For the rest of the day, Hermione found it incredibly difficult to concentrate on her classes. Many times she would find her hand had strayed to the ribbon once again tied in her hair as she thought about the fact that in two days she would be on display in front of her Sir, wearing nothing but that beautiful ribbon around her neck. The very thought did so many contradictory things to her; it was maddening, even as she loved every minute of it. She was at once completely turned on by the idea of Harry being able to see every bit of her, that her Sir would be able to properly examine his property, because she did belong to him.
At the same time the idea of being so exposed, so completely vulnerable was intimidating, embarrassing, and even a little humiliating, because it made her a thing, something to be objectified and coveted, and yet somehow those feelings turned her on even more. She had to push such thoughts carefully from her mind, but after they'd left the room in order to Turn back an hour before heading off to their afternoon classes, she would find her hands straying to that ribbon, and the thoughts came flooding back, making the problem of keeping her mind on task much more difficult.
She ended up having to wait until that evening, after dinner, to try and think over the homework assignment Harry had given her. When she presented herself in less than two days, she needed to give a full accounting her mistakes. Sir had indicated that there were three things she had done wrong... and that he didn't count the Firebolt incident as one of those mistakes... so what were they? Speaking out of turn regarding the dynamic? Okay, maybe she shouldn't have done that. Bringing in things from outside? Yeah, that had definitely been a huge lapse of judgement on her part. But what was the third?
Maybe when she raised her voice to him? No… that would fall under the category of speaking out of turn.
Focus, she admonished herself as she sat near the fire in the Common Room waiting for Harry to return from his meeting with Professor McGonagall. She really wanted to have this figured out before he came back, but her attention kept wandering to what exactly was he going to do to her on Wednesday? She'd requested a physical punishment, but she wasn't certain if that's what he would actually do, and since this wasn't going to be a punishment over the Firebolt… did she still want a physical punishment?
It doesn't matter what you want, she reminded herself. If he decides to punish you with pain, then you don't have any choice in the matter... not unless you use the safeword.
She had two days to figure this out, and she wasn't called the brightest witch of her age for nothing. She could figure this out. She would. If only she could stop worrying over what was coming and focus! She very nearly growled, throwing down the book she'd been trying, and failing, to read onto the sofa next to her. Dammit, he really was getting good at this whole thing. Or did he not realize that by giving her so much damn time until her punishment, that he would be driving her crazy with worry? That her mind would conjure up one possible punishment after another, simply to torture her?
One thing she could honestly say, is the constant concern had certainly distracted her from her stressful class load. She'd completed the day's assignments without even really noticing what she was doing. Looking back over her Transfiguration essay, however, she decided that the quality was more than up to her usual standards despite her distracted state.
By the time Harry finally came into the Common Room she was certain that she looked a frightful mess. The ribbon in her hair was likely the only thing preventing it from being a frazzled cloud around her head, dark ink stains dotted her hands, and she could feel her bottom lip was swollen from the near constant worrying at it with her teeth. The minute she caught sight of him however, all other thoughts left her head as she focused her attention on her boyfriend; watching him intently as he made his way, almost casually, toward her. More than once he stopped to chat with one person or another, the longer he took to reach her the more tense she became.
Her eyes narrowed dangerously when she noticed him looking in her direction out of the corner of his eye, a small smirk twisting his lips for a moment before he turned his attention back to Oliver Wood. The boy was teasing her! He knew she was anxious to hear what their Head of House's decision had been regarding his classes, and he was purposely taking his time getting to her, just to make her wait.
Oooohh… you're lucky you're cute, Potter, she thought when he finally started moving toward her again.
"What'd she say?" she practically demanded before he even had a chance to take the seat next to her on the sofa. Harry chuckled, amused by her behavior as he sat and wrapped one arm around her shoulders, pulling her close against his side.
"Anxious are we?" he asked, smirking at her; she swatted his chest lightly with one hand.
"You're killing me here, Harry," she whined. "Come on, this is cruel and unusual."
"All right," he laughed. "She said that I managed to improve in all my classes but one. My Potions grade still isn't what it should be, but," he added quickly before she could blow up, "she is aware that Professor Snape and I don't exactly get along well, so to be certain, she had some of my earlier essays and my newest ones looked at by an outside party over the weekend. They said they would consider my newer work to be 'of much greater quality and showing an increased understanding of the subject material.' Professor Babbling was there, McGonagall said that she called her in once she saw my grades were up high enough, and Professor Babbling gave me a short test covering some of the midterm exam material to see where I was."
"And?" she asked, her body tensing eagerly in anticipation of his answer.
"And I'm not quite where the rest of the class is, actually probably a few months behind still, but she said for only two weeks of mostly self study she was impressed, and if I could keep up that pace she thinks I could catch up with the class before too long. So I get to go to Ancient Runes with you tomorrow."
Hermione turned and suddenly threw herself at him, knocking them both over onto the couch as her mouth covered his, a pleased squeal escaping her just before their lips sealed together. It was the catcalls and wolf whistles from those still in the Common Room that got her to back off of him, her face blooming a vibrant red, and Harry couldn't keep a silly grin off his face as they both sat back up; Hermione enveloping him in a hug once again.
"'Oh, I'm so proud of you, Harry," she cried happily. "I knew you could do it. This is going to be so much fun, I'll help you study to catch up, I promise. I've been having a much easier time of it lately with my other classes and I can help quiz you so you'll be able to keep up with the class…" For several more minutes she rambled on, bouncing excitedly in the seat next to him as Harry simply sat, smiling almost serenely at her.
