So, this is pretty much just a bunch of crazy not-quite-fluff written at the behest of a challenge given to me by a friend. So, thank her. Also, this is an alternate to Chapter 8 (Scorpio) of my other Sinistra/Snape piece, Some with Traps. You don't necessarily have to have read it first for this to make sense, but I can't not recommend it. Also, rating is M. Bet you can't guess why.

Oh yes, and I don't own, so don't sue.

First off, she couldn't believe she was doing this. It was crazy. Like, Bellatrix Lestrange crazy.

And she would know—she'd watched the woman fawn all over Lucius Malfoy back in school. If chasing after that prick of a man wasn't crazy, then she didn't know what was.

But to the matter at hand: it was actually rather out-of-character for her, considering she didn't usually like to do anything that might put her on Dumbledore's bad side. And since she wasn't strictly sure Dumbledore even had a bad side, it was a testament to how truly insane what she was about to do really was.

Yeah. It was that bad.

The good news was that she knew what she was doing, for a change. The little glass flask in her pocket was proof enough.

She had gotten an Excellent on her Potions O.W.L., after all, and she was not one to let him forget.

It was almost too easy, really—all she had to do was slip the flask out, uncork it, pour it in…voila. Even the greatest wizard in the world wouldn't be able to detect something that was both odorless and tasteless…unless he was paranoid enough to cast about ten different revealing spells on every item he consumed.

Since she saw Snape eat near every day, she knew for a fact that he was not.

The very second the china touched his lips, she had to swallow a rather unexpected guilt.

But there was no other way. She needed answers.

It was that look that really did it for her, though—the look just before the plunge, clouded and slightly confused, but recognition nonetheless…betrayal. She found herself having to take very deep breaths as she dragged him to the armchair in the corner and strapped him to it, because he hadn't even been angry.

And, Merlin, she'd take anger any day as compared to what she'd seen—to what it was doing to her. It was unnatural.

At the conclusion of her last knot, checking the tension, she heard a static echo somewhere in the distance like thunder, and it set the mood for the overcast brimming in her heart.

Next was another flask, somewhat smaller than the first. She tilted his head back and stopped when she felt the gentle absence of resistance, knowing well the danger associated with shoving even small quantities of liquid down an unconscious man's throat like a sink drain.

No, she wouldn't have his blood on her hands. Years of handling telescopes and charting stars had made her careful and precise—at least, when she truly wanted to be.

She needed to wake him up.

The difficulties therein weren't exactly something she'd say was precedented, but neither had she foreseen another way. She needed him to be at least semi-conscious, which was slightly problematic, and that was that.

Working fast held no room for regretting how much draught she'd used. Such distractions were not allowed.

Therefore, she began with the simplest method available: shaking his shoulders and calling his name. Which awarded her with a bit of a snore and was, to be completely honest, a lot more like regression than progress.

Secondly, the water—a chilled, dripping glass of it filled generously to the top. The redeeming factor was that he groaned a little, under his breath, which was better than nothing, yet the dissatisfying downside was the utter soaking of his face, some of his hair, and most of the front of his robes.

Thirdly, and she had to wince, the slap.

"I'm sorry," Aurora confessed, "but you probably deserve it anyway."

It didn't sound at all like what she would've imagined—more like a wet smack, and she flinched again when his head jerked sideways. She'd never in her life slapped a soul, and it was oddly invigorating…even if the intended party wasn't precisely awake for it.

Except, sadly, there were no signs of consciousness to speak of apart from a mild movement of his lips and lowering of his brow.

"Oh, to hell with it."

She was running low on options.

Although she couldn't have said it was something she wanted to do (certainly not something she fantasized about, or anything), she couldn't deny that revulsion was probably the best way to induce consciousness upon Severus Snape, besides some spell that Madam Pomfrey knew and she did not.

With this in mind, Aurora took the opportunity to cautiously position herself in the center of his lap, facing him (no small feat), and cupped a hand to the side of his face as she steeled herself for what was to come.

It was just a kiss. No big deal.

He probably wouldn't even feel it, anyway.

Just a kiss.

There was an eternity between the moment where she sat peering across at him and the moment she gathered the resolve to lean forward, and in it she felt the dampness beneath her fingertips, the heat of his breath on her face and his body beneath her, the contrast of a cool draft creeping past from somewhere on the left, and then the tickle of his hair, ends sharpened with wetness, against her skin.

