Mid-Day

Disclaimer: The characters here and the world they inhabit are the creation and property of JK Rowling and her assigns.

Aurora and Igor had an idyllic vacation. They took long walks through the city and viewed it through many different lights. He played with her hair and declared, "Yu are as peautiful as I imagine when I am in my rooms at Durmstrang. Yu glow in dawn's light and you make me smile when I see yu."

She knew her smile was a little crooked and that her love of chocolate had already made certain changes to her hips. However, she also knew that in her eyes, whatever imperfections existed in Igor melted away. She was perfectly happy to be beautiful in his eyes. Perhaps it meant...

"I loff yu, Aurora." His look was so very intent when he was speaking to her just then. He had an all or nothing way of looking at things that made her know it was real and it was forever, unlike the time when Regulus Black had...What was she thinking?

She kissed him hard. "I love you, too, Igor. I think I've loved you since we met at Slughorn's party. I kept looking to see if you were still watching me, and I was always so glad that you were."

He kissed her again. "Ve must marry."

"But... we have jobs in two different countries!"

"Ve vill haf whole summers... here... in Paris. I vill buy an apartment. It vill vork, and efen vhen yu are not vith me, I vill dream of my Aurora, my dawn light."

She asked herself if there were better offers to consider. There weren't, and she really didn't want any other offers. Some day, perhaps he would be able to come to Hogwarts or she would go to Durmstrang. Why wait if that was the case?

"All right," she answered.

"Besides," he said, "Vhen yu grow large vith my child, yu vill need marriage certificate."

"That's true." She blushed, sure she wasn't pregnant... yet.

* * * * *

Igor saw Aurora onto her train at the beginning of August. She would need to prepare her classrooms and for the teaching generally. He gave her what hints he could about managing a classroom, but the culture of Hogwarts was very different from that of Durmstrang and the disciplinary tactics would be very different, too.

They had discussed whether to make their marriage public or not. Igor was sure that knowledge of it would work against her at Hogwarts, so Aurora agreed not to mention it. He made sure she had their marriage certificate carefully packed away. They didn't think it would be an issue this year, but if she did conceive, he wanted her to be able to prove she was properly married and had been all along.

After watching her train disappear, he turned and looked for his own. They would meet again for Christmas. It would be for less than two weeks, but they would make it be enough.

* * * * *

She grew to hate the first few days of school. Instead of the warm man who held her tenderly and spoke to her softly, there was a shorter man who sneered at her and pointedly looked at the ring on her hand before saying, "Did you have a good vacation, Professor Sinistra?"

She always held her bag more tightly and said, "Yes, Severus, quite nice." She was sure he knew about her marriage. He would look at her at meals or during meetings when they discussed the Slytherin students. She would suddenly find herself thinking of Igor, his kisses, or the way he undressed her as though he was unwrapping china. Then she would look up at Severus and see his eyes narrowed and curious.

The best moment of the school year was the day she arrived at King's Cross and switched to the station from which she took a train to France. Sometimes Igor met her at the train station and sometimes she went to meet him. They always clung to each other until they felt as though they couldn't tell where one stopped and the other began. They kissed, mingling their breath until they felt as though they had breathed each other in. Then they made their way to their apartment and spent a heady evening in their bedroom.

When they finally felt as though they remembered each other, they started taking walks together through the city. They ate at different cafes and restaurants, and they looked at various shops. They didn't buy much. They purchased necessities for the apartment and a trinket now and then for each other.

One type of shop they avoided, by tacit agreement. They always walked quickly past baby shops. For some reason Aurora didn't get pregnant, although both had hoped to have at least two or three children. They decided not to worry about it. Perhaps Fate decided that since they couldn't be together all the time they should wait. There was plenty of time. Neither was thirty years old yet. Still, it grated on them enough that they didn't look at baby things. They couldn't stand the pressure.

Summer invariably ended and they went back to their schools. When Aurora got to the staff room for the first meeting, Severus was usually sitting there. The heads had their meeting before the general staff. He smirked at her and looked at her intently. She would recall her last tearful moments with her husband, and Snape would twist his lips and clear his throat.

"I trust your vacation was pleasurable, Professor... Sinistra?"

Every year, on the night she arrived at Hogwarts, Aurora started a calendar where she could scratch off the days until the next summer.

* * * * *

To say Igor was thrilled when the Tri-wizard Tournament was announced was an understatement. "We will be at Hogwarts all year, my dawn," he said. "We will find a way to be together every night."

They stared at the ceiling of their rented tent for the Quidditch Cup and smiled hopefully. Igor had been let into the country for this event and he would be coming to Hogwarts for the tournament. As he observed, they could be together for the entire school year.

