Ensnared

Chapter 3 – Ensnared

"Miss Granger, if you continue to exercise so little control over your teenage hormones, I shall be forced to tie your wrists to my bedposts – except I keep getting the revolting suspicion that you might enjoy that too much. Remove. Your. Hand."

Wide-eyed and half in shock, Hermione pulled her hand away, mortified by the exploration it had undertaken in the semi-unconscious state between sleep and wakefulness. She could still feel the impossibly smooth skin under her fingers, the contradictory hardness beneath and the twisting, jerking movements against her palm. Flashes from the scene in the shower from the day before penetrated her mind, and she quickly turned, hiding her burning face in her pillow, trying to block out his scathing comments as well as the fuming voice, which she found didn't help matters at all.

"Do you want some of the potion?"

They had worked the day away in silence, each boiling with anger and frustration. Two cauldrons simmered serenely on the working table.

"How come you are convinced that this one will work when the others haven't?"

"It's not an attempt at a solvent, Professor," she said softly. "It's a Sleeping Potion." She looked up at him for the first time since they had locked eyes this morning. "I'm afraid I can't turn the clock back, but I can try to make things a little easier by giving you a night of peaceful sleep." Her voice faltered for a second before she continued, "I'm afraid that as far as the solvent is concerned, I'm quite out of ideas, sir."

Looking around the room, about thirty cauldrons filled the working space. Each and every attempt so far had been a failure. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and tried to bridle his frustration.

"Take your potion. We're going to bed. Since this day seems to bring me nothing but torment, I might as well end it." She held up a small flask to him, into which she'd decanted her potion, but he shook his head. "I have no problem sleeping as long as you let me be, I assure you. Now come to bed."

Funny how those four words had been such a strong part of her most secret fantasies, she mused, following him, still hand in hand. The reality of him, and his words, had managed to rip away any rosy filters she might have had and replaced them with harshness. He was too prickly, too blunt, too brutal to hold the allure of romantic hope. Still, her fingers burned where he touched them.

Walking into the bedroom, she grasped the flask resolutely and downed the Sleeping Potion.

He awoke from a jumble of erotic dreams to find himself impossibly hard and her on top of him, kissing and licking his stomach, moving downwards. With a flash of panic, he realised that somehow, they were both completely naked. Twisting desperately, he managed to roll her on her back and pin her treacherous hands down above her head, trying to keep out of physical contact. Shaking her hard, he prepared to fix her with a stare and coldly tell her that her luck was out and that she would be spending the rest of the week on the floor. She didn't wake up, however, but twisted in his arms, arching against him, moaning softly in her sleep as she struggled to get closer.

He pinched her, shook her and slapped her lightly on the cheek, said her name over and over, in a voice that lost more and more of its icy control. She still didn't wake, but fought against him, kissing whatever skin she managed to reach and mumbling incoherent words of desire and wanting while moving with him on the large bed. In sleep, she lost the insecurity and self-doubt that he had glimpsed over the past few days. She fought against him, not to get away, but to get closer. He felt his control slipping dangerously with every touch and cursed his current situation.

The potion – it had to be the potion – was keeping her from waking up and was allowing her dreams full reign of her body. He went through all known Sleeping Potions in his mind as he tried to peel her hands and mouth off him without causing any physical harm. There was the Dreamless Sleep of course, which was out of the question since the chit was clearly dreaming; the Deep Sleep, which would have rendered her comatose and unable to move, no matter her dreams; the Enchanted Sleep, which... He suddenly jerked away, panting hard. Her hand had managed to snake its way down his body and closed around his pulsing flesh, stroking him. A groan escaped him as he managed to tear the hand away, only to be faced with the reality of her soft, wet lips as her mouth managed to close in on what her hand has just evacuated. His head swam as he tried to make sense of what was happening to him, breathing harshly as he struggled against the impulses of his body to lose his free hand in her curls and just enjoy her ministrations. His body ached and pulsated and her lips seemed to both torment and relieve him, rendering him totally incapable of coherent thought. With a last explosion of willpower, he managed to pull out of her wet mouth and roll them over, effectively pinning her down with his body.

