Chapter 17

Author's Notes: This chapter contains non-consensual acts which may be upsetting to more sensitive readers. Before you flame me, know that I was molested as a child, so don't even think about lighting that torch in your hand unless you've suffered similarly, too. Know also that there are different levels of severity in situations like this, and this is by comparison to most of them not very severe.

XVII.

Faster than she thought possible, his free right hand whipped out his wand, blasting her backward. At least she landed on the bed, though she bounced roughly from the impact. Winded, Hermione tried grabbing for her wand, but a sizzle of magic snapped her arms and legs out to the corners of the queen-sized mattress.

"You shouldn't have done that."

His voice didn't sound right. Blinking, Hermione peered at her bonds, a variation of the same silvery ribbons she'd used on Draco. "This isn't funny, Russel. Let me go."

"No, I'm afraid I cannot do that," he murmured, moving up beside the bed, into her field of view. Clad in a green shirt and the navy utili-kilt, he looked normal, but he didn't sound normal. "It takes a full minute for the transformation to complete itself, and I cannot interrupt the process. I could leave," he murmured mock-thoughtfully, "and hide my identity...but you've obviously gone to a lot of trouble to learn some sort of time-acceleration spell. It would be rude of me to not show you who I really am, after unmasking me."

Transformation? Hermione thought, tugging at her bonds. They didn't give her more than an inch or two of slack. But he's not changing! He looks exactly the same...

His hand touched his stomach, then his fingers flew down his chest, unbuttoning his shirt. Tugging it free, he pulled the cotton wide. Not to remove it, but to display himself to her. Hermione stared at his stomach, and saw it happening. The all-over tan of his body was withdrawing from his skin, leaving it alabaster pale, marred only by the faint-pink and aged-white remnants of his scars. The colour swirled up through his chest, and that was when Hermione realized the light brown dusting of hairs were drawing in some of that tanned colouring, darkening themselves to black.

Apprehension curdled her stomach, as more and more dark golden tan was replaced by sallow skin. She shook her head, wanting to deny what she was seeing. But she couldn't deny it. All this time, she should've known, and she couldn't deny it, try as she might. "No...no..."

"Yes...yes..." the wizard she knew as Russel mocked back, letting the edges of his shirt hang open as he braced a hand next to her ribs, leaning over her. His ash-blond hair had darkened to a deep brunette, and as the last of the colouring drained from his arms and his face, his locks finished deepening to a plain, straight black. His Canadian accent had vanished, leaving a plain, ordinary British one. "Psyche dared to look at her Cupid's face...and found she'd married a monster in his place."

Hermione whimpered, looking at her ex-teacher's face. Severus Snape. She'd married--and slept with--Severus Snape! Even the black had bled its way back into his once-grey eyes. There was no denying his identity. She'd made love to this...this murderer!

One of his brows arched sardonically. "What, no loving greeting for your husband?"

"Bastard!" Hermione hissed, feeling ill. Feeling kicked in the stomach, and physically ill. She tugged at her wrists again, but the magical bonds held.

"Tut tut, Miss Granger...sorry, Mrs. Snape," he corrected himself. "Such language. You have only yourself to blame, though; I told you not to seek my true identity. And I told you not to don the ring. Yet you did both," he whispered, leaning closer. She squeezed her eyes shut, flinching from his nearness. His breath smelled like tea, incongruously cozy in the face of her revulsion. The lips she'd been looking forward to kissing when she'd first heard him arrive now grazed her brow in a parody of a soothing kiss. "I suppose, now that my identity is revealed, I should bare all of my secrets to you. All that I can, of course...

The ticklish touch of his lips drifting down to her cheekbone made her flinch and try to twist her head away. Strong fingers caught her by the chin, holding her head still. Warm breath puffed against her skin, tickling her hairline and the curves of her ear.

"I'm sure you'll not be surprised to learn that I've lied to you, wife. You see, you cannot take off your ring to end this marriage...but I can."

That snapped her eyes open. Peering out of their corners, she stared at him, startled by the revelation. His mouth curved in a cruel smirk. Cruel because of the way he confirmed her wild hope.

"Oh, yes...all I have to do is declare our marriage null and void, and draw the ring from my finger of my own free will, and we're through. Divorced of each other. But there's the catch," he purred into her ear. Hermione squirmed against the grip of her hand, feeling the tickling at her ear stimulating nerves halfway down her body in a very unwanted manner. "Even if you sullied your noble self by placing me under the Imperius Curse, the ring would not come off. It has to be by my own free will...and I will never divorce you."

Confusion raced through her, prompting her to speak. "But...but why? Why tie yourself to me? You hate me!"

"Hmm, yes...well, I was leery of the possibility of you donning the ring...but I wasn't your teacher anymore," he murmured, sending shudders down her spine, "and you are an attractive, nubile young witch. It amused me to seduce you, when you didn't know my identity...and it worked out so well, didn't it, my love?"

Hermione thrashed against her bonds, revulsion lending her strength. All she managed to do was bruise her wrists, however. The bonds didn't budge, and didn't loosen. She felt his hand cupping her breast and gasped in desperation, "--Sigurd! Sigurd, help me!"

The dragon didn't appear, not even in dragonette size. All she earned from her efforts was an amused chuckle, and a massaging squeeze of her breast through her blouse. "He won't save you. Our wedding rings were created in an era when husbands owned their wives. I could beat you to death, and he would not lift a single gilded claw in your defense. Scream all you like, love. This suite is too well-warded for anyone else to hear and help you."

"Stop saying that!" Hermione ordered him desperately.

"What, 'love'?" Severus Snape mocked. "But you just confessed your love for me, and I for you! And you were so happy to love me, and to have my love--how does it feel to know you fell for the seduction of the man who killed Albus Dumbledore?"

"If I had anything in my stomach, I'd vomit it on you!" she snapped, tugging uselessly on her bonds again.

