A Terrible Temptation

A/N - I am posting two chpaters tonight so that I don\'t leave you all wet and frustrated! :) heh heh. And now, finally lemons...

Thanks Kate! Thanks my lovely reviewers and loyal compadres!


Chapter 41 – Home at Last

He was waiting for her at the gates as she marched up the road. The very sight of him, still in his flowing black robes with his hands hidden in their depths, was enough to make her flush and her heart beat faster. She quickened her pace, eager to be back by his side.
A slight blush started up as her mother’s words returned to her. If the first part of the visit had been awkward as they all adjusted to the sudden shift in the family dynamic, the last part had been wonderful.

She had told her mother about Severus. At first, her mother had had a frozen expression that told Hermione that she was frantically trying to edit the words “pedophile, crush and Lolita”m hem her vocabulary. As Hermione had talked, explaining the highly unusual circumstances (even for the Wizarding world, body swapping was bizarre), her mother had relaxed, growing thoughtful and listened with the calm intensity that had always made Hermione feel at ease.

Once her initial resistance was past and the fact that both Hermione and Severus could live to be nearly two hundred trickled into her mind, the mere twenty year age gap dwindled in significance. Hermione’s description of all Severus had been through, coupled with his restraint whilst she was a student, soothed her mother sufficiently for Hermione to som some good solid practical advice. She decided to put the first piece of it to the test.

She walked briskly up to Severus and into his arms, wrapping him up and holding tight. He crushed her against him, relief radiating from him con confirming once more that Dr. Granger was as astute a woman as she was a mother. She had been right that Severus was more likely to be insecure in the relationship’s uneven nature than Hermione was.

“I love you so much, Severus.” She murmured into his collar as she clung tight. He let out a breath audibly and she nuzzled his neck, feeling utterly content.

“I was quite concerned for you.” Translation: I was worried sick that you would run into Nott senior or worse and/or you would come to your senses and not want me anymore. She chuckled at both what was said and unsaid.

Hermione found that her understanding of him grown over the long months of letter-writing, clandestine meetings, the things she had mulled over from during the time he was Harry, and all the opportunity she had had to observe him, had come together at some point to gel into an instantaneous Snark-to-English dictionary.

“I was fine.” Translation: You are such a ninny. He chuckled back at her exasperated tone but he still didn’t let go.

She nibbled on his earlobe and he made a little noise that set her pulse racing.

“Perhaps we should go in now.” He sounded unsteady and she felt an entirely feminine satisfaction. It was a heady sensation to have power over such a controlled and dangerous man. She felt like a wild animal tamer, secure enough to put her head in the beast’s mouth but still not entirely certain that she wouldn’t get clawed if she was disrespectful.

“Perhaps we should.” She affirmed with a purr. She shifted to her cat form and darted away towards the castle. She heard a bark of laughter and then Soot was racing along beside her, whiskers twitching in glee.

The wind ruffled her fur and the ground raced by beneath her paws; they were laughing and free from the heavy burdens of humanity for the time it took to slip through the magical cat door into the Castle and then patter down to Severus’ rooms still chuckling. Once inside, Hermione shifted back to her own form and gaped about her like a child at Christmas.

Severus had floated silver taper candles around the room and laid the table with emerald green linens. The room was scentith ith rose petals and music was softly drifting from nowhere, like the music of the spheres. She turned and caught the fleeting look of panic on his face as she stood there speecs. Ss. She smiled at him, his face relaxed again and he gave her that utterly vulnerable little shy smile that had come to mean so much to her.

“Oh Severus, it’s beautiful.” She looked around and noted the enchantments he had carefully laid. The furniture seemed coated with fairy dust, the ceiling sparkled with tiny lights that mimicked stars and the floor beneath her feet seemed somehow softer. All his usual clutter was gone and it was like a fairy bower -- an art nouveau fairy bower. A sudden question occurred to her and she turned to him.
“Something wrong?” He asked quickly and gave the room a quick look about.