"What?" she asked when she finally noticed his expression some minutes later. "What's that look for?"
He shrugged, his expression remaining fixed. "I just think it's cute how excited you get about learning new things and helping other people. You have such a… a thirst for knowledge that it absolutely amazes me," he said in the calmest, most sincere tone she thought she'd ever heard from anyone before and she nearly instantly blushed under his praise.
"Nobody else seems to appreciate it," she mumbled, trying to wave away the compliments.
"Well everyone else is stupid. Your delivery might need some work at times, I'll admit. You can come off as a bit bossy, Hermione. But I think I've learned enough about you to realize that you're just eager to help, you don't mean to seem bossy but you can't always help it."
Her blush deepened and she quickly turned and dug in her bag for her Ancient Runes text.
"All right," she said, blatantly changing the subject. "Let me quiz you. We'll start with the Elder Futhark alphabet and move on from there?"
He smiled again and leaned back on the sofa. "Go for it," he said, and they spent the better part of the next two hours going over Ancient Runes before they finally headed to their respective dorms to rest. Despite her best efforts, Hermione laid awake for several hours, turning over Sir's homework assignment in her mind, attempting to find the third reason for her punishment, yet by the time she finally fell asleep, she was no closer to an answer than she had been before.
#####
For Hermione, Tuesday seemed to pass by in a blink. Immediately after breakfast she left with Harry to show him to the Ancient Runes classroom, so he could speak to Professor Babbling before class started. He would sit in on the classes but work at his own pace, while Hermione kept up with the rest of the class. The professor agreed to let Hermione tutor him using her notes to help him get closer to where the rest of them were. Eventually he'd have to start working with the current material but both Hermione and the professor had every confidence in him based on what he'd managed to do so far.
Harry had spent a large part of the morning blushing at the uncommonly heard praise over something he'd actually done, as opposed to people going on about something that he had no memory of, and no one could say for sure was honestly because of anything special about him. When the rest of the class had come in, Hermione had proudly introduced him to Susan Bones and Daphne Greengrass. The fact that she was friendly with a Slytherin had caused a raised eyebrow, but he'd recovered quickly and the four of them settled in, chatting for the few minutes before the class officially started.
Just before leaving the class, Harry thanked Susan for mentioning to Hermione that her Aunt worked in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Due to Hermione's suggestion, he had actually written to Madam Bones, and she'd sent a response letting him know that she would look into it, expressing her apologies that no one had thought to do so before then. If there was anyone in the world that deserved to read those records, she'd written, it was him. Susan had seemed a touch confused by the sudden gratitude, but she'd taken it in stride and simply said 'you're welcome' before she left the room.
With how quickly Tuesday had passed her by, Hermione was more than a touch frustrated by the fact that Wednesday seemed to be dragging on slower than any day she could remember. Through every class, she could swear the Second Hand on her watch was ticking slower and slower, she was almost convinced that it would start moving backwards at any moment, without the need for her Time Turner.
She was a massive bundle of nerves and roiling emotions from the moment she'd woken up that day. One moment she was afraid, nigh unto terrified, of what was waiting for her that afternoon; the next she found herself nearly dripping with anticipation over the thought of the whole experience. Not that she felt she was going to enjoy this punishment, but how Sir had told her, the calm certainty in his eyes and in his voice, the inevitability of it; the memory of it made her shudder as she knew that today was going to be the first time he truly, completely dominated her.
Thus far there had only been moments, good ones true. Great ones, even. He'd been doing very well at distracting her from her worries and concerns, but there had still been those hints of doubt that had sometimes shown through. She'd found getting into the proper headspace easier lately since he'd started adding rules for her to follow when waiting for him at the start of each session, but she was also falling out of it at times when Harry found himself feeling a bit unsure.
The confidence that he'd shown. The absolute certainty that he would order her to submit to whatever it was he intended to do to her, and there was no doubt whatsoever in his mind that's exactly what she would do… she had never wanted him more than she had in that moment.
That memory constantly distracted her during her classes as her mind would randomly throw out one possible scenario after another. She envisioned herself, quite without meaning to, with her wrists cuffed together and the chain between them looped over a hook suspended from the ceiling, her back and arse covered in red marks from her punishment. For another moment she was strapped securely to a bed, her body open and vulnerable to his whims. Other times she had a vision of herself, bent over a table, her arms stretched to the sides with her wrists restrained at the tables edge, legs spread wide with her ankles also cuffed to the table legs. Harry stood behind her and to one side carefully studying the stripes across her arse that he'd left with a thin wooden switch or a cane that he held loosely in one hand.
You just might have an interest in bondage, Hermione, she thought to herself when she realized that every idea she was coming up with had her bound and helpless in some way. More than once Harry had nudged her with his elbow during one of their shared classes and she'd find that some minutes had passed wherein she'd spaced out, wondering over what he might do to her. It was both thrilling and absolutely infuriating at the same time. Especially as each time he brought her out of a daze she'd fallen into, she'd notice a smug smirk on his lips and a knowing gleam in his eyes that fairly shouted he was well aware of what was distracting her so thoroughly.
That damn smirk made her feel so many things. She'd been shocked the day before when she'd realized that Harry had never really smirked before they'd begun this dynamic. Grinned? Yes? Smiled? Absolutely, though not nearly as often as she'd have liked. But smirked? No, she'd never seen him smirk before. Since he'd started controlling her however, his confidence seemed to be growing by leaps and bounds as he definitely appeared to enjoy the control he had over her, hence the tiny little smirk that had started to fuel the fires of her dreams.
