Augury & Ardor

Severus acknowledged the obsequious congratulations from those around him with as much disgust as he did the sniggered inferences in regard to his ability to carry out the task at hand. It was with more interest that he noted Hermione being carried back to the castle on Voldemort’s orders. Crabbe and Goyle may not have been the ones to inflict the wounds he’d noticed on Hermione’s face, but he was certain they would happily add more – or do worse – if left alone with her. Granger, Potter and Weasley were only protected from the brutish strength of the pair while at Hogwarts. Without friends, without a wand, she was completely at their mercy.


With a stiff bow to Voldemort, he indicated his intent to retire. When the Dark Lord alluded to his eagerness to serve him in this particular matter, he managed a smile of measured humor. Let them assume he was desirous, if that stirred their depraved humor.


With quick, measured strides, he sailed through the maze, crossed the expanse of lawn to the castle, and made his way to his room. To his relief, he arrived just as Crabbe and Goyle were shoving Hermione through the door to the quarters he occupied. It was on the first floor, as he preferred, and of modest proportions. It had a bed, bureau, armoire, a table with two chairs at which he could breakfast, a small fireplace and a bathroom. It was the Malfoys and Lestranges that required opulence to satisfy their towering egos, not he.


“Leave us,” he snapped, surprising the two halfwits just as they were about to follow her in. They stared at him blankly for a moment before lumbering away down the long, carpeted hallway. He slammed the door on their curious, backward glances and turned to gaze at Granger.


Whatever the girl had endured before his arrival was taking its toll. Little force had been behind the shove the boys used but it had been enough to send her stumbling to the floor. She pushed herself up on her arms and glared at him through a curtain of tangled hair, but her face courted weariness as well as defiance.


There was so much he needed to tell her, yet nothing he could speak. While at Voldemort’s lair, nothing was private. True, he could ward a room as if it were his own – keep people out while he slept and the like – but no conversation would be private and no spells of any importance could be cast without the Dark Lord’s knowledge. Voldemort had not come to power by trusting those around him. While he endeavored to solve this mess, he was going to have to conduct himself like a loyal Death Eater or both of them would be in danger.


A tentative knock interrupted his thoughts. When he opened the portal, two female house-elves curtsied to him and indicated in their high, squeaky voices that they’d brought dinner for him and his new bride.


Bride, Severus thought with a sneer as he stepped aside and allowed the elves to carry in the platters of food. He wanted her about as much as he wanted the food being laid out on the nearby table. He had no appetite for either. His eyes moved back to her crumpled form on the floor. While plenty of the men present tonight would have dearly loved to be in his shoes, the thought of what must transpire filled him with disgust.


“Get off the floor unless you wish to eat there like a common cur,” Severus snapped as the house-elves finished at the table and moved across the room to turn down the bed.


“I’m not eating with you.” Her voice, while heavy with weariness, still held a sharp bite.


“Then you’ll be happy to hear that I’ve already eaten this evening,” he replied. When she merely sat there, glaring at him, his mouth thinned out further. “Either gain your feet on your own power and seat yourself at the table, or I shall help you do so.”


With a wince she tried to hide, Hermione climbed to her feet, squared her shoulders, and moved to the table. While she did so, Severus removed his cape and handed it to one of the elves. A squeal of alarm from the other elf spun him around to face the table again.


Hermione rounded the table, a steak knife in her hand and a stony look on her face. Severus studied it a moment before lifting flat eyes to hers. “Put down the knife, Miss Granger, before someone is hurt.” When she merely swayed on her feet at the far end of the table, knife held out from her body, he drawled sardonically, “You won’t use it.” He let those words sink in a moment before continuing in a low voice, “It’s much too personal a mode of dispatching a person. The resistance, then the sickening give of the knife penetrating flesh, is translated through the handle when you stab a person.” He smirked at the look of revulsion that betrayed her. “Having blood on one’s hands, literally, is a much messier affair than in the figurative. It’s surprisingly warm.”


His brows snapped together when Hermione’s stance quickly changed. Instead of brandishing the knife in between them, it was now at her throat, balancing against her carotid artery. “Don’t be melodramatic. Drop the knife, immediately,” he snapped even as his pulse rose to a gallop.


