A Man Cannot Control His Dreams

A/N More! epic smut in the works.
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At the end of the class, all of two potions out of 28 were deemed acceptable, and Severus dismissed the lot of them with a leaden irritation in his voice. They scurried out like so many rats under his gaze. Alone, Severus sat heavily into his chair, and closed his eyes. He had some time before his next class, but sleep did not come easily. He thought, not without irony, of the detriments of a talented mind: thoughts moving so fast across so many threads that he could find little rest in the opaque blackness of night in the dungeons, let alone in the midday bustle of work to be done – the student cacophony.

He heard a distant cough and started. Perhaps he had been dozing. Looking up to the door, he suppressed a long-suffering sigh.

“Miss Granger.” He straightened himself. The bushy-haired girl moved quickly to her customary seat, early, as usual.

“Um,” she cleared her throat, “are you all right, Professor?” Her eyes were fixed on her book bag as she began unpacking the class’ necessities.

“Quite,” he replied, both dismissing the question and discouraging any others that might spring from her over-active mind. She nodded, almost to herself, and remained quiet. The room was full less than fifteen minutes later, and Severus realized he must have dozed, indeed.

When Harry came in, Severus, his back turned, was recording the day’s notes on the blackboard. He therefore missed the look of relief that passed over Harry’s face at the sight of the Potions Master. It was brief, so brief that not even Harry recognized it, but it was there. Severus was no easier on the fifth years than he had been on the third, and the class passed in a charged, nervous silence, rife with unexpected sparks and smoke.

****

For Severus and Harry, dinner passed in much the same way: tense and electric in its quiet. Severus, eyes dark and scouring, sat at his usual place at the staff table, carefully avoiding the small talk that tended to be epidemic among the other faculty. He answered any inquiries with short, terse responses, and generally ignored everyone. He was tired and cross. Tired, yes, but not half tired enough to miss the tight, nervous lines of Harry’s body, perched on one of the Gryffindor benches, surrounded by his entourage. Though the Gryffindor was looking resolutely at his plate, his body language was clear as day. Severus felt a stirring low in his body: Potter knew he was being watched, and he was afraid. And Severus itched to resolve the previous night’s confrontation, from which he’d been so rudely snatched. He was, after all, loath to let anyone get away with the sort of disrespect he’d been shown.

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Harry poked restlessly at his food. Though he didn’t dare look up at the staff table, He hardly needed to. He could feel Snape’s eyes on him, right between his shoulders. Merlin, that gaze was like ice on his skin. Ron elbowed him, but he didn’t respond – didn’t really care at all what the redhead had to say at the moment. All his attention was focused on not looking.

“Oi! Harry!” Ron elbowed him again, more forcefully. “What’s the matter, mate? Need to clean out your ears?”

“What?” Harry snapped, finally. “I was just thinking, Ron. Maybe you should give it a try sometime.” Hermione gave him a look from across the table, but said:

“I agree.”

That took the attention back off of him better than Harry could have hoped, as the pair was yet again locked in a bickering duel. Harry turned his attention away, and, after his distraction, forgot why he wasn’t looking at the staff table, and did just that. The lapse lasted only a moment, but in that moment, his green eyes were caught on black, and his blood ran fiercely, feverishly hot. And he had to get out into the air. Pride forced him to stand his ground a few minutes longer, heartbeat panic-fast, and skin itching for the cold relief of night air.

****

Severus snapped fully alert as Potter excused himself from his friends, and all but fled the hall. He caught only a brief moment of the boy’s direction before the closing doors hid him, but it was enough to see he was not heading to Gryffindor tower. Perhaps the grounds… He drained his tea.

“Excuse me,” he intoned solemnly to the table of professors. “I must be returning to work.”

“Of course, of course,” the insufferable Trelawney replied from his right hand. He hadn’t been able to avoid sitting with her that night, having come late. “One’s work is never done…” she trailed off, the old lunatic. Probably spiked her pumpkin juice with a tad too much whiskey.

****

Harry sank to his knees on the damp grass behind the greenhouses. The cold night air – for winter was coming on fast, and the sun had set nearly an hour before – soothed his overheated skin, and he gulped it down, not quite gasping, but not quite breathing either. He felt… he didn’t know what he felt. But it was hot and heavy and smothered his breath like the crushing weight of a stone block. Putting his face in his hands, he missed the soft padding of boots across the grass until it was too late.

“Mr. Potter,” Snape drawled. “Feeling ill, are we?”

Harry scrambled to his feet, the heaviness that had been somewhat relieved by the brief time alone dropping back into place, all the more devastating. He felt familiar flash of panic block his thoughts, and struggled for words.

“Professor! I, uh, no I was just – “ Luckily for him, or perhaps unluckily, Severus had no interest in whatever he was attempting to say.

“Please, Potter, did you really think I wanted that answered?” He wasted precious few seconds boxing Harry against the greenhouse glass; holding him in place with one slender hand, Head dipping to speak into his ear. “I must advise you not to draw attention to yourself,” he started; voice low enough to raise the hairs on the back of Harry’s neck. “You…provoke me.”

Harry shook his head, closing his eyes.

“I – I didn’t – didn’t mea- oh, Merlin.” Breath ghosted over his throat, followed by the tiniest suggestion of lips, and Harry’s fingers scrabbled madly for purchase on the greenhouse wall, but it was glass, and offered no traction. But he wouldn’t touch Snape… he couldn’t. The pad of a thumb stroked over his bottom lip, and he squeezed his eyes shut, resisting the tingle of desire that spread from the touch.

“Potter.”

It wasn’t really a sound, Snape’s voice. For how could a sound so easily strip Harry of every defiance?

“N-no. I can’t.” Can’t…what? Open his eyes? Surrender himself? Stay on his feet? What? Harry didn’t know. But he did know that this wasn’t right: it wasn’t him.

But… maybe that’s why he was doing it. Harry opened his eyes. He looked up into the fearsomely focused gaze, zeroed in on him like an archer to a target, and was gripped by an insane urge. He didn’t let it linger long enough to be examined, though, and simply acted on it.
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tbc quite soon