Chapter 17

A/N: This is an enormous chapter - as long as 2 chapters in 1! - and I hope you'll review it two chapters' worth! It is the moment we've been anticipating/dreading ever since we learned about the Lethe Elixir. If you need a hand to hold, I'm right here, and the professor has loaned me a stack of his freshly laundered handkerchiefs, if you have need.

Chapter 17

Wake up, it's time, little girl, wake up

All the best of what we've done is yet to come

Wake up, it's time, little girl, wake up

Just remember who I am in the morning

Losing Your Memory

9 July, 1998

Nothing was left of the lunch but bread crusts, which Hermione had strewn about for the birds, and Butterbeer bottles, which she returned to the hampers.  The other housemates scattered, some to painstaking wandless cake decorating, some to hilarious wandless wireless repair, some to after-lunch Quidditch, and a few to post-prandial repose.  Hermione watched Severus, who had remained with her, assisting with tidying up the lunch detritus...but he was strangely uncommunicative, and had been ever since the exchange with Arthur and the twins about the wireless.  Was it about the dancing?  Was it because of ... last time?

It was true that there had been a rather unfortunate occasion when he had felt the necessity to dance with her publicly, but they hadn't been ... close, when that happened.  Surely they need have no scruples about it now, when things were going so well between them.  And of course, there was the dream about dancing, but that had nothing to do with Severus...it was another of her sex dreams, and it only began with dancing.

He darted a swift, calculating look at her as he bent to lift the two heavy hampers from the ground, and Hermione turned away, bending to collect the rugs.  She shook one free of ground debris and began to fold it, determinedly staring at the ground.  Would they go upstairs for a 'nap'?  Or would he disappear again?  What was he thinking?

'Let me help you.'

She turned in surprise, the blanket bunched in two fists...what did he mean?  But he made it clear by prying two corners of the blanket from her and walking backwards, until they stood the length of the blanket apart from one another, the four corners stretched out in their hands.  It was odd, for some reason, seeing her famously withdrawn husband poised to do something as homey as sharing in the folding of the wash.

He walked towards her, the length of the blanket folding between them, until they stood very close, their fingers meeting in an awkward tangle as they brought the blanket corners together.  Hermione looked into his face, memories of the previous night and their activities beneath the blankets flooding her mind, causing colour to flush her cheeks and her heart to trip into a quicker rhythm.  It seemed as if his thoughts were in concert with hers, to judge by the half-lidded, burning quality of his eyes.

When she thought they might drop the blanket in the dirt to grapple with one another over its crumpled shape, he bent at the waist, allowing her to retain ownership of the blanket corners whilst he took hold of the newly made doubled edges, and after moving a few steps away to smooth the creases, he came towards her again, bringing the blanket corners he held to her clutching fingers, until she held the quartered blanket before her, and his hands were empty...only the air between them thrummed with the sexual tension, their awareness of each other's nearness and the desperate acts of intimacy they had shared beneath their blankets as palpable as the bed covering she now held, neatly quartered.

'You can manage from there, I think,' he murmured, his tone making it clear to her that he was fully aware of her state of sudden, aching need.

'Of course,' she answered, her voice a whisper, and she folded the blanket one last time, until it was the perfect size and shape to lay atop one of the hampers.

Then he turned to her again, the second blanket in his hands, and a challenging lift of his brow brought her resolutely forward to claim two corners and begin the folding process again.  She would not be intimidated by his implied sexual aggression...not when all she wanted was his hands on her again.

'Do you suppose you can assist me with this task, Miss Granger?' he taunted in the tone of intimacy she heard from him only behind the closed door of their bedroom.  'Who would have thought folding the bedclothes would be an act of such erotic promise, hmm?'

The ache between her legs was near the point of physical pain, but she backed away from him, pulling the blanket taut of creases before walking towards him again, bringing the four edges together in his hands.

'Shall we complete the job?' he asked, his silken voice both a torment and a promise.  'Or shall I take you here, on top of a half-folded blanket in the great outdoors, where Merlin knows who'll watch us fuck?'

'Stop,' she whispered, embarrassed, but her voice sounded unconvincing even to her own ears.

He took the halved blanket from her and completed the folding with three quick, decisive snaps of his arms.

'Why don't you stop issuing half-hearted commands and go upstairs and disrobe.'

She stood irresolute, half wanting to repudiate his assured assumption of what she wanted, half relieved to have him understand it so completely and take charge.

'I'll deliver these to Molly,' he said, his black eyes watchful.  'And then I will come to you and ...'

