Deliver Me

Chapter XXII – Wicked Loathing


“Draco,” Bellatrix purred softly.

He was surprised when he saw her, she was beautiful, or at least there was the illusion that she still was. He hadn’t seen her looking like that in his entire life, save old photographs. Her hair was parted down the center and draped around her shoulders like long strands of black silk; an old medieval crown adorned her head. The crown, he could tell, was an old Malfoy family heirloom; his mother had a similar one. It was in the form of a thin, gold band that graced the center of the forehead in a ‘v,’ with a single gem hanging from it. His mother’s was a ruby and it was only worn for rare, special and highly important occasions. Tonight, Bellatrix’s was an emerald.

Draco stepped into the fireplace and kissed his aunt’s cheek. Blaise followed him into the darkness.

They entered Malfoy Manor to find some of the Death Eaters in their formal ceremonial robes, conversing in the solar.

“Upstairs,” Narcissa Malfoy instructed her son.

He looked over to Blaise, who was searching the room for her father and mother.

“They are in the study with Mister Malfoy,” Narcissa answered Blaise’s unasked question, “Pansy, Marcus and the others are already upstairs,” instructed Narcissa, furthering them up the stairs.

When Draco and Blaise reached the top, she paused. There was a sinking in her middle, something was not right.

“What is it?” he asked her, “We can’t stop here they can still see us.”

He ushered her towards the east wing of the house. It was where the guest bedrooms were, and probably were their peers were waiting to be called.

Blaise found a few other Slytherin girls in the room she was led into.

There was a dress waiting for her on the bed. It was a simple, deep green and gold, lady’s Grecian robe.

There was to be ceremony tonight.

When she emerged out of the bedroom, the other girls fled down the stairs to meet their parents and escorts anxiously. She lagged behind and waited for Draco.

“Have you seen Alizeé?” she asked him.

“Yes,” he answered, “she’s fully marked now.” He meant, that now, Alizeé was a full-fledged Death Eater and Blaise was soon to be next.

“I can’t do this tonight,” she admitted to him. He could hear the choking in her voice.

“We all have too,” he told her.

“Draco,” she stopped and held him back.

“Yes?” he answered.

“It’s not that I don’t think tonight is the night, it’s that I can’t do this tonight,” Blaise said.

“Another night, isn’t an option,” he told her.

“I know. Draco, I don’t think I can do it…at all.”

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“What about me?” Hermione asked.

“I don’t know how to tell you…” Severus’ voice drifted off, while he was trying to find the right words to say to her.

Hermione waited in the darkness. She looked down at her wrists and she began to think about the events that had taken place over the past couple of months. Things were definitely crazy. Insane was more like it. And yet everything seemed to go wrong with her, no one else but her.

Her thesis lessons started with Professor Snape in order to teach her the art of potion making and it’s relevance to life, and art and magict. But then there was Lucy, dear, sweet, young Lucy. Dead Lucy. And then there was the funeral where everything seemed to fall apart.

There were random moments she couldn’t remember, enough of her blood spilt to make her wonder how her heart ever found the strength to produce more. Then there was Severus. She went from wanting him so badly, to just wanting to be next to him, to hating him, to wanting his closeness all over again. What did she want now?

“Hermione, are you listening to me?” he asked, noticing the far away look on her face.

She blinked herself back into reality out of her thoughts, “What?”

“Why aren’t you taking this seriously? You could have died, you are behaving like a stupid little girl,” she wasn’t paying him any mind again, “Hermione, are you listening?” he asked again.

“Do you love me?” she asked out of the blue. Without waiting for an answer, she took all the energy she had left and hauled herself at him, pressing her lips against his.

His lips were just as wonderful as she remembered. She had forgotten how amazing his hard body felt as she pressed herself closer to him, feeling his body heat burn through her skin.

Severus didn’t fight her off, but didn’t advance her further either, he just let her do whatever he felt she needed to do.

He gently placed her back on the bed, easing the stress on her body.

“You feel good,” she murmured. He stopped and laid himself at her side, almost separating himself from her.

“You could have died,” he repeated placing the back of his hand against his forehead in a mix of frustration and anxiousness.

“And you know how to ruin a moment,” she responded getting irritated. He was always making her irritated.

He rolled over and off the bed finally, waved his hand, and a chair appeared at the side of the bed. Another wave and a tray with two cups of tea and croissants appeared. Severus sat down on the chair, he sighed, rain his fingers through his hair in agitation, before getting back up again.

“We need to talk,” he said.