"So full of fire and passion," he murmured, caressing her other breast. She tried to shake him off, but he only resumed his stroking when she stopped moving, face red from her fruitless efforts. "No, I don't think I'll give up the prize of such a beautiful, blushing bride."

His head dipped to hers, his mouth angling over her lips. Growling, Hermione snapped her teeth, catching his bottom lip. He pulled it free with a hiss of pain, and touched the blood welling from the small wound she'd made. Eyes narrowing, he stared down at her. A lick of his tongue soothed the injury while his dark eyes calculated with a cold fury that only increased her fear. Shite, Hermione, that was fucking brilliant of you!

Voice dipping lower than before, he muttered thoughtfully, "...I wonder how long it will take to bend you to my will. An hour? Two? Perhaps a whole day? More?"

"You'll be in Azkaban, before then!" Hermione retorted, thinking of the warning she'd given her friends, that she would be done in an hour and a half. He caught her chin, forcing her to look at him.

"Do you really think you'll be able to get free, and capture me?"

She stared back at him defiantly, but said nothing; all she had to do was wait, and eventually Harry and Ron would come looking for her...

He gave her a wary, thoughtful look. "You're too confident..." The hand on her breast shifted to her waist, making her shrink from his touch. Drawing her wand, he flicked at her. "Legilimens! "

Magic impacted in her brain. Hermione struggled to reflect it back at him, to make her mind and her memories nothing more than a tranquil lake. She felt him shifting over her, did her best to ignore his presence, focusing firmly on an image she had of the lake next to the school; she'd seen it on a perfectly still spring day, once, unruffled by wind or wave--

"--Ow! "

The bastard had pinched her nipple! She fell into darkness as her mental composure shattered, only to emerge in a memory of a time when she'd been nipped by the neighbor's dog at the age of six; the retriever hadn't broken the skin of her hand, but he'd frightened her with the bite. It morphed into a memory of her reading a card her parents had sent her for her sixteenth birthday. Hermione fought the spell, trying to return to the lake, but his hand was mauling her breast, and she could only get as far as the day Hagrid had told them about Buckbeak's impending execution.

And then she felt him tugging her jeans open, felt his hand sliding down inside, over her mound, and she couldn't stop the memory that spilled through her in despairing, repulsed hope, ...You know, to find the book that I'm looking for. I should be back in an hour and a half... Hermione groaned in despair as she felt him molesting the memory, and unearthing her certainty that her two friends would come looking for her once she was gone too long.

He withdrew his hand roughly, as the world fell back into place. Hermione's eyes refocused just in time to see him inhaling the scent from her fingertips, and realized with a painful, embarrassed shame that she was....wet. She shouldn't be wet! There was no reason for it--she was afraid of him, not bloody well aroused!

...Wasn't she?

Pushing off of the bed, he sneered down at her, "It seems I have yet more damage-control to perform, today. You've given me far too much trouble, my dear wife. As I don't want your two bumbling idiot friends to interrupt us, I shall have to intercept them and tell them that you faced off against 'the bastard traitor'," he mocked, "and were injured. That you'll need a few days of rest in my tender care while you recover, and that you'll return to them when you're feeling better. That should buy me the time I need to bend you to my will."

"Why don't you just cast Imperius, and have done with it?" Hermione snapped, outwardly fierce but inwardly terrified.

"And risk you breaking through my control? No," the half-clad bastard murmured, staring down at her. His mouth curved up on one side in a playful smile reminiscent of Russel, yet too cruel to be anything but Snape. "Besides, what I have planned for you will be far more fun. For me, at least. Oh, and before you get any ideas...you won't be needing this anymore."

Lifting her wand, he grasped it by the ends, and snapped it in half. Magic spat from the break, then the vinewood shaft was quiescent again. Despair prickled her eyes with tears. Hermione could barely see him through the blurring of her vision, but the drawing of his own wand was unmistakable. She braced herself for the pain of Cruciatus, or worse.

"Stupefy!"

The fiery red bolt that erupted from his wand knocked her into darkness.

...

Hermione roused slowly from the depths of slumber. Hands were kneading her back, talented hands that squeezed and soothed the knotted muscles underneath her shoulder blades. They were working their way up to her shoulders, and in her sleep-hazed state, she was content to let them work their Muggle magic on her flesh. A sound of contentment escaped her chest as they stroked up the column of her neck, then started to work their way back down the length of her spine.

It was a relaxing feeling, invoking a blissful lassitude she hadn't known was possible. For a long time, Hermione just let her mind drift, not quite asleep but not quite awake, either. If she were a cat, she would've purred in pleasure, she decided. That thought eventually made her think of Crookshanks, and that in turn made her think of Grimmauld Place, Harry and Ron--the book, the confrontation--Snape!

Gasping, she yanked herself free of the hands kneading her buttocks, craning her head, frantic to see who was touching her. A tanned, light-haired face met her gaze, grey eyes puzzled. Russel, kneeling on the bed beside her, clad in his blue-and-green Ferguson kilt. "Are you alright?"

"Get away from me!" Hermione kicked at him. He yelped and grabbed her arms as she tried to hit him; they ended up with him covering her naked body with his half-clad one.

"--What has gotten into you, Jane?" he demanded in his Canadian accent as she tried to budge him, and failed. "Are you hallucinating? Is that what that book did to you?"

"Wh-what?" Hermione stammered, staring up at him. Damn her body, but the feel of him pinning her down was reminding her flesh of a few other times that he'd pinned her down, times when the only thing either of them had been wearing had been his kilt...and nothing underneath it. She didn't know if he was wearing anything underneath the scratchy wool, but she knew she was naked, and it was disconcerting her.

"The book--I came here, and you had collapsed, and were suffering from some nightmare. Are you alright?"