He left the sentence unfinished, as if he knew that she would complete it for him...that her mind would be all too ready to fill in that particular blank.

'All right,' she whispered, and it felt as if she was barely able to force the words out through a throat strangely constricted with emotion.

'Good girl,' he replied and turned to the house, a hamper in each hand, the folded blankets neatly stowed on top of them.

Hermione remained where she was, oddly thrilled with his praise, and watched her husband walk away from her, his posture rigidly upright.  The sunlight glinted on his blue-black hair, and the width of his shoulders made a nice contrast to his slim waist...and the tight bum showcased in his black trousers, nicely on display without the veil of his enveloping teaching robes.  He was a bit of top-shelf totty, this husband of hers, and she felt almost light-headed with desire as she hurried into the house, anticipation of pre-nap festivities thrumming through her blood.

He had wanted to go off after lunch, away from the low-level buzz of the party preparations...away from Hermione, to show his independence...but just watching her move about, bending to load the hampers, twisting to scatter the bread crumbs, made him want her in bed again.

Offering to help fold the blankets had been inspired of him.  It had left him with an almost mindless desire for her, a determination to have her naked before him, ready and willing.

He came into their room to find just that, his wife in a shaft of sunlight, nude and waiting.  She came directly to him, as if unable to wait for him to discard his clothing.  She wrapped her arms about his waist, pressing her breasts to his chest, and he watched them flatten against his shirt front.  He liked having her naked and wanting, her hands shamelessly at his belt buckle, and he had the perverse desire to take her without disrobing, aroused at the mental picture of his clothed power thrusting into her naked vulnerability.

She succeeded in unfastening his flies, and she had his swiftly hardening cock in her hand, far more proficient at handling it (Handling me, his inner voice supplied) than she had been just a few days before.  He tangled a hand in her hair and tugged lightly, pulling her head back for his kiss.  She tilted her chin and opened her mouth, welcoming the invasion of his tongue, her lips closing greedily as she suckled it.  Her clever hands fondled him, hefting his bollocks, gently pumping his shaft, making him ready to thrust into her body...her warm, wet, welcoming cunt.

He heard a sound issue from his throat, a growling groan, and his hands covered the globes of her breasts, massaging, feeling the pretty pink nipples harden against his palms. How many times had he touched her this way...and how could it be that it felt so new every time he did?

She murmured against his lips, and her smooth leg rubbed up the outside seam of his trousers, her knee bending as she hooked a foot briefly about his lower leg, the motion parting the lips of her vulva, causing the scent of her arousal to rise to his sensitive nostrils, inflaming him further.

He walked her backwards a few steps to the end of the bed, until her back was against it, and he urged her up to sit at the edge of the high mattress.  She cupped his arse cheeks, squeezing, and leant forward to nuzzle his bobbing erection, her tongue extended, seeking the sensitive knob, still partially covered by his foreskin.

'Behave,' he told her gruffly, and she darted a gleam at him from beneath her lashes, the picture of a naughty, pert little minx.

Desire thumped in him, a heavy, demanding urge.  'Lie back,' he instructed her, amazed by her obedience, that she would let him direct their sexual encounters, simply eager to add a new experience to her amatory repertoire.  She complied, languidly reclining, her breasts sitting atop her rib cage with youthful firmness, pebbled pink nipples inviting all sorts of mischief.  But he had a specific goal, so he coated two fingers with saliva and parted her labia lips, lightly rubbing her clitoris before inserting his fingers into the channel his cock yearned to inhabit.

'Are you in a hurry, Professor?' she inquired playfully, her hips rising to rub against his fingers.  He was reminded of how she had teased him with the title on their wedding weekend, evoking images of naughty teacher/student scenarios.  He was opposed to such things...always had been...but this was his wife, and she was lying passively with spread legs, deliberately seductive in her manner.  It was all right to be a bit titillated by the fantasy she conjured.

'In a hurry to fuck you,' he said, probing her opening, making sure she was ready for him.  He teased her with the ball of his thumb over her clit, then with his other hand he grasped his erection, exposing the engorged head of it, casually stroking himself as he pleasured her, enjoying the drugged expression of lust that came into her unfocused eyes.

'Then I wish you'd get on with it,' she said, cupping her breasts tantalisingly, her lips parted, her tongue just visible between her teeth.

He didn't reply to her, but stepped closer, lifting her legs and holding them up, her heels nearly to his shoulders.  He indicated to her to keep them there, then reached down to insert himself into her slit.  The movement was strange to him; it was difficult to achieve much of a rhythm, but the sensation was both peculiar and wonderful, and the view ... well, the view was incomparable.