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“Have you lost your mind?” Draco asked Blaise, “You have too!”

She looked like she was ready to vomit and her skin had turned pale. Her eyes glazed.

“I can’t feel the floor anymore,” she told him.

He grabbed her by her shoulders, and gave her a hard shake, “You listen to me, you get through this tonight, and get sick later. You cannot back out tonight, do you hear me Blaise?” he was whispering knives into her ears.

“If you don’t want to fall tonight, you need to suck it up, and take it,” he moved his hands around her waist to support her. She looked like she was ready to pass out.

“I’ll be right next to you, grab my hand if you need it,” and he escorted her to the stairs.

When they reached the bottom of the staircase, waiting to escort her to the ceremonial room, was none other than Alizeé’s husband, Davian. She gulped when he touched her. He made her feel even sicker. She loathed him with a passion. He had just married Alizeé too. It wasn’t a love match either; Alizeé could care less for him. He was a vile, handsome, but dark, excuse of a man, whose sole purpose in the marriage, was to aid in the production of heirs and protect the pureblood line.

Alizeé, unlike Blaise, did not care about relationships and love, her one purpose was to serve the Dark Lord, keep up her family name, and die with honor. Davian was a hateful creature; he always made these crude glances at Blaise, found disgusting ways to touch her and excuses for being alone with her. She hated him for it.

“I won’t bite,” he whispered to her, “hard,” the tip of his tongue flicked her ear.

Blaise looked at Draco. He urged her on. She turned back to Davian, smiled, and was escorted away.

Once inside the ceremonial room, the Death Eaters-to-be lined the walls in a circle, each wearing the same ceremonial attire, their escorts behind them.

Where was Alizeé? Blaise was sure she would have felt less disgusting had Alizeé been her escort, rather than her vile brother-in-law.

“I vow to honor, I vow to accept,” the oaths went around the circle. When it reached Draco, Blaise grabbed his hand for balance; she was next.

Davian noticed.

“I…I vow to honor, I vo-w to accept,” she barely got the words out of her mouth.

When it was over, they were ushered into the solar, but Blaise and Draco joined their parents in the Malfoy main study.

“Hello father, mother, Mister and Mrs. Zabini,” Draco greeted when they walked in.

Blaise smiled, while Draco undertook the formalities.

“Will you be ready soon?” Mister Zabini asked Draco, pouring warm brandy for himself and Lucius.

“Whenever my family deems me so,” answered Draco.

“And you, my lioness?” Blaise’s father asked her using his pet name for her.

“Whenever you wish, father,” she answered. She wasn’t ready to be a Death Eater. She couldn’t bear it.

“It’s getting late, darling,” Narcissa reminded Lucius, looking over to Blaise’s mother Katya.

“What? Yes, yes it is. You should be heading back,” and they were dismissed.

Blaise’s father kissed her forehead before she headed out the door. Draco lagged behind for a quick word with his mother before they left.

Once out in the hallway, Blaise let out a hard breath and leaned against the wall for support. This was going to be harder than she thought.

But she wasn’t against the wall, was she? No, she was against someone, someone whose fingers were digging, painfully into her ribcage.

“Miss me?” a hiss in the darkness, “Does the young Malfoy satisfy your needs?”

“Davian, let go of me,” she stated calmly. She didn’t know how she got the words out.

“Oh, but I do not wish it. Let me make you scream, I can do a much better job that silly Malfoy junior,” he asked crushing her ribs with his fingers, while his other hand found it’s way up her leg.

“Let me go,” she requested again.

He turned her around and crushed his lips to hers. His hands roamed her body as he pressed himself further against her. Blaise panicked and reached around her for the easiest thing to grab. There was a small picture frame against the wall, she grabbed it and hit him on the skull.

“You bitch!” he grabbed the frame out of her hands and struck her.

She screamed.

The door to the study opened, Lucius Malfoy and Eros Zabini were standing at the foot of it.

Blaise was struggling to stand up, moving away from Davian and bleeding, with her dress partly torn off her shoulders.

“What’s going on?” Blaise’s father roared.

“Nothing, Eros, nothing. She stumbled,” Davian lied.

Draco appeared behind his father, and rushed to aid Blaise. He crouched over her, “Did he do this to you?”

“Daddy, I’m sorry, he…he…” she couldn’t get the words out. Before she could even muster out anymore, her father’s threw his hands around Davian’s neck pinning him to the wall.

“How dare you touch my daughter,” Eros yelled.