"...Nightmare?" she asked, stunned. Had it been just a nightmare? An hallucination, brought on by the magic in the Diary? Oh, the thought appealed to her...but now that she knew what to look for, his tanned skin, grey eyes and lightened hair didn't fool her. The searching, concerned look in those eyes almost did...but she knew the contours of his face. "You--liar!" She struggled to push him off of her. "You're Severus Snape! I can see it in your face!"

"I am not!"

"You look like him, and you're lying like him! Get off of me!" she demanded, shoving futilely. He was just too heavy, too strong for her to move, even with such a lean frame.

"--You think I look like him?" Russel grunted as she tried to thump him in the leg with her knee. Unfortunately, he was now lying with his legs between hers; the only thing keeping them from being even more intimately pressed together was the fabric of his kilt. His voice took on a lighter tone. "Well, I didn't want to tell you, but I am related to him..."

Oh, he infuriated her! Baring her teeth, Hermione yelled, "Stop lying to me, Severus Snape!"

He stilled over her. With his face hardened, no longer charming, she couldn't see him as Russel anymore. Just an oddly coloured Severus Snape. "...Very well. Remember that you demanded this of me, wife. Modusepara!"

Her arms and legs jerked outward again. A glance at her nearest wrist showed it wrapped in a black velvet band; a crane of her head showed her right ankle was bound in black velvet, too. "Let me go!"

"No. I had hoped to spare your delicate sensibilities, but it seems you'd rather do this the hard way."

Sitting up on his knees, he reached behind his neck and unfastened the ribbon holding up the raven-carved amulet. Lobbing it at the nightstand, he unfastened his kilt. Hermione squeezed her eyes shut, but that made it instantly worse; now she didn't know what he was going to do, couldn't anticipate the next touch. Her imagination would become his ally, increasing her fear. Opening her eyes to slits, she studied him warily. Already the colour of his tan, the melanin that coloured his skin, was draining up over his knees, heading for the hairs of his body.

"Lesson One. Hermione belongs to Severus. That means Severus can touch Hermione whenever he damned well pleases. Wherever he pleases," he added in third-person, speaking once again with no trace of an accent.

Baring his groin, he tossed the blue-and-green plaid aside. Fear held her in a breathless paralysis, until she realized he wasn't erect. Thank god for small mercies... But his words weren't reassuring. Shifting out from between her legs, he spoke another wandless spellword.

"Moduprono!"

Hermione yelped as she found her arms jerked over her head, and her body flipped prone on the sheets. He'd stripped back the bedding at some point, leaving her on clean white sheets. Shock made her yelp again when she felt his hands cupping her buttocks.

"I believe I was here, before we were interrupted."

Hermione had enough leeway to turn her face to the side; her arms were now stretched to either side, and her legs splayed apart, half of her face pressed into a pillow. The bed shifted as he moved to kneel between her knees. Uncomfortably aware of how vulnerable her naked body was in this position, she felt a whimper rising in her throat. Fear tingled through her nerves, especially down at her groin. At least her breasts were hidden from his gaze, but she couldn't close her legs, couldn't protect her femininity.

His hands shifted, kneading the tense muscles of her bum. Thumbs grazed the crease of her flesh intermittently as he worked his way down to the tops of her thighs. She tried to tense her body, tried to keep him out, but his thumbs rubbed in leisurely circles between her inner thighs...and that was when her humiliation completed itself, when his thumbs brushed against her nether-lips.

She was wet.

Worse, she felt more moisture seeping out of her flesh as his hands stilled. He knew it, too. Betrayed by her flesh, Hermione felt her face burning with shame. How can I feel aroused by this? Oh, god, what did I do to deserve this? Kill me quickly, please...

His thumbs massaged the sides of her labia, stroking her own moisture over her flesh, then they withdrew as he kneaded her hamstring muscles. Any hope she had of him being a gentleman on the matter died a withered, embarrassed death as he murmured, "I'm pleased to see this won't be quite as difficult as I'd thought..."

Merlin, rise from the grave and kill me now! Lockhart, Obliviate me with Ron's broken wand--anyone, have mercy on me!

"You have lovely thighs. Pale and perfect," he murmured, his baritone pouring over her raw senses like motor oil, dark and slick. He stroked lightly over the backs of her knees. Twitching from the ticklish sensation didn't do anything but make her leg spasm; the velvet bands acting like manacles prevented her from moving very far. Fingers manipulating her calves, her captor continued. "I meant to re-seduce you in a form you seemed to like, to make things easier on you, psychologically. But you're too stubborn, aren't you?"

He reached her ankles, and her feet twitched in anticipation. Not from ticklish sensations, but because he--as Russel, that was--had used the sensitivity of her feet to enhance her orgasms in the past. The thought of Severus Snape tormenting her with the ecstasy of a foot-rub was humiliating. Perverted.

His fingertips eased over the edges of her heels.

"Please--don't!"

Stilling his hands, he contemplated her blurted request. "...Sensitive? Ticklish, perhaps? Or are you afraid I will use your own desire against you?"

Yes, yes, I'm afraid of that! I'm terrified of what you're making my body feel! She ground her teeth together to keep from blurting those words, too. When she stayed silent, his hands slipped down her soles, massaging them firmly, but not painfully. It was more soothing than stimulating, but her body didn't know any differently. Hermione could feel her nipples tightening, and her body moistening itself even further. A whimper escaped her throat. I don't want to feel this way!

"Tut tut, Mrs. Snape," her ex-professor admonished her, sliding his hands back up to her calves. "All that work I did on your body has just gone to waste. You're far too tense, again."

Abandoning her right calf, he massaged the left one, slowly working his way up her leg; as he kneaded, he spoke.

"You wanted the truth. I suppose I should tell you. Perhaps then you will understand just what sort of situation ensnares you. Where to begin... Where else, but at the beginning?" he answered rhetorically. "The Dark Lord has known all along about my plan to communicate with you through the rings."

Hermione winced, biting her lower lip. She was very, very glad she hadn't yet had the chance to ask the Order to let him in on the Fidelius-kept secret of their Headquarters. He continued lightly, stroking the tension from the back of her left leg. It didn't help that his touch made her flinch, the closer he got to the inner top of her thigh.