Her eyes were wide now, intent, and she held her lower lip between her teeth with an air of intense concentration.  He watched her breasts wobble with his every movement, particularly attentive to the one marked with his love-bite bruise, and the rapaciousness he felt brought a lip-curling sneer to his face.

She was as wet as he could ever want, and the position was one he'd never tried, with her legs so close together, constricting her opening, making it tighter and full-on amazing.  But there was no contact for her pleasure spots, and he wanted her to enjoy this as much as he did.

'Touch yourself,' he ordered her, knowing he sounded peremptory but too intent on fucking her to care

He half expected her to object, but she surprised him by reaching down, fingers slipping into her pink slit with the ease of familiarity, and she began rubbing, a glazed, pleasurable look coming over her face.

Seeing her that way cranked up the arousal for Severus to almost unbearable levels.  He glanced down at himself, booted and fully dressed, save for his cock poking out his open flies, sliding in and out of the naked cunt of his wanton little wife.  His tempest, he had called her then, and she still was a rampaging typhoon of sensuality, but he never used the endearment now

Almost never.

Not content with rubbing at her clit, Hermione began plucking roughly at her nipples, the erect and elongated protrusions popping up and snapping back into place with each pull she gave at them.  Severus watched her, his mouth going completely dry at the fierce, abrupt treatment she dealt her breasts, accompanied by the increasing tempo of the fingers in her quim.  She uttered a strangled gasp, her legs jerking on his chest as she climaxed,  and he felt himself cresting the wave of completion unexpectedly, managing to hold his shout to a loud grunt as he came, his fingers gripping Hermione's trembling legs like a white-knuckled vise.

He released her and watched as she rolled away to crawl to the head of the bed before collapsing upon her pillow, her heavy-eyed gaze upon him.  He cast a wandless Cleansing Charm and tucked himself away, doing up his flies.

'You ... you're not going, are you?' Hermione said, a slight note of panic in her voice.

He sat on the mattress and stroked her hair back from her face.  'You should have a bit of a nap,' he said.  'You look sleepy.'

She grabbed his hand and held it, as if to prevent him from going.  'You should have a rest, too,' she said persuasively, indicating the other pillow.  'I'll even promise not to bother you.'  She said this with a small, hesitant smile, her youth and uncertainty suddenly very clear to him.

'I'm not tired,' he lied, feeling the urge of flight too strongly to be swayed by her neediness.  He had to get away.

'You ... you don't have to be worried about the dancing,' she blurted, and when he went cold inside, horrified that she had read him so bloody well, she looked contrite, as if she were sorry she'd spoken.  'I know you don't like to dance ... with me.'

He pulled his hand from hers and stood, behaving as if he'd not heard her...as if she'd not spoken at all.

'Have a good rest.  I'm sure I'll see you at dinner.'

He pivoted and strode to the door, feeling a greater need to escape from her than he'd done since ... well, since the aftermath of the incident in the dungeons.

'Severus?' she whispered, but he went out the door and closed it firmly behind him.

Although sleep seemed to be a long time coming, Hermione at last drifted into an uneasy doze, and soon, she was dreaming.

She entered the room down a staircase, through fiery red light, into warmth and simmering excitement.  A song filled that air, a tinkling, music box tune, classic and familiar.  He stood before the hearth, tall and perfectly still, watching her.  His figure was limned in the red-gold glow from the fire, his face in shadow.

She was not conscious of walking, but seemed to float towards him, slowly but inexorably.  Her primary emotion was one of ebullience, to be the object of this man's attention, the cynosure of his eye.  He was immobile as a statue until she drew near, and then he pulled her into his arms.  For an instant he held her to his heart, as the tinkling song came to an end.  Then he took her hand, placed his other hand at her waist, and at the downbeat of the song beginning again, he led her into the dance.

In her mind, she knew she had always been something of an awkward dancer, because she never had the opportunity to practice, but in this moment, she moved with grace she'd never hoped to possess.  She was acutely aware of him, the sensation of fullness in her chest so immense she could scarcely draw breath.  She was triumphant in her ability to attract and attach him, jubilant in his willingness to indulge her, on fire with the desire to be physically taken by him.  After a mere few revolutions of the rotating dance (one-two-three, one-two-three her mind repeated, the lesson learnt and never forgotten), she wanted to be done with it, to give in to the crushing impulse to merge with this man, body and soul.  But he would not be deterred from his determination to dance with her, allowing the tension between them to mount, apparently uncaring that it twisted and towered, threatening to engulf them both in its whirling, rampaging power.  It was as if he knew the dance would morph into the deeply invasive fucking she so desperately needed, and he was content to make her wait for it, wantonly wanting.