When he took a step forward, she pressed the knife more firmly against her neck. “I won’t let this happen.”


“Nor will I,” he replied with the same fluidity as he pulled out his wand. “Expelliarmus!”


The knife flew from her hands and clattered to a stop at his feet. With a kick from one black boot, he sent it scuttling across the stones behind him, toward the elf that had cried out. “Take that and the rest of the cutlery out of here,” he commanded sharply, his wand and gaze still fixed on Hermione. “And do not bring another potential weapon in here again.”


The two house-elves fell over themselves in contrition, squeaking their apologies as they hurried to do his bidding. Moments later, they were gone, and the room was silent except for the ticking of a clock in the corner. Slowly, Severus lowered his wand.


“As disgusting a position as we find ourselves in, Miss Granger, what has been prophesied will be done. Tonight, you’ll experience the bridal bed. Railing against it won’t change a thing but merely make the experience more unpleasant for us both.”


“If you think I’m going to cooperate with you, you’re mad!” she ground out, furious. “I’ll die before I’ll let you touch me.”


Her mouth went immediately dry as he slowly unbuttoned his frock coat and sent it sailing across the room to hang on a hook by the door. With flat eyes, he gestured to a door next to the bed. “If you’ve no wish to eat, then the bathroom is through there. You can go prepare yourself.”


Caught by surprise, she stuttered in reply, “P-prepare myself?”


“Shower,” he drawled, eyeing her from head to toe in a way that indicated he found her wanting, “It appears you haven’t been afforded that amenity in quite some time.”


“I’m not washing for you,” she gasped in indignation.


“The alternative is I wash you,” he replied, his eyes traveling back up to meet hers, “Is that what you’d prefer?” At the look of horror on her face, he smirked. “You have ten seconds to make a decision. If you’re not in the bathroom by then, I’ll assume you want my assistance. Ten…nine…eight…seven…”


The sound of the bathroom door slamming behind her arrested his counting. The sound of the lock clicking into place caused his lips to thin. With a quick switch of his wand, the lock disengaged. “Do not test my patience, Miss Granger.”


Hermione released a stifled sob of dismay as the lock disengaged and Snape’s condescending voice drifted past the closed portal. Rubbing her hair out of her eyes, she looked around the small room. There were no windows and nothing of any weight she could use to block the door. Her wand was Merlin-knew-where and she’d been handed over to a man of considerable power. With rising despair, she realized there was nothing she could do to prevent events from unfolding as they’d been described in disgusting detail by the men who’d captured her.


She shuddered as she remembered waking up to find Voldemort’s monstrous, serpentine features inches from her own – how he’d mocked her and read the prophecy in a suggestive and sibilant voice, whispering parts of it directly into her ear.


“I don’t hear water. You won’t get a second warning.”


Hermione started at the sound of Snape’s stern voice and immediately opened the shower door to twist the faucet handle. Water poured into the tub and almost instantaneously the room began to fill with steam.


“You have ten minutes. If you’re not out in that time, I’ll assume you want assistance.”


The though of him coming in to the bathroom prompted her hands to fly to her robes. Quickly, she stripped out of her soiled clothing, diverted the water to the showerhead and stepped into its stream. A dozen tiny scrapes and bruises protested the soap and hot water, but she ignored them as she hurriedly washed.


Severus listened to the shower door close and turned to the table spread with his wedding feast. He curled his lip at the travesty of a celebration and ignored everything but the carafe of wine. He poured one glassful, then moved with it across the room to where his coat hung. From within its many pockets, he pulled a series of packets and measured a few of their contents into the cup. With that done, he swirled the contents until the wine flared with a brief pulse of light before resuming its deep red color. Setting that aside, he moved to the bathroom door and silently opened it.


The sharp scent of soap met his nose before he noted her indistinct, muted shape moving beyond the smoked glass of the shower doors. For a split second he paused in the doorway, caught by the unexpected wealth of curves the view afforded. Then he bent and gathered the pile of dirty clothes from the floor. He didn’t look back as he stepped out of the bathroom and quietly closed the door. In the small bedroom/sitting room, he spelled the torn and soiled clothing away, walked to the table, and collapsed into a chair.


