Chapter I

Severus Snape finished grading papers with an inner sigh. Those silly dunderheads were getting dumber every year and made him wonder why bother teaching them at all. But then, he needed the money. 'Now more than ever' he thought, pinching the bridge of his nose.

After almost two months of marriage and unprotected sex once a week he couldn't say he was surprised. But then again, he never thought that he would ever get caught in this situation, especially with a woman he did not love and who couldn't love him in return either. Yet, his wife had their suspicions confirmed by the mediwitch in charge of her case that morning that she was indeed with child.

And Snape still could barely get his mind around the fact that he was married. To a woman much younger than himself. A former student for crying out loud! Even with all her accomplishments and brilliance, to his eyes Hermione Granger was still the bushy haired little girl who made little jumps in her chair whenever she knew the answer to the question he made. Sure, there were times when he forgot that and saw her as the war hero she was, brave and strong-minded and couldn't help but to watch in awe as to how puberty had done its magic with her, filling her in all the right places and softening her face features. If there was one thing he could not deny, was that his wife was very pretty.

'And yet, she was still a child, even if she was 19' he thought as he sat back on his chair. '19 years old, and fought countless dangers, faced death more times in the past year than most people in their lifetime (even two lifetimes), suffered tortures and deaths of many friends and schoolmates and helped to bring down one of the greatest villains in British history. Not that won her especial treatment from the Ministry, only a medal and a thank you bonus in cash'.

One would think that being one-third of the Golden Trio would grant her some benefits, but when the time that the Marriage Law came into effect, Miss Granger was forced to it just like any other muggleborn between the ages of 18 and 45.

"And to me of all people" he grumbled to himself. As if he needed the constant reminder that he owed his life to her.

'Damned her intrusiveness! She should have just let me die in that bloody shack' he thought angrily. But she was Hermione Granger and she couldn't leave someone to die if she could help it, even if he deserved it. And deserve it he did. After all the things he had done, it was right for him to die; agonizing in pain and slowly watching his life bleed out. He even longed for it, an ending to all the sorrow and misery that had been his existence.

However, the former Miss Granger had had the excellent idea of foreseeing that the snakes bite might be a danger and she gave him the antidote just in time to save his life. Sure thing, he saved her life many more times in the battle itself, since as soon as he was able to walk he stayed with her and Weasley, who barely understood why she had even aided him at all. The girl was exhausted during the fight and that messed with her senses, making her more vulnerable to attacks (plus, the ginger troll-headed buffoon wasn't helping). He, on the other hand, healed almost miraculously thanks to her treatment. So much so that thanks to all the Death Eaters he almost single-handedly captured that he almost won some tolerance and acceptance of people who initially hated him.

In his trial Potter brought forth a huge amount of personal papers of Albus Dumbledore, where he explained how Snape had been always acting under his direct command and how without his help the war would have never been won. That cleared him almost on the spot, and he too was given the newly introduced Platinum Merlin Class, award that had been created for the Golden Trio.

But then again, he was also a Pureblood and even with that award and that he was in the top list of most hated men in Britain just a couple of months back, he was also dragged into that stupid law that was supposed to "unite the muggleborn and pureblood families to create ties of friendship and love so that this won't ever happen again". And so, as a statement of the purpose of this law, he was married off to Miss Granger.

No matter how many strings they pulled, between the Order and himself, and how many threats he made to the Winzengamot, their marriage was the first one. He was married to Miss Granger on the 14th of July, barely two months after the war had ended. And with only a fortnight of knowing they had been paired up. And with her still in the hospital being treated for extreme dehydration and exhaustion until a week before the wedding.

And now, September 3rd , his wife, a woman he scarcely knew, was pregnant with his child. A woman whom he rarely spoke more than a "good morning" and "good night" each day. Not that he was purposely avoiding her, mind you. He just felt… like a pervert around her. Knowing how he had gotten hard by seeing her naked figure, a former student. He knew that they were magic bound to have sex at least once a week, yet the way she laid motionless as he moved inside her, as if her mind was far off in a sunny place, made him feel like a rapist.

Worst of all, he couldn't help it.

Because there was no way he could ever talk to his wife about it. And even if he wanted to, he couldn't. After years of relying of his abilities to hide his emotions deep within him and to conceal any thought of feeling that he had forgotten how to even go about it. How to express his worries and his thoughts other than the information he found by spying.

And there was another matter, even worse than the sex. He had known Hermione Granger to be a bookworm, but he also knew her to be a socially active girl who smiled and laughed with her friends. Now, he knew that she wasn't being held captive in their rooms in Hogwarts (and he knew that she knew that), so it couldn't be that she felt like a prisoner. And her closest friends, the Weasleys and Potter stood by her proudly at their wedding and he knew she corresponded with them often and even went out with them a few times, so it couldn't be that she was feeling lonely.

But Snape was an observant man, and he knew that Miss Granger was losing weight and getting paler by the day. He knew that she was quieter, more introverted than ever before. He sometimes caught her shaking involuntarily, her hands never seemed to settle somewhere and they were always twitching. And the most awful thing of all: when he was still Headmaster of Hogwarts, he heard a rumour that Potter, Weasley and his wife had been captured and taken to Malfoy Manor. Had it only been for a day before they escaped he had not though much of it, but he knew that the boys had managed to escape with a couple more prisoners and that his wife had been taken in their attempt to get way. For two whole days Miss Granger had been at the mercy of one particularly angry and vicious Bellatrix Lestrange. Thankfully, she was dead now, but Snape knew, to his dismay, that his wife was only beginning to show the real signs of depression and post-traumatic stress. Not to mention that the traces the torture left on her body were grabbing hold of her.

But, how to do something? Whom to tell? She needed help, that much he knew, and he couldn't assist her without remind her that at some point he could have used the same method that Bellatrix used on her on someone else. Also, this being such a personal matter he had to be very careful. His entire instincts told him that Hermione being captured wasn't a coincidence, and how she got out either. There was a traitor's doing there, and Snape was going to find out who he was.

Thank you for reading!