It was not until the music box melody had played through its entire tinny tune that he stopped dancing, and with exacting, decisive movements, opened her robes from throat to ankles, leaving her naked before him.

Severus strode through the trees, his jaw set, seeking a haven free of human infestation.  He was unfit to mingle with others now...he knew himself well enough to recognise the signs...and he craved a space for solitude.  His mind churning, he spotted a familiar place near the stream...the bank where he had shared a meal and a rather steamy kiss with Hermione...and he chose that as his hiding place, trusting that no Weasley Seeker would fall out of the sky in pursuit of a Snitch to disturb his peace.

Slumping to the ground, he allowed his head to sag forward, fleeting thoughts and surging emotion roiling through him, leaving him wrung out and weary

Severus Snape had precious little control in his life these days, a fact he encountered, it seemed, around every corner he turned.  He was used to a certain measure of that, after all, the double-crossing spy that he'd been all his adult life; his two masters ordered his days...and nights...with majestic disregard for him.  But he'd always retained dominion in his emotional world, heedless of the precious feelings of others he'd lacerated along the way.  He'd wielded his choice in the matter of all things emotional with ruthless self-interest.  Now, however, he had one additional person to consider, and that reality tended to lurk just out of sight, ambushing him at unexpected moments with leering amusement.

For the last several days he'd been swinging wildly between two imperatives: fight or flight.  It felt as if he'd done far more of the cowardly latter than the valiant former, and there was nothing that infuriated him more than being tainted with the mere hint of cowardice.

Trapped in a house with party-planning females?  Flight.  Confronted with his desirable young wife?  Fight.  Alone with his wife in their bedroom, fully dressed and fucking her naked body?  Fight.  Dealing with the emotional aftermath of that sexual encounter?  Flight.

Or was it the talk of dancing that made you run, Snivellus? his inner critic taunted mercilessly.

Fucking dancing.

Goddamn Valentine's Day at Hogwarts...the school had been under the control of the Ministry and headed by the despicable Dolores Umbridge.  The toad-like headmistress had been desperate to ingratiate herself with the students, so she had decided to throw a Valentine's Day dance...nothing would make the old harpy happier than to splash the school in her favourite sickly pink.  Valentine's Day had fallen on a Saturday, of all the worst luck...no classes the next day to rein in the fatuous folly...and attendance by the staff had been mandatory.  Furious, he'd skulked on the periphery of the wallflowers in the Great Hall, defiantly under-dressed in his oldest everyday robes, scruffy of face and greasy of hair.  Somewhere in the crowd was his wife, lipsticked and perfumed and wearing her dress robes.  She wasn't beautiful...far from it, with her shadowed eyes and slight acne eruption and impossible hair...but she was his, even if she didn't remember it.

Keeping the darkened corners empty of snoggers and gropers, he prowled, his most imposing, implacable sneer firmly in place, scattering students like cockroaches running from light.  No one was going to find this misbegotten social occasion an excuse for snuggling on his watch...but one eye was always on the dance floor, searching out the soft blue of her dress robes, ever vigilant, ready at the least provocation to prevent his wife from making a fool of him before the entire school.

He had lurked in the sitting room of their quarters earlier that night, waiting for her to emerge from her room, tarted up for the evening's festivities.

'Who's the lucky boy?' he'd asked her, bodily blocking her way to the door, his voice dripping with the derision he felt for himself and his pathetic wish that she'd make such an effort on his behalf.

Her eyes had closed for a moment, then her chin had come up, and her eyes had opened.  'Don't do this, Professor.'

'I see you made a special effort,' he'd persisted.

'I see you didn't,' she'd replied, brushing past him to the door.

'You'll remember our agreement,' he'd said in a louder voice, as if issuing a command.

'You'll never let me forget it,' she'd muttered, slamming out into the stone corridor.

So he'd watched, waiting for her to do something he could object to, but she'd been circumspect.  Moving from group to group, chatting with students from every House...save his, but he could scarcely fault her for that...she'd been an engaged, interested prefect.  All any teacher could ask of a student in her position of leadership...but a husband might wish for more...might wish for a wife who'd prefer his company to that of her contemporaries.