"He doesn't know that the rings do not allow me to lie to you, but he knew everything else."

A startled sound escaped her.

"Oh, yes," Severus Snape answered, as if her gasp had been a question. "The rings do force their wielders to communicate the truth, and only the truth, through them. I could call myself 'that bastard traitor' in third-person because I am one, a bastard in the metaphorical sense, and a traitor. I can even get away with calling Wormtail a bastard traitor, because he was one to his friends...but you couldn't lie to me about Potter now being your brother," he sneered, Harry's surname all but spitting from him. "...But let us not discuss him.

"No, Marvolo knows everything but the fact that the rings enforce some version of the truth. Any communication tool forged with Veritaserum infused into its very being will ensure no lies can be transmitted through it. Veritaserum is used as the base of the potion infusing the anti-cheating quills at the school, for instance, and these rings were forged by the great wizard John Dee during the first Elizabeth's reign, forged in dragonfire, infused with protective magics, and quenched in Truth Serum.

"So yes, I am working to bring down the Dark Lord, to destroy him and dance upon his grave. My methods, however, are not exactly orthodox," he sneered, rubbing high enough on her inner thigh to encounter her wetness again. Stilling his hand, the other one still massaging in circles along her outer hip, he added, "As you may have noticed."

His hand shifted, and one finger plunged into her body, making her stiffen. "--No! Don't!"

He pulled out...and thrust two of his long digits into her depths. Hermione held her breath, body tense with shame. A twisting, a bit of fluttering, and she gasped, pleasure arcing through her nerves like miniature lightning. Dammit, this wasn't right! He shouldn't know where to touch her to arouse her body! Straining through the war of conflicted emotions and sensations, she focused on what he had said. Torture her if he must, she wasn't going to let him break her!

"I wouldn't call it orthodox, when you murdered Professor Dumbledore!"

His thumb pinched her clitoris, with the help of his remaining two fingers. She bit back a groan, but was unable to quell the tremor the agile move instilled in her involuntarily aroused flesh. "I don't appreciate your tone of voice, Mrs. Snape."

"--Stop calling me that!" Hermione gasped as his fingers pumped into her a little. "Stop it!"

His hand left her body. She heard wet, suckling sounds as the bastard savoured her juices, then felt the heat and brush of his body leaning over hers, the depression of the mattress sagging as he braced his weight by her ribs. His left hand came into her field of view, his thumb touching the band. "Hermione Jane Snape...you are my wife, and I will call you whatever I want and touch you wherever I will."

Her finger heated, but his hand was in the way, and her own hand lay too far from her face for her to have read the words anyway. Removing the warmth of his body, he resumed his position on his knees between her spread legs, and began massaging her right calf. For a moment, her treacherous mind had to admit that he had the hands of an angel, when it came to massaging someone. But he killed Professor Dumbledore! she reminded herself firmly...and all she knew was a heavy confusion. "Why did you do it? Why did you kill him? Or is that where your honesty ends?"

"I took an Unbreakable Vow, to either help young Mr. Malfoy complete his tasks--repairing the cabinet and killing Albus Dumbledore--or to complete those tasks myself, should he failed. He succeeded at the first. When I saw him starting to lower his wand that night, I knew he had failed with the second. Either I had to kill Dumbledore, or I would drop dead myself from a broken Vow. Obviously, I wasn't the one who dropped dead."

"You're no better than Pettigrew!" Hermione snapped, remembering a night in her third year when Sirius Black had shouted that he'd rather have died that betrayed his friends, unlike Peter Pettigrew, who had betrayed James and Lily Potter to the Dark Lord.

Severus Snape struck like a serpent, pinning her back with his warm weight. One of his hands fisted painfully in her hair, holding her head in place. "--Never compare me to that odious little worm! You will rue such careless words, wife." Releasing her roughly, he backed up, and confused her by resuming his methodical, careful massage of her thigh. Still, it took him until he was massaging her backside before he spoke, his voice calm once again. "...Albus was visibly weak, that night. He'd been caught by Draco Malfoy, of all people. I did what was needed. It gained me the highest esteem in Marvolo's eyes. He now thinks I am one of his pet serpents, an asp he can summon with a whisper to do whatever he wills."

"More like an arse," Hermione muttered. She winced when he kneaded her buttocks a little harder.

"Such language from a young lady... Nearly everything I have done with you, the Dark Lord knows about. He'll probably even learn about this moment, too. I have succeeded because I tell him the truth. Just as I told it to Albus...and just as I am telling it now to you." His fingers worked their way up the small of her back in muscle-soothing circles. "The truth can be just as misleading as a lie, when told in the appropriate manner. We'll call that Lesson Number Three."

"You missed Lesson Two," Hermione muttered.

"No, I just haven't taught that one to you, yet."

"How do I know you're even telling me some twisted version of the truth, never mind the full truth?" Hermione asked. As far as torture sessions went, this wasn't too bad; he really did have the perfect hands for a masseur... What am I thinking? These are the hands that wielded the Killing Curse!

He leaned over her again, and she felt the probing hardness of an erection nudging against her inner thigh, making her shudder. It was too close to her vagina for her mental comfort. His hands braced themselves to either side of her ribs, denting the mattress at the level of her breasts. "Well, that is just something you will have to take on faith."

A shift of his hips, and the tip of his prick nudged at her opening. Hermione flinched. "Please, don't!"

"Lesson One, wife. I will touch you whenever, wherever, and however I like." Sinking into her slowly, he murmured in her ear, "You will learn to accept my conjugal rights. Even the greasy git of the dungeon has needs...and you asked me to swear to not cheat on our marriage with anyone else. You can't have it both ways, my dear Jane."

"I would rather you--ahh!"

