Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. I own nothing. Apart from maybe Hoggy's soul. This one's for you! ;)
Summary: "And what stories of absurdity were tainted by his deranged mind?" "Capricious accounts of werewolves and vampires." Hermione returns to Severus, and many things have changed, especially with her. Maybe in her final moments she can be happy again.
Pairing: HG/SS
Author's Note: I wanted to try something different in between all my other fics, and this emerged. Con crit is very welcome, as is chocolate... Enjoy!
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To See the Sun"Severus."
The seductive whisper of such a simple word had never elicited such a reaction. Fear, shock, arousal, suspicion. His head snapped up, the quill he was writing with falling to the table as his attention was wrenched back to reality.
"Hermione," he replied, his voice clipped.
He watched her with a steady gaze as she slinked out of the shadows from the corridor, although his classroom was hardly much lighter. Her eyes danced with an amused fire as she studied him, and she exuded confidence as she slowly walked over to the desk.
As much as he tried, he couldn't help but inspect her fully, taking in her pale skin, her chocolate eyes that shimmered with golden specks, her ruby red lips nibbling enticingly on her bottom lip. His fingers itched to caress her cheeks, to entwine themselves in her hair.
But he knew he couldn't.
"Well, Severus, it's been so long..."
She twisted a stray curl of hair around her finger provocatively and pouted at his silence.
This isn't the Hermione I knew, Severus reminded himself. This isn't her.
"Too long," she added. Pulling out her wand from inside her robes, she muttered a charm, never breaking eye contact. Severus heard the lock of the door click shut, and she put her wand away with a mischievous grin.
"I believe it was you who went away," Severus said.
"Yes, well," she sighed offhandedly, waving a hand airily. "You know what they say, that a break often does wonders. Besides, I'm back now."
"Yes. Yes you are," he replied sadly.
"After all this time I thought you'd be a little more... enthusiastic."
"Hermione, it has been nine months since you went missing. I got used to the idea of you being dead a long time a go."
Hermione blinked, then tilted her head back as she laughed in mirth. The sound shook him, making him feeling claustrophobic in her presence.
"Do you not want to know where I've been?"
"I know you'll tell me eventually," he said quietly, trying to get the full measure of her. Her self-confidence in abundance and her eerie, commanding air unsettled him. This isn't her.
A few steps closer, the tap of her heels reverberating around the dungeon. Closer still, until he had to look up at her.
"I've missed you, you know," she said lightly with just a trace of sadness to tinge her words. "Those long, cold nights on my own. No doubt you felt the same. We're not that much different anymore, both dead inside." A smile played on her lips as she cupped his cheeks with her hands. "When I entered the forest, I thought I was so close to catching him. I wasn't bothered about bringing a much needed success story home for the Ministry, just about the satisfaction of knowing he was dead."
"Pettigrew's been found since. He had some interesting tales to tell," Severus added after a slight pause.
"Indeed?" Hermione said with mock surprise. "Tell me, Severus. Tell me of his fanciful tales."
He ignored her fingers idly stroking his hair, playing with it in mild fascination, and said in his well practised voice of calm, "Tales of how he had been in hiding ever since the Dark Lord had fallen, of how almost two years in solitude had nearly driven him to madness."
"Madness," she echoed, the word rolling of her tongue as if it was something delicious. "And what stories of absurdity were tainted by his deranged mind?"
He hated being manipulated like this. She was always the only one that could bend him to her will and make him conform to whatever rules she wanted to play by. Her little puppet, waiting for her command, always entertaining. Not many people knew she had such a vindictive side to her.
"Hmm?" she said, encouraging his answer.
Losing her friends, her family, the world that she knew... Such things will always change a person. And not always for the better.
"Capricious accounts of werewolves and vampires," he said. That's what she wanted to hear.
"Tell me, Severus, should I believe these fantasies?"
"You tell me," he replied, sick of playing such games. She chuckled gently in response.
"I guess fiction is based on fact. Certain parts are true."
