This Salted Earth

A/N: My thanks to my writing group: Anastasia, my partner-in-dark!writing and uberbeta (who beta'ed this chapter under the most extreme circumstances); Indigofeathers; Potion Mistress; FerPorcel, my art!beta; docmara, my psych!beta; and AnnieTalbot... and my thanks to all who voted for this foray into Darkness in the recent OWL Awards. I am touched by your support of my tale.

He searched her face, for what he wasn't certain – and in her preternaturally calm regard, he found fear, regret, and resolve – to be expected, he supposed, admired, even. No hesitation, none at all, but there was something else...

And at once he knew that there was no saving either of them now.

--------------------------

"Funny," she was saying, "that we should end up so similarly, with what we've done, yet..." She did not know how to complete the thought, and looked at him.

"Yet my worst crime, and its censure, were public."

A small flash of envy in her eyes.

There it is. "Your envy is misplaced, Hermione. My time in Azkaban was largely symbolic, a panacea for a world that prefers not to understand the meaning of sacrifice, nor to question too closely its own hand on the knife." He paused, brushing his fingers almost speculatively over the parchment. "Mostly, it was peaceful."

"I can see how it would have been."

"My real sentence began long before, in temptation and guilt, circling in on themselves in an endless chain. Neither has ever left me; neither ever will."

After a long moment, she nodded.

"Whether they bury us in Azkaban or raise us on a plinth matters not at all, Hermione. For us, in the end, the result is," and her voice joined his, "the same."

They regarded each other in silence.

Finally, she spoke, "You said there were ways to guard against... some of it."

Her voice was, to his ear, higher than normal, but only slightly. He marveled at how well she held in check what he knew was rising within her, but it was there, growing, and – the ache in his hip intensified, and his riding leathers creaked as he flexed his side to alleviate the pressure. "Yes. Some."

Hermione's eyes searched automatically for the source of the sound. "And the rest...? That cannot be prevented?"

He closed his eyes briefly, reason warring with instinct for a brief moment. It would be so easy to reach out, to take what she did not fully realize she was offering. A muscle jumped in his thigh, and he focused for a moment on holding himself very, very still.

It was not a question whether or not he would answer her – just how.

In the near-silence of the library, he could hear her fingertip moving on the table, heard the motion change to a small tap as her patience trickled away.

But the book of Severus Snape would not be read quickly.

Hermione finally stilled her fingers and muttered, "You do have some experience with these matters..."

"Indeed," he said, opening shuttered eyes to her, allowing her to glimpse an existence he both longed for and despised.

Hermione inhaled sharply, not fully knowing why.

"It is possible to divert some of the desire, Hermione."

Her gaze fell away briefly, and her color deepened, but she rallied. "I assume your choice of words is not accidental."

A slow half-smile appeared on his face. "Not at all. You can prevent the temptation from growing if you satisfy it in an alternative way."

"I see." Hermione exhaled slowly, and the flickering torchlight of what had flared briefly between them seemed to deepen in the sunlight.

"It's not without cost, Hermione." His voice seemed to feed the wavering light, slowing its agitation, smoothing its depths.

As his gaze rested intently on her features, one corner of her mouth raised, half ruefully, half in...

Anticipation... he breathed inwardly.

"Well, it would have a cost, wouldn't it." It wasn't a question.

A brief cast in his eyes acknowledged what must be lost, but he leaned in slightly, the ache in his hip seeming to melt, spreading slowly, heavily. "It is not without compensation. If one's control is sufficient, there are ways to alter temptation, to reshape Darkness into..." He waited.

Her mouth went dry. "Into?"

"Incandescence."

She closed her eyes, wanting to let go, to give herself over to the release of gravity, to allow herself to finally fall. She was tired, so very tired of holding herself still against the sharp, cutting edge... better, perhaps; warmer, certainly, just to bleed...

And his voice followed her, carrying the smoothness she sought. "The desire to reach through shadow into Darkness can be satisfied if the touch, the mind, the being of another is similarly driven, their desire matched by similar Darkness, similar desire. If the one you touch is sufficiently, equally dark, then touching them will serve, being touched by them will serve, and together you substitute for Darkness for, and in, each other."

Hermione drifted in the promise of his words even as a warning rose in her mind, a warning she wished deeply to ignore. "But..."

His voice a gentle, patient heat, "But?"

"But you said that I would try to break the soul of... of whomever..." Her eyes open, seeking a way around what she knew in her core must remain true.

"You would break the soul of almost anyone were you to connect with them, Hermione."

Her voice rounded by the war of reason and instinct, she managed to choke out, "Then how?"

Her struggle so imminent that he closed his eyes, both in sympathy and to better savor the agony of the moment. "To avoid doing it, you will have to want to do it, more than you want to breathe, more than you want to live, more than you want your heart to beat, alive, within you."

Her eyes regained some of their focus, and she frowned as though he had interrupted her sleep. "You're making no sense."

He chuckled. "You have read Derrida, Professor?" he drawled. The satisfaction in his tone was unmistakable.