At first, he made no movement to respond; a suggestion that she'd have to do better than a chaste little peck.

And so she shut out all feelings of disgust, threw away resolve, stopped thinking, and felt.

Felt herself ply into him, felt their noses collide (on account of how large his was, of course), felt him make a noise beneath her, felt something warm pool in her stomach, and felt herself reach up to grasp…what? His hair? His collar?

Both, she decided in a split-second, and the feather-touch of his flickering eyelashes alerted her to her success.

And suddenly, he was kissing her back, pulling her forward in a way she wasn't quite sure how, but neither did she stop to think about it. She probably couldn't even if she tried, seeing as she was having a spot of trouble focusing on any one thing in particular.

It was like magic. Real magic. Not the kind that stirred pots, or enchanted brooms, or even got into people's heads…but the kind between two people in a moment neither can precisely predict, the kind that a person was born with that sits, dormant and innate, waiting for that moment to be released.

Like laughter shared between friends, voluminous, without a clue as to its true origin. Like that connection that lighted up a whole room, that brought a smile to every face.

Like the way she had trouble breathing for the way his lips moved on hers, even though she was pretty sure that up until now she'd basically hated him.

"Severus," she finally said when she could pull back, because it was the only thing she could say.

To look at him, he was still half-asleep, and speechless. Which was so much of an accomplishment she could've cried, because, where she was concerned, Snape always had something to say. And it usually wasn't good.

This time, for the longest time, he just stared. Just stared. No glaring, no scowling, no sneering, none of it.

And then she remembered.

"Oh. Um. Drink this."

He didn't accept or refuse the proposal, but it wasn't like he had much choice in the matter, either. As she lifted the second flask to his lips and poured it into his mouth, he could only swallow.

That, or spit it pleasantly out into her face—and she was spectacularly glad that he didn't.

There was a crease in his brow that appeared even before he drank, right when the thick potion entered past his teeth, and when he was finished he surprised her by saying, in more of a whisper, "Veritaserum, Aurora?"

Naturally, he knew. He would know. He knew…and yet he drank anyway.

…why?

"Well, yes," she cringed apologetically. "Sorry."

His eyelids lowered in what she thought was supposed to be a glare, but she couldn't really be sure. "You are, without doubt, the worst perpetrator in existence. Do not apologize to your victims; you will see no mercy from them."

"I don't have victims, Severus, I have you. And I'm not trying to be a…a…perpetrator. I just want answers."

He inclined his head to her, sporting a look that might have otherwise been challenging. "Surprising as it may be, there are things of which even I do not have a firm grasp. I suggest you ask your questions wisely."

It must have been the veritaserum talking, for him to have admitted a thing like that. But Merlin, she must have been out of her mind, because she couldn't get that feeling, his lips on hers, out of her head. And what was more, she wanted it—wanted to do it again.

She had to have gone round the bend. There was no other explanation. She was completely and utterly insane, and needed to be hauled off to St. Mungo's immediately.

"So you're just going to…let me do this? I mean, you're not even going to convince me that this is really stupid? …you knew what it was, so why in Merlin's name did you drink it?"

He smirked, and the lip-movement gave fuel to her plight. "On the contrary, this may be one of the more admirable actions you have taken. You are unexpectedly capable in the art of potion-making. Furthermore, I cannot pretend I am not the slightest bit intrigued by what questions you may think to ask."

Intrigued. He was Intrigued.

Dear Merlin…

And she was still in his lap, still with her fingers curled somewhere at the nape of his neck.

"Er—alright. You aren't, um…uncomfortable, are you? Like, this doesn't hurt?"

She was offered a flat sort of look in response to this, and the air on her cheeks indicated the length of his next exhalation. "Aurora, you have bound me to a cushioned armchair. Although I would prefer mobility, I assure you I am hardly in agony."

Of course. "But…your ropes aren't too tight?"

"No. Conversely, they are quite easily escapable. Might I suggest the use of a spell next time—the full body bind, perhaps?"

Cheeky as always, even under the influence of two separate potions.

"Next time? How often do you think I take people captive? This isn't exactly a weekly thing for me!"

"Obviously, or you would be better at it."

"Well, let's see you do it any better!"

For a moment he became very still and she was sure she'd said something wrong…but then he made an odd movement she didn't quite understand, and somehow, his hands were on her back. He was picking her up, standing, walking…sweet stars, how had he done it?

