Folsom Prison Blues

Fortuna opened her eyes slowly, realizing that she was with Tiberius, safely ensconced in her parent's bed, and she could hear her daddy taking a shower in the bathroom. From the kitchen, she could hear the sounds of breakfast being made and smiled as she snuggled against her daddy's pillow. Any minute, her mummy would come in and join them in bed with a tray of food, and Augustus would come too...

Fortuna sat up suddenly, remembering that her mummy had gone to La-tee-va, but not to bring back another brother, for another reason, and she had red spots all over because of Augustus. To make matters worse, Remus was the one cooking in the kitchen, banging her mummy's pots and pans around. Fortuna frowned and stood up in bed, then made her way into the kitchen, hugging her doll tightly to her chest.

Remus was standing by the stove, wearing pajamas. He was cooking in Fortuna's mummy's pans, and using a metal spatula, even though her mummy always got mad at her daddy for using metal.

"You're doing it wrong," she said.

Remus turned to Fortuna and gave a little grimace. That made her happy. "What am I doing wrong?"

"You can't use metal in that pan, it hurts the teff-oh-lawn."

Remus had the nerve to smile at her. "It's all right, I put a spell on the spatula to protect the Teflon. I promise, I won't scratch your mummy's pans."

He put a spell on the stove, and the food began to cook itself. Remus then took Fortuna by the hand and led her to the table where he sat her in one of the chairs, and pulled another up close before sitting in it himself.

"Fortuna, I need to apologize to you."

"Why?" If her daddy didn't have to accept his apologies, she didn't either.

"Because last night, Tonks and I were being noisy, and you got confused."

Fortuna suddenly remembered why she was in her daddy's room when she woke up. "You were hurting her! Where is she?" Fortuna jumped up and started racing off down the hall to find Tonks.

"Fortuna, I didn't hurt her..." his voice trailed off as she opened the guest room door.

Tonks was just pulling on a jumper, looking perfectly fine. "Good morning, Fortuna!" she said brightly as Fortuna threw herself at her. "Goodness, look at you!"

Fortuna didn't know what Miss Tonks meant until she picked her up and held one of her arms in her hand. Fortuna immediately began to scream bloody murder.

Snape was enjoying a leisurely shower, something he would not be permitted had Tonks and Lupin not agreed to help him out. They might have made a mistake the night before, but they seemed more than repentant about it. Tonks had even mentioned that they had been trying to conceive (being the reason for their obvious oversight of discretion as well as their need for each other at a friend's house), and that any advice regarding child rearing that he might have to give would be most gratefully accepted. Snape felt that she might have divulged a bit too much about her personal life, but he shrugged off his feelings of embarrassment long enough to deliver an appropriately scathing retort that left Tonks red-eyed and shaky.

More importantly, if they could just get through the day, Hermione would be back the next morning. She would fill in all of the holes that he could never seem to fill for his children, she would comfort them much better than he could, and they would be easier. This he knew.

He had just started to relax when he heard Fortuna screaming at the top of her lungs about something. At first, he thought it was simply one of her tantrums, but as the screams grew more frantic and hysterical, he left the shower quickly and belted a black dressing gown around himself as he drew close to the screaming.

Fortuna was being held by Tonks, who looked very white, particularly white since Fortuna herself was green. Her skin also appeared to be thicker than normal and very knobby, and her eyes looked bloodshot. Tiberius and Augustus followed him into the room.

"Daddy!" she cried, holding her arms out to him.

Snape lifted her and held her close. "It's the final stage of the illness, that's all. Your skin will go back to normal in a few weeks."

"Weeks!" She shrieked. "I want mummy! Mummy-e-eeeeeee!"

"I wants mummy too," Tiberius sobbed, grabbing Snape's leg.

"Yeah, me too," Augustus mumbled, crushing Tiberius against Snape's leg as he leaned against his father as well, wrapping his arms around his chest. Snape sighed.

Fortuna sat in her parent's large bathtub, which was filled with a really thick and yucky-smelling potion, with her brothers. Her daddy was smoothing the potion over their faces and necks and scalps as they soaked. He had said that the potions would help their skin keep from feeling too tight and itchy, but she didn't think it was working. She itched worse than ever, and her head was really stuffy. She really didn't like sitting down in the bathtub, either. Her bottom felt really lumpy. What was worse was that there were only a few small places where she didn't have dragon skin-the back of her neck, a spot on her lower back, and her palms and the bottoms of her feet. That skin was still smooth and pink, though her neck and back had a smattering of the red freckles that Augustus had given them.

She didn't think she would ever forgive Augustus for giving her and Tiberius his red freckles. She wondered if he had caught them from Rene Weasley, one of Jimmy Potter's cousins. Rene seemed to have freckles all over his face, and they matched his red hair.

"Are you feeling any better?" her daddy asked, sounding tired. He hadn't even gotten dressed yet, and Fortuna was beginning to worry that he was upset with her and her brothers for getting sick. Tiberius also felt that way, he had told her so when their daddy left the room for a minute.

"I want out now, Daddy," Tiberius whined. "I wants to go back to bed now, and Remus can give me something to eat because my tummy is growling."

"All right, let's get you rinsed off," their daddy mumbled as he magically emptied the tub of potion, and then he switched on the shower head.

Tonks came in and rubbed thick lotion all over Fortuna while Snape did the same thing to the boys, and then Tonks took Fortuna to her bed and tucked her in well.

"Here's a 'kerchief, lover," she murmured as she set different stuffed animals around Fortuna. "And if you feel like it, here's a brand-new coloring book and crayons that your daddy ordered special for you last night."