When Arithmancy, her final class of the day, ended, Hermione had to restrain herself from sprinting her way to the Room on the seventh floor. Sir's order had been to go there immediately after class, but it wouldn't do to draw attention to herself. She walked as calmly as she could up to the seventh floor, moving past the entrance to the Tower, and found a completely different door waiting for her across from the tapestry.
Sir had explained the Room's unique properties to her, but she hadn't been entirely certain she believed it possible until now. Whereas before the door had been simple and made of a dark colored wood, it was now much more ornate, of a lighter color, and had a large brass handle set in the center. With her heart practically in her throat, she turned the handle and pulled open the door. The sitting room from Monday was gone; in its place was something entirely different. The fireplace was still there, or a similar one at least, however instead of a pair of chairs there was a small sofa against one wall, a simple wooden table set off center of the middle of the room, and in the exact center, about fifteen feet from the fireplace stood a comfortable looking chair facing the fire.
The floor beneath her feet and the walls were stone, and light was provided by a series of lanterns that hung from brackets set at regular intervals along the walls. Setting her bag down on the sofa, she noticed a small wooden chest on the floor next to the sofa itself, and from where she stood, she could see a piece of parchment laying on the table. Moving over curiously, she picked it up and read the note.
Mine-
I had to set up the room so I was here when you arrived, but I kept under my dad's cloak. Don't try to find me now because by the time you read this I'll have already left. You know your orders. You may use the top drawer in the chest by the sofa, but do not use the cushioning charm as we have been. The Room is set up so that only you or I may enter, so don't worry about someone randomly coming across the door and deciding to investigate. I will be back soon, though I won't tell you how long you have until I arrive. So you might want to get a move on.
-Sir
Finishing the note, she couldn't help but let her eyes sweep the room again. Was he really gone? Or was he standing there under his cloak, watching her? It didn't really matter, since she was going to do this either way, however a little thrill passed through her at the idea that he might be there waiting to watch her undress. She winced slightly over the idea of doing without the cushioning charm, but she couldn't deny it would be effective. Really, Sir had been very easy on her. Despite commanding and controlling her, he was still treating her with the same kind of tenderness and care that he did when he was just Harry, her boyfriend.
With another glance at the note, she reminded herself that she had no idea how long she had to get ready, so she set it down and quickly went about removing her clothes, which she placed in the plain wooden chest as ordered. She removed the ribbon from her hair and placed it around her neck, tying it carefully so that it would be snug without constricting, and also so that she avoided creasing the soft material. For a moment she stood there examining the new sensation of the ribbon wrapped around her throat, and she could only determine that the reaction it caused in her body was extremely pleasurable. She would have to try to analyze her feelings on it more later.
Moving to a spot midway between the fireplace and the chair, she knelt and carefully arranged herself in the Student pose. For a few minutes she was hyper aware of the fact that she was completely naked. The air around her wasn't exceptionally cool, but it felt so against her bare skin, especially across her breasts and between her legs. The anticipation of what was going to happen, the knowledge that at any minute, Sir was going to come into the room and see her completely open to him… she shivered in expectation. She'd been wet even before she'd undressed, and was even more so now. The air whispering against her damp flesh had goosebumps racing across her body. She shook her head, trying to ignore the sensations in her body; letting her mind wander while she waited.
While she did, she considered the Room itself, and the brief conversation that she'd had with Harry the day before popped into her head. To be more precise it was a question she'd asked him that he'd answered in a distracted state. They had been sitting on the sofa in the Common Room, both of them reading a different book, but she'd been distracted by the frown on her boyfriend's face. Finally, unable to contain herself any longer, she'd asked what was bothering him. He'd shrugged and muttered absently 'Just been thinking how the Room limits things a little'.
What had he been talking about, though? She wondered. The Room as he'd described it, and what she'd seen of it so far, seemed like it would only help expand what they could do, what they could try, where before they were lacking in certain things. This Room could probably produce items for their use that they wouldn't have been likely to get anytime soon otherwise. So what limits was he talking about? She resolved to bring that question up during their upcoming conversation and came out of her musings to realize that she'd slumped over slightly in her pose while she was thinking. Just as she straightened back into position, she heard a quiet click, when the door swung closed.
#####
As soon as the door opened and Hermione came fully into the Room, Harry slipped out behind her before the door had swung completely shut. Outside in the hall he removed his dad's cloak, folded it and stuffed it into one of his robes pockets before he settled in to wait. He'd decided ahead of time that he would give her twenty minutes. Plenty of time for her to prepare, if she didn't get too distracted wondering about the Room, or contemplating the orders that he'd left her.
The last two days had passed agonizingly slowly for Harry. He understood the importance of proper punishment in situations like these. At least, he understood as well as he thought he could. He still didn't get it, but he got that it was important to the sub, and a part of his role as Dom was seeing to her needs. He needed to take this seriously, but that didn't mean that he had to like it. He just hoped that he could get through this without screwing up.
The second concern that had kept him up at night had been just what to do to her? As far as physical punishments went, as far as actually causing pain, he was severely limited in what he could actually do. Well… honestly he'd checked and the Room of Requirement had been able to produce a large number of items that he could use, but that brought him back to the thought that any number of things could go very wrong with some of those items, or the ideas for punishment that accompanied them. He could honestly do serious damage if he made a mistake, and that was the last thing that he wanted.
After much consideration, he'd settled on something that would be a mixture of psychological and physical. With what he knew of Hermione, he was reasonably certain that his plan should be effective, though he realized he'd need to get past the distraction of being in the same room as his very naked girlfriend in order to properly pull this off.
She's your sub right now, he reminded himself. Not your girlfriend.