She was left no time to ponder the matter as she was smoothly dropped onto a bed (since when was there a bed? How had she missed that?) with her wrists pinned above her, over her head.

"Believe me, I have," Snape said darkly, hovering somewhere over her. "Unlike you, I have taken lives—you would do well to remember it."

"Okay, okay—point taken." She didn't exactly like where this was going, or the way he was looking at her, or how that look sparked a quiet shiver that she did her best to suppress.

"Where is it, precisely, that you have taken me?" he asked bluntly, still firmly gripping her wrists.

"The Room of Requirement. …what? It's not like I could've done this anywhere else! You know how many pictures and nosy people and…house elves…there are in this castle! Besides, could you let go of me now, thanks?"

He looked a little indecisive, like he couldn't settle on if he wanted to or not, before finally releasing her and pulling back. It was actually very weird, considering this was Snape and all.

"Veritably, I do. I do not contest that it is a…reasonable notion."

"You know, I think I really like this veritaserum stuff—it makes you, like, ten times nicer. In fact, I think you should drink some every day."

Not to mention that such a circumstance could thoroughly ruin his whole triple-agent thing just a bit. Or that the implications of veritaserum making him nicer meant that he usually went out of his way to be as unpleasant and jerkish as possible.

Which, she really didn't want to think about why that was—why, truthfully, he wasn't nearly all that bad. Or why he felt the need to lie all of the time (in a sense) for covering up this fact.

Or was it just her he was absurdly hateful towards all of the time (with the exception of that Potter kid, because everyone knew how horrible the man was to that poor boy)?

Of course he was an evil bat to everyone, there was no getting past it, but…with her, it seemed to escalate somehow, like he was actually making a point to be disagreeable instead of just being that way to begin with.

On turning her attention back to him, she was startled at his expression. Rapt with concentration, he was studying her every nuance, penetrating sharp as steel straight to her core, where she felt something rise up. She wasn't used to anything like this, especially not from him, and it was singularly peculiar.

She started again at a crackle overhead, low and long that sent little aftershocks through the castle's foundation. The storm was brewing.

He blinked slowly in a way that reminded her of a snake, swallowing once before turning his stare on the mattress instead.

Aurora simply had to take a moment to reflect on the fact that the Room of Requirement had supplied them with a bed. Because, Merlin, it wasn't enough that Sprout already made a nuisance of herself by trying her utmost to conspire them into couple-hood—no, the room just had to be in on it, too.

And though she should've been balking in disgust, the truly terrifying part was that giving in was almost tempting.

"Tell me," Snape said simply. "Why are you wearing…"

Oh. That.

"A green dress?" A very short green dress? "Er—yes. About that. It was all Mona, I swear!"

It looked a lot like he didn't believe her, which wasn't surprising. She wouldn't have believed herself, either.

"No, honest. I mean, you know how she likes to play match-maker, and how she thinks we're secretly in love or something, right?" No response. "…right. Well, see, she found out that I was, um…coming to see you, and so…you don't really want to hear this story, do you?"

Because she didn't really want to tell it—wasn't up for that sort of embarrassment.

Snape shook his head slightly, giving her his back as he turned to face away, and the room was flooded an electric white as lightening split through the sky outside.

And suddenly, she couldn't take it anymore. Not the excuses, not the deception, not the arguments, the denial, the fear…none of it was acceptable or logical. None of it made sense.

Too long, they had played this game—a lilting dance, grazing past each opportunity on the wings of lies. Too much like wizards' chess, beaten and broken but never quite defeated—check, check, and check again but never that final stroke.

Well, she was through pretending it didn't exist. She was through ignoring the way he sometimes looked at her, through overlooking the way she complained about him but never stopped coming back, through neglecting the way that, despite their differences, they understood one another, and certainly through acting like she didn't care.

"Severus," she implored, not unkindly. He didn't turn around, didn't even move, but she could see the tension in his shoulders and she tried again. "Sev, why won't you face me?"

He said nothing, but she knew he must have been working on it because the serum would not allow mere silence to suffice. After several seconds, she came to him instead, and she could feel his muscles squirm at the hand she placed between his shoulder blades.

When she tried to turn him around, he didn't resist, but she wished he would've at least prepared her for what she saw, because the look in his eyes, as out of place as it was, was enough to freeze her insides cold and melt them all over again.

"You're insufferable," he half-glared into her, and it wasn't really an answer, but it was all he said.