Fortuna felt too miserable to enjoy her new gifts. Instead, she snuggled under the covers and took a nap. Her mummy always said that everything looks better after a good nap and a nice cup of tea. Maybe Tonks would get her a cup later.

The following morning found Snape snuggled between Fortuna and Tiberius, and Augustus was once again pressing his little brother into Snape's side as he cuddled against him. The master bed was a tangle of green limbs and blankets, and Augustus was snoring lightly. The rest of the house was perfectly still in that early-morning way, just before the sun peeks over the horizon. He could feel the anticipation of dawn in the air, or was it just the anticipation of Hermione returning home?

Unable to continue sleeping, even though he was bone-tired, Snape disentangled himself from his children and stepped out into the kitchen, stretching as he went. At his back, floo embers crackled merrily in the pre-dawn chill, and as he poured himself a cup of coffee, they sprang to life, and he turned just in time to see Hermione spinning madly in the ashes.

"Severus!" she breathed as she ran into his arms. "I took the first Portkey to London from the Latvian Ministry, I couldn't stay away another second!"

As Snape folded her into his embrace, he felt all of his tension ebb away as though she were absorbing it from him.

"Ah, Hermione," he murmured against her sooty hair. There were so many things he could have told her at the moment-how much he loved her, how magnificent she felt against him, how wonderful she smelled, but he could not quite make the words form, so he settled on a long, passionate kiss that made her melt against him and fist her hands in his nightshirt.

"Missed me, did you?" she murmured when he released her.

"Just a little."

"Where are Remus and Tonks?"

"Probably having a shag in their room. You do realize that we will be forced to burn their sheets?"

"Of course, darling," she muttered in a distracted way, nuzzling her nose into his shirt.

"Possibly the Guest Bed as well."

"Whatever you say, my love."

"We might as well re-do the entire room. Maybe have some decorators in and have it done up properly."

Hermione smiled and kissed him once more. "Where are the children? In our bed?"

He nodded, and taking her by the hand, led her to their room.

The children could have looked like little cherubs, were it not for their green bespeckled skin.

"They look monstrous!" Hermione whispered.

"You should see how yellow and sharp their teeth have gotten. And they can't stop drooling."

They stood together for several long moments, drinking in the sight of the children, Hermione's face pressed to Snape's chest. All would be well again. He could stop worrying actively about the children, and let his wife spend her energy with that. He could once again be a voice of reason when she started fussing over them. Mr. Mom no more, he mused.

"Oh, Severus, I just don't know how to tell you this," Hermione said before his peace-of-mind had been fully restored.

All of his tension returned. "Are you sick as well?"

Hermione paused too long for his liking. "Well, no, I'm not ill. I went to see the on-call Mediwitch at the convention as soon as you contacted me Friday night, and, well...she said that I don't have the dragon pox."

"What do you have?" A cold feeling settled into the pit of his stomach. Was it serious? Was it curable?

"I'm going to have another baby. I'm pregnant again."

It took a full five minutes for her news to settle in. Not terminal. Nothing to cure. Pregnant. Pregnant. Something in the back of his gobsmacked mind began to tickle a bit. "But you're on the potion..."

"Yes, well, it's not exact, is it? I mean, we have three when we were supposed to stop at two." She paused and worried her hands. "You're angry, I can tell. Severus, I promise, I've taken the potion faithfully. After Tiberius was born, I had my Healer make the potion stronger. What can I say? You're just...virile. Nothing can stop you or me."

"You wanted another one, though, didn't you? The potion has a hard time working against your desire."

Tears filled her eyes, and he felt ashamed for a brief moment. "Perhaps you should start taking one as well."

"Perhaps I should," he agreed, distracted.

"Are you really that angry about it?"

He thought for a moment, and then pulled her close. "No, no, of course I'm not angry," he muttered. It wasn't exactly a lie. Disappointed? No, not really. Confused? Definitely, and maybe just a little hurt. After all, they had agreed to no more, hadn't they? But then, the laws of physics state that it does in fact take two to tango. Still, four? Children already outnumbered parents in the house, what would it be like with one more? Would they really be worse off? Could it be better?

She smiled at him and squeezed his hands before going to the bed and gathering the children against her.

Snape just stared at them. Four children. "Bloody Weasley's shouldn't have a corner on the market," he muttered before joining his family and settling in to a deep sleep, the first he had in three days.

The End

AN: I based the looks of the children on the Wizard of the Month at JKR's site-Chauncey Oldridge-First Recorded Case of Dragon Pox: http://www.hp-lexicon.org/images/wizcards/wom/oldridge-cut.gif. The incubation period, red spots on white skin, etc., actually comes from the Muggle affliction chicken pox (as you've probably already guessed). I have no idea if they start out the same, but I think that a lot of Muggle-born wee wizards have been afflicted, but were whisked off to St. Mungo's before their parents could catch wise. At least, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Sorry for ending so abruptly, but I've already given the kids a disease, made Snape invite Remus Lupin into his house, and terrorized the children with sounds of adults shagging next door. There's not a whole lot else I could do, unless Augustus starts breathing fire and sets his bedcurtains ablaze. Which actually is a really good idea, but I don't really want to go into that.

Big thanks to anyone that's taken the time to read, and even more thanks to those who have reviewed.

Also, special thanks to Geek6 for her unfailing Britpicking abilities, and for always telling me that she likes it, even though it's crap! I love you, Geekus Maximus!

~Zambi