His hand had fisted roughly in her hair, gripping her curls painfully hard. "Do not rescind that vow!" Severus growled in her ear. "While I am bound by it, I am ineligible for the gang-rapes of the Death Eaters' victims. That is something I have never been interested in doing, but in the high position I am in, it would be expected of me, had I not demonstrated how the rings enforce monogamy on both sides of this marriage. And that is only possible on my half because you asked me to swear to it on our wedding-rings.

"Rescind that vow, and something far worse than this," he punctuated the word with a thrust, rubbing against her g-spot, "will be the fate of the females I run across. You, at least, are receiving pleasure in this act." Buried deep inside her, he rotated his hips in a subtle, sensual grind. "Remove my vow, and you will be just as responsible for what I will do to them."

"You don't have to do it!" Hermione protested.

"Like I didn't have to kill Albus?"

She twisted her head to the other side, but there was no way to avoid his voice, no way to avoid his touch.

"I will maintain my position among the Death Eaters by any means possible, so that I may stay in the most useful position for spying as possible. That doesn't mean I have to like what I must do...except for this," he murmured, nuzzling her neck through her curls as he rocked into her again in emphasis. "I like this..."

"Well, I don't!"

"...Liar." Brushing her hair from her neck and shoulder, he kissed the curve of muscle hidden there.

She shivered. Timing his thrust, he withdrew, then bit her delicately on the next surge inward, a nip of his teeth. He'd done this to her before, as Russel, and knew how her body reacted to the love-bite. Now, as then, it sent a shiver of pleasure racing between spine and groin, forcing Hermione to bite her lip, quelling the urge to moan. It wasn't fair that he knew how to arouse her so well. It just wasn't fair!

"Mmmh," the bastard moaned, scraping her skin with his lips as well as his teeth, before releasing her from both. "I can feel how wet you got, just now. I suspect you love being disciplined--you were wet when I bound you to this bed, and you were wet when I fondled you ruthlessly, and you were wet when I bit you, when I dominated you. It shames you, but you like it. I wonder..."

Withdrawing, he pushed away from her body, and shifted to kneel beside her hip. Just as Hermione started to turn her head to that side, to see what he was doing, she felt and heard a sharp-burning crack, and yelped. "--Ow! You spanked me!"

"You have a bad habit of stating the obvious." His hand smacked onto the same spot on her right buttock, making her flinch and yelp again. It wasn't bruisingly hard, but it was stingingly hard.

"Bastard!"

"Any time, any place, any how. I think you will like this," he murmured, disgusting her with the humor lacing his tone. "In the end, that is..."

With that as her only warning, the bastard spanked her arse ruthlessly, raining the slapping blows on one cheek, then the other, then both in random patterns. Several times he paused and she flinched automatically, expecting a blow--and then he struck, just as she relaxed in the painless aftermath. She squirmed on the bed, but couldn't avoid the blows; her arms and legs wouldn't let her move far. She bit her lip, but couldn't stop the pain from dragging itself vocally from her throat.

And then he stopped, but only long enough to slice his fingertips between her nether-lips. That was when Hermione learned her body had betrayed her again: she was incredibly wet. Her backside was burning from the fierce blush raised by his blows, and she was literally dripping wet; she could feel the damp puddle on the bedsheet directly beneath her groin. It was inconceivable, and yet undeniable: her body was aroused by being spanked. Yet one more streaking thought to add to the whirling vortex of confusion inside her mind.

He started again, but this time his blows struck between her legs, smacking into her mound in stinging slaps that weren't quite as strong as the ones applied to her bum, but still managed to make her flinch with each impact. How long he kept it up, she didn't know; long enough to make her loins hot with the rushing blood, at least. But he did finish. A muttered, "Modusupina," flipped her over, and another word, "Moducrusa," released her lower limbs from their invisible bonds, though her arms were still pinned flat to either side. Hooking his arms under her knees, he lifted her pelvis as he positioned himself between her legs. A prodding of his erection, and he slid inside, hard and fast.

She was too wet; her body offered no resistance, save for the clenching of her muscles. That, she discovered, not only did nothing to keep him out, it was quite pleasurable. Despairing, she closed her eyes, but that only magnified the sensations in her loins. All of the blood that had rushed down there from the stinging slaps he had delivered only served to heighten her stimulated nerves. Each deep thrust mashed his pubic mound into her clitoris, slapped his scrotum against her flesh.

The arm under her left knee forced her leg further back, doubling her thigh toward her breast. A moment later, her eyes snapped open as she felt wet warmth enclosing her toes. With his own eyes closed, with a look of sensual absorption she'd only see on Russel's face in moments like this, she watched Severus Snape sucking on her toes.

This was the same man who'd sucked on her toes before. This was the same man who had made her incoherent with pleasure. This was the same man as Russel Fawkeson...and he was sucking on her toes and making her bloody incoherent once again. Shivers of ecstasy rippled up through her belly.

Giving up on trying to make sense of anything, Hermione let herself sink into the sensuality of the moment. He would have to answer to her for his lies, and for binding her, and for touching her when she'd said no...but in that moment, Hermione was tired of trying to make sense of the world. And, in letting go, discovered not only a wash of pleasure that tore a moan from her throat, but a startling sense of freedom, too; he was in control, for the moment, and it felt good to let him plunder from her this strange sensuality found in being bound and spanked and ridden until she was soaked with sweat from her climax.

This wasn't by her consent, but whatever this was, it wasn't the terror and pain of a true rape; given what she could've suffered at his colleague's hands--moments of pulled hair aside--he was really being very considerate....

Bastard.

Snape quickly sensed the change in her, his hips stilling for a moment, his dark eyes opening and meeting hers. Releasing her foot, he leaned down between her legs. The moment she wrapped them around his hips, he stiffened warily again, then cautiously closed the last bit of distance between them. Aware of the true, sallow-skinned identity of her lover, Hermione didn't bite him when he kissed her. She was hesitant in returning the kiss, but then they both were being cautious. But sliding lips led to licking tongues, led to moving hips as he rocked into her again. And, scars and skin-colour aside, Severus proved himself every bit as considerate as Russel, slipping one hand between them so that he could stimulate her clitoris between his fingers.