"I couldn't agree more," she nodded sagely.

His eyes shut tight, and she saw his nostrils flare, but it was impossible to get a read on him—she'd never in her life seen him act this way before.

He might've said something—she saw his lips move—but she couldn't be sure because if he had, it was drowned entirely by the shock of thunder that reverberated in her bones.

Without bothering to ask about it, she settled for closing the gap between them instead, scooting closer to the edge of the bed to lean into him, touching her forehead to his. It was disconcertingly warm, and she felt it when he sighed.

In her mind, that was all the permission she needed to travel the remaining distance, finally carrying out what she'd been yearning to do for the past twelve min—but no, that wasn't right, was it? It was longer than that. Much, much longer.

About three years longer.

But it didn't matter anymore, because she had him in her arms, kissing him squarely and soundly, and it was right now.

"M-uh," he breathed, and she was falling backwards, pulling him back with her, into her, her arms locked tightly around his neck.

He caught himself over her, bearing into her only enough to make her breath catch before shifting away, his breath hot on her neck before she felt his tongue searing up her carotid.

Dear Merlin, God, sweet stars above, could he feel her pulse? Because the roaring in her ears could give the thunder itself a run for its money.

In fact, the electricity above could hardly compare to the electricity between them, in his touch when he slid a large hand down to rest at her hip, the other stationed sentry-like next to her ear.

But this was nothing. Nothing at all—and she was soon to find out.

As he travelled back upwards she moved to trap him, slanting her mouth against his in a not-so-gentle capture as she reached up to fist—Merlin forbid—his hair. Under normal circumstances, she might have found this to be thoroughly revolting.

As it was, she was a bit too busy to think of such things.

Something buzzed at the back of her mind, however, even as the hand covering her hip began to trace dizzyingly slow circles southward. A pesky bugger it was, too—the more she swatted it away the harder it became to ignore.

"Hey," she said, breathless, trying to attract his attention away from…whatever in Merlin's name he was doing to her. "Hey, Sev?"

He sent a fleeting, half-lidded glance upwards, and the dark glaze she saw in his vision was hell on her stomach. A throaty, noncommittal grunt was his only indication for her to continue, and she felt the sound tickle on her skin where his lips pressed down.

Merlin.

"Oh, bugger—forget it," she hissed, because it didn't matter. Nothing mattered—nothing at all, except for the way he raised gooseflesh on her limbs with his teeth, the way he was writhing over her, claiming her lips as his own, burning her up from the inside out.

He crashed into her, invaded her every sense, tore through her thoughts, and stole her breath. And to think—she'd been missing out on this for three years.

But of course, there was the matter of reciprocation. Swiftly, she raked her mouth down the flesh of his throat (who said she was out of practice?), stopping a moment to cradle her head in the junction between his neck and shoulder, savoring it, before shying up along the line of his jaw.

Twist. Pant.

A low sound, like a growl, rumbled in his chest as she arced into him, straining her back. She liked it, she decided.

Curve. Flex.

All too soon, he was bearing down upon her with little restraint: his hips bucked into hers, and she couldn't help but gasp at the first sensation. His head fell to the dip in her neck, hanging as if in shame, and she could tell he was struggling.

Trembling before him, she listened to his breaths—long and slow, heavy and slightly uneven—as he managed to gain control again. The mere prospect that he'd even lost it in the first place, that she had been the impetus for such a marvelous reaction, had her reeling.

Rain overhead, battering the walls around them, and she inhaled.

"Sev," Aurora said quietly, and her voice shook. "What the hell is going on?"

Breathe in. Out. His voice carried on the air like silk, muffled into her shoulder as he exhaled.

"I haven't the faintest idea."

It was so far from anything she expected him to say, so different from anything he'd ever said to her, she couldn't help the almost-devious smile from toying across her expression. Perhaps, then, ignorance truly was bliss.

"Yeah." She could work with that. "Me either."

Looking up into his eyes, she saw herself mirrored back. When he blinked, her focus re-centered: the look he was giving her, she was sure, was unlawful. So dreadfully unlawful, in fact, that it should've been decreed forbidden in all cases by the Ministry itself.

The moment he moved, a slight forward shift, it awoke stirrings that churned in her abdomen, a coil of pleasure that had her fighting not to grab at him, to wrest and jolt him closer.

"A bit, uh—overdressed, don't you think?" she heard herself say, and she felt it when he smirked.

