To Save A Serpent

“You’re going to be late,” he whispered against her ear.

Hermione shot up from the bed, eyes wide, glancing around the room in a panic. He had been right there, his lips on her ear, she had felt him. Panting, and feeling that she had broken out into a cold sweat, she sighed and fell back onto his pillows. Her night had been filled with peculiar dreams but that had not been a dream, of that she was certain. She had heard him, he had warned her. Tossing her eyes over to the timepiece on his nightstand, she muttered a foul string of curses.

She’d overslept and was expected in the Great Hall in less than an hour. Hermione did not need less than an hour, she needed a life time, for she felt that no matter what she said it would not do him justice. It seemed only appropriate that she was donned in all black, a set of his fancier dress robes, transfigured to look slightly more feminine. Her hair was slicked back, pinned at the base, and she wore no make-up, though she never did.

The Great Hall was filled with a dull roar of people gathered to pay their respects, mostly the survivors of the battle, and her eyes fell to the onyx casket at the head where the staff table normally rested. It was closed, and various bouquets of flowers had been strewn over it. There were flowers and planted flora all along the platform and a lectern lit with candles just in front of the casket but off to the side.

Harry was standing with his arm around Ginny and the appeared to be in rapid discussion. She strained her ears to hear as she approached them.

“I don’t know either, Ginny, but God help us if Hermione finds out.”

“She shouldn’t have any reason to, everything is settled and as long as no one says anything, it should be fine.”

“If you say so—”

“What is it that no one is supposed to tell me about?” Hermione demanded, stamping her foot down. “What?”

“Nothing,” Harry lied. Ginny’s eyes fell, first passing over the coffin and then to the floor.

Unfortunately for her, Hermione was particularly perceptive. She followed Ginny’s quick gaze to the coffin. “Why is it closed casket? His wounds were healed.”

“Wizards don’t have open casket,” Ginny said.

Although this was most likely true, as the images of Dumbledore’s respects service came to mind, she didn’t seem to believe her friend. “Ginny, why is the casket closed?”

No one answered her. Storming past them both, she grabbed piles of the flowers that were heaped on top Severus’ coffin and began tossing them aside. “Hermione, no!” Harry shouted. The hall fell silent, all eyes on her as she flipped the latches and hoisted the heavy half lid open.

Hermione fell backward, grasping her chest, sobs tearing through her mouth. “What have you done?” she shrieked, eyes searching first for Harry then to Ginny and then to anyone else who dared to look at her.

“Hermione we—”

“He just wasn’t there!” Ginny said, firm and trying to hold her ground against her emotionally unstable friend. “Harry went down this morning with Minerva to see that he was laid right in the casket, but his body was gone.”

“What do you mean gone?” she shrieked.

Minerva McGonagall had pushed her way through the crowd and come up behind the girl. Both hands came to Hermione’s shoulders. “My dear, Hermione, please, don’t make a fuss, we’re all baffled…”

“Baffled?” her voice was a high pitched squeal. “You were going to bury this casket and let everyone believe he was inside it! God only knows what’s happened to him!” Minerva tried to calm her but she wrenched free of the older witch’s hands. “Get off me!” and she stomped down from the platform, pushing through the crowd, desperately trying to get away.

Something horrible had happened to his body, she knew it. And they were merely lying. Some sick fuck had done something terrible to him. She found herself just outside the main entrance, her knees pulled up to her chest and her head in her hands. There was a chill that swept over her, all too similar to those she had felt in the shrieking shack. At once she pulled her head up, eyes searching, but she saw nothing, just the bleak gray grounds standing still.

“Hermione,” Ginny called, “Hermione!” She moved down the steps and sat beside her, putting a firm arm around her shoulder. “Look, I know—” she halted her words, unsure how to continue on, knowing she was treading on very thing ice. “Hermione, I’m not going to pretend to understand it, because I don’t. But whatever you felt for him that was your thing. You’re grieving for him that much I do understand, I’ve lost a brother—”

“So what, Ginny, you’ve got five others! There was only one of him!”

The redhead’s eyes filled with tears. She sprang to her feet and took off running back into the castle.

“Ginny, wait! I didn’t mean—” Hermione bit her lower lip until she drew blood. How could she have been so insensitive, so rude? The coppery fluid filled her mouth and she nearly gagged, the overpowering scent filling her nostrils and reminding of her of the shack, of all his blood that she’d cleaned from his robes. She still hadn’t figured out how his body had gotten from the bed to the floor and managed to dress itself, but everything in her mind was blurry.

Trembling, she forced herself to her feet. With hurried steps, she took off almost in a sprint, heading toward the lake, and didn’t stop running until she was beneath a very low hanging willow, tears still streaming down her face.

~*~

“Out after hours again, Miss Granger?” his lips pressed against the back of her ear, one hand winding around her stomach the other tilting her head back against his chest.

“Professor!” she yelped and turned around in his arms. It was highly uncharacteristic of him to touch her in such an intimate way in such a public space. The branches of the willow tree hung very low, but once you crawled beneath them, there was almost an alcove made in their umbrage where two people could stand and be alone together. Her eyes twinkled up at him and her lips met his at once.