It was the end of the night, the end of the dance, for the final song had been announced, when she appeared at his side.  'We should dance this one,' she'd said, looking everywhere but at his face.

'I will not,' he'd returned, longing to hold her in his arms but unwilling to do so with the eyes of all Hogwarts on him.

Bright, burning brown eyes had been turned on him.  'You worry so much about what my behaviour will cause people to think of you, Professor...what do you imagine a husband who refuses even one Valentine's Day dance will cause people to think of me?'

The logic had been damnably irrefutable, and with ill grace, he'd taken his unyielding wife in his arms, holding her for the first time since their wedding weekend, and he'd danced with her, hating the open-mouthed shock on the faces of his students, lacerated with memories of another time...another dance.

10 January, 1998

Severus emptied his bladder and washed his hands, staring into the mirror.  In the loft, Hermione lay propped up on pillows, perusing a book on the subject of memory...she'd brought it in her book bag, almost as if she'd known he would offer to remove her memory of their dutiful consummation sex.  The irony was not lost on him.  She insisted she had been reading the book all Christmas break, and he saw no reason to doubt her.

He splashed water on his face.  The four hour nap he'd taken had revived him in some regards, but he knew he was not thinking as clearly as he ought to be.  Immersed with Hermione in this cottage filled with acceptance and passion and wordless emotion, he was completely outside of himself, much less the circumscribed life of Dumbledore's spy in the Dark Lord's camp.  He was acting only to please his bride...and himself, but he would never have suggested, for instance, that they prolong their wedding sojourn, or engage in more than the required consummation for this mad marriage of convenience.  How much longer would they linger here?  Hermione still had one dose of Pepper-Up, as yet uningested.  When would she swallow it, and how long would she want to remain here after she did?  Classes would resume on the morrow, and both of them would need to be in place for that.

He dried his hands and face on the soft hand towel.  At the minimum, he had eight more hours in this cottage with Hermione, whose mood was clearly romantic.  Severus Snape had zero experience in the matters of romance, but he was not completely ignorant of the subject; he had, after all, lived for thirty-eight years amongst people who indulged in the myth of romantic love.  He knew what the children of his wife's generation believed about it.  She would want his attention, his interest, and his sexual services.  Merlin only knew what more he would be able to manage in the way of erections for fucking, but there were other ways to pleasure a woman, and if he had done little of that in his life, he had at least thought to read up on it when his marriage had become imminent

He was, in fact, something of a text-pert on the subject.

He tossed the towel aside and climbed the stairs to the loft, loosening his dressing gown as he went.

Hermione looked up from her book and smiled at him, her expression soft and welcoming.  He allowed the dressing gown to drop to the floor and slid beneath the covers with the warm, cosy woman waiting for him.  She readily surrendered her book to him, and he set it to one side, gazing down into her face with half-lidded eyes.

'I wonder how many orgasms a nice Gryffindor girl can have in one lazy winter Sunday?' he mused aloud, and he felt the foolish grin that split his face as she rolled towards him, her lilting laugh filling his heart as surely as it filled his ears.

She permitted him to minister to her needs for nourishment as well as her desire for sexual gratification.  So after a morning of making love to his wife with his hands and his mouth, they lounged on their pillows, having ingested a meal of the last of their wedding supper chicken and sprouts, quaffing champagne like the most decadent of newlyweds.  When Hermione set her wineglass aside, she yawned deeply, her hand rising to cover her mouth.

'I beg your pardon,' she murmured, abashed.

He was surprised that it had taken this long for her lack of sleep to manifest.  Feeling it was his duty to do so, he asked, 'Are you ready to sleep?  I can gather our things, and we can be back at the castle quite quickly.'

They had already agreed that she should wake in her bed in their quarters at the castle.

She looked a tiny bit hurt.  'Don't you ... don't you want me to take the Pepper-Up?' she asked.

Severus swallowed, inwardly glad to hear her mention it.  Damn it all, he was not prepared to have her leave him yet.  'That is entirely up to you, Hermione,' he said, doing his best to evince no preference, one way or the other.  How infamous would it be for him to ask her to swallow a stimulant so that he might enjoy her company when it had been far too long since she'd slept?

She began pleating the bed sheet with her fingers, her gaze averted from him.  'So it doesn't matter to you, one way or the other?' she asked in a small voice.

He frowned.  Didn't she understand how selfish it would be for him to express a desire for her to take a drug?  He was unsure how to answer her.

'I will accede to your wishes, little tempest,' he said softly, allowing his fingertips to ghost over her cheek.