A glance at his watch told him that enough time had passed so he turned, pulled open the door and stepped through before he could start to second-guess himself. Letting the door swing shut quietly behind him, he made certain that it was fully closed and noted movement out of the corner of his eye. It looked like she was sitting up straight, as if she hadn't properly been in her pose when he entered the room. He didn't react. Instead he took off his robes and moved across the room to drape them over the arm of the sofa before he loosened his tie and unbuttoned his uniform shirt sleeves, rolling them back to his elbows.
He took his time, never once actually looking at Hermione where she was kneeling in front of his chair, well aware that the wait would drive her crazy. Eventually he made his way over and sat, finally looking at her directly. Her head was down, eyes directed at the floor between them and her long hair had fallen forward over her shoulders, mostly obscuring her breasts behind a curtain of brown curls.
"Look at me, Mine," he ordered as calmly as he could, and she slowly lifted her head to meet his gaze.
"You weren't properly in your pose when I came into the room, where you?"
Hermione hesitated for a moment, "No, Sir. I wasn't," she whispered, shaking her head slightly.
"Why?"
"I… I was thinking and got distracted. I realized I wasn't holding my position just before I heard the door shut."
He considered that for a moment before he nodded and moved over, dropping to one knee in front of her. Reaching out he tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear, holding her gaze the entire time.
"I'm disappointed you haven't put that same effort into this that you put into all your other studies. I'm certain you'd be perfect in no time if you did," he murmured. "You will have to work on that, and I will help you, but just know I expect you to do better and we don't need to give it any more thought than that. Understood?"
She nodded, her face clearly showing that she was upset but he didn't think it was with him. If anything she would be upset with herself.
"I asked you a question, Mine."
"Y-yes, Sir."
He leaned forward to press a kiss to her forehead for a moment before he straightened up again.
"Now this?" he indicated her hair. "This is my fault. I wasn't very specific with my orders." His hands shook, just slightly as he carefully pulled her hair back, letting it fall in waves nearly to the middle of her back until nothing was left to block his view of her. "Let's say, in the future, that you tie your hair back somehow before I arrive as well. As much as I love your hair, I would rather not have it blocking me being able to see you." He took great care as he worked that he didn't touch her skin directly, only moving her hair until he was satisfied with his work and returned to his seat.
For a few moments he held her gaze before he let his eyes, very deliberately, wander over her exposed body. The bright flush in her cheeks extended down her neck, broken only by the brilliant green of the ribbon wrapped around her slim throat, and across her upper chest but didn't quite reach the slopes of her breasts. He was slightly surprised to discover that her nipples and the surrounding areolae were a darker color than he'd expected, a light brown against the creamy skin of her breasts. Her stomach was trim, but not toned, likely from hiking the stairs everyday with all of those heavy books. The lines of her body and the angle of her spread knees drew his eyes further down to find a sparse dusting of wispy curls just above her wet and swollen entrance.
He took his time examining her, committing every detail he could to memory, before letting his eyes finally return to meet hers. He could see worry in her gaze, an anxious nervousness that he hated seeing in her.
"I don't ever want to hear you say that you aren't pretty ever again, Mine," he said after clearing his throat so that he would be capable of speaking clearly. "Sure, there are more beautiful women in the world, just like there are guys that are better looking than me. I think you are absolutely gorgeous, and I won't have you putting yourself down anymore."
Her flush only deepened further and her posture straightened just a little more, the worry in her eyes vanishing as a bright smile spread across her lips.
"Thank you, Sir," she said. For a moment she looked as if she were going to say something else but then her mouth clicked shut.
"What were you going to say?" he asked and she ducked her head slightly without thinking.
She shifted slightly for a moment but then quickly stilled. "I… I was wondering if y-you had anything you wanted me to change, Sir," she admitted. He cocked his head slightly to the side in confusion.
"How do you mean?" he asked, after considering the question for a moment.
"I mean my body, Sir. Or… or my hair?"
Now he was even more confused and the frown on his face clearly indicated that. Staring into her eyes, he said, "I already said I love your hair, Mine. You don't need to change it at all."
The red in her cheeks had been growing steadily darker as they talked, and she took a deep breath before letting it out slowly. "I meant… I meant down there, Sir," she whispered her eyes flicking downward for a moment and instinctively his eyes followed the direction of her gaze.
A moment later realization clicked and he straightened up, eyes widening in surprise before he was able to smooth out his expression.
"Down where?" he asked, his lips twisting into a small smirk. Her breath was coming a little faster, he noted, and the muscles in her stomach and legs tightened and relaxed as she fought not to shift about in her pose.
"A-above my vagina, Sir," she squeaked out, causing his smirk to turn into a grin.
"And that leads me to something else I had planned to bring up in the near future, but since you mention it, I think we'll do it now." He settled back in his chair, crossing his right leg at the ankle over his left knee, letting his hands rest casually in his lap, as he felt himself sinking into the headspace he'd worked at cultivating. Here he controlled her. Here he didn't have the same nerves that had been plaguing him since he first looked at her. Before, he was looking at his girlfriend, and he was smitten, in awe that such a girl, such a woman, would find him worthy of her. Now he was looking at his sub, his property, and it was his right to look at her; to command her as he wanted.
"You said before that you wanted this partly so you could stop being you for a time. So you could be someone else, something else, and leave all the worries you have to me. Isn't that right, Mine?" he asked in a conversational tone.
"Yes, Sir, I did," she responded.
