Chapter Ten

I'm thrilled so many of you have enjoyed the story so far. It is complete, and I will be uploading the remaining chapters this week. Your comments are lovely and I'm really enjoying reading them.

These characters are the property of JK Rowling. I make no money on this story.

It's unbelievable how much you don't know about the game you've been playing all your life. Mickey Mantle

As Hermione Portkeyed away from the cave, Severus dropped onto the bed, sickened by what he'd done. The delicate bracelets still dangled in his fingers, and he fought the urge to throw them into the fire. After a moment's thought, he stood and quietly placed them on the mantle. No. He had destroyed enough tonight.

In that moment, Severus felt blind panic seep into his veins. How could he have been so stupid as to agree to this? He should have known he would fuck things up utterly, and he had. He knew he would eventually have to face Hermione and beg her forgiveness, but he could not right now. He didn't deserve it.

Coward. You've destroyed your marriage with your sick, twisted perversions. Serves you right if she hexes first and asks questions later.

Oh, but it had been glorious. He closed his eyes. Seeing her strapped to the table, screaming his name as he lapped at her delicious body like a starving man ... feeling the power as she knelt before him to don his bracelets ... seeing that mixture of fear and lust as he sneered, "I wouldn't get too comfortable." It was like the most potent drug - powerful, addicting, and free from consequences.

Hermione had been everything he'd ever wanted, even when she was still his student. It had been a dark secret in a lifetime of dark little secrets; one he'd kept hidden even from himself. He had known it would be a mistake to confess the feelings he'd harboured for her, but he couldn't help himself. Feeling her come undone beneath his fingers, seeing her plump little pussy grow blood red as he spanked her on the table – it had excited him like nothing he'd ever known.

Gods, he'd never felt such crippling, overwhelming lust, even as a callow youth with a libido like a freight train. All propriety and sensibility had been driven from his brain and replaced with dominance, and he had been powerless to prevent the truth from coming out.

And she'd been so deliciously responsive, giving in to him, allowing the submission to carry her along to the places he had mapped out especially for her. All he had to do was keep control of the situation. All he had to do was excite her, and plant the suggestion that he could possibly hurt her. Then he would give her pleasure. The only thing she had to do was allow it, and she had done so with the ecstasy of a martyr, willingly and gratefully – the perfect submissive.

Severus felt gall rising from his gut. He had been so close – so wrapped up in the sex that he had not realized the moment he started hurting her. His vision had been clouded with a dark, erotic mist so overwhelming it had reduced him to an animal, and the thrill of fucking her had saturated him with her scent, her taste, her subjugation, and he was hurtling toward the best orgasm of his life when she screamed her preposterous safe word into the air, and reality dropped on him like a bucket of ice water.

She had been shaking, sobbing, and he came to his senses to see his hand wrapped around her hair, yanking ruthlessly, as he drove into her like the worst sort of rapist. She had been scrambling to get away from him while he held her down.

Severus scrubbed his face with his hands. And the most pitiful thing of all? She had apologized to him. In the short time he had been dominating her he had conditioned her to believe it was her fault. He felt like the worst sort of bastard, and what was worse, he would have to face the music.

He had been the worst sort of hypocrite.

He was no longer the man who simply stalked away exuding a brittle, false superiority, blaming others for his misfortune. Those days were long gone. His new life had brought him the gift of self-esteem honestly earned, honestly deserved, but with that gift came responsibilities. He would have to face his fears and face himself; he would have to acknowledge the dark professor who loved his wife with the same intensity as the man he'd learned to be.

He had to make this right with Hermione, even if she spat in his eye and hexed his balls to Barcelona.

Severus fought rising tears. He couldn't lose her. He'd loved her too long and too much. He needed to talk to someone; he needed advice on how to fix this, and as unsavoury as the thought was, he knew exactly the person to go to.

"Severus! A bit of a surprise seeing you here! Come in," Draco smiled, welcoming his godfather into Malfoy Manor. "Mother's at the flat helping Astoria plan our first dinner party, but Father's in his study. How's Hermione?"

Severus arranged his face in pleasant, expressionless lines. "Fine, thank you, Draco. How is Astoria?"

The young blond beamed. "She's lovely. She and mother have this mad idea about inviting half the country to our little flat, and apparently I'm in the way."