Incongruously, as her head arched back and his mouth nibbled over her chin and down onto her neck, Hermione's mind filled with the thought of Severus Snape in an all-black ensemble of poet shirt and pleated kilt. That made him look like a ruddy Scottish pirate, in her imagination. A moment later, he bit and suckled her pulse-point, and another orgasm boiled through her nerves and emerged as a bliss-ambushed cry, stimulated by his touch. The sharp upward buck of her hips seemed to undo him, for he spasmed and pounded roughly into her, wet and warm as he spilled himself in his own climax.

"Jane, Jane, Jane--!"

That irritated her out of her post-coital bliss. At least, it did once some of the lassitude wore off a minute or so later, when his breath warmed the skin just below her left ear, his face buried in her tangled curls. The rest of her sexual contentment evaporated as Hermione frowned. "Why do you keep calling me that?"

"Mmmh...what, 'Jane'? That is your name," Snape murmured in her ear. He was considerately keeping some of his weight on his elbows and knees, though most of it was pinning her in place sufficiently enough, he probably didn't need the spell keeping her arms flat on the bedsheet.

"My name is Hermione," she reminded him.

"Yes," he agreed, nipping at the unbruised side of her throat with each word. "Hermione...Jane...Snape. I just happen to think 'Hermione' is a ridiculous mouthful."

"Oh, like 'Severus' isn't? Is that why you chose your middle name as your alias?" she asked him tartly as he shifted, pulling his limp shaft from her body in favor of kissing his way down to her breasts. Her question made him lift his longish-haired head with a smug smile, amusement glittering in his black eyes.

"'Russel' isn't my middle name."

That confused Hermione. "What, is it your first name?"

"No."

"But, the rings--you used it with the rings! If they enforce the truth...?"

"Have you forgotten Lesson Three so quickly, my dear wife?" her former teacher prodded her verbally. "The truth can be twisted out of its natural shape, until it implies something entirely different, yet still seem perfectly valid." He smirked, and drew out the sibilants in his confession, his lips skimming over the valley between her breasts. "My name is Severus...Selenius...Snape. I wrote the first four and last five letters of my given and middle names in the air over the page, and only committed the R U S and S E L to paper, when I wrote to you. Thus I wrote the truth, in a way that made it seem like a lie."

That was disgustingly clever of him. "A pity you can't do the same with your true personality, leaving certain bits and pieces behind..."

He bit the side of her breast, making her yelp. The sharp nip was accompanied a moment later by the curling of his tongue around the same nipple; it tickled. Hermione tugged at her arms, but they were still pressed to the bed, though her legs were free to move. With his long, dark hair spilled over her skin, his lips nibbling between words, he murmured, "You will learn to accept all of me, love. Including my many flaws."

"At least you admit you have them. And stop calling me that!" Hermione ordered him. Just because she was tied down and unable to stop the ticklish torture of his tongue flicking her nipple didn't mean she had to be a bloody doormat. With the illusion of Russel Fawkeson shattered and broken, she didn't trust him any further than she could throw him at the moment, and she did not like his use of endearments.

"Stop calling you what, love?"

Oh, the bastard knew what he was doing! She flinched at the caress of his voice; she'd fallen in love with Russel, but Russel was nothing but a lie, and she didn't love Severus. How could she? Hermione didn't even know him. Six years as her teacher, seeing him working for the Order, had taught her almost nothing of this man--and the events of last spring had shown she knew nothing of what motivated him. She did know that he wasn't motivated by love. Lies, yes; love, no. "Stop using endearments!"

He licked along the underside of her breasts, shifting to torment the other one with a sweet, sensual fire at utter odds with the topic at hand. "Why?"

"Because you make a mockery of them!"

Abandoning her breast, he reared over her, bracing his torso on his elbows. "And how did you come to this brilliant conclusion?"

"Because you don't really love me," Hermione accused, jutting up her chin. "And to call me by an endearment under such circumstances renders it as meaningless as most of your other lies and so-called promises."

"...Really? And how did you become an expert on love?" he challenged her, arching a brow. "Or are you just upset that you gave your heart to an illusion you'd perfected in your head? Oh, yes, you are equally responsible for the illusion of Russel Fawkeson. You wanted a charming man. I gave you one. You wanted a spectacular lover. I gave you one. You wanted someone to love. I gave you one! You know nothing of love!"

"I loved Ron!" Hermione retorted, tugging at her bound arms. She wanted to push him off of her, but couldn't move her wrists from the bed. "I would've stayed with him, if it weren't for you! I, at least, have been in love before!"

A soundless snarl twisted his sallow face. Gripping her hair with his hand, he growled into her ear. "I wanted Narcissa Black! Our seventh year, I would've walked on broken glass for her. I even begged my grandmother to give me the rings that you and I now wear, so I could ask Cissy to marry me as soon as we graduated, since she wanted to remain pure until her marriage. But she told me she couldn't marry me; I wasn't romantic enough for her. I didn't love her enough! That I was a penniless half-blood, and that her parents had already arranged for her to marry an older wizard from a rich, pureblooded family...and he was handsome, and charming, so she went to him happily, treading on the shards of my heart, and leaving me the one bleeding from it.

"Do not tell me I do not know what love is!" he snarled into the shell of her ear. "The woman I have taken as my wife lies here under me, telling me she loves another wizard, and mocking my knowledge of what love is? Love is pain! You live in a fantasy world, if you think otherwise!" Pulling back slightly, he gave Hermione a tight little smile. His obsidian eyes glinted with bitterness, cruelty, and amusement. It was not a pleasant combination. "You don't want me to use endearments, my beloved wife? You don't want me to speak of emotions? Then I shall be a polite, accommodating husband, and refrain from burdening you with the lies and the truths of my feelings...save for one last time. One last torment, since you'll never know whether it was a truth or a lie. But then, why should you care? You seem to think I can manufacture feelings on a whim, a superb actor without compare. Allow me to indulge your faith in me."