"Impatient, are we?" was his breathy mockery, smoothed fondly across her clavicles as he grazed over them, making his way to her cleavage. She liked the note in his voice—liked the way his tongue flicked out, much like a snake's, to taste the skin of the cleft between her breasts.

"What…do you mean?" she whimpered, bending into him, bearing herself as he slipped a steady hand along the inside of her thigh.

Too close. Much too close. But not close enough—and it was royal torture.

"Why, we aren't nearly finished, you and I."

"Well, yeah. You m-might say we just started." Whatever it was they'd started.

Close to her ear, she heard Snape make a strange noise, and it wasn't until a minute or so later that she realized what it was: he had chuckled, a dark sound, not exactly musical, under his breath.

"Precisely," he whispered to her, trailing devious fingertips beneath the hem of her dress.

It was the sound of the chuckle, matched by the agonizingly light touch he served her through the fabric of her (surely ruined) panties, that made her flinch—and not at all in a bad way.

He teased her thoroughly: two fingers spread to encompass the outermost of her folds, then four. Back and forth. Harder then softer. Closer then farther, never quite on the mark.

Aurora responded in kind, chafing her lips across his in a bruising, almost-violent action, stifling something akin to a moan with the tricky business of tongues.

Without warning, he stole past the barrier of fabric and was, unexpectedly in her opinion, stroking at her entrance. The anticipation could have killed her—she could've died right then and there for all his trouble—but oh, what a way to go.

"You're certain?" he questioned her, devoid of inflection.

Merlin, he asked her this now, of all times? Were they really gonna do this now?

Fervently, she nodded, and it took all she had in her in order to remain still.

"Aurora," he warned, and his fingers curled against her, almost inside of her.

"Bloody hell, yes, I'm sure, you…you—ruddy, blooming—"

"Quite the tongue, you have."

"Yeah?" Pant. "You haven't seen anything, yet."

Through the heat and the feeling, she slipped her arms around him to unfasten his cloak, swinging it off his shoulders and to the floor in a heap. He made no protest.

All at once, a thrust of his palm brought him straight into her, and she hung onto his neck with a desperate strength, not quite able to bite back the sharp cry that slid past her teeth. His eyes flashed at the noise, and she could see the chaos in his expression as his thumb worked clumsy circles around her clit.

He might as well have Avada Kedavra'd her and gotten it over with—it would've been faster. In fact, she couldn't even begin to describe how crazy, how absolutely insane, this was.

Three days ago she was pretty sure she wanted to off him with a giant axe (where she was liable to find said axe she'd never quite worked out), and now…this.

Venus, Jupiter, and Neptune—where had he learned it all? Certainly not in his school years, and certainly not from that Evans girl.

Perhaps during the course of some Death Eater ritual—Merlin only knew what those cretins did when they got together. They couldn't go off and kill defenseless mudbloods every night, after all—that would just get monumentally boring.

But oh, he was enjoying this. Every scant, curtailed sound she made, she could see the whirling emotion grow stronger in his stare.

It wasn't fair, is what it was. Even though she might've, just maybe, enjoyed this type of torture and just maybe didn't want him to stop.

But that was entirely beside the point. Enough was enough, she decided.

And so, rocking into him, Aurora prevailed in rolling him not quite onto his back, but onto his side. Well, she couldn't say she was surprised.

Taking his shoulders, she nudged him where she wanted him, watching him watch her, intrigued. It was a new position for her, admittedly—and she couldn't deny that she kind of liked it.

For once in her life (because God only knew she wasn't with her classes) she was in control. And not just with anyone, no: with Snape. The one man in the whole school who showed no weakness, who gave no sign of vulnerability, who did not "open up" to anyone, ever. And he was beneath her, working to breathe as she clamped her still-trembling knees around him and pressed herself to him, pressed her lips to his.

Pausing, she took the time to lift her emerald dress over her head, and it joined his cloak on the floor.

She heard him suck in a breath as she busied herself with the ungodly amount of buttons on his frock, and she couldn't help but look up to survey his enthrallment.

"Exquisite," he breathed, and it wasn't so much the word as the way he said it that had her cheeks burning bright.

No one had ever looked at her and called her exquisite before—especially not like that (usually, the word of choice was more along the lines of "plain.") Not with such…what was it, eagerness? No. Snape was not eager. Snape was never eager.