"In your day-to-day life you're not a prude, but you are rather prim and proper. If you want to be something, or someone, different in here," he said, dropping his right leg back to the ground so he could lean forward and gently tap the center of her forehead with one finger, "then you need to act differently. So why don't you try that again, without the proper terminology? You used a different word before, when you were begging me to touch you. What was it?"
"Oh Merlin," she moaned quietly, and she lowered her head, directing her eyes at the floor again.
"I told you to look at me, Mine." Her head snapped up again at his sharp command. "You don't hide from me. Do you understand?"
"Yes, Sir. I'm sorry, Sir," she rushed out pleadingly, to which he offered her an encouraging smile.
"Answer me, Mine," he told her a moment later. "What hair were you referring to?"
A small whimper escaped her for a moment before her mouth opened and she said, "the hair on my… my c-cunt, Sir. I was wondering if you wanted me t-to do anything about it?"
Now that the question had been asked, Harry realized he didn't exactly have an answer. He'd honestly never really considered it before. Aside from the pictures in their books, she was the first naked woman Harry had ever seen, and he'd not yet formed an opinion on the matter.
"To be perfectly honest, I don't exactly know," he admitted as he mulled over the question. "For now, leave it. I'll decide later if I'd like for you to do anything else."
"I understand, Sir."
"Now, we need to get on to the reason we're here, don't we, Mine?"
When she answered, he could barely hear the meek murmur that escaped her.
"Mine, you need to speak up so that I can hear you," he admonished her lightly.
"Yes, Sir," she repeated in a stronger voice, her eyes holding his gaze, but he could see she was fighting not to look away. "Can… can I ask a question, Sir?"
"Of course, Mine. But we really do need to hurry so I hope its it's a short question."
She nodded. "I was just wondering… yesterday you said the Room limits things but… from what you've said about it it actually gives us more options. What did you mean?"
Harry blinked in surprise, falling right out of the Headspace he was in while he tried to remember what she was talking about. "Was that when we were reading in the Common Room?" he asked, frowning in thought and she nodded.
"Yes, Sir. You said you were thinking about how the Room limits things, a little."
"Oh! No, I didn't mean 'the Room' as in this Room and what it can change to. I mean us keeping things to in the room." He stopped and took a moment to gather his thoughts, before he looked back at her. "I was just thinking a lot about this dynamic, and what we're both supposed to be doing. You're supposed to be learning, and I'm supposed to be teaching you. But neither of us really knows what we want yet. As with your punishment, which we still need to get to. Whatever punishments you earn, they have to be something limited to the time that we're here, and some are meant to last longer, or should at least." He shrugged.
"I was just trying to figure out what the best thing to do was, and I was having some difficulty deciding on something I thought would fit, but we'll talk about this more as we go along. For right now we need to get to this discussion so we can move on. Stand up, Mine."
#####
Hermione carefully got to her feet, wincing slightly as her knees protested the action and she shook out a bit of numbness in her legs as quickly as she could. She could feel that her face was still burning and she had to fight the instinctive urge to cover herself with her hands. She had been the one to say it before, if anyone deserved to look at her, it was her Sir. Being perfectly honest with herself, she could admit in the privacy of her own head, that she really liked the appreciative way he looked at her body.
She'd always thought that she would hate catching someone ogling her like a thing, instead of a person with her own mind and will, but she absolutely loved feeling his eyes on her, and seeing the obvious signs of what that view did to him.
"Did you bring the contract we wrote?" he asked.
She jumped, slightly startled by the sudden question but her answer was immediate. "Yes, Sir. It's in my bookbag."
"Get it, and put it on the table, Mine," he ordered and she moved to obey.
Digging through her bag, she quickly located the roll and swiftly brought it over to lay it out upon the table. Sir came up beside her, setting a blank roll as well as a self-inking quill down next to their previous contract, before he went back to his chair which he had turned so that it was facing the table.
"So, we're going to discuss the rules we have, and decide ways to improve them, Mine," he told her as he sat and made himself comfortable. "You're going to write it out as we decide, do you understand?"
"Yes, Sir," she said. After a quick look around however, she frowned.
"What's wrong?" he asked, a knowing smirk spreading across his lips again.
"I… I was looking for a chair, Sir," she admitted.
"That's fine, you're not going to need one. First, copy out the individual sections and then we'll go over everything." He waved one hand toward the table, indicating that she should get to work, she frowned slightly but complied.
Very quickly, she realized that this was going to be an awkward endeavor at best. The table was too low for her to be able to comfortably write while standing, but it was too high for her to kneel. In the end it took less than a minute for her to realize his plan and she couldn't help another fierce blush that swept through her. The best way for her to be able to do this would be to bend over and rest her forearms on the table, but with him sitting behind her…
Oh my God! He'll have a clear view of my…
The thought popped into her head, completely unbidden but once it was there she couldn't banish it.
"Is something wrong, Mine?" he asked from behind her and she could clearly hear a bit of amusement in his voice.
"No, Sir," she said. "Absolutely nothing."
With that, she pushed all thoughts of what he was going to see from her mind and simply bent to her task, literally. For the next hour she wrote as carefully as she could, trying to ignore the thought that he could easily be staring at her sex and anus each time she bent over the table, especially as she'd had to spread her legs somewhat to relieve the tension in her back while she worked. Pussy or cunt and arsehole, she reminded herself. Change how you think.
When she wasn't actively writing, she stood and turned to face Sir as they discussed the changes both of them felt needed to be included, then she would turn back to write down the new rules. She made sure to include his rule about her not letting herself get too stressed and tired before requesting time with him. They added a section more clearly defining the types of punishments possible for different infractions she might make, removing the ambiguity that had existed before.
