AU: Voldemort has been defeated, a new Dark force reigns, and Snape is still alive. Warnings for graphic language, mature theme, kinda-sorta dub-/non-con?, and one very unrecognizable character shift. You've been warned.


They said everyone had darkness within. They said there could be no light without the dark. They said sometimes, one had to embrace the darkness in order to defeat it. Severus had never believed any of it, until the day they dragged him before the one who had vanquished the Dark Lord once and for all.

"Kill him," she instructed his captors without a second glance. Perhaps it was the boredom in her tone; perhaps it was the lazy flick of her wrist as she dismissed him; perhaps he was desperately clinging to some kernel of good remembrance that he hoped she might harbor for him deep, deep down. Perhaps it was even—loathe as he was to admit it—a spark of some sinister, traitorous arousal for this twisted being before him that compelled him. Whatever it was, it stirred him enough to choke out a plea.

"Don't," he wheezed, his voice still struggling with the ravages to his throat. "Please—I beg you—I shall do anything."

"Anything?" she drawled, just the right amount of curious and amused. The Crucio hit him with malevolent force, and he acknowledged his surprise that she had actually done it. That the tales of her cold ruthlessness were true. He had hoped, just the tiniest bit... But the next hex took his breath away, and with it, his ability to think of anything beyond the excruciating pain.

Abruptly the pain ceased and a euphoric high settled over him. He wanted to fight it off but found he was powerless to the utter bliss seeping into his very bones. He gazed up at the girl—woman—who even now had not stirred from her throne. She was paler than he remembered; more gaunt and battle-scarred, too. Yet the power shrouding her called to him more than any siren's song. His cock twitched just before the pleasure switched once more to pain. He heard her laughter as his vision went black.

Eventually—or perhaps quickly, he had no idea—the pain subsided and he was left lying on the unforgiving stone floor, his body numb and his mind empty. No one paid him any heed, if the echoing sounds of footsteps and queenly orders being issued were any indication. Severus slowly became aware of a warm liquid pooling by his ear and a draft of cold air blowing across one bared leg.

Very, very gingerly, he pushed himself to his hands and knees. Blood ran down his face and dripped off his nose. He swallowed with great difficulty, wishing for the thousandth time he had been able to see a Healer after Nagini's attack. But the circumstances had not allowed it and now he was forced to live with the ruin. When the floor stopped swimming in his vision, he raised his head to look at the slip of a girl who had brought him to this newest low.

"I knew you would come to me. And here you are."

When their eyes connected, he felt the tendrils of her magic probing at his mind, and in his extreme exhaustion he allowed it. He didn't know what she might be looking for—he had no valuable information to provide, not anymore; he couldn't even summon up the proper feelings of survival or will to carry on. At present, his only concerns were dulling the pain in his throat and wondering what in the name of Merlin's balls could have brought Hogwarts' star pupil and companion of Harry Potter to this point.

To be sure, the Hermione Granger he had known—forever ago, it seemed now—would have fainted dead away had she even considered casting a Crucio. The creature staring disdainfully back at him now, however... He began to shudder when the thoughts of the curses used upon him mere moments ago resurfaced, and he shoved them away as best he could. The tremor remained.

No. This person, this witch—she was Hermione Granger as much as he was. That girl had gone, and in her place a cruel and unfeeling sorceress had arisen. He'd heard the rumors, of course, about her rampage after Harry's body was carried from the forest. He'd even silently applauded her grit when he heard, entirely confidentially of course, that she had dabbled in Dark magic in her quest to confront Voldemort. But he hadn't believed, not really, that she had sunk quite so low—or risen quite so high, depending on your point of view—on her path to vengeance.

The evidence now sat before him, however, lithe legs sprawled carelessly upon her seat. Former Death Eaters and Order members alike cowered against the walls of her command center, awaiting her instruction and hoping to avoid torture, which she allegedly doled out for her amusement as much as for punishment. Her hair, that damnably bushy mane, fairly crackled with her power—it was her one feature that remained largely unchanged. The eyes, albeit the same brown, were a bit more sunken now and much, much more devoid of emotion than Severus would ever have cared to imagine.