“I think a detention may be in order, this is the fourth time I’ve caught you out past curfew this week…” his voice was very quiet and she shivered against him.

With a bit of a smirk, a very un-Gryffindor-like smirk, Hermione drew her wand and cast several charms around them, disillusionment included. “Yes, well if my lover would stop wandering the corridors at all hours of the night…” It sounded strange, to refer to him in such a playful manner, but it kept their relationship strong, never taking anything to serious, always physical, always intimate.

His arms were around her, pulling her closer to him. “And does your lover know you’re being a rather naughty young woman out here with a dour old man?”

She couldn’t help but snort. “Shut it, Severus,” she whispered and kneeled down, fingers going to the zipper of his trousers, but he stilled both her hands with his left. “What?” she quirked a brow and then gave her best attempt at looking innocent.

“Miss Granger…” he practically slapped a firm scowl over his lips and she had to bite her lip to keep from bursting into a fit of giggles. It was rather sexy when he attempted to play the angry professor and she the naughty student, though they’d only recently started that, and had stayed away from it for a while due to their last encounter with the scenario. They both had been rather insistent that she be thrown back over one of the desks in the potions room and be ravished until she was sore, which had resulted in a splinter in her arse, leaving her in bed for a full twelve hour recovery which she had been none too happy about.

Within moments she’d forced his trousers and boxers down around his ankles and had his bum backed up against the rough bark of the tree. But her lips were slowly suckling at the tip of his weeping erection and all thoughts of the rather uncomfortable tree were quickly forgotten. “I suppose as punishment…” she said, twirling her tongue in flitting passes over his length. “I should…go to the potions classroom and scrub some cauldrons…” swiveling her head back, she released his tip and pouted.

He tried his best to growl at her, but only managed a groan when she thrust his cock into her mouth, sucking him back to the recesses of her hot, tight throat. It did not take long with her intricate lip work and subtle finger teasing at his testicles to have him arching hard into her mouth, fingers tangled tightly in her hair.

“Gods,” he panted, fucking her throat. “Merlin, sweet Circe!”

All she could do was smirk, and suck harder, swiveling her head about in a figure-eight like motion, her tongue making rapid strokes around him while the pad of her thumb stroked along that sliver of flesh that led back between his bum cheeks.

A howling hiss escaped him as she prodding her thumb into his tight pucker, his eyes wide, suddenly rolling back into his head. Her thumb was replaced by her index and then two fingers, slipping inside him to tickle that sensitive spot on his prostate. She could feel him swelling inside her, pressing hard against the back of her throat, and it took all she had to keep breathing and not gag.

With both fingers pulsing against his prostate, Severus came rolling over his climax, pushing hard down her throat, pumping hot seed into her. Both of his hands gripped the bark, scraping his skin and he kept from crying out, only by biting down on his tongue, drawing even more blood.

When she’d swallowed it all, she gently laved her tongue over his member, cleaning him and letting him regain himself. A moment passed while he stood there panting, eyes still closed, half fluttering. Licking her lips she looked up at him, waiting. After recovering his breath he quickly fixed his trousers back into place before pulling her close to him, wrapping the long folds of his black cloak around her. “It’s late,” his breath was warm against her ear. “We should retire to bed…”

“Have I worn you out already?” she teased and kissed his lips.

“I said retire to bed, not to sleep.” The tell tale Slytherin smirk crept across his lips. With an almost eager grin on her own lips, Hermione nuzzled into his side, well hidden beneath the billowing folds of his cloak as they made their way back toward the castle. She longed to ask a thousand questions. Why had he been so willing to let her have him under that tree in such a public place? What had he been doing outside? Though she supposed most of the answers didn’t matter because she was tucked along side him and would stay so for the rest of the night.

~*~

She sniffled, leaning against the willow tree eyes falling to several spots of bark had been ripped away in their trysts. Hogwarts needed to burn to the ground, else she needed to get away from it forever because every last thing reminded her of him. The thought of a several bottles of Draught of the Living Dead came to mind, but did not linger long as a silvery light seemed to catch the corner of her eye.

Before she could be certain the thing had vanished in the general direction of the castle and Hermione stomped her foot in frustration. But she had hardly slept and was overwhelmed with grief, there was no way that the silver flash could have been what she thought it was. Resolving herself to gathering what few things she had inside the castle and leaving immediately there after forever, she began a long and tiring path back up the hill.

But again her eyes saw it, the almost blinding flash of silver, dashing toward the tiny alcove near the back of the castle, the one that led to the side exit for the dungeons. She dared not hope, not wanting to over excite her heart, and when the flash did not reappear and no doe had made itself visible, she hung her head and moved on, trudging through the entrance foyer.

It was not the stunned silence that unnerved her as she approached the Great Hall, but rather a sense of great foreboding. And before she could even wrench open the doors, they came flying at her, a blur of red and freckles clashing into her. “Oh!” Ginny cried, and then straightened herself up, shaking her head to clear her focus. “Hermione! He’s alive!”