Finally, she found herself back in her pose between him and the fire, while they let the ink dry on the contract. The apprehension and nervousness she'd felt over the last two days seemed like nothing compared to what she now experienced, as it hit home that she was minutes away from her promised punishment. Sir's demeanor had shifted as well. For much of the time, he'd seemed vaguely amused, with moments where he'd become sharp and serious, such as when she'd lowered her eyes after he had ordered her to look at him.
Now he seemed incredibly serious. His face was nearly expressionless, save a slight ticking of a muscle in his jaw and a tightening around his eyes that she was barely able to detect. He held himself strangely still in his chair, leaning forward with his elbows on his thighs, chin resting on his hands as he studied her for several long minutes. A shiver ran through her body at the look in his eyes. This wasn't like the appreciative looks he'd given her before. He wasn't admiring her body. He appeared to be deciding how to tackle a particularly stubborn problem that he needed to eliminate.
"How did you do on your homework assignment, Mine?" he finally asked and she fought not to wince.
"Not as well as I would have liked, Sir," she admitted.
"Oh? What was the trouble?"
"You… you indicated there were three things that I did wrong," she said, he nodded. "I could only think of two specifically. Each, possibly more than one time, but only two distinct things stood out in my mind."
"What were they?"
"First, I… I tried to bring something into the dynamic that happened not only outside it, but before we'd even started it. I understand that I shouldn't have done that. Second, I argued and spoke out of turn when you told me 'no'."
"And do you think that's all you did? That I'm wrong to think you did three things specifically, or do you believe you just haven't thought of it?"
She frowned at that, carefully considering her answer before she spoke. "I don't know," she said after a time. "Both are possible and I'm not certain which is more likely."
He was silent for a minute before a small smile curved his lips. "I'm proud of you, Mine," he said and she jerked slightly, surprised by that reaction.
"Sir?" she asked.
"You admitted that you weren't sure about something. You could easily have decided that I was wrong, but you didn't go with the easy solution. I'm proud of you."
She flushed again, a warm feeling of pride blooming in her chest, and her posture straightened even further as she unconsciously drew herself up as that sensation filled her.
"The third thing that I believe you did wrong," he then said, causing some of that feeling to dissipate, "is that you were trying to control our session. When I told you 'no', that should have been the end of it. But you pushed. You demanded something from me, and that was not your place. If you want to renegotiate our contract again, giving you more control we can consider that," he said, gesturing to the contract on the table. "Is that what you want, Mine? Do you want to be in control rather than be controlled?"
"NO!" she blurted out, then shrank back slightly when she realized how loud she'd been. "No, Sir. That's not what I want at all. That's not what I need. I don't know why I did that... I was… I was just so upset… I thought it could help me and I didn't think it through."
"Then you agree that is the third mistake that you made? You tried to take control from your Sir?"
She thought it over carefully again, a heavy sense of shame falling over her as she realized he was right, that was exactly what she'd done, and the fact that she really hadn't meant to didn't mean anything.
"Yes, Sir," she finally whispered, her eyes on the floor again. "I agree. I deserve to be punished for that."
"And what have you done wrong so far today?"
"I didn't keep my pose while I was waiting for you. I looked away after you ordered me to look at you. And I hesitated when it came to writing out our contract," she said almost immediately. "I also raised my voice but I'm not certain if that would be doing something wrong."
"Why wouldn't it be?"
"I… I wasn't raising my voice at you, Sir. It was a reaction to what you said, (comma) and I was simply expressing that I disagreed, I don't want more control. I… I want less, Sir." An idea started to form in her mind as she turned over the last words she'd said. Did she really mean that? Less control? Less how? Less than letting him do anything he wanted to her with only a safe word for her to stop it?
"I agree." His voice brought her out of her thoughts and she tucked the idea away to consider later, returning her full focus to him. "That last bit, raising your voice was not something you did wrong. Also we already discussed your not holding your pose and that was the end of it. Disobeying an order by looking away and your hesitation. Yes, those are both mistakes you made today, but relatively easy to fix. Consider this your reprimand for those, though if they are repeated then we'll have to look at a proper punishment for not learning."
"Thank you, Sir."
"Now, as to the three things you did wrong on Sunday… would you like to know what I've decided for your punishment, Mine?"
No. No she would not like to know, but she knew she that needed to know so she slowly nodded her head and let out a quiet, "yes, Sir."
"I considered a lot of different ways that I could punish you," he admitted, sitting back in his chair again, his eyes fixed steadily on hers. "Many of the possible physical punishments I could use… well I wouldn't want to attempt them without some way to practice first. It would be too easy to really hurt you without meaning to. A simple slip and we'd be visiting Madam Pomfrey in the Hospital Wing."
He chuckled a moment later at the horrified expression that stole over her face.
"Yeah, I figured we would want to avoid that. So I finally settled on something simple, fairly standard, really." With both hands he gestured to the chair that he was sitting in, a simple, cushioned item with no arms. "You are going to lay across my lap, and you're going to get a spanking, Mine. Ten strikes for each violation. You are going to count each one out loud. If you stop counting at any time we start over. Do you have any questions?"
Hermione's mouth dropped open in surprise when she heard the word 'spanking' leave his lips. A spanking? she thought. I've never been spanked before. Not even my parents ever gave me a spanking! Honestly, she wasn't certain whether or not she was insulted that he was treating her like an… an unruly child! Or if she was mortified that he was treating her like a child! Laying across his lap… it was humiliating! It was insulting! It was…. It was exactly what he was going for, she realized. The physical pain likely wouldn't be too terrible, but the psychological effect would have a far more lasting impact, and making her count out each strike, making her an active participant in her own punishment…
"Mine, I asked you a question," he said in a harder tone of voice and she blinked, realizing she'd spent far too long thinking and had, once again, hesitated to respond to him.