She caught his hand and looked into his face.  'Tell me you want it, Severus...tell me you want it as much as I do.'

Her eyes were glistening, as if with tears, and fear clutched at him...was she going to cry again?  Bloody hell, this business of negotiating a woman's emotional storms was more difficult than reading the Dark Lord at his most petulant.

'I want you,' he told her.  'I want the rest of this day with you.  I want as much as I can have of you.'

Two of the threatening tears escaped her brimming eyes, tracking twin tracks down her cheeks, but her smile was pure effervescence.

'Oh, I want it too,' she whispered, and slipping from the bed, she dug the second phial of Pepper-Up from her book bag and popped the stopper, upending it over her mouth.

Steam began pouring from her ears.

Buoyed by her action, Severus threw the bedclothes from him and grabbed her hand.  'Someone needs a cold shower,' he declared, and her delighted laughter rang in his ears like a sweet melody he ought always to remember.

He carried her to the bed from the shower, climbing the stairs as if she were weightless.  She was wrapped in a thick white towel and clinging to him as if he were her only anchor in the midst of a deluge.  His arousal was extreme, after washing her body and allowing her to wash his.  She had attempted a repeat of the previous night's shower, but he would not permit her to put her mouth on him.  He wanted...needed...to penetrate her and experience that incomparable sensation of being sheathed by her body.  Was this the last time he would fuck her?  He might, if she were awake long enough, manage one more time before the end of the day, but there was no guarantee.  He approached her as if he would never do this again, and she received his attentions in that spirit, hushed and near reverence.

He trailed kisses from her delicately notched clavicle to the tantalising arch of her foot and back up the other side, ignoring her ever more fragrant sex in favour of less often exalted parts of her luscious body.  His tongue dipped into her navel, traced the curve of her hip into her waist and the outer swell of her breast.  When she reached to caress him, he gently pushed her arms upward, until they rested above her head, and he buried his nose in the hollow beneath her arm, scrubbed clean and as deserving of attention as the rest of this body he meant to worship with his own.

He urged her over, onto her belly, and he began at the nape of her neck, pushing aside the heavy, waterlogged hair and inhaling her like the fumes of a potent, narcotic drug.  She cried out at a nip to the back of her neck, and he took his time exploring her sensitivity, noting that his tongue elicited humming, while his teeth prompted squirming and incoherent cries.  He thought he might have been able to spend days playing her body to hear the symphony of her responses, but he didn't have days...he had now, and his need for her was growing with every passing second.

Her back was an expanse of unmarred, milky skin.  He tongued down her spinal column, his hands travelling the contours of her sides in tandem, until he reached the valley leading between her arse cheeks.  Here, the scent of her arousal was stronger yet, and scent memory provided her taste, as if his tongue was there, in her sweetness.  He allowed the tip of his nose to travel down the crease of her buttocks, his hands lightly cupping and massaging the rounded cheeks, until he reached her perineum.  She uttered a strangled cry, raising her hips and thrusting back, inviting him to taste her quim, but he denied her.  His teeth nipped at the backs of her thighs, he suckled the tender dip at the backs of her knees, and he gazed along her prone form, imagining pulling her to her knees to enter her from behind.  He could make it good for her that way, he was confident...but if this was to be his last time with her, he wanted it to be face-to-face.

She readily rolled to her back, reaching for him with eager arms as her legs parted, then rose to embrace him, pulling him fully within her slick warmth.  She seemed impatient, but he did not allow himself to be hurried.  He moved slowly, deeply, deliberately, pausing to tongue a nipple or nip her throat, so far outside himself that it amazed him to find he felt this encounter more strongly, more completely, than any he'd ever experienced before.  She was within him: her voice and warmth, her acceptance and admiration, her hope and vision.  It was more, so much more than her enveloping cunt, her scrumptious breasts, her hot little mouth, her grasping, caressing hands

It was harbour.  It was beauty.  It was affirmation.  And damn it all to hell...it was love.

He stared down into the face of this unexpected windfall, his wife, Hermione, and her eyes grew unnaturally round, her lips forming an answering 'o', as she began to orgasm, a soft, feral keening rising to the rafters, growing in voice and volume as the sensation rolled through her body.  Severus was not proof against the perfect splendour of her rapture.  His completion was upon him, a tide of exquisite euphoria that went on and on, him continuing to rock within the cradle of her body until his limp penis slipped from within her, and he slipped aside, utterly spent.

He turned his head until they were almost nose to nose.  She was breathless but not tearful...thank Merlin.  He fought the sudden onset of grogginess, but there was no defeating it...if she had no immediate need of him, then he would ...