She eyed him delicately, choosing her next move. With nimble fingers she unfastened his robes and pushed them aside, then set about undoing his trousers.
Severus just sat there, powerless, unable to move, even if he wanted to. His mental protests of This isn't the real her and How can I let myself stoop this low? were cut short as she ran her fingers gently down his length.
After so long he was incredibly responsive, and Hermione grinned then straddled him. She used to satisfy him first, used to gain pleasure from his gratification, but now it was straight to the act. Hitching up her skirt, she eased onto him, and he barely had time to process the thought that she had no knickers on.
She had come prepared, knowing her mere presence would knock him in to submission after nine, long months of loneliness. She knew that he would not have found someone else. After all, it had taken him so many years to find her, to love her.
"Severus," she hissed as she rocked on him, slowly at first, revelling at the feeling of him inside of her once again. Her sharp nail clawing into his back were nothing to distract the pain from that inside, though.
"Stop."
It was clear that she hadn't been told what to do in a long time. She tensed and froze, a mixture of shock and incomprehension in her gaze. But she'd be lying if she said that she didn't want someone to take control, that she felt comfortable in such a dominant role. And they both knew it.
"Stop," he repeated, although it was more a request that an order. His mind narrowly overcame his mind as she slid off him and staggered back into his desk, lips pursed together, eyes frantically looking anywhere but at him.
"What are you doing here?" he asked, carefully moving his hand to cover his unsatisfied erection.
"I thought that that was obvious," she laughed harshly.
"This isn't you, Hermi-"
"How do you know?" she cried fiercely, at last bringing herself to look at him in the eye. "How do you know, Severus?"
"Because I loved you. You."
And that was when it happened. All her quelled insecurities, her hidden fears, her darkest secrets, that was when they finally caught up to her and reduced her to nothing more than a scared little girl stood trapped in despair.
She sagged and sat back against the edge of the table and covered her face with trembling hands. Finally, he saw that her face wasn't artistically pale, but white with ill health, not unlike Lupin between his transformations, and her blood red nail varnish was chipped, declaring neglect.
"Dammit, Severus. Only you- only you can do this to me," she hissed and inhaled a shaky breath. "Only you."
"And only you can do so many things to me. But you already know that," he added with a self-deprecating tinge to his voice, reverting back to a sneer.
"I knew you wouldn't get over me," she replied from behind her fingers, although they weren't there to hide the tears shimmering in her eyes, but to act as a barricade, to hide herself from the only man that could ever truly read her. "I knew you wouldn't get over me, Severus, not even if you thought I was dead."
"And why wouldn't I? Because I'm some hopeless romantic that needs to hold on to some long gone ghost of romance to feel a purpose in life to see me through the day? Hardly," he laughed humourlessly.
"No," she whispered. "Because I haven't got over you."
It was his turn to look away. Thoughts comprised of so many truths he didn't want to hear bombarded him, tried to reason why the situation was such a bad idea, and why the fleeting fantasies his deep desires composed had so many wrong possibilities. But all he could think was that she was here again, stood before him, offering herself.
"I can't do this."
"Why not?" she whimpered softly. "Just give me one little thing. Do one thing for me."
"I- I can't."
"What kind of a reason is that?" The words were meant to hurt, but the tone was almost pleading.
Severus shook his head and replied eventually, "I don't want this person you're trying to be. This falsely confident, this overly rash being. It took me years to love you, and you're acting like someone else."
"I'll never be the same again, Severus," she whispered, "but I'm not all gone."
"Then that's what I what. You."
"Then what are you waiting for?"
He eyed her, stood there before him. They both wanted each other, and that was painfully clear. He wasn't sure if he still loved her, but his heart was beating fiercely in his chest. He wasn't sure what to do, and his conscience was screaming. Torn apart over what some would consider an easy decision...
What would happen if he did, though? I guess we'll find that out in the morning.
He put a hand either side of her, trapping her against the desk, and kissed her lips hard, with a haste that told of desperation. Down over her jaw line, down her neck, and to what once was a perfect stretch of skin, now corrupted with the scars of two puncture marks.