His arm had tingled as the Dark Mark hung in the air over the campground. Aurors came and questioned him, a fact that embarrassed him in front of his wife. Aurora shook her head and took his hand to lead him back to their tent. Once there, she knelt at his feet and pressed her lips to the now-quiet mark on his arm. Soothed by her love, he had undressed her and they returned to their joy in the coming school year. Although someone among the Death Eaters had been imprudent, it wouldn't affect the tournament. They would allow themselves to be happy about that.

He returned to Durmstrang and then explained to the students what would happen that year. Some of the parents were worried about sending their children when times were so uncertain. Igor carefully explained that the students would not be taking classes with the Muggle-born students at Hogwarts. Some parents still refused permission, but the majority became excited by the trip and stood delightedly at the Durmstrang dock as the ship left.

Igor guided the ship through the waters that would lead him to Hogwarts. Every moment brought him closer to Hogwarts... and Aurora. He couldn't let the thought of her distract him. Bringing the ship through the lake was difficult, especially if he did not want to end with that squid on his bow.

She was the first thing he saw as daylight became visible. It might be late in the day, but she was the dawn for him even then. She stood with the Hogwart's faculty, but she looked into his eyes and for an instant it was as though they were the only two people in the world.

* * * * *

"You'll have to wait, Professor," said Snape out of the corner of his mouth. "We'll invite him to sit near us at dinner, but you can't go at each other on the table."

"We can wait to 'go at each other' as you so delicately put it," she responded. "But I am spending the night with my husband."

"Just mind that you're able to teach your classes," answered Snape. "I have far too much going on to make your excuses to Dumbledore."

"When have you ever made my excuses to Dumbledore?"

He frowned. "Just see that it doesn't happen tonight. I have enough on my mind without worrying about your inappropriate romantic encounters."

She lifted a shoulder and narrowed her eyes. "There's noting inappropriate about two married people engaging in lovemaking."

He winced. "Remember what I said."

"Perhaps you'll remember that I'm a Slytherin, too. I can be cunning when I have the need."

The introductions were carried out with little difficulty, and dinner went quite well. Severus made a point of ignoring Igor, so it fell to Aurora to include him in the conversation. "You speak English quite well, Headmaster," she teased him.

"Ah, it is due to the love of my life," he whispered. "Every summer she tutors me in it."

They chatted together in delight as they made their plans to meet in the evening.

* * * * *

He came to the door she pointed out. As soon as he saw her, he pulled her close and started kissing her. "My dawn shines for me in the moonlight." His lips devoured her throat as his hands started fondling her.

"Wait! Igor! There are some things I must tell you." She tried to put some space between them, but his passion was intoxicating.

"I vish to be alone with my vife," he said, his voice husky with desire. "Talk is for later."

She put her finger to his lips and led him up to her rooms. The door was barely closed when he was pulling her to the bed and tugging at her skirts. "Is time for love, voman. Come to bed."

There was no reasoning with him when his accent lapsed like that, and why would she want to? Her desire for him was unbearable as well, perhaps intensified by...his hands were all over her, driving her to the brink of distraction. Her clothes were long gone, and his fingers were tracing along her knee, drawing it around his hip.

She was only too eager to accede to his demands. She pushed up against him, opening for him, welcoming him, accepting him. He growled and held her tighter as she lost all sense of time or place. She was simply a woman with the only man who existed for her. She sighed contentedly and lay quietly, prepared to bask in his nearness, but it seemed he wasn't done, yet.

"Yu are more peautiful than efer," he muttered as he started touching her again. "So full, so ripe..."

"There's a reason for that," she whispered. "Igor, I'm pregnant."

His lips stilled as he looked up into her eyes. "Is true?" He sat up and whispered a charm to brighten the lights so that he could look her over from head to toe. He placed a hand on her unchanged tummy and frowned. "Is too small. Our sons vill be big."

"No, silly," she smiled as she tugged him up close to her face, "the baby starts very, very small. By next May I shall be quite large, indeed." She held her hands out to show how big her tummy would get.

"Is true, then?" His voice was thick and husky as he whispered something she didn't understand. Then he leaned up over her and spoke in careful English. "I had given up hope. I had thought to be happy with just my dawn, but now...Aurora, I love you so very much."

"I think knowing we would be together this year, knowing that we would share this... I think that is what allowed us to conceive. I love you too, Igor."

He started kissing her with a new intensity, and she realized that she would be tired indeed at breakfast the next morning. Severus might scold, but she would be triumphant.

A/N: Thank you to Kyria of Delphi and Owlbait for the beta review.

Also thanks to LynF and Owlbait for an after-posting fix!