Dropping his cheek so that it pressed against the left side of her face, he held up his left hand within her field of view, and touched his thumb to the ring girding the base of his third finger.

"Hermione Jane Snape...I love you."

Her ring finger burned. His head blocked her view; the message was short enough, she might've been able to read it on the scaled surface at arm-length, but his black-haired head stayed in the way until the heat of the ring eased and faded. He stayed with his cheek pressed to hers, his face hidden from view, for another minute or so, then finally moved. The tight little smile from before was still curling his lips in a sneer.

"Let that burn in your conscience, wife. Am I telling the truth, or am I telling a lie? Am I playing games with your heart, or games with your mind?" He dipped his head close enough that the tips of their noses brushed, and his warm breath gusted over her lower face. "You will never know. But know you this: I have plans for you. Regardless of how either of us feel. Resign yourself to being my wife."

Shifting down her body, he pressed her thighs apart and licked her flesh in a broad, slow lap. Hermione shivered, disconcerted by the contrast of pleasurable touch and hurtful tone. He suckled her flesh, arousing her nerves...and then stopped. Withdrawing from the bed, he stood and began donning his Russel-clothes with the same sort of methodical neatness she imagined him donning his black professorial robes. The colours and the unwizardish kilt made him look softer than she knew he was, made him into a strange amalgamation of Russel and Severus. It also reminded her of her own naked state.

"What are you doing?" she asked him as he finished tucking his shirttails into the plaid waistband.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" he mocked. "Or have you lost your wits along with your illusions?"

"Beyond that," Hermione retorted, rolling her eyes briefly. "Are you leaving?"

"Yes."

"You're not just going to leave me here, bound to this bed, are you?"

He smirked at her. "A tempting thought." Opening his sporran, he drew something from its depths. Hermione's eyes widened as she recognized the carved vinewood shaft of her old wand. He twirled it idly in his fingertips. "No, you'll be set free. You'll probably go running to your friends to tell them all about the nasty fiend that Russel turned out to be...but will you be honest enough to tell them how you wrapped your legs around the naked hips of the greasy git of the dungeons, and screamed in ecstasy? And if I send you information about an impending Death Eater attack, will you believe me and send someone to the victims' rescue, or stay your hand, and risk innocent lives suffering and dying because it was a warning sent by a cold-blooded murderer who could be laying a trap for the Aurors and the Order?"

Setting her wand on the dining table, he picked up the Diary.

"You can have the other books. You still have a Charm to finish composing for me. This one, however, is too dangerous for an amateur like you. Not unless you wish to be blinded by the Dark Magic it contains, in your foolish, stubborn insistence that you can handle anything that comes your way." Tucking the black leather volume under his arm, he sneered at her. "If you wish to protest, I suggest you take a second, long look at exactly who and what you married.

"You have only yourself to blame. I warned you not to don that ring." Drawing his wand, he flicked it at her. The velvet bands vanished from her arms and legs with faint pops. A moment later, he Disapparated from the room.

Drawing her arms into her chest, Hermione winced as her joints protested. Moisture seeped from her core, making her wince from that as well; he'd ridden her hard, ejaculated his seed into her womb and coated her breasts with his saliva, and left her without even the courtesy of draping a sheet over her ravished body. And the bastard had the temerity to make her enjoy it, too.

Curling onto her side, thighs clamped together, Hermione hugged herself. She could still feel the same sexually sated energy thrumming through her blood that she'd enjoyed in previous encounters with her husband. Husband, she repeated silently in the confusion of her mind. Severus Snape is my husband... Russel is Severus is my husband...

Her head and her heart and her body ached. Her mind whirled with confusion, her emotions felt battered, and her body...well, aside from her aching shoulders, and a lingering heat in her bum from being spanked, her body felt good. Mortifyingly good. She didn't want to think about it, but she had to; she couldn't focus enough to Apparate with her thoughts whirling like this.

There was a part of the maelstrom in her brain saying that she was a slut and a whore for enjoying being taken forcefully, and a part of her brain demanding why shouldn't she enjoy it, when she knew very well it could've been so much worse. Hermione had a very active imagination. She knew that what had happened to Mrs. Pardgeter could've happened to her. Yes, she'd been taken against her will, but it could've been without pleasure, without consideration. She could've been injured.

Having her hair gripped had stung only for a little while, as did the spanking, and even the bites he had given her hadn't broken the skin, as far as she knew. The right side of her throat was a little sore, but in the way that said she probably had a hickey-bruise at best. All in all, it could have been so much worse.

Needing to see for herself the damage, Hermione dragged herself off of the bed. Her joints were a little stiff, but she padded into the bathroom and flipped the light-switch. Wincing at the bright glow, she eyed herself in the floor-length mirror. Being Muggle glass, it didn't move independently of her own actions. All it showed her was the truth. Her breasts were still a little flushed from lovemaking, and dotted in a couple places with the rose-coloured marks of suckled love-bites that would fade within a day or two. The side of her throat was bruised purplish-red, a mark that would probably take a week or so to vanish, and when she twisted and peered over her shoulder, her backside was still a little red, but otherwise unbruised.

She looked like she normally did after a lovemaking session with Russel, aside from the added blush on her bum.

He was relatively careful with me... It was scary when he implied he could be a lot rougher, a lot more brutal with a woman, and after what he did with Professor Dumbledore, I'm inclined to believe he could be that ruthless...and yet I think I believe him when he said he wasn't interested in that sort of...interaction with the Death Eaters' victims. Hermione touched her lower lip. Normally after a lovemaking session, it was puffy from desire, but he hadn't really kissed her mouth, just her body. His relative treatment of her only confused her even more. Why was he so gentle? He was so angry that I'd pulled away the mask of his deception, I honestly thought he was going to hex the living daylights out of me...but he didn't.