“No, just curious. Not to be rude, but did you pick out the furniture?” Her dubious tone made him laugh and she smiled as his eyes lightened and the years dropped away from him.

“No, I didn’t pick it out.” His laughter died and a look of sorrow and longing came over him. She moved to wrap him up again and he tucked her under his arm and rested his head on hers. “This furniture is all from my family estate. After my parents died when I was little, my great-aunt was made my guardian. She moved me from my home where I had been happy to her dreadful mausoleum where I was utterly miserable. As soon as I was free of her, I went back to the family residence.” There was a long pause while he fought for control. “She had put everything under Holland covers and closed down the house completely. The gardens where I had played as a child were dying and everything was falling apart.”

Hermione froze in his arms, suddenly remembering the dreams. She pictured the little black-haired boy in her mind again and realized who he was. The dying garden, the locked doors, the maze -- it all became clear though at the same time it was also more confusing.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Severus had pulled back as she had gone still and she looked at him realizing that she was panicking him.

“I had these dreams, Severus. I was in this garden, playing with a little boy -- he looked like you. The garden was dying and I was chasing after you through a boxwood hedge maze.” She rattled it out with no breath and the incredulous expression on his face turned to a sort of weary resignation.

“I should have known. Potter had the same sort of dreams whilst he was out of his body; apparently he saw you there as well. Albus implied that the reason you were in the dreams with Harry was that you were on both of our minds but I doubt that he really knew the answer.” Hermione listened with wide eyes to his recitation and found herself blushing. Harry had been there? But some of the things in the dream were sort of … um … private. Oh Merlin, she would die of embarrassment.

“This is so strange.” She muttered. Body-switching, shared dreams -- you would think they were part of a bad novel written by an unimaginative writer.

“Indeed.” He raised an eyebrow at her and she realized that she had cut him off.

“So, the furniture?” She prompted and he pulled her back into his arms.

“It is all from my parents’ house. Each piece has a happy memory associated with it. The couch is where my mother used to read, I would climb up and sleep next to her. The chairs are from my father’s study, they still smell a little of his experiments. The table was from the breakfast room where we would talk over our eggs and toast.” Hermione snuggled against him, imagining the child he had been with the loving and happy parents he had once had. His voice was so different when he talked about them, as though there was still that boy in there somewhere.

“So I take it that your great-aunt wasn’t very nice?” She asked, wondering how terribly the loss of such adored parents must have hit him.

“That woman is pure evil and when she dies I will throw a party.” His tone had gone venomous and cutting but he was clutching Hermione as if she were a talisman against his past. She clutched him back, wanting to defend him from the darkness, wishing she could go back and hold the little boy he had been.

“I’ll buy the whisky.” She muttered and he buried his face in her hair. Hermione imagined a few fairly inventive horrible deaths for the old lady who had made Severus’ life so unhappy.

“I am very glad that you are back.” He responded gently and stroked her hair. It was about as close to a verbal declaration of love as he had made so far. He was comfortable writing it out, even implying it, but he had yet to actually say the three words to her together in a sentence in the correct order.

Strangely, Hermione found that she didn’t mind. All the things he had done far outweighed any words he might have said. He was a man of action, she mused.

They stood there for long moments until Hermione recognized a singular fact. She had graduated, they were alone and they both had way too many clothes on. She decided to remedy that last part.

Despite her long talks with her mother, she was still a virgin and there was a moment of panicked confusion as she tried to figure out how to seduce a man. She thought about the man in question and decided that her usual methods with him would work best. She’d try honesty and see where that got her.

“Do you think we could got to bed now?” she asked tentatively and with a bright red face. It was a far braver moment for her than anything she had done on the battlefield. Severus looked at her with an expression that set her skin to tingling and she was relieved to find that honesty really was the best policy.

“I think we could arrange that.” He murmured back to her and she discovered that his voice could do things to her down low that she hadn’t imagined could be done with just words. It was quite a revelation and she gathered that as much power as she had over him, he had an equal amount of power over her. It was heady stuff indeed.