"I'm sorry, Sir," she apologized. "I was trying to think over everything. Do I have any questions?" she asked for clarification and when he nodded she considered it quickly. "Will this be… how will you be… what will be hitting me, Sir?" She stumbled over the question but finally managed to get it out. The smirk that turned his lips at that did little to reassure her in any way.
"Well… when I requested this room, it actually provided me with a tool," he said. Summoning the chest from beside the sofa with a wave of his hand, he pulled a beautiful cherry wood paddle that had the words 'Ms. B. Havior' carved into it from the lower drawer. "I considered it, but decided that really for the first time here it would be better to keep things more personal, so I'll be using my hand to redden your beautiful arse, Mine."
A small whimper escaped her when he put the paddle away and returned the chest to its' previous place. She honestly couldn't have said whether it was a sound of dismay or desire. Her head and her body were completely at odds with each other. Her head was telling her this was going to hurt. This was not going to be fun in any way at all, and she was so embarrassed and humiliated to be in this position to begin with. She was ashamed of herself for messing up so spectacularly, breaking one of the most important rules she'd insisted on when writing their original contract.
But her body absolutely hummed at the very thought of what was coming. maybe not the pain she was going to experience, but something about the way he was treating her simply filled her with desire and anticipation. Several times he'd been pleased with her, and she felt so elated to have done something to please him. She felt as if she were losing herself. Hermione Granger was fading away, Mine was supplanting her and she had no idea when that had started, how to stop it, or even if she wanted to. She could literally feel a drop of her excitement dripping down her skin to wet the floor under her.
"Do you have any other questions, Mine?" he asked and she shook her head. Leaning forward again, all trace of his amusement gone as he stared intently at her. "Do you agree to this punishment? You don't feel this is going to be too much for you?"
Her answer was immediate and without any hesitation. "No, Sir. I don't think it's too much at all, and I agree completely. I earned this, Sir, and if this is how you wish to punish me..." She trailed off but her meaning was clear, and after a moment he nodded and sat back again, patting his thigh with one hand.
"Come here then, Mine."
She almost leapt to her feet, moving over to him quickly, determined to accept her punishment, and show Sir just how much she wanted this. Carefully, he helped her to lie across his lap; as she did so a low footstool appeared on his left side, placed so that she could rest her arms on it to support herself. She almost let out a quiet groan when she felt the hard length of his erection against her hip, but her attention was quickly drawn away when she felt her hair being moved. There was a light tugging sensation against her throat and she realized he was untying the ribbon from around her neck. Moments later her hair was gathered and tied into a low ponytail, letting it all fall over her right shoulder, baring her back to him, yet keeping her hair from falling into her face.
"Mine?" he asked.
"Sir?"
"I need you to tell me your safeword."
Startled she looked back over her shoulder at him.
"I mean it. I understand this is fairly simple, but I just want to be sure you remember, just in case."
Quietly, she muttered the safeword they'd agreed to and he gave her a nod. "Good girl," he said, smiling gently and she turned back to face forward.
A moment later his left hand rested gently on her back between her shoulder blades as his right hand came down to cup her arse; she was momentarily startled to realize that was the first time he'd actually touched her since coming into the room. A shudder ran through her body, and she tried to force herself to relax but her muscles kept wanting to tense in anticipation of the first strike
"Don't forget to count, Mine," he whispered into her ear.
"Yes, Si- AAAHHH!"
She hadn't finished speaking when she felt the muscles in his body shift and a startlingly loud crack echoed through the air; a sharp pain burst across her right cheek. Her entire body jerked in a mixture of pain and surprise. She would have fallen off of his lap and onto the floor if he hadn't still had one hand on her back, holding her in place.
Holy shit, that actually hurt!
"O-one, Sir!" she cried out.
Another crack, seemingly louder than the first, rang out and her left cheek was suddenly on fire.
"Aahh! Two, S-sir!"
He put several seconds between each strike and for the first few, he didn't hit the same place twice, shifting where they landed across her arse, even moving lower to just above where the curve of her cheeks met the back of her thighs. Those first few strikes definitely stung like a bitch, but eventually he started hitting flesh that had already been struck and the pain became considerably worse.
"T-t-twenty… S-Sir," she sobbed out. She realized tears had started to fall somewhere around strike number ten, she couldn't stop them. Not great gasping sobs, but she was certainly crying and, almost against her will her body tensed again, waiting for the next strike to land. After several seconds passed and it didn't, she blinked several times. A gentle touch brushed across her heated skin and she flinched for a moment before she realized that Sir was very gently rubbing her arse as if attempting to soothe the pain.
No, she groaned mentally. He can't be stopping.
"I'm not certain we need to continue this," she heard him say.
She squashed down hard on her initial reaction to demand that he not stop. She would not behave in the same manner that was part of her punishment to begin with. But… how to get him to understand that she was okay to continue? That it was okay, period.
#####
Harry was at war with himself. He kept swinging, almost violently back and forth, in and out of the headspace he needed to see this all through. Having the table at a height where her best solution to write on it was to bend over had been an intentional attempt to distract her from what was coming. He'd given her two days to stew, to drive herself crazy, to torture herself with the thoughts of what could be coming, and he'd felt that a reprieve was needed. Of course, he hadn't accounted for the fact that he'd be torturing himself just as much, watching the way her body bent and moved, the way her breasts swayed as she shifted, the view he had of the full swollen folds between her legs glistening in the light of the lanterns, and the tantalizing glimpse of that puckered opening above.