Draco chatted amicably as he led Severus to the door of his father's study. "I'm off home, Father, but I've left behind a substitute." He winked at Severus in farewell, and Lucius turned and spotted his old friend.

"Severus!" His smile of surprised welcome was genuine, and he crossed the floor to shake his hand. "Lovely to see you! Come in and keep and old man company in his hour of need. I've been abandoned by my family for the evening and left to my own devices."

Lucius poured dark red wine into two glasses and invited Severus to sit. "Ah, that is lovely," he said, sampling the wine. He looked over at Severus as if observing no more than the cut of his robe. "Now, Severus, what's wrong?"

Startled, Severus took a large gulp of wine. "Wrong? Why on earth would you surmise anything wrong?" He frowned. "Can't I visit an old comrade without there being something wrong?"

Lucius shrugged elegantly. "Well, you could, I suppose, but not at half eleven at night. And you never call me a comrade unless you're brooding over the old days." He fixed Severus with a look almost Dumbledore-ish in its scrutiny. Lucius' gaze softened. "What is troubling you?"

Severus took a deep breath. Without preamble, he told Lucius what had transpired with Hermione. He did it with the cringing knowledge that Lucius would take every opportunity in future to use the information against him, but he accepted it. The stakes were too high. He was afraid for his marriage. He told it quickly, without the details, but enough to convey the seriousness of the situation.

For a long moment, Lucius watched him silently. Save for a slight tic in his left eye, the blond aristocrat was still. Finally, he sighed, rose from his seat and walked over to the liquor cabinet. "I think we need to graduate to something a little more substantial." He poured brandy into two cut-glass snifters and handed one to his friend, resumed his seat, and leisurely crossed his legs.

"So, let me get this straight," Lucius drawled, after what seemed to Severus an interminable silence. "Your lovely wife has finally grasped the fact that her husband was a former bad boy with a dominant streak a mile long and she's expressed a desire to explore this with you. But you were afraid that the darkness, which was so much part of your misspent youth, would eventually take you over to the point where you could not return to the mild-mannered pussycat you are now? Does that just about cover the first part?"

Put that way, Severus had to admit it did sound a bit ridiculous. Rolling his eyes, Severus nodded curtly. "Indeed," Lucius purred, smirking. He took another sip of brandy. "And furthermore, you decide to indulge your wife's submission fantasies, she loves it, your sex life becomes the most thrilling joy ride since your first dark revel, and she even calls you 'Daddy' in the throes of passion?"

Grimly, Severus nodded again. Lucius tutted, shaking his head.

"Severus, are you further telling me that, in a very fiery moment of said passion, you experienced an outburst from your wife which you didn't understand and didn't bother to investigate. You then had a bout of conscience and you sent your lovely wife home, crying, begging you not send her away, and you then proceeded to come here to pour your blackened heart out to your old comrade, and reassure yourself you weren't in imminent danger of becoming Wizarding Britain's next Dark Lord?"

Severus could feel colour rising in his face. He felt twelve times a fool, hearing his situation described so baldly. Quietly, he said, "I didn't mean to hurt her, Lucius. She's everything to me. I can't lose her."

Lucius gazed at him for several seconds. In his most slippery voice, he replied, "Then what in the name of Circe's seven tits are you doing here? Why aren't you at home reassuring the woman who means everything to you ... that she means everything to you?"

"But what if she's so traumatized she can't stand to be around me? Or worse, what if she takes me back, and the next time, I actually do something to harm her?" Severus could hear the desperate fear in his voice and hated himself for it.

Lucius made a dismissive gesture. "You won't. It isn't in you to harm those you truly love."

"Of course it is!" Severus snarled, running a hand through his hair. He knew his argument was flawed, but he couldn't help himself. His breath exploded from his body in frustration. "You remember the early revels! We were like animals!"

Lucius stifled a belch with such impressive elegance it actually distracted Severus for a moment. "You know, Severus, for a man of your brilliance, ability and intelligence, I do believe you are the most emotionally stunted man I've ever known." Lucius rose from his chair and began to pace. "We were little more than boys in those days, with the world dangled before us like toys before the eager paws of kittens. Depravity is for the young, if they are dark enough to seek it and have the juice to carry it through!"

"I did some pretty depraved things."

Lucius looked down at his friend. "Yes, you did. And most of the time you enjoyed it, as did the consenting witch you were debauching. You had imagination, I'll give you that.