"I have."

She glared at him, and his smile deepened.

Delicious.

He thumbed the edge of the blank parchment, brushing it firmly enough for sound, but cautiously enough that its placement remained unmoved. "To control the temptation to break something, you must both want to break it and have enough control to deny yourself that end. To hold it at the breaking point – just there, no further. Temptation is desire, Hermione. Not satisfaction."

Her eyes gleamed as her understanding unfolded. "Satisfaction would just initiate more temptation."

"Exactly. And you, I fear, are not equal to the task."

Another flash of pride; a warning in her tone. "I have been."

"Until recently – very recently. Satisfaction initiates temptation, Hermione, and with each satisfaction your temptation must grow."

"And you are, I suppose? Equal to that task?"

His eyes glittered dangerously. "I am."

Before she had a chance to even form an inquiry about that, he was denying her an answer. "No, at a fundamental level, what you seek is not control, but knowledge."

Her eyes narrowed dangerously, and the shadows deepened around them. "Knowledge is control, Severus."

He appeared to be watching his thumb on the edge of the parchment. Far too casually, he countered, "And when your reason slips away?"

"Into madness?!"

"In your case, sleep is sufficient." Check.

She stared at him, frozen.

"Even in the safe darkness of sleep, Hermione, what you seek is knowledge, not control. No," a deep rumble that might have been laughter, "to demand control with each breath, each touch, with each caress of thought seeking skin, to dictate another's desire... to deny them what they believe they want, revealing instead what they cry out for from beneath their dreams... to desire that, to demand it of oneself and bestow it on one's partner, requires that as you slip beyond reason your primal, driving need be, ultimately, control – to control your own pleasure, your fear, your terror and your pain through the creation, and denial, and delay, of those same desires in your partner... as with a single breath of air moving on waiting, open skin, you begin a primal dance of heat, of light and darkness playing out, unfolding, becoming – and then, as you wish, if you wish, allowing a taste – a brief, fleeting taste – of satisfaction, however small, however tainted, however compromised... no, Hermione."

He laughed low, and darkly. "That kind of control is simply not in your nature."

Her breath shallow through parted lips, yet somehow she managed to speak. "How do you know?"

"Because it is very much in mine."

And a clear intelligence returned to her eyes.

Excellent.

"So that's it, then?"

His eye fixed on her, and she held her breath. "Even at the height of Voldemort's power, there were only a few in whom the taint of Darkness was equal to what you require, and yes, I am one of them."

He looked at her until she nodded.

"But your situation, your temptation is complicated by guilt; guilt is separate. There are those who touch Darkness and feel no guilt – Lucius, Bellatrix, some of the others." His eyes unfocused briefly, and she caught it.

"Who, Severus?" she asked quietly.

A shadow crossed his features. "Narcissa. Narcissa Malfoy. Fear held her back from the complete experience," he said, his tone slightly brittle. "Lucius considered it a weakness, of course." There was no way to save her, or her son, he told himself, as he had so many times before.

Mastering whatever thoughts he would not share, he returned to the present, to the troublesome woman before him. "Any of the Death Eaters could divert temptation, even those with small minds and less wit. It need not be erotic; physical violence will do just as well. But guilt... guilt was rare. Having a conscience, knowing regret even as you kill, or break a soul, however necessary in some larger constructed scheme – that knowledge, that guilt lends a nuance, a twist to the temptation. Whether it manifests as a need for punishment or as a refusal to accept any more is, again, largely a matter of character."

She nodded slowly, her eyes resting on the stack of parchment.

Willing an air of intense calm around them, he stated, "I told you, on the Tower, that I would not allow you to use me as a means to punish yourself."

She nodded again, still not meeting his eyes.

Lying his hand flat on the parchment, he eased toward her. "I did not say that I would not do it for you."

Her eyes raised instantly to his.

"Can you do it, Hermione?" His eyes searched her face. "Your first contact with the Dark was made in panic. If the decision is made consciously, deliberately, methodically... then, even when civilization gives way to instinct, you retain a core of ownership which may allow you to come back afterwards, when you have achieved your ends."

"'May,'" she repeated.

The intensity of his regard did not waver. "There is always a point of no return."

"And how do you know when you get there?" She did not expect to like his answer.

"You don't. Bellatrix Lestrange was quite mad, long before the end."

He waited in silence while her eyes moved rapidly over his hand on the parchment, as though he kept some inscription hidden from her.

Slowly, he moved his hand aside, resting it flat on the table, noting that her eyes followed it. "You went from Shield Charms to Horcruxes, Hermione, skipping years of study and theory. You should not have been able to do it. You're not that powerful." He studied her for a moment. "Or, at least, you weren't."

He studied her for a moment more, then leaned back, his hand lying, casually, on the table between them.

Palm down.

Still tracking her eyes, he asked, "You were a sweet child, weren't you? Generous, caring, sensitive..."

She winced, as though from a remembered blow, and nodded, too sharply.