“I didn’t touch her, Eros, please, who are you going to believe? Me or this scrawny little thing?”

The grip tightened around Davian’s throat.

“Take him into the study,” Lucius ordered McNair and Nott, who heard Blaise’s scream and ran down the hall.

Narcissa and Katya stayed in the doorway watching as the events unfolded. When the men were gone, Katya was at her daughter’s side.

“Mum, I’m sorry…” her chest was heaving, “I can’t…”

“Shh, my petite one, your father will deal with him,” she kissed her daughter on the cheek.

“Draco, use the fireplace in my bedroom, take care of her,” Narcissa instructed and the wives disappeared into the solar to keep the oblivious guests none the wiser.

“Can you walk?” Draco asked her, helping her up.

“I think so,” and she moaned in pain and grabbed her abdomen.

“Did he hurt you badly?” stupid question, Draco told himself after he asked it. He knew very well that Davian did her hurt. But if knew Blaise, which he did, she would take it like a real solider, a real Death Eater, she would take the pain, bite at it, and try to move on.

He knew it and she knew it. This was exactly the reason why they were paired together at events and gatherings. They were too much alike. And after the final initiation, they would be paired as partners, a brotherhood so to speak, just as Severus, Bellatrix, Rudolphus and Lucius had once been.

Blaise had a high tolerance for pain and was smarter more than half the male Death Eaters. She was what Alizeé could never be, what Alizeé wished to be. The difference was, she did not want it.

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“You need to listen to me and listen to me good Hermione, do you understand me?” Severus asked.

“Yes,” Hermione answered.

He nodded, and handed her a teacup.

“You are in danger.”

“How so?” she asked.

“The Dark Lord,” he started. She recalled that only Death Eaters ever called Voldemort the Dark Lord and it reminded her that he was a one of them.

“The Dark Lord, or should I say Tom Riddle, created something when he was at school here. He created a way to see, where he couldn’t physically be, he created a way to control, what he couldn’t physically control and he created a mask to hide it under.”

“Okay?” she asked quietly, unsure where he was going with this. It was really rare that Severus ever spoke about Voldemort or Death Eaters, and she thought it best to keep her mouth shut.

“There was a girl who was here, Lisel. She was a Ravenclaw and an orphan just like him; some even think he might have even had some feelings for her. But she had a sister. Katie. A Slytherin. You’ve heard of Katie. Katie Ann Aiken. Does that name ring a bell?”

Without letting Hermione answer, he continued, “Katie wrote a book some years back, ‘Behind the Mask: Life with the Dark Lord’ before he killed her. Hogwarts has one of the only remaining copies I believe. It contained a lot of what Tom Riddle discovered, created and manipulated in his years here.”

“Why did she write it if she was a follower of his?” Hermione asked, and almost wished she didn’t. She didn’t want to interrupt Severus with her questions. She wanted him to open up to her, and this seemed like the first time that he actually was.

“She wrote it after discovering how twisted he really was,” he paused and thought out what he wanted to say.

“Katie and Lisel’s parents had a mixed marriage. Much like Tom, their father was a muggle and their mother was a witch. Marie, their mother, died in childbirth, and their father, Christopher, died from grief – he killed himself, how was he going to raise bewitched children? He believed they killed his wife. He was as deluded and selfish as Tom’s father.”

“These girls, had much in common with Tom, as very few did. Katie saw herself as his near equal and believed in everything he wanted. Lisel on the other hand, I mentioned she was a Ravenclaw, didn’t believe in the revenge and lust for power that her sister and Tom possessed. But she was giftedly intelligent, and their pasts bonded them together. She was one of the few non-Slytherins Tom associated with. He loathed in her what happened to him, but sympathized with her, what he felt. It helped that Katie was one of his biggest supporters.”

“Sometime after graduation, when things picked up, Lisel began to see what was really going on, and confronted Tom in front of Katie. She was so angry. It was the first time, someone Tom felt genuine feelings for, went against his wishes. She was so different from him in her beliefs, but so much like him in so many ways, he almost cared for her. She had even helped him devise some of the spells and creations that he is given credit with.”

“What happened to her?” Hermione asked.

“I’m coming to that,” he answered, “Katie still believed everything Tom believed in, but it wasn’t until a couple nights after Lisel’s argument with Tom did everything really, truly change. Death Eaters had not come into existence yet. Most of us were in our second year when it happened.”

“What did?” Hermione asked eager to find out the rest of the story. She had never heard anything really true about Voldemort’s life and was genuinely interested.