He registered the sound of the shower shutting off - the door opening, then shutting. He was distracted, however, and he noted all this purely on a subconscious level. After five minutes of glowering at the plates of food before him, his mind warring with what was to come, he lifted his head and snapped, “Do not make me come in to collect you, Miss Granger.”


Hermione stepped out of the bathroom, wrapped in a white towel that stopped inches above her knees. Her face was pale, her features twisted into a mutinous expression. Her long hair was tangled and audibly dripping water on the stones beneath her bared feet. “Where are my clothes?”


“They were as filthy as you,” Severus replied, having difficulty not eyeing the vulnerable curve of her bared shoulders. For some reason, he found himself mesmerized by the delicate ridge of her collarbones and the long column of her throat. In the six years he’d known her, he realized with a start, he’d never seen her shoulders bared. “Besides,” he sneered, tearing his eyes up to meet hers, “you won’t be needing them, will you?”


“If you think I’m going to sleep with you, you’re insane.”


“Deny it all you like, but tonight is your wedding night.” Severus snagged the wine glass between his fingers. Lifting it, he held it out in offering. “Here, drink this.”


“What is it?” Hermione asked, warily, without moving.


“It’s wine,” he replied with exaggerated patience, spelling it to float the distance between them. “What does it look like?”


“What else?” She caught the stem of the glass and gazed down into its depths.


Severus’ mouth quirked in grudging respect. “No need to fear. It’s merely a calming draught and some healing herbs, much the same as Madam Pomfrey dispenses.”


“I don’t want it,” she bit out with suspicion.


“Drink it, you little idiot!” he snarled before gathering his composure and gazing at her steadily from beneath hooded eyes. When he spoke again, his voice was once more modulated. “I’m trying to make this easier for you.”


Startled by both his sharp reproof and the wisdom of his words, she fumbled the glass to her lips and took a large mouthful of wine. In her haste, she swallowed poorly and was seized by a coughing fit. Once her breath returned, she studied him warily as she took smaller sips.


He was slumped in the wooden chair in an uncharacteristically relaxed pose. All the years she’d known him, she’d never seen his manner so informal. Normally, in his Potions class he stood rigidly, watching every move they made, or strode about the rows of desks, intimidating the students as he stared down his hooked nose at their concoctions, always ready to berate or scold. Normally, his stance was one of carefully coiled control.


Nothing, however, was normal about tonight.


She wasn’t used to seeing him without the full, heavy black robes of his profession. The white lawn of his shirt emphasized his dramatic coloring. His skin was nearly as pale as the linen, making his ebony hair and eyes all the more severe in comparison. To her surprise, his expression as he watched her was not the one of disapproval she was used to. He looked pensive. Tense. “Please, Professor…you don’t have to do this,” she whispered.


“That is where you’re wrong, Miss Granger,” he replied, his eyes lifting from the wine glass to meet her gaze. “While neither of us may desire it, both will submit to the prophecy. To believe otherwise is foolish.”


Despite the warmth and lassitude the wine was affording her, she felt a chill rush up her spine at his implacable words. She lifted the glass to take another mouthful of courage and found to her dismay it was empty.


When he stood and began to unbutton his shirt, a surge of panic fought the languor stealing over her and sent her heart thudding against her ribs. “Wait!” she cried out in a voice more breathless than she’d intended, “Give the draught time to work. Give me more wine!”


With wide, wary eyes, Hermione watched him consider her request. After a terse nod he grabbed the wine bottle by its neck, walked it over to her, and poured a few inches more.


She wasn’t sure once he was seated again whether she was glad or not. When he’d been standing so near, the reality of what was about to happen had flooded over her, making it difficult for her to hold the glass still. Now, with him back in that slumped position a few yards away, she felt as if she were being stalked. With his black hair and hooded obsidian gaze, he reminded her of a panther lying in wait.


Severus watched as Hermione lifted the trembling wine glass to her mouth. Despite her nervousness, the wine and draught were having an effect on her. In the brief time it had taken him to pour the wine, he’d noticed her pupils were enlarged. He’d also noticed, to his discomfort, not only that the split in her lip and some of the minor scratches had mended, but also that beads of moisture from the shower still dotted her neck and shoulders. For a moment, he’d been standing in the humid and alluring tang of her scent, suddenly thirsty for those offerings of water.