'll see.'

She actually wasn't sure what she was doing. She just knew she wanted to touch him. And she felt that, after last night and today, he owed her his co-operation.

She laid her hands on his bared stomach and slid them up over his ribcage. So pale. This was where she had been on Saturday night. She skimmed her fingers over the mysterious little knot she'd felt then. 'A scar,' she murmured. And it wasn't the only one. Shiny white lines crossed one another over his chest and a patch of puckered skin the size and colour of a plum lay under his left armpit.

Old wounds. She shuddered, looked up. His expression was guarded, his mouth a flat line. She craned up to press a soft, open kiss against his compressed lips, then another. When his lips parted, she smiled into his mouth and deepened her kisses.

Again, he buried one hand in her hair; with the other he pulled her hip into his thigh.

Her hands were on his back, in the warm space under his clothing. She ran them over his vertebrae and traced his sharp shoulder blades. So thin. More scars revealed themselves to her touch, and suddenly she blazed with anger at whoever had made them.

She was seized with a savage desire to make it better, and that desire mingled with the hunger she'd been staving off all day. She could have snarled out loud. Instead, she whispered fiercely in his ear: 'Beautiful.'

* * *

'Beautiful.' She dragged his earlobe into her mouth and bit it, sending a jolt to his cock and burning away his last scrap of shame.

The hands that had been wandering around his back swept up to his chest, palms skimming then circling his nipples.

Where her hands went, her mouth soon followed. Her tongue, flat and wide, then hard and pointed, then forming a hot, wet circle with her lips, sucked one nipple into her mouth while her hand played with the other one. There was a small, bright explosion at the top of his spine.

Now her fingernails were skating down his torso and every square inch of his skin felt alive where the fuck did you learn that oh don't touch that yes touch it FUCK I'm going to come in my fucking trousers.

Groaning, he put his hand over the top of hers where it lay along the length of his cock. Then her hands got busy with his belt buckle.

Oh Christ. 'Hermione. You don't have to do this.'

'Do what?' Wide-eyed. She had his flies open.

'Whatever... what you're doing.' He dragged the words out of himself.

'Of course I don't have to. I'm pleasing myself just now, remember? And getting a little of my own back?' Her hair was a glorious tumble. 'Don't think you're the only one who wants to hear and feel and, and smell and taste.

'You look rakish.' She grinned at him, obviously enjoying herself.

'Now I should tell you that I have the theory of this but lack practice. You'll help me if I go off the rails?' She pushed ineffectually at her hair.

'Yes.'

She slowly sank to her knees in front of him, kissing her way down.

It was and it wasn't among the best he'd ever had. Or so he decided when it was over and he had collected the pieces of his mind and reassembled them.

She clearly did have a handle on the basic principles and even some advanced techniques, which she employed with varying degrees of success. Taking him into her throat did not work so well...she had to retreat from that. But the perineal stimulation was very effective. Just... very.

More than technique, though, her genius was in the way she seemed to... like it. The first few minutes were tentative exploration, during which she would occasionally look up at him with a serious face, asking 'This?' before doing something magnificent.

If she only knew, it was all magnificent, but the more she lost herself in it, the closer he came to losing control. He wanted to seize her and fuck her into oblivion. Another time, he chanted to himself. This time, her hot mouth and hand were wrapped around his cock, her other hand was cradling his balls, and it was sheer fucking heaven.

Oh fuck, here it comes. 'I'm coming,' he gasped, pushing at her head a little. She responded with a swirl, a suck, a squeeze, and he was gone, his orgasm blowing through him in a blast of dark heat.

When he was still and spent, he looked down and touched her face, wincing as she slid her mouth from his cock. She looked up at him and swiped a trembling hand across her mouth and streaming eyes.

He pulled her up into his arms to kiss her hair and face and mouth. Surely he'd never before seen anything so beautiful.

* * *

'... so beautiful,' said Filius, shaking his head appreciatively.

'Hm,' grunted Severus. 'What?'

'It's a beautiful piece. Do you know it?'

Severus stared at his colleague with cold incomprehension. But before Filius had got halfway through some business about the Brahms motet his choristers had mastered, or not mastered, or were on the verge of mastering, or whatever, he'd lost his audience again.

Severus felt his Galleon flash hot in his pocket. He pulled it out and, placing it in his serviette, he brought it up to his face under cover of wiping his lips.

Watch appeared at the coin's margin.

He looked down at the Gryffindor table, where pudding had appeared. Hermione was helping herself to the trifle. It was, perhaps, a little messy. She popped the fingers of her right hand into her mouth, one by one, to clean them, then leaned in to hear something Ginevra Weasley was saying. She laughed along with the Weasley girl, her face alight. She never once looked his way.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A/N: Thanks and love to all of you, and especially to those who voted for me in the SS/HG Moste Potente Passions awards, wherein I placed in the Best New Author category. How cool is that? *dances *preens Eternal love is due to greenstuff, hechicera, and lifeasanamazon, who are steadfast and supportive even in the face of much wibbling and the occasional diva fit.