There was something there, though, even if she wasn't quite sure what it was or what to call it, and she saw it best when she, just for a fraction, abandoned her endeavors in order to fit her lips against his and drag skin across skin. It was like something had loosened in his vision, and she was no longer trying to stare down some kind of lonely, empty abyss, no longer trying to interpret a vacancy.

The lust drawn across his face was inescapable—but it wasn't the half of it.

She imagined it was a lot like the stars: like little cosmic glimpses of his soul in a vast and dark space, something she might even be able to read if only she could chart the patterns and discern the rhythms.

It was like there was a whole universe in him, a whole world of thought and emotion, past and future, day and night, and it was impossible to wrap her mind around so much life. She could feel herself on the edges of that universe, all her brief brushes against it, when he sighed into her kisses or when she felt the pace of his pulse and wondered whether it wasn't actually hers.

She wondered, too, if that was what he'd meant, when he'd looked up at her and remarked she was "exquisite"—like perhaps he'd noticed it, too.

And then she realized that this was Snape she was talking about, and since when had she been such a hopeless romantic?

At the removal of his (ridiculously button-endowed) frock coat, she was disappointed to find a white, collared blouse possessing, sadly, more buttons. Pressing on, working on unfastening this number as well, she came across the thought that maybe overdressed was an understatement.

Severely overdressed sounded a bit more accurate.

She couldn't begin to fathom what he did during the summer months, because she'd never seen him wear anything less than his layers of black on black.

"Why do you wear so many clothes," she complained on helping him shrug off the blouse only to discover an undershirt. "God, it's like…are you cold-natured? You really do belong in Slytherin—you're like a cold-blooded reptile; you're like a snake."

The corner of his lips quirked upwards, and she didn't miss the way it reached his eyes.

"Professionalism, Aurora, does have its consequences."

"Ha! What would you know about being professional? You practically eat your students alive, and I heard what you did to poor Seamus Finnegan the other day."

"That…was merely incidental." The end of his sentence was a bit broken, because by this point she had reached bare flesh and proceeded to trace its contour with her lips, paying special attention to the skin just below his navel.

"Oh, really, now? Funny, but incidental isn't really the first word that comes to mind."

"He singlehandedly produced an explosion that demolished over one half of my classroom. He caught six individuals, myself included, on fire."

"Well, it's a small wonder you caught on fire—you wear enough clothing to be a walking fire hazard!"

Somehow, she was so used to picking at him that it came naturally, even without her having to try. Laboring with the fastening of his pants, she worried that she might've said too much—that falling back on habit had ruined whatever was developing between them.

Being proved wrong, she observed, was relieving.

He might've tried to say something—probably something about how her hair was a bigger fire hazard than his clothes—but it only really came out as a low, somewhat stifled kind of whine out from the back of his throat as she finally flung his trousers over the bedside and (quite on accident) drove a palm along the crown of the bulge revealed by his (black, of course) underwear.

For an interval of maybe three seconds, she froze, but not on account of shame. It was the sheer disbelief. Because, holy stars above, she wasn't aware he could even make a sound like that.

It was unnatural. And, okay, maybe a little sexy. Or a lot.

To think she'd been the one to do that to him—it was a bit overwhelming.

And she wanted very much to do it again.

Faster than she would've thought possible, he descended, not even bothering to roll her over: just slamming into her and dragging her down with him, hands everywhere at once as he engaged her tongue in a battle she couldn't possibly hope to win. Somewhere in the descent, her panties and bra had disappeared (his hands were highly suspect), and so she wasted no time in dragging down his remaining article of clothing to drop it—alongside their socks—at the top of the pile formed on the floor.

And there they were, bare before each other, all barriers shed. Nothing remained that separated them, and good riddance. The second the last items hit the floor, she realized it was true—for three years, they had been the only ones stopping themselves.

Now, this was not the case. Now, they could only move forward.

And so forward they moved…forward, and back, and forward again.

It took a bit of maneuvering on his part to extend himself to her, because she couldn't remember the last time she'd done this and she doubted he could either, and at first it was tight and hot and uncomfortable. This initial sensation was quickly rectified, however, by her first experimental thrust, filling her to his hilt, and thereafter he moved with her to create a rhythm, helping hands just below her buttocks.

For three years, they'd been dancing around each other with heated words and some misguided kind of mutual acceptance of the fact that their undeniable connection was not to be mentioned or acknowledged, under any circumstance.