“Tom went to see Lisel unannounced and they got into a heated argument. He was so angry, so full of rage, he killed her. I don’t think he meant too, however. I think the magic just built up inside of him, and seeped through his body too fast for him to control it. Katie was upstairs in the house when she heard Lisel’s screams. Upon finding her sister’s body, the dark mark was invented. It was branded across Lisel’s heart.”

“That’s terrible,” Hermione whispered.

“Lisel had helped Tom invent something else though. Something that had a similar symbol, it was a tongue, no skulls. The full Dark Mark was his way, most supposed, of completing her work. If she wasn’t with him, she was against him, and he wouldn’t have her be any other way. So the Dark Mark was his homage to her, in a sense anyway.”

“It never occurred to me, that the dark mark could have been created out of love,” Hermione thought out loud.

“Was it love? Or was it not? Hermione, the Dark Lord does not know how to love,” Severus continued.

“What was the other mark?”

“That is the material point. Lisel helped Tom to create something called a Jadelisk. Do you know what that is, Hermione?”

She nodded her head, “How did Katie die then?”

“Katie, complied all of the Dark Lords secrets, notes scribbled by Lisel, and she wrote a book. As a way of trying to demise him, she fell out of his circle and seemed to go mad with grief. She locked herself up in that house of theirs, and most thought she was grieving. She was writing and compiling, the grief just facilitated it. Well, after the book came out, he killed her, and almost every copy was recovered and burned.”

“What does this have to do with me?” Hermione asked.

“The Dark Lord has not used a Jadelisk in a very long time, no since the days of Lisel and Katie. But recently he decided he wanted one again.”

“And who might this Jadelisk be?” she asked.

“You.”

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Draco and Blaise found themselves back in the Slytherin common room.

“Oh, back so late?” Pansy asked sleepily emerging from the girls’ wing.

Neither Draco, nor Blaise said anything.

“What took so long?” she prodded and moved over to the couch of which they occupied.

She couldn’t make out Blaise’s full profile, but Draco looked hard, angry and deadly.

“What happened?” she asked again, “Blaise? Are you okay?”

She saw the single tear run down Blaise’s cheek.

“Draco?” Pansy asked. He remained silent.

She walked over to Blaise who wouldn’t meet her eyes.

“Blaise?” Pansy asked yet again, and this time Blaise turned to her, to reveal a dried, bloody, cut on the other side of her face.

“Good gods, what happened?” she shrieked, “Draco, get me a towel!”

He didn’t move.

“Draco, what the bloody hell’s the matter with you? Go get me a towel, she’s bleeding for Merlin’s sake!”

He turned to her then, “Leave us Pansy. I’ll take care of her.”

“They didn’t, did they?” Pansy was anxious, “Put out your arm Blaise, did you get one?” and without waiting for a response, Pansy pulled out Blaise’s arms, looking for a dark mark.

But none was to be found.

“Pansy, leave,” Draco instructed again.

“Did you get one?” she asked excitedly.

“I won’t ask again, leave us now,” he requested.

“Fine, be that way,” and she stalked off back to her room, “I was only trying to help.”

When she was gone, Draco, slid over to Blaise’s side of the couch, turned her face and looked at the cut.

“A simple healing charm will get rid of that easily,” he said comfortingly, “Does it hurt badly, Blaise?” he touched the area around it and she winced.

“Draco,” she could barely get his name out of her, she was having trouble speaking.

“Yes, love?” he did always call her ‘love’ didn’t he? It was his pet name for her. Ginny probably wouldn’t want to know about it though.

“I can still taste him,” Blaise told him, her eyes wide in fear and disgust.

“Not anymore,” he leaned in and kissed the taste of Davian out of her. They both left their eyes open.

“Better?” he asked slipping his tongue out of her mouth to lick her bottom lip.

“What are we going to do?” she asked quietly, her eyes fixated on the lit fireplace.

“What we are supposed to do,” he answered.

“Draco, I don’t think I can,” and a second tear escaped her eyes.

Blaise never cried.

“I’ll kill him for hitting you,” he promised her.

“No,” she said softly still watching the fire.

“No?” he asked.

“Let me do it,” and her eyes met his in agreement.

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“Me?” Hermione asked in disbelief. Things were beginning to make sense. She had thought about it.

“But you won’t be for long,” he reassured her.

“What?”

He didn’t know how to answer her question.

“I haven’t the markings,” she thought outloud.

“You do,” he took the covers off of her, lifted the shirt she had on, and exposed her hip.