"But the rest of the time, you were as thestral-shit with fear as I was. Our biggest tragedy is not the things we did, but why we did them. We were too frightened not to. We had to survive."

"That is no longer the case. I was enjoying myself with Hermione." Severus flushed with shame.

Lucius looked mildly exasperated as he refilled Severus' drink. "Don't think I'm as vapid as I look."

Severus bit back, "You couldn't be."

Another long suffering sigh escaped the blond man. "Thirty years later, and you are still wounding me with the same insults." He took another sip. "I saw you at the revels - you know, the ones we were subjected to when he returned." Lucius did not need to clarify who 'he' was. "You had no real stomach for rape any more than I did. Pretending that too many potions had rendered you impotent; an Order meeting which must be attended; a head cold, I believe, was the excuse you gave for the last one. He may have accepted these transparent excuses as truth; who knows? I never really knew what was going on the man's head. Now, I'll admit we might have enjoyed a little rum, sodomy and the lash in our youths-"

Severus shot him a sour look. "I was never one for sodomy, Lucius. And I'll thank you to remember that the 'rum and the lash' part are the reason I came here in this predicament."

"Always so literal, you are." Lucius rolled his eyes heavenward. He leaned forward, and in his best 'pay attention, boy' tone of voice, declared, "My point is that you were never evil. Any real darkness was only ever put on and taken off with your Death Eater robes, my friend."

He sat back, his eyes bleak with remembrance. "I knew true darkness; I saw it often enough in those last, awful days here. It was in the face of my sister-in-law. It was in the eyes of Tom Riddle." He turned back to Severus. "It was never in yours. You were a good man, Severus. I've had ten years to analyse it, and I know I'm right. You hid it well, but in the end, your light brought me back from the brink more surely than you'll ever know."

Severus stared at Lucius, stunned. "I know," Lucius smiled. "Who would have thought me capable of such depth of understanding? I can scarce believe it myself." He sat down, and brushed a speck of lint from his immaculate trousers.

"So, on our last games night Miss Gryffindor was deceiving with the truth," mused Malfoy pensively. He smirked, "I never got Cissa that hot and bothered prancing around in my Death Eater robes, I can assure you. Mind you, they were so heavy I was always the one hot and bothered – "

"Don't talk about it that way!" Severus spat. He looked at his friend disgustedly. "That's the whole problem with all of this! Treating those robes, those ... symbols of evil, like they're some sort of kinky costume-"

"And what, pray tell, is wrong with that? That's all they were, Severus. I don't know why you kept the moldy old thing, anyway. Cissa put mine to the torch the moment this mess was over."

Severus, who had finished his brandy while Lucius was speaking, made a gesture toward the brandy snifter. Lucius nodded toward his own glass, and watched as Severus refreshed their drinks.

The dark-haired man took a long pull. "I kept them because I wanted to remember what we fought against. Playing house with them is wrong! It mocks those who died! It defiles the sacrifices people made on both sides in the name of all those robes stood for! It ... cheapens it."

To his surprise, Lucius laughed. Really laughed, like during a heated play on games nights when the drinks were flowing and everyone was having fun. He was holding his sides, and tears spurted from his silver eyes. "Oh Severus! Merlin, if I didn't know you were serious I would call Hermione and tell her what you just said." He managed to gain control over himself, ignoring Severus' glowering form standing over him.

With a last chuffing laugh, Lucius sat back and sighed as he wiped his eyes. Severus was fuming. "It's not amusing in any way, Lucius."

"But it is, Severus. That's the difference between my upbringing and yours. I know the significance, the true significance of those robes. Thank Merlin one of us was brought up to know better."

Lucius shook his head and gave his friend a look of pity and understanding. "Severus, nothing was more low-rent than being a Death Eater. Those itchy old deathtraps cheapened us, Severus. The significance you place on them is what mocks those who gave their lives in this mad war."

Severus slowly sat down, shaken. Lucius' words had struck home. "You see, Severus?" he implored. "Nothing good on this earth came from you wearing those robes, except giving your hot-blooded, Gryffindor wife the thrill of her life. What could be more redemptive that that?"