Despite everything, he found his gaze roving over her frame hungrily. After years of toiling for Voldemort and Dumbledore, he knew how rare it was to be in the presence of such magic, such control, such supremacy. He'd meant it when he'd offered her anything in exchange for his life: he knew she hadn't misunderstood his proposition. And he couldn't help but wonder what it must be like to surrender one's body to such a magnificently terrifying creature. He began to grow hard again as the images played across his mind.

With the speed of a Snitch she had risen and stalked towards him, stopping only when he had tilted his head all the way back to see her face.

"You think you would enjoy being mine, Severus Snape?" she asked him, almost angrily. The silence in the cavernous room was deafening as her subjects watched with bated breath. His neck was starting to crick but he could not look away from the fire in her eyes and the caricature of a grin on her mouth. Up close she was even more beautiful and horrible, the Dark magic within her manifested in the greyish tint to her skin and the bloodless color of her lips. He wondered whether she would ultimately take him, or not; whether it would be painful, pleasurable, or both; and whether she would use that magic to do things he could only dream of.

She must have seen his thoughts writ across his face, or maybe she was still buried in his mind. All he knew was that she suddenly sombered and, with a slight gesture of her wand, lifted him up until he was floating mid-air before her, arms outstretched and unable to move.

"So you want to play with magic?" She prowled around him, her wand twitching as the lights dimmed and ugly purple strands of light spilled from the tip. "Perhaps, Professor, you should know what you're falling for."

Lightning crackled all around them. She raised her hands and it seemed as though the room was spinning—or maybe he and she were spinning—smoke surrounded them, blocking everything else from sight except Hermione. In the eerie glow she appeared nearly ethereal, like a goddess or demon come to Earth. She laughed maniacally and the sound grated, but he was frozen in place, unable to clap his hands against his ears or look away. Not that he'd want to—as more magic spilled out of her he became more and more aroused.

"Careful, Professor. You better choose carefully. I'm capable of anything and everything."

Agony and bliss now hit him simultaneously, and so forcefully that he nearly threw up and ejaculated at the same time. The feelings were unlike any he had ever known. Still he was frozen in place, sick with pain and painfully hard. The spinning became faster and Hermione seemed to meld with the swirling purple until she was half-human, half-vapor. The ground shook and the floor opened up, revealing a dark chasm that led Merlin only knew where. Probably to the center of the Earth, or straight to Hell. Cuts opened all along his arms, new blood mingling with the older splatters from before. In his head he was forced to relive all his worst memories, all his nightmares, all his greatest moments of triumph—all at once. It was more dizzying than the spinning.

He could see, now, how she had become addicted to the Dark side of her own nature. He could tell from her expression that she'd enjoyed every last moment of revenge that she'd inflicted on the Dark Lord before she'd brutally murdered him. There was no swotty Gryffindor know-it-all left—only the most powerful witch that their world had possibly ever seen or would ever see again. And he wondered what she'd had to give up to obtain such magical might.

Abruptly everything stopped. He fell to the ground, broken and battered and pumped full of a desire to take her against the rough stone. She approached until the swirl of her robes brushed his forehead.

"Well? Do you dare to make me your one and only, Severus? Just don't make me your enemy. Once you're mine, there's no going back."

Using his last ounce of energy, he drug himself forward to place a groveling kiss on her feet. "Anything," he whispered again.


A/N: Well, that is by far the darkest thing I've ever written. I have no explanation other than listening to Katy Perry's Dark Horse on repeat for a long car drive. I have enjoyed imagining Hermione as this angry, vengeful lunatic-after all, she's the best of the age.

I'm not JK Rowling. [insert legally defensible disclaimer here]