The Failure of Logic

A/N: Many heartfelt thanks and much chocolate to my betas, Melusin_79 (who also Brit-picked) and Sahiya. Any remaining errors are all mine. Thanks also to Shalimar1981 for the early-on brainstorming.

Disclaimer: Not mine and not making any money.

The Failure of Logic

She gave him a few more hours to rest and possibly think, though she wasn’t sure how much thinking he was actually going to be able to do. How could a person think logically with a spell telling him that the very person trying to help was actually plotting against him? It was truly an insidious curse. No wonder Voldemort had latched onto it.

I wonder what made him decide to add it to the Dark Mark? Severus said it was after he came back.

Her eyes opened wide as the realisation hit her. It never had made sense to her that Voldemort had offered Harry’s mum the chance to stand aside rather than be killed. What if ….

Of course, even if her guess was correct, that knowledge didn’t help with the current problem. It was very interesting, possibly a little disturbing, but largely irrelevant.

The solution was simple enough. That was, of course, why so many additional effects had been added. It was bloody unlikely that someone would willingly have sex (again) with a person they believed actually had it in for them. As she’d told him, there were potions that might get around the physical problems that posed, but she did not think she could bring herself to do that. At least there were still a couple of days before she would have to consider something that desperate. Besides, it might not even work. Intent counted for a lot in magic.

Words did, too.

That was something else that was bothering her. At least one of the books, and the one that seemed to hold the most relevant information, stated that an “act of love” was required. Not simply “sex”. It could be merely an euphemism, but that seemed unlikely given some of the other things it came straight out and said.

Viktor could be right that she had some sort of feelings for Severus. Feelings that went beyond gratitude, respect, and friendship. But she certainly didn’t love him. She’d know it if she did, wouldn’t she?

Perhaps a sort of general “love for one’s fellow man” would suffice.

Perhaps she was reading too much into it.

And perhaps Viktor’s elves would take more kindly to being offered badly knitted hats than Hogwarts’ elves had, but she wouldn’t place money on it.

The shape of the spell was evident, the more she thought about it. It required actual love between the wayward “spouse” and the person with whom they had strayed.

Even if Viktor was closer to the truth than she gave him credit for, that still left the problem of how Severus felt toward her.

Severus was doomed.

~*~

“Mr. Snape,” a low voice said.

Severus opened his eyes with some effort. It was that little bitch’s lover.

“What do you want, Krum?”

“Vy vill you not allow Herm-own-ninny to help you?” the man asked.

Severus snorted.

“You can drop the act, too, Krum. I may be too weak to do anything about it, but I have deduced your plot. I refuse to be party to it.”

“Did she explain vat vould be required?”

“She said enough.” The tone in which he delivered this would have brooked no further discussion, had he been upright and somewhat less skeletal, he thought.

“Then you do not luff her?”

He scowled.

“What nonsense is this? Of course I do not ‘luff’ her.”

“Then the vay you vere looking at me ven you thought I vas flirting vit her vas merely an effect of the curse?”

“If I did any such thing, it could only have been the result of a curse.”

“The Dark Lord, he did not alvays look into things as carefully as he should. He did not believe in luff. He did not believe anyvun could break his curse because he did not believe the counter-curse could be real.”

“He did not believe anyone could break his curse because he was an extremely powerful wizard. The only other wizard who might have done so… is no more.”

A sharp pain tore through Severus at that thought. For that crime alone, he should have died long ago. Perhaps that was the real reason for Granger’s little assassination plot.

“And vat vould that vizard haff said about what I haff just told you.”

“He said it often enough,” Severus scoffed. “‘Love is the power the Dark Lord knows not.’ Even if that were true, and even if you were right, I do not have such emotions toward Miss Granger.”

“Do you think you could?”

How was he supposed to answer that? Nearly anything was possible. Was such a thing probable? How could he know, based upon one night of lust?

His thoughts drifted back to the sight of her as she slept, curls spilled over her pillow and soft snores escaping her. He had watched her for a brief moment and had felt… something.

What I felt was a desire to make myself scarce before she woke up!

It had been pleasant to watch her, though.

“Even if you could not…. Even if you believe you vill only die faster, perhaps, vould it be so horrible to haff a beautiful voman make luff to you first?”

He snorted and turned away from Krum. As if he were in any shape to enjoy such a thing. It would probably horrify the chit if his heart simply gave out in the middle… which might be worth it for that alone. He could almost picture the look of disgust on her face. His stomach churned.

“That is not what they call it when one has sex as the only way to avoid death,” he snarled at the wall.

Behind him, the door opened and closed, and he was alone once again. They would not do it. They would not convince him to participate in his own destruction. He had been foolish enough to succumb to her wiles in the first place, but he would not simply hand her the rest of his life force on a gilt platter.

And if some corner of his soul thought that was not the real reason he rejected the notion of being intimate with her again in such circumstances, it was surely just another effect of this curse, trying to persuade him that the damned harpy was truly trying to help.