Severus frowned into his glass. He saw so clearly in his mind's eye Hermione's face when she turned around and saw him wearing the robes for the first time. It had not been some kinky game to Hermione. She was on fire for her wizard, the dark side as well as the light. She wanted him, in all of his shades of imperfection, not a Death Eater. And you sent her away, as if she'd been the one in the wrong ...

"But returning to more recent events," said Lucius briskly, "if Hermione desires for you to continue this sexy little role playing with her, why not? She's a very strong witch capable of hexing your bollocks off if you take things too far, which you won't- "

Severus made a low growling noise. "That's the point, Lucius! I did! I made her say our safe word! She was screaming it!"

"What is it?"

Severus stopped pacing. "What is what?"

"Your safe word," Lucius replied, his eyes as wide and innocent as a young boy's. "I'm merely curious."

Impatiently, Severus replied, "Bumbershoot, but – "

"Huh. Odd little word, isn't it?" Lucius mused. "Then again, it's not the sort of word one would usually scream during sex, so I suppose it's as good as any – "

"It doesn't matter what the fucking safe word is! That's not the point, Lucius!"

Lucius stood and crossed the floor to stand by his friend. "Yes, it is." He laughed. "Honestly, Severus. Sometimes I think you actually believe that what you truly deserve is to end up an old, half-breed wizard, in a squalid little bedsit in Purley, huddled around a tin of Voldie's Revenge for warmth and comfort. Keep believing it and you'll turn it into a self-fulfilling prophecy!"

He reached forward and gave the dark-haired man a shake. "Safe words are there for a reason! You got carried away with your own dark fantasy – she said the safe word – what did you do?" When Severus did not reply, Lucius cocked his head and pursed his lips. "Well, go on – what did you do?"

Severus muttered, "I stopped."

"You stopped. And you turned tail and ran away." Lucius tutted again. "Poor form, Severus. Being the big, bad, irredeemable Death Eater you are, why didn't you just keep going and hurt her some more?" He gave Severus a cuff around his ear.

Severus growled warningly, "Lucius ..."

Lucius tilted his head. "Do you honestly think a true Death Eater would even give his victim a safe word, much less honour it when it was spoken? Stop self-flagellating yourself over things you were forgiven for years ago and for things you had no control over. Everyone knows the measure of you, Severus, except yourself."

Severus looked at his friend for a long time, seeing the truth behind Lucius' foppish exterior. Finally, he sheepishly answered. "I've been the biggest sort of fool, haven't I?" The hopeful note in his voice was almost painful to hear, and Lucius' felt an odd sort of affection well in his breast. It reminded him of how he often felt for Draco.

He smiled smugly at Severus. "You're not as stupid as you look."

Severus sighed. "I don't know, Lucius. Once a Death Eater – "

"Always a Death Eater, I know. I took the oath too, my friend." Lucius' smile turned wistful again, as they spontaneously pushed back their sleeves to reveal the faded smudge of the Dark Mark both had taken in their youth.

Quietly, Lucius said, "I wanted to believe that my family name and bloodline would be secure; you wanted to believe that power could make up for a lifetime of helplessness. We both had the means within to accomplish what we sought, but we didn't have the confidence we needed to do it. We wanted it so badly we ransomed ourselves to the manifesto of a madman.

"But we love, Severus. And as hideously Hufflepuff as it sounds, my family is my life, and in the end, I got my life back." Severus could hear the emotion in his friend's voice.

Lucius added, "So did you, Severus. Don't throw it away because you think you're not supposed to deserve it."

Severus nodded in acceptance. He looked at Lucius with new eyes and replied ruefully, "When did you go and get so deep on me, Lucius?"

"Oh, I've always had depth, Severus. I just found it easier to hide in the shallow pool. You were always the one drowning in the deep end."

He gave his friend a fond pat on the back. "Go home. Apologise to that lovely wife of yours and flog her into a mass of insensate lust." He prodded Severus to his feet and turned him toward the door. "There's a lovely little shop in Knockturn Alley called Pandora Spocks. You know the type - just bristling with all sorts of treats for your kinky little lioness to play with. Go and buy her something nice. Tell them I sent you."

Genuinely intrigued, Severus asked, "Why? Will they give me a discount?"

Lucius looked pained. "No, but the Malfoy name still carries weight in this country. If you mention me, I'll get a discount."

Severus chuckled, his heart suddenly lighter. "Still scrounging freebies. Quintessential Lucius."