Hermione didn't allow him to dwell on the horrors forming in his mind at the confirmation, and wriggled free at his hesitation and pressed his head against her, encouraging him, and moaned as he nipped at a sensitive spot.
She began to trail her hand down his stomach, but he caught it in his.
"Not here."
She looked up at him in surprise, but smiled devilishly and allowed him to lead the way. Through his office, a small door, and into his quarters they stumbled, never breaking contact. Up against the old wall, the coolness of the stone making her shiver against Severus' hot body, she began to unbutton his shirt.
He helped her strip off his robes and shirt and set about unfasten her shirt buttons, but she ripped them off and threw it to the floor. She pressed up against him, nipping at his neck, making him painfully aware of what they were doing, of how close she was to being his demise, yet his hands still slid down her back, and still pulled down the zip, and still eased it over her hips to let it pool on the floor around her ankles.
Maybe he didn't care if he died. He was fairly certain that no body else would.
He guided passionate, bushy-haired, clever Hermione into his bedroom and onto the oh so familiar, inviting, memory provoking bed, and pushed his annoying, rebellious thoughts out of his mind.
There, where there were no barriers or prying eyes or limitations, they allowed themselves to be themselves, to be open, to be free.
- - -
When Severus woke up, he found the bed empty beside him. He frowned back the oncoming headache, as the onslaught of memories and 'what he should have done's hit him.
He slipped out of bed and padded quietly out of the room and into his living room. Dodging the piles of clothing on the floor, he picked up the note left for him.
Fingering the edges of the folded parchment hesitantly, he wondered what it would say. That she was sorry? Hardly. That she had gone? Probably, but her clothes were still there.
Sighing in resignation, he opened it up.
I've gone to watch the sunrise.
Severus blinked. Sunrise. It only took a few moments for just what that meant to sink in.
He dressed hastily, resolve pounding through his veins. He didn't stop to guess how his shoe ended up where it was in the haze of last night, or when exactly the passion had caused Hermione to bite him on his shoulder. All that was irrelevant.
He grabbed a handful of Floo powder and was soon hastily mounting the spiral steps, climbing ever closer, ever nearer.
At the top of the tower, he burst through the door and into the fresh air. It was still dark, but on the far horizon, the beginnings of daylight looked soon to appear.
"How did you know I would be here?"
She wasn't angry, but her voice was melancholy and low.
"The Astronomy Tower is the highest, it has the best view," Severus replied.
He hovered near the door for a moment, watching her stood there, one of his simple white sheets draped around her loosely, her mass of hair rippling in the breeze. He smiled slightly as he savoured the look of her against the backdrop of the ever lightening sky, then moved closer.
She felt him wrap his arms around her, and leant back against his chest, tucking her head underneath his chin.
His heart beat resounded around his chest, his blood pumped through his veins. His soul, although certainly marred by uncountable atrocities, was still there, a part of him.
"I have to do this, Severus," she said, her voice barely audible.
Of course she had to, he reasoned to himself, and although it was a start, a small bit of acceptance flared within him at the inevitable. Maybe they shouldn't have been so blind and got together quicker. Maybe she shouldn't have gone off on that Ministry assignment to find Pettigrew. Maybe last night was a mistake. Maybe he should have said no and summoned his last remaining shreds of will powers.
He hadn't expected to see her ever again, but all those mistakes and possibilities were all irrelevant, too, now.
She tensed in his arms, and he forced himself to look at the horizon. Tendrils of lightness flickered into view.
Pulling her tighter, closer, as if it would make any difference, he pressed a kiss to her temple, and in response she put her hand over his and gripped it tightly.
Severus closed his eyes as the first seconds of true sunlight came. The pressure of the body pressed against him faded as she was obliterated, and he let the ashes fall through his fingers. Last whips of dust encircled him on the breeze, swirling around him as their last embrace.- Fin
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I've wanted to try vampire!Hermione and, well, slightlyderanged!Hermione for a while. Now, please don't flame me for trying something new. Be nice. :)
Thanks for reading. Review?!