Sleep.

He woke to the afternoon sunset of January in the Highlands.  The light on the walls was a deep orange, and Hermione was propped on the pillow beside him, her lovely bare shoulders visible above the bedclothes covering her breasts.  She held a book open on her chest, but her eyes were unfocused, gazing at nothing.  Her wild hair had dried in bulky, bushy waves, and a teacup on the table beside her indicated that she had been up and about whilst he slept, but here she was beside him again, naked beneath the bedclothes.

He closed his eyes against a sudden, visceral wish that they might remain forever hidden in this place, with no more pressing business about them than to eat, sleep, and make endless, inventive love.

'You're awake,' she murmured, smoothing hair back from his face.

'You're observant,' he replied, and pulled her down for a lazy, tongue tangling kiss.

She scooted against him, warm and soft, and he nuzzled between her breasts, his lips curving into a smile against the unbelievably soft skin when she sighed, murmured, and pulled him closer, twining her legs with his.

'Oh, God, Severus...I don't want this day to end.'

Her voice was small and sad, and it smote him with guilt.  How could he mend this for her?

'But it will end, little tempest,' he said, giving up the comfort of her breasts to pull her onto his shoulder and hold her close.  'Tell me what you'd like to do with what's left of the day.'

She stroked fingertips over his ribcage, as if she were exploring the intercostal spaces.  'If we'd had a normal courtship...'

It was laughable, really.  There would never have been a marriage if not for the actions of the Ministry...how could she speak of a courtship?

'...we'd have had banns, and a church wedding, and my parents would have been there ...'

He dipped his chin to take a breath of her hair, incapable of feeling impatience with her, wanting only to soothe her.

'What would have happened at this church wedding?' he asked, willing to humour her in the fantasy.

'All my family and friends would have been there...and yours too, of course...and there would have been flowers and music and a huge party after the ceremony.'

Her tone was dreamy, her gaze once again unfocused, and her fingers were tracing the contours of his abdomen, actually raising a bit of interest from his slumbering cock.  She had no idea what a nightmare her words conjured for him...socialising with a lot of Muggle strangers?...but he had no need to communicate it to her.  She was daydreaming, and it was safe for him to indulge her.

'A party?' he said, to show he was attending to her.

'With a sit-down dinner, and toasts, and for afterwards, a deejay; he would play songs, and everyone would dance.'

He leaned his cheek against her forehead, relishing the skin on skin contact, until he realised he was in need of a shave, and he moved his bristles away from her face.  'Dancing, hmm?' he responded encouragingly.

'I'd dance once with my father, of course, but mostly with you.'  She tilted her face up to smile at him, a sweet curve of her lips that seemed to physically pull his heart from his chest, into her keeping.  He let it go without a struggle, consigning himself to a life without possession of that stalwart organ.  Surely it would be safe with Hermione.

'Well,' he said, needing to fill the void with unimportant words...needing to prevent himself from informing her that she had stolen his heart.  'We had flowers...the ones in your hair...and a sit-down dinner was planned for our guests, though there were only the two professors.'  He swallowed past the odd obstruction in his throat and tightened his hold on Hermione, watching the emotion bloom in her beautiful brown eyes and not permitting himself to name what that emotion might be.  'And I'm not entirely sure what a deejay might be, but if that music box on the mantelpiece is in working order, then we can probably manage a dance, here and now.'

She flushed rosily, and he wondered how she could continue to look ever lovelier to him.  Was it sex?  Did sex make a woman more beautiful?  It had never done so with any woman before Hermione, but he was damned if he could work out why she seemed prettier and prettier as time went by.

'Really?' she breathed.  'You'd dance with me?'

He felt his mouth quirk on one side but quashed it before he could make too much a fool of himself with grinning.  'Allow me a visit to the loo, and we'll dance, even if I have to hum in your ear.'

The music box, thankfully, was in working order.  He wound it gently, standing before the newly replenished fire in the shirt and trousers he'd worn to be married.  His hair was combed, and he'd shaved, applying his scented aftershave lotion with a cocky smirk at his unprepossessing reflection, happy to know that Hermione liked the way it smelled.  She had called to him not to come upstairs, that she was making herself pretty for him, and he was content to busy himself preparing for her, stoking the fire and winding the music box.

'Are you ready for me?' she called down to him.

'Yes,' he answered.  'Come to me, little tempest.'