"I was not," he said, and her eyes met his in question. "Sweet," he supplied, as though that had been her question.

"No, I wouldn't have expected you to be," she said, uncertain as to where he was leading. "But sensitive..." She considered him carefully, measuring. "Yes," she decided, "you would have to have been sensitive."

His eyebrows twitched. "And on what do you base this conclusion," he breathed, "Professor?"

One shoulder raised in a half-shrug. "With your morals, you would otherwise have been a thug."

His eyes glittered with dark amusement. "Quite," he concurred. He shifted slightly, and his hip protested. "My home was not kind."

Her eyes guarded, but curious, she ventured, "The Slytherin Common Room must not have been much of an improvement."

"Ah, but it was. You see, Hermione," he said, tracing a knot on the table, "if one expects cruelty, there are ways to parry it. Cruelty in Slytherin House was expected – almost casual." She was tracking his finger, and he watched her. "Quite the opposite of the cruelty you experienced in Gryffindor."

She glanced up. "I never..." But memories of her first months at school flooded in. "Oh."

He nodded, as though approving her at lessons, and began tracing the circle in the opposite direction. "Deliberate cruelty can be anticipated, shaped, twisted back on itself. Other cruelty – " he opened his palm briefly "– inadvertent, thoughtless, careless – is impossible to guard against. No," he continued, his finger resuming its slow, careful path around the knot, "deliberate cruelty is far, far preferable. To survive its wounds, it only requires that you not be innocent. To triumph, you must expect the wounds, and inflict your own, far greater, on your opponent. You must be forever on the offensive, actively seeking power in each interaction, especially when seeming not to do so, your weapons readied by constant, deliberate attention to detail, to nuance, to betrayals of vulnerability – and craft it into the cutting remark your opponent will use to carve out his own heart. At its best, it is a slow, artful dance.

"Innocence will shield you, at least partially, from thoughtless cruelty until you are convinced of your moral superiority, strong enough to ignore the bleeding, numb enough not to care. To survive deliberate cruelty, all you need do is expect it," his finger slowed, and stopped, "and the innocent never do."

"The flaw in Dumbledore's thinking," she offered.

"Precisely."

She sat straighter in her chair. "And to win?"

A low triumph grew in his eyes. "To win, you must strike first. You triumphed over the Dark Lord because no one thought you a threat. You would have been a target, you would not have remained standing, otherwise."

She blinked once, but her eyes were widening.

"Which you already knew. Well played, Hermione."

She blinked again.

"I truly believe that your morals would have kept you from doing it again, had you a choice, but you touched it once, and the temptation remained with you, growing, unchecked, until it could not be restrained. You buried it valiantly, to be sure, but the foundations were imperfect, and the slightest breath on the cornerstone shook the highest tower."

She flinched as her eyes flew up, then dropped back to his.

"At the level of instinct, you are pure curiosity; only one level higher, you are pure rage. Neither is civilised, and, unconsciously, you touched it again. And now, only one question remains: Are you willing? I would have wagered, before you reached for me last night, before I felt your skin respond beneath my touch, that your character would prevent you, that you would stumble blindly into madness rather than..." His voice trailed away.

"Than what?" she demanded, against the ragged pulse in her throat.

"I would have thought you would choose madness over my embrace, Hermione."

"And now you think otherwise?"

"Ours is a dangerous game... one from which there may very well be no return." For either of us, he thought. "The taint goes deep, Hermione, and has changed you."

"What makes you think so?"

"I do not think it; I know."

"Fine, then." She gestured irritably, tossing her head, and her lock of hair brushed her throat, and the memory of her skin warmed his hands. "How do you 'know'?"

"You wished me sweet dreams."

She waited, but he spoke no further. Finally, she demanded, "And?"

"Your dreams may roll you under into rippling anesthesia, and leave you spent – breathless, exhausted, your skin slick, your body flung, limp, brutally twisted beneath hot, tangled sheets – but somehow I doubt that they are ever 'sweet.'"

As he watched, her eyes grew distant, then returned. Flat.

"Deliberate cruelty, Hermione."

Her eyes hardened, and the pain in his hip knifed through him in response.

"Well played," he acknowledged, scarcely breathing. "Yet my question remains." He leaned in and murmured, "May I have this dance?"

He slowly opened his hand, extending it toward her.

There was no softness in his gaze, and none in her smile, when she reached her hand across the table to feel, once more, the smooth, cruel sweetness of his skin touching her own.

----

In Hermione's tower, the tiny ghost gasped as a hot, real tear slicked down the image of her skin.

It was the first sound she'd made in twenty-two years.

Turning from her reflection, she fled Hermione's mirror, another tear spattering to the stone floor as she swept into the corridor.

One sound, one tear, and a tiny, feathered flower seed.

She had blown it and it had fallen, rent by her breath from its stem, and, as the tear rounded beneath it, it balanced, poised on its end, and a lone, wayward draft lifted its feather to send it, sparkling and salted, adrift in the castle.