A Man Cannot Control His Dreams

A/N: some plot might happen soon. GASP
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In actual fact, Severus got very little work done when he left the Headmaster’s office. Instead, he slept: long and soundly, with dreams so untroubling he could hardly recall them upon awaking the next morning. This was an unusual blessing for Severus. The things he’d seen and done in his lifetime were not easily forgotten, not even in sleep. At least, Severus thought, what had been his most immediately threatening dreams (those of the young Potter, laid bare beneath him, of course), were no longer so much of a problem.

It was once again Friday. Meaning, of course, Potter’s day for tutoring as an Occlumens. Severus sighed at the prospect as he got out of bed. It truly was becoming quite a daunting task. And one, he knew, that would actually need to be seen through to a reasonable level of completeness. And interrupting each session half way through to fight or fuck (or both) was really rather impeding progress.

Potter needed to learn. But more pleasurable lessons kept taking precedence over the mundane (important) ones. Not that riffling through Potter’s mind wasn’t enjoyable, of course, simply that Severus’ perusal of the more interesting memories therein inevitably lead to total disintegration of the learning environment. Whether that disintegration took the form of a violent outburst or a sexual encounter depended on the way Potter had first been provoked. All interesting knowledge to have acquired, but none helpful to the all-important Cause. And, at the heart of it all, Severus was dedicated to the Cause, the Order, and the general downfall of the Dark Lord. Which was why he simply couldn’t, in good conscience, continue to use his allotted tutoring period for sport.

Though subduing the eventual desire to do just that was sure to be unpleasant.

****

Little did he know (or care, of course), that Harry was slipping in other academic areas as well. His general coursework had absolutely plummeted – nary a complete assignment to be found – during the past weeks. Minerva McGonagall, in particular, was getting rather concerned as the first semester came to a close. She began watching Harry a little closer, looking for signs of stress-exhaustion or depression. Such things were all too understandable for a boy with such a heavy burden, and needed to be headed off. Harry was too important.

Minerva had been teaching teenagers for more years than she cared to count, and Harry Potter was the first one she’d yet met who could truly say, without exaggeration, that the world was on his shoulders. Every run-of-the-mill adolescent thinks, at one time or another, that no one understands his troubles. Harry was not a run-of-the-mill teenager, and such a statement, should he make it, would be undeniably true. And so she watched him in class. She watched him at meals. She watched him with his friends.

Harry didn’t realize he was drawing attention to himself, of course. He hardly thought about his homework at all anymore, and therefore didn’t worry about not doing it, either. It had all started to seem so pointless. He wasn’t a schoolboy, he was a figurehead. A symbol. An object, as he was so often reminded. But, Harry rationalized, if he were to be an object, it would be on his terms. And so, he went to Severus – again and again and again.

Luck would have it, however, that Minerva could not watch him when he was invisible. She therefore had to assume that he was asleep in his bed when, more often than not, he was digging his nails into the back of a pale, corded neck. She had to assume he was safely in dreamland while he was moaning and arching against a desk, a wall, or a bed, and being left with bruises far to real to have been dreamt.

After all, how could she know such things? Harry’s two most useful possessions - his cloak and map - were with him always, now. And even as the well-meaning head of Gryffindor house did her rounds, two black dots labeled Severus Snape and Harry Potter were incriminatingly overlapped within the curled edges of the Marauder’s Map. How was she to know what was keeping Harry from his homework? Mischief managed, indeed.

Similarly, how was Neville Longbottom to know what he had really seen? And Albus Dumbledore? What reason could he have to question Severus’ apparent absence from his rooms? How could any of them know how far Severus had overstepped his boundaries – or how much Harry was being changed by it all?

****

The first day of Christmas Holidays, it was raining. The wind whistled through the castle, forlorn and piercing as the cries of Moaning Myrtle, but nothing so unpleasant could rouse Harry from the comfort of his bed on this, his first day free of classes. He stretched languidly, feeling only a slight protest from his often-screaming muscles, and thought of a nice, hot shower before breakfast. He looked to the other beds in his dorm, and was grateful to see that he was the last to get up. He was alone.

Showering had become a bit of a challenge in his day-to-day, due entirely to the ever-renewing marks Snape supplied him with. At first, they had been restricted largely to his neck and shoulders. But lately, they had spread to wherever Severus could easily reach. His chest, beside his navel, his hipbones, thighs… It was becoming a daily trial hiding them. But, a boy had to bathe, and it was as good a time as ever, so he roused himself from the languid comfort of a late Saturday morning, and padded to the lavatory, wrapped protectively in a dressing gown.

****

The hot water felt divine on his skin as the heat sank luxuriously into his only mildly sore muscles. He thought vaguely of the agony of his shower after that first night with Professor Snape. Stretching experimentally, Harry realized just how un-sore he was. Not that he’d been treated gently the last time, by any measure. The bruise on his cheekbone was a testament to that. He was simply getting used to it.

Harry shuddered at that thought, and it coiled subtly into arousal at the base of his spine. His thoughts turned to Snape himself, shying away from the implications of his body’s adaptation to such harsh treatment.

The Potions Master wasn’t a handsome man. He wasn’t ‘pretty’ or ‘sexy’ at all. Harry had to snort at the thought of anyone thinking such a thing, let alone saying so. They’d be locked up for sure. What Professor Snape was, though, was powerful. It radiated off the man in waves. And his voice… the hairs on the back of Harry’s neck prickled up at the mere thought of it, despite the hot water streaming down his skin. That voice, in the proper tone, could make ‘pay attention, Mr. Potter,’ sound like ‘get on your knees.’

Before Harry could properly think about it, his hand was between his legs, slick with shampoo, Snape’s voice firmly in his mind. It had become so natural, to think of Snape this way, that he could hardly remember ever conjuring anyone else in his fantasies. The thought of getting off to anyone but the Potions Master had become almost absurd.

He did have to be very careful not to… moan anything untoward, though, lest someone hear him. It just wouldn’t do to have a passing Gryffindor hear an impassioned cry of “Professor!” from the showers, even if they didn’t know which professor. Didn’t matter, really, they were all technically off-limits. But perhaps it was best that he not even think of Professor Snape as ‘Severus.’ Merlin knew what would happen to him if the name ever slipped out in the man’s presence. He could just picture it: The Potions Master, grabbing his hair with one long hand, wrenching his head back, hissing into his ear:

‘What did you call me?’

Harry bit into his fist, forcing back a moan.

****

Some time later, satisfied with his morning wank, Harry surreptitiously stuck his head out of the bathroom. No one was there that he could see, so he dashed over to his trunk, and pulled out his clothes.
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TBC
soon