“That’s a silly scar. It’s a mark from a bruise, a scar, everyone gets them.”

“No, Hermione, it’s a tongue.”

She fell quiet looking at the mark. That would explain everything, now wouldn’t it, she thought to herself.

“You knew?” she thought out loud.

“What?” he asked, unprepared for her throwing something back at him.

“You knew and you didn’t tell me?”

“Hermione, I couldn’t have told you, think about it, you know that,” he tried to reason.

“If you love someone, if you trust someone, you tell them everything, it’s what relationships are based on,” she was getting angry, not at the mark, at him.

“What relationship, Hermione?” the old Severus was coming back “This? What is this? The sharing of saline here, and play there? This isn’t a relationship.”

“If you love someone -” she started again.

“What love Hermione? You call this love?”

“You love me,” she told him.

“I never said I loved you, you just assumed that I did because I kept silent. A silly little school girl crush, Hermione, that’s all it is.”

“You made me believe…”

“I didn’t make you believe anything. You believed what you wanted too, and nothing more, nothing less.”

“You’re vile,” she tired to get off the bed and leave, but her body was too weak, she winced in pain at the shots of pressure stabbing through her body.

Instinctively, he bent forward to help her, letting her fist meet with his jaw, again. The girl was something else.

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Ginny was in the Gryffindor common room studying when Ron appeared, apparently flustered.

“Have you seen Blaise?” he asked.

“She left about an hour ago with Draco,” his sister answered nonchalantly.

“Where did they go?” Ron prodded.

“To see someone named Alizeé,” Ginny answered.

“Her sister?” said Ron, apparently very surprised.

“She has a sister?” asked Ginny, now curious.

“Yea, a Death Eater of a sister.”

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Hermione was calm now. Severus had pinned her down on his bed, her hands above her head, so he couldn’t be assaulted again, carefully avoided her slit areas, and his legs pinned hers together, so he couldn’t be castrated either.

She cried, she screamed, and she attempted to bite him more than once every single time he spoke.

Her attempts to fight him off eventually ended up in soft whimpers, and coughs.

“You are so violent. Is that a Muggle trait? Good gods, you’re killing me,” he hissed.

“Let me die then,” she finally spat at him.

“You aren’t going to die,” said Severus harshly.

“What are you going to do about it then? Save me?” she asked sarcastically.

“I already have,” he answered and he removed himself off of her.

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Draco did the healing charm on Blaise’s face and the bruise disappeared. Her skin was as flawless as it ever was. Her beauty was back.

“Thank you,” the words came out of her mouth meekly.

“You need not thank me,” he told her.

“Not for the charm, for tonight,” she continued.

“My father was not pleased,” he admitted.

“Neither mine,” she added.

“He was quite angry when that filthy bastard struck you though,” Draco patronized.

“As was mine,” she added again.

“One should never strike a lady,” he was going off of formalities.

“What will Lucius do?” she asked.

“Maybe kill him,” Draco honestly admitted.

“I…I want…”

“You don’t have it in you to kill Blaise, I know you can’t. You should not have too,” he touched the place where the cut had been, and she closed her eyes remembering the blow.

“Did he touch you anywhere else?” he asked, ready to fix up the rest of her.

She nodded and dropped the top of her dress, leaving the upper part of her in the nude to the waist.

And right there under her right breast, on her rib cage was a large purple mark, resembling a handprint.

“Salazar!” gasped Draco and there was venom in his eyes.

“I can’t breathe,” she choked when he touched it.

“Lay down,” he instructed. Once she was flat on her back he covered her breasts with her dress, picked her up and carried her to his room. This was a job that Madame Pomfrey simply could not be aware of.

He laid her on his bed, went into his trunk and found a fist size, silver stone. He placed his wand over it and whispered, “donne.”

Draco then placed the stone on her body, in the middle of the mark. Blaise inhaled sharply from the pain. Draco placed his wand over the stone again, and watched, as the silver stone turned black, taking the bruise off of her body sucking the pain into the stone. When the process was complete, there were beads of sweat on her forehead and chest. She never cried, she never screamed, and he knew that the process was painful. Most men couldn’t handle the pain of the stone.

It was a magical remedy very few used, because very few could handle the intense plunging effect it caused. Most of the people he knew, who used it, passed out from the initial contact of the stone. But she did not, no, Blaise was strong, there was no one else like her.

He took her dress off, and wrapped one of his shirts around her.

“How do you feel?” he asked.

“Weak,” she answered.