This time, alongside the chaos outside, they danced a different dance entirely. Not a dance they were used to, and in fact a very unsteady and unsure type of dance; not a dance that was perfect, because there were plenty of times she bumped chins and bit her tongue, plenty of times he picked up her slack for being tired or losing the beat, and plenty of times their teeth were briefly and jarringly knocked together…but it was a dance where perfection didn't matter, a dance where even tentative trust was built a structure, a dance choreographed by ancestors' instinct and a dance that, in time, they would learn to shape with ease.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, Aurora was marginally aware of the way the muscles in her arms were starting to ache and the way her hair kept smacking Snape in the side of the face, but it didn't matter. Through a half-lidded gaze she watched his lips part, watched his eyes flutter, watched the moisture gather at his hairline and watched him shudder to breathe.

Warmth quivered in her abdomen, and there was this heady sense of disbelief as her head swam and the feeling swelled, like this couldn't be real and this wasn't Snape before her, between her, and in her…moaning for her.

But it was. It had to be, because she was confident that there was no one else in the world that could be looking up at her through those dark eyes, full of little glimpses of his soul, breathing into her face and making her feel…like this.

If she'd been paying attention, she would have marveled at the way they fit, their bodies curving and twisting together like two jagged pieces of the same, worn puzzle.

He whispered something that sounded oddly like "icebox," but she was too far gone.

Two more beats, and the world went white. She fell hard, crashing down into him, and though she wasn't exactly sure what kind of noise she made, she knew he must have liked it because it was his answering growl that returned her senses to her. Pure, raw ecstasy.

Quickly and shakily, she picked herself up again as his breaths became shallower and his muscles taut beneath her. It was a rare sight to see him this way, in the throes of passion, and she wasn't one to miss it.

He drove into her deeper than she thought possible, awakening a few more bursts of faded pleasure, and she could see the whites of his eyes as they rolled up into his head and his head snapped back. His hips ground fiercely upwards into hers once more, trembling savagely, and she felt his every muscle tense as heat exploded inside her.

Delectable, the way his voice raked up several pitches and fractured. Not quite music, but better.

Collapsing under her, chest heaving, he allowed her to remain on top of him, skin sticking on hers. She felt it when he shivered, so ferociously she clamped a hand on his wrist out of surprise.

At his next sigh, something he was too proud to ever admit was contentment, she grinned.

"Exquisite," she agreed quietly. His answering smirk was more of a half-smile, but that was also a thing he'd be too proud to admit because, of course, Severus Snape did not smile.

"Mm," he said when she stroked damp hair out of his face, and his eyes flicked open to light upon her grin and drink it up.

When she picked herself off of him and shifted away so he could cool off, Aurora felt him move swiftly behind her, an arm shooting around her waist that clamped her to his chest.

Stay.

It wasn't really a request—more of a demand, really—but it was the closest he would ever get to begging because she saw, very clearly, in his eyes that she didn't have to.

Well, that made her grin all over again, and she settled back into place readily.

She could've said something, but why ruin it? She'd have to do much talking a in a few hours anyway, because this would be just the sort of thing Pomona Sprout would die to hear.

Sprout had been right all along; three years of nagging seemed to finally have paid off. But she hadn't done it for the sake of her friend; no, there was something much deeper than that—something that tugged at her heart every time she looked at him. Like gravity, perhaps from that universe of his.

Merlin, did she have some exploring to do. It was funny, knowing this all started because she wanted answers—and here she was with more questions, not even having had answers to her first set.

Except, now he was giving her a strange look for the way she was still grinning.

"Don't mind me," she told him. "It's just…well, have they gone looking for us yet, do you think?"

He blinked. "We have, at most, until this evening."

Until classes. Probably because they were the two least likely professors to be noticed missing—her because she was just that pathetic, him because he was highly disliked by most and no one was brave enough to approach him.

It turned out to be highly convenient.

Even as she could still feel her heart hammering in her throat, he lay there, tranquil, like it was the only thing he'd been doing for the whole day.

That was when she decided: screw answers (if they hadn't effectively done just that already.) Because today was not a day for questions—perhaps never had been.

The only answers she received, the only ones she needed, lay in the way his fingers curved down her spine, the way his eyes slipped shut when she kissed the corner of his mouth, and the way he said nothing to her in the stillness and the silence—didn't need to—as distant rumbles from the sky were their only reminder of the storm that had passed.