Only to realise that he was now flush against her smooth skin, rubbing against wet heat and being effectively trapped as she wrapped her legs around him and attacked his neck with urgent kisses, begging him to come closer still.

She was walking down the path to the greenhouses with Harry and Ron, only to find a door there which normally belonged to the Charms classroom. She turned to Harry to ask if he didn't think that this was peculiar, when Harry suddenly turned away and ran off to greet Hagrid, who came towards them, riding baby dragon Norbert (which seemed normal, in spite of the book suddenly in her hand, which said that it was absolutely impossible for a wizard or witch ever to ride a dragon). While staring at the dragon, Ron morphed into Luna on the other side of her, asking if she wanted to pet her thestral.

The dream changed...

She was in Snape's office, working on a potion, her back aching from having been hunched over her cauldron for too long. Suddenly, he was against her back, his breath hot in her ear as he pressed himself against her, hands coming around to caress her belly. She turned in his arms, and he kissed her hungrily, lifting her up on a nearby desk and attacking her neck with his lips and tongue. Without even being aware of her own actions, she raised her wand (which was suddenly, and with no logical explanation, in her hand) and vanished both their clothes. The sensations intensified, and the kisses grew hungrier as they moved against each other, changing places and positions like clouds of smoke on a windy day. She was on her knees kissing her way down his stomach; he was pushing her roughly against the wall of the greenhouse, where she felt the stinging slap of a nearby Devil's Snare; the two of them were rolling around on the Quidditch field, caressing, teasing, panting from excitement and effort; she was lying down, her back against the soft sheets of his bed, her legs tightly wrapped around his back as she felt him enter her, filling her body and making her moan loudly with pleasure before covering her mouth with nearly desperate kisses...

He was lost. Lost in her soft, pliant body which rocked and arched against him, lost in her wet kisses and the way her breasts pressed into his chest. He was lost in the way she moaned his name, lost in the way she moaned her desire for him, begging him to take her harder – lost in the way she whispered his name like a thing of satin and gold in his ear.

His mind had left him when his hardness came into direct contact with her wet opening, which seemed to draw him in. Plunging into her, there was no mind, only instinct and age-old pleasure surging through his body. A red haze seemed to cover everything that was thought other than registering the growing sensations in his body and the girl's wild responses to his touch.

Surging forward again and again, he heard the breath catch in her throat and captured her moan with his mouth as he felt her come around him. He felt the sensation multiply, as it seemed to turn into a cycle of fire, fanning itself to new eruptions with each rise of flames. Shuddering, he jerked his head back, closing his eyes in rapture as he came deep within her.

Feeling his arms shake, his body near collapse, he fell down next to her, pulling her with him to keep the physical connexion. With uneven breaths, he filled his lungs with air and opened his eyes.

Hermione's face was only inches away, her eyes open and filled with fear and confusion.

The full weight of the implications of what had just happened hit him, and he felt pure, undiluted fear for the first time since the days of the Dark Lord. Would she accuse him of sexual misconduct? Gossip to Potter and Weasley about him? Force him to marry her and have a hundred billion children with his nose and her hair? A thousand scenarios arose before his mind's eye, growing steadily more gruesome...

And then, she kissed him. Softly, shyly almost, as though touching him for the first time. Sheer surprise stopped him from responding at first, and when the shock left him, he joined her in the careful exploration, very aware of how thin and brittle the ice was where they trod.

He felt a small smile on her lips as they left his, and without a single word she simply laid her head down close to his chest and grew still. Feeling slightly awkward, he draped his free arm around her waist and held her to him. Sooner or later, there would be music to face, but thankfully, it didn't seem as though this was the moment.

Relaxing his muscles, he allowed his sated body to lull his mind back to sleep.

THE END

A/N: Short and sweet. The category in itself should warn off any hopes of an epilogue. Can't have an actual plot, now can we? :-) Besides, I have other plots to work on... dum-dum-dum....