“You’ll never be weak.”

“I feel empty, dirty, he touched me, I can’t move,” she tried to get up, but the after effect of the stone, caused her body to become stiff.

“Then don’t,” he pulled the covers over her. She watched him change into his night trousers and shirt, and climb into bed next to her on top of the covers, “you won’t know his touch anymore. That I promise you.”

“You don’t know that. Hold my hand,” she requested.

“It won’t make the pain stop,” he told her.

“I know, but it’s how I can justify it,” she reasoned.

She slid her hand out from under the covers for him to grasp.

He kissed her palm, and rested her hand on his chest, before getting ready to fall asleep.

“Blaise?”

“Yes?”

“You won’t know his touch, you’ll know mine.”

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“What do you mean you have?” Hermione asked, not moving from the positions he had held her up against.

“What do you think your thesis lessons turned into? Random flask drinking? Please, tell me you have more common sense than that?”

“That’s what Ron and Harry were speaking about, oh my Merlin,” the words slipped off her tongue slowly as the realization began to hit.

“What the devil are you talking about? What would your pathetic friends have to do with this?” he asked getting angry.

“I need to find Harry,” she stated, but the pain from attempting to move, reminded her differently.

“You aren’t going anywhere tonight,” he told her flatly.

“You really are a bastard, you know that?”

“Enlighten me to what I know not,” he responded.

“Why are you always so difficult?”

“What are you always in a rush to fix everything, even if it isn’t yours to fix?”

“And it’s yours to fix then? Am I yours to fix?”

“Yes,” he answered her quicker than she anticipated.

“You really are daft then,” she said, “If you don’t want the entire cake, you cannot have a bite.”

“We aren’t talking about cake,” he told her clearly agitated. She never got him to the point of real, dangerous anger, anymore, it was more along the lines of frustration and the feeling that reason wasn’t coming through.

“You are right, we are talking about you and I,” she told him.

“There is no you and I,” he interjected.

“You didn’t seem to think so a couple hours ago,” she retorted.

“How could you know, what I think,” Severus said.

“Is that the game then?” Hermione asked, “I never thought anyone could make me feel this way, but you know what?”

He didn’t answer, Severus didn’t like where this was going.

“You’re cold, and you’ll always be cold, blame me, I don’t care, but this is the end of you and me. It’s too late, and I can’t wait for this to be over. Gone, all gone, and thrown away.”

“How poetic-”

“Oh, don’t bother,” she said, “I forgot, there is no you and I. This is the way it is, no more tears am I going to shed for you, Severus Snape. Surely, you don’t think you deserved them?”

“Hermione,” he started.

“Don’t start, so what if you’re the one I wanted to chase? I one I want to hold me? I’m not loosing anymore of my time.”

She watched his expression, and she could see his anger venting up. His eyes became dark and his jaw hardened.

“A waste of time,” she whispered the last words, before he hauled himself on her and kissed his craving.

His heavy body was pushing her further into his bed as he rode her mouth. His hands began to roam, and they found their way to the buttons on her blouse. Hermione’s fingers undid his shirt and hugged him around his waist, letting his chest press into hers; skin to skin. He suddenly stopped, got up and removed his pants, before coming straight back to her. She curled one of her legs around his waist as she deepened their kiss. It went from hard demanding kisses, to soft promises, to a hunger neither one of them could stop.

She was naked under him.

He trailed kisses down her neck, between her breast, flicked her belly button with his tongue, before dragging it back up to her mouth lazily.

She moaned softly, “I love you so.”

Her fingers played in his hair, as their bodies stroked the other. Hermione moved her lips from his and took a moment. He wondered what she was doing.

“Do you want this?” he asked her.

“Only, if you want me…this time.”

“I never stopped,” and his tongue slid on to hers.

When he reached her entrance, he paused, his is her first real time, and he was going to do it right.

“Forgive me,” and he pushed into her fully. He gave her a moment before moving. And when he did, she moved with him, arching her back taking him deeper into her.

He loved the moans she made, and the soft little whimpers that came out of her mouth as her eyes closed.

His movements picked up and her nails dug into his back. She screamed his name; he growled hers.

They remained still for quite some time. He softened inside her. Hermione stoked the back of his neck and caressed his hair, dampened from their rendezvous. Severus held her tight, and rolled on to his back, taking her with him; their bodies still one.

When he was drifting off to sleep, he heard her muffled sound, “Did I please you?”

A faint smile crept to his lips, one she couldn’t see. “You always do,” he answered.