His friend saluted him with his glass. "Still refusing to believe the best of yourself. Quintessential Severus."

Lucius opened the door. "Severus, don't screw this up. I'm counting on you not to break up our 'Golden Quartet.' Go and beg your little girl for forgiveness, then roger a Hermione-shaped dent in the mattress. Or the bed of nails, or whatever you degenerates are using as a surface nowadays."

"I will. Do pass on my love to Narcissa."

"I will. Tell Hermione I look forward to our next games night."

Severus Apparated to the grounds and walked toward the school gates. He wanted to give himself time to plan exactly what to do and say to make things right with Hermione. He entered the castle, feeling a renewed sense of optimism. Hermione was the brightest witch of her age. She knew he had ballsed up royally, but she loved him; she would forgive him for being such a berk. Severus increased his stride, his long legs eating up the miles of corridors to their bed chamber.

He would be tender and gentle, but still dominant and in control, just enough to test the waters, to see if she wanted to continue with their experiment. Merlin, he hoped so. It had been fucking amazing.

Mentally, he retraced his actions in the cave, right up to the moment she'd screamed the safe word. It was difficult; he had been so caught up in the sheer rapture of the moment he scarcely remembered his own name. He had unrepentantly taken liberties with the definition of pleasure, to be sure, but she had reveled in that. The little forays into punishment and discipline had excited her unbearably; he could sense it, taste it on his tongue, scent it in the air.

She had begged him for more and he had willingly given it, drinking in her pleas and cries as he pounded his urgency and his lust into her body. It was only when he realized he was holding her hair like the reins of a horse had he come back to himself. Something about her hair, perhaps?

He frowned. He loved dragging his hands through the wild, untamable mane of her hair. How many times in the past few days, leading up to the cave, had he buried his hands in her impossible tresses, kissing her feverishly, as she opened her mouth and allowed his domination?

He quietly opened the door to their bed chamber, and approached their bed, thinking she would be asleep. He would undress and slip in behind her, using all his formidable powers of persuasion to entice her to forgive him. She had to; she simply had to.

The bed was empty.

For a moment, Severus stood staring at the bed. He was disappointed, but not unduly concerned. He looked at the time; it was just past midnight. Perhaps she'd taken a walk around the school. She sometimes did so after a difficult day, just to work off some tension. Perhaps he'd corner her in a deserted classroom and make a detention fantasy come true.

Severus took out his wand. "Accio Headmaster's Map!" A small scrap of parchment flew into his hands, and he laid it on the bed.

When Hermione had told him about the infamous Marauder's Map that belonged to Harry Potter, he had been reluctantly impressed with the magic needed to imbue the map with the ability to track each and every person in the school - even though it had rankled him at the time to admit it.

When Hermione had returned to Hogwarts as a professor, Severus had enlisted her, along with Minerva and Filius, to create something similar for himself and future Headmasters and mistresses. It not only showed the whereabouts of each person in the castle, but everyone on the grounds, and could switch from House to House and from Wizarding Folk to other Magical Creatures. It could also zero in on one particular person or one particular part of the castle.

It had become an invaluable tool; it had also cemented his reputation with students as being able to appear out of nowhere at the very moment a student was in a part of the school they shouldn't be in performing acts of mischief they shouldn't be doing. He often wondered if Dumbledore had owned something similar, but if he had, the old poof wasn't telling.

Severus tapped the parchment with his wand. "Show me Hermione Snape." He watched the map swirl and change like smoke moving over the parchment. Lines formed and dissipated, names flickered over the surface and vanished.

Severus frowned. The words, "Hermione Snape is not at Hogwarts" appeared on the parchment.

Scowling, Severus tapped the parchment again. "Show me Severus Snape." Within seconds, the shapes and words shifted to reveal the line drawing of their quarters, and the legend, "Severus Snape is in the Headmaster's Bed Chambers" flashed over the parchment.

His heart pounding, Severus tried to think where Hermione might be. They had several friends, but he could not imagine her with them. In fact, knowing her, there was really only one place she might be.

The cave was dark and cold; the fire had died, leaving the room dank and gloomy. The bed was empty there as well. Feeling the first vestiges of apprehension blooming in his chest, Severus called her name, but heard nothing but the echoes mocking him, tossing her name back to him in his beautiful voice.