Hell, he tried to seduce me!

There had been no denying the mostly gentle stroking of his hands when she'd woken up, and after he'd pinned her face-down to the bed to continue his massage. Why had he done that? She'd been helpless at that point. He'd tutted over how tense she'd grown when he'd teased the soles of her feet, and massaged her all over again. Why? He'd treated her carefully, as if trying to gentle a skittish animal.

It can't be because he actually cares for me...can it? Oh, god, he sounded angry and bitter when he snarled at me for saying he didn't know what love was. Did I... Hermione stared into her brown eyes, her reflected face pale with lingering shock. Did I hurt his feelings? It almost sounded like I did, and yet...how could I, of all people, hurt his feelings? He was just using me all along!

More moisture seeped from her body. Blushing, Hermione plucked a washcloth and a complimentary bottle of shampoo from the counter and turned to the bathtub, intending to take a shower. She stopped before stepping inside the rim, staring at the implements in her hands.

I could take this as evidence of a rape to the Wizengamot...but if I did that, they'd want me to trap Snape so they can haul him into a mockery of a trial. Hermione didn't deceive herself on that score; it would be a mockery. He would be the perfect poster-child for the Ministry to publicly abuse just to make themselves look effective in the war, to make Scrimgeour look good. The outcry against Albus Dumbledore's killer would be overwhelming. They'd be able to turn the so-called trial into a three-ring-circus, an entertainment more bloody and brutal than the gladiatorial games of the ancient Roman Empire.

But...by sending me all that information about Death Eater attacks, Russel...Severus...saved lives. He swore through the rings that he wants to defeat Voldemort, and if the rings won't allow a lie to pass through them unchallenged... He's done good things--he's been able to do good things, because he's still a Death Eater in the eyes of the other Death Eater bastards...

Her head hurt. She shouldn't have to make the decision of whether Severus Snape lived free or was crucified in the public eye...and yet she was stuck in that very position. Even if she didn't report him to the Wizengamot, there was still the decision of whether or not to confess his identity to the other members of the Order of the Phoenix. If she did so...no one would be inclined to trust any more messages from the Ring of Truth, because they'd know Hermione's partner in information was the man they most hated for his most heinous crime.

And even if she didn't tell the Order...she would have to keep this a secret from Ron and Harry. They wouldn't haul him before the Wizengamot for a mock-trial. They wouldn't even call on their fellow Order members. They'd just kill him outright, if they could. Ron, because it wasn't just Russel the Death Eater spy who had stolen his girlfriend, it was Severus Snape, ex-teacher and murderer, who had stolen his girlfriend. And Harry...her blood-bound brother hated Severus Snape with a level of passion that was almost frightening.

She couldn't tell anyone, Hermione realized as her eyes stung with the prickle of tears. Sniffing, she stepped into the tub while she could still see, and turned on the tap with trembling hands. There was no one she could talk to, no one she could ask for advice. As the initial shock of cold water quickly warmed, pouring over her body like a magnified version of her tears, she mechanically poured some of the shampoo on the washcloth to work up a lather. If she couldn't tell anyone, she might as well wash away all evidence of what had just happened...though it would be far easier to wash away the semen on her thighs than it would be to wash away the knowledge that she'd thoroughly enjoyed how it had gotten there.

Her mind whirled with a million thoughts, all of them chasing each others' tails. The night she'd confessed her love for Russel...and how she'd spanked him, that night. Hard enough to leave a reddish imprint of her hand for a few minutes. He'd returned her few blows with a flurry of his own...but the stinging of her bottom would fade faster if she acknowledged and abandoned the hypocrisy of thinking she'd never have done the same to him. She'd already done it. She didn't have to be a Slytherin to know that turnabout was fair play, not foul.

Which left her with a mass of confusion over what he'd meant by having plans for her, and what his motivations were. Severus Snape was too intelligent, too methodical to not have motivations acknowledged and contingency plans plotted in advance. He was on the side of the Light, in that he wanted to destroy the Dark Lord, but his methods were far, far from orthodox. He claimed to have loved Draco Malfoy's own mother when they'd been in school, the youngest of the three Black sisters, Bellatrix, Andromeda, and Narcissa, yet he'd gone on to lie about loving her, throwing about endearments like spoiled potions ingredients, and having the gall to act hurt when she threw her previous love for Ron in his face...

Hermione stopped scrubbing her ribs. She had to know what the truth was: she had to know if Snape had told her the truth. Lifting her left hand, she rinsed the suds from her fingers and stared at the scale-patterned ring. There was one thing her 'husband' apparently didn't know about these rings, but which she knew... Swallowing the lump in her throat, Hermione gathered her courage and spoke.

"Sigurd, you are summoned."

The golden dragonette deigned to appear in a glittering cloud that shied away from the pouring water. Shifting her body to one side, she let him form around her left arm, spiral-wrapped halfway up her bicep, his golden eyes slitted against stray droplets from the shower spray. Swallowing again, dreading she knew the answer, that it was all just a game, a mental mind-fuck of the sort the bastard would enjoy holding over her head, she cleared her throat.

"Sigurd...show me the truth of what Severus Snape said, when he claimed through the ring that he loved me, just now."

The dragonette's head shifted, craning towards his sinuous flank. Hermione bent her arm a little so that she could read the words forming in the pattern of his metallic scales. For a moment the droplets obscured the shifting lines, then the hide around them cleared far enough that they stood out, plain and clear. Written on his hide was the undeniable truth of how Severus Snape, formerly Russel Fawkeson, truly felt about his young wife.

Hermione burst into tears, palms covering her face and muffling half of her broken sobs. The sound of the shower splattering around her muffled the rest of her gasping, shuddering cries. Sigurd vanished, his services no longer required. There was no one who could comfort the confused, overwrought witch, anyway.