He opened the primed music box, and it began its tinkling melody, a waltz more of the nineteenth century than the twentieth.  She came down the stairs toward him, her hair ruthlessly plaited and pinned up, wearing what appeared to be her school robes, save for the silvery white colour...she must have charmed the fabric.  She smelled of a flowery lotion she'd smoothed over her skin, and when he lightly kissed her mouth, she tasted of peppermint.

He watched her, storing the memory as if it were information vital to the war effort...willing himself to memorise every detail.  He would remember it all.

The song began over again in its endless cycle, and he led her into a waltz, thankful for the few occasions that particular grace had been required of him...it would have been sad to disappoint his darling tempest in something as simple as a wedding dance. They rotated in the small space, managing not to trod upon one another's toes, and the swelling, suffocating feeling made itself known again, migrating from his chest to his throat and upward into his head, making it difficult to breathe, much less think

She was wearing a glossy colour upon her lips, something she had not bothered with for their wedding ceremony, and he was gratified that she had made herself up for his pleasure.  She wanted him...wanted to attract him and please him...was happy to be his wife.  The reality of it was more than his brain could process.  Just as well, then, that the burgeoning emotion carried in its wake desire like a brushfire, flaring between them and heating their blood, their gazes, and the very air they attempted to breathe.

In the end, all he could do was tear the robes from her body and take her upon the hearthrug, submitting to the imperative of possession.  The clock ticked, seconds passing into minutes they could ill afford to lose, marking the last kisses and caresses, moans and sighs they would ever share as husband and wife.  Severus was as sure of it as he was that her conquest of him was now complete, for she had taken not only his body, heart, and soul...she was in his mind, a flame he could never extinguish.

He stood beside her in the small room he had furnished as her bedroom in his...their...quarters.  The candles were lit, and she had changed into thick, flannel pyjamas and heavy wool socks, standard sleepwear for winter in Hogwarts Castle.  The covers of her single bed had been folded back invitingly, and the clock in the sitting room began to chime the hour...it was midnight, and Hermione had not slept in over forty hours.

He held up the phial of Dreamless Sleep.  'I want to be certain that you sleep well,' he said, striving to keep his tone cool and even.

Hermione made no such effort.  She grasped his robes and gazed up at him imploringly.  'Please,' she begged, her voice ragged and clogged with tears that had yet to fall.  'It's too late for me to write it all down...let me put the memories in a Pensieve, Severus.  Don't take us away from me!'

He took the handkerchief he had been sure to tuck in his pocket and dried the tears from her eyes before they could fall.  'We had an agreement, Hermione,' he said steadily, as kindly as he could, forcing himself to look after her, heedless of the raging injustice of it all.  'I must honour that agreement.'

The clock completed the twelve bells, moving them from Sunday into Monday, the first day of the new term.  He sat her upon the bed and settled beside her, wondering how he could allow her to sleep, knowing that she would wake with no memory of him...the man he had become in the warmth of her love.

'Severus,' she whispered, as if she knew he was weakening and meant to find a way through the crack in his defences.  'Severus, don't you know I...'

He pressed a finger over her lips, silencing the words she might have spoken, believing their utterance would have defeated him completely.  'No, Hermione...don't.'  He drew a ragged breath, gathering his strength about him again, firming his resolve.  'You won't remember...but I will, you see.'

He granted her a small pained smile, the last glimpse she would have of his humanity.  Then he pressed the phial into her hand.

'Drink it.'

She popped the stopper without looking and upended the potion, the fourth she had ingested since becoming Mrs Snape.  Then she threw the phial to the stone floor, where it shattered.

She clung to him, and he wrapped her in his arms, the heart he had denied having...the one now in the keeping of this witch...breaking as surely and completely as the crystal phial dashed beneath his feet.

'I don't want to leave you,' she whispered brokenly, yet she lay down upon her pillow all the same, pulling him down with her.

'You never will,' he promised her, covering them both with the bedclothes.  'Dream sweetly, little tempest.'

She curled around him, her face pressed against his chest, her fingers clutching his robes.  He watched every breath she drew, drinking in the contours of the face now more familiar to him than his own, waiting as the inevitability of sleep overtook her and all memory of what they had been to one another was lost to her forever.

A/N: If you listen to no other song alluded to in this story, I beg you to listen to this one. It's called Losing Your Memory by Ryan Star. It's not perfect, but it's damn close. I listened to this song every day for months, building up to the writing of this chapter. With tears on my cheeks, having read the chapter with you, I invite you to listen to it with me now. Here's the YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLVOs0qiJ1A