By the time he had her draped across his lap, he was holding onto that headspace with an iron grip, determined to see this through. He'd thought he understood. He'd thought he had it figured out, the purpose of a punishment. When the tears started, he lost any grip he might have had on the proper headspace, and every following strike left him feeling disgusted with himself, until by the twentieth strike he just didn't think he could continue.
Hermione suddenly looked back at him over her shoulder, tears staining her cheeks. "Please Sir... can I have some more?"
There was a desperation in her voice that was completely at odds with the tears he could see streaming down her face, "I'm not sure I can do this..."
"Sir?" The word escaped her in a pleading tone, less a question and more a frantic request.
He shook his head. "It's… this is wrong... isn't it?" he muttered.
Hermione was silent for a moment beyond a few sobbing hiccups that escaped her before she finally addressed his question. "Can I stop it at any time, Sir? If I wanted to, I can stop this, right?"
He blinked, startled by the simple question. "Well... uh..."
"You made certain I remembered my safeword, Sir. If I said it... would you stop?"
"Yes, of course I would… but..."
"Have I said the safeword?"
"No. No you haven't but… but... you're my girlfriend… this just doesn't feel right."
"Sir... Harry... I'm both your sub and your girlfriend... I want this. I promise you, please."
I'm both your sub and your girlfriend.
What did that mean? Harry wondered, confused that, despite how upset she appeared, how much this was hurting her, she wanted him to continue. He studied her face carefully, finally seeing something that resonated somewhere deep within him, something he was really only just beginning to understand. She didn't want this, she needed it. It was clear in her eyes, in her pleading expression, and her statement only reminded him of what he was thinking outside in the hall when he was waiting for Hermione to ready herself. A part of his role as her Dom was seeing to her needs, and this was something she obviously needed. Just because he didn't understand it, didn't change that fact. He only hoped she would be able to explain it to him later.
The headspace he'd lost, found him again. Not as fully as he'd experienced before, the mindset necessary for the dynamic they were in, but he reminded himself that there really was very little that he wouldn't do for his Hermione. He took a deep breath, letting it slowly out as his expression smoothed into calm confidence.
"Mine?" he asked.
"Sir?" confusion clouded her eyes for a moment, but he could see it written plainly there as her own headspace was fully established, the confusion cleared and she was ready for him to continue as her Sir.
"Did I just hear you use my name a moment ago?"
Tear filled eyes widened for a moment before she ducked her head, letting out a quiet, "Yes, Sir."
He kept one hand on her back between her shoulder blades, the other never ceasing gently caressing the heated skin of her arse as he considered the options available to him for a moment. Reach out he pulled a lock of her hair that'd come loose from the ribbon and tucked it behind her ear, holding her gaze the entire time.
"Eyes front, Mine. You still have ten to go. Don't forget to keep count."
Hermione's head snapped forward and she lowered her forehead to her arms where they were crossed on the footstool in front of her. "Yes, Sir… Sir?"
"What is it, Mine?"
"Am I… am I starting my count back at one, or do I just continue where we left off?"
"Where we left off," he told her after a moment's thought.
Placing his hand on her back again, he lifted his other hand and felt her body suddenly tense an instant before his hand met her flesh loudly.
She let out a strangled sounding cry, and her body shook slightly before she stammered out, "T-twenty-one, S-sir."
He frowned, something about her reaction tickling the back of his mind as he swung again, aiming for her left cheek. That time she released a strained grunt and quietly muttered, "Twenty-two, S-Sir."
That he recognized from personal experience and he immediately placed his stinging hand on her lower back.
"Mine," he said sternly. "Don't hold back if you want to cry or yell. I won't have you hiding anything from me, especially how you're feeling. Do you understand?"
"Yes, Sir. I'm sorry, Sir."
"Don't be sorry, just don't do it again."
Before she could respond, he pulled back and swung again; that time when the loud crack of his palm striking her cheek echoed around the room, her head came up and she practically screamed, "Twenty-three, Sir!"
Her body shook as she let the tears fall, and by the time he finished the last stroke she was sobbing openly. He gathered her carefully into his arms until he was cradling her in his lap, then stood, grateful that she didn't weigh more, and carried her over to the sofa; sitting against the left side and the corner, in the crevice between the back and the arm, as her body curled into him, her arms coming up to wrap around his shoulders.
With the moment over, Harry felt the same guilt come rushing back as she sobbed against his chest, but he simply held her as gently as he could, running one hand soothingly up and down her back. It took a few minutes before he realized that, between sobs, she was saying something, the words muffled against his chest, and he tilted his head slightly to try and hear her better.
"... thank you, Sir… thank you…"
#####
She really wasn't sure how long she sat there, curled up safe and secure in his arms. Eventually though, her tears subsided and the unending litany of gratitude that poured from her mouth finally stopped and she was able to pull herself together. With her arms still wrapped around his shoulders she lifted her head and pressed her tearstained face against his neck.
"Thank you, Sir," she whispered again, kissing his neck several times. "Thank you, so much." Gods, this man, she thought. She was well aware how difficult punishing her must have been for him, but he did it, and for that, for everything he'd been doing... she didn't know how she would ever be able to repay him.
"I don't understand."
She froze at the note of disgust in his voice.
"I don't… how can you thank me for hurting you."
Hermione sat up slightly, lifting her head so she could look him in the eyes. "You did not hurt me, Sir," she said, her voice earnest and sincere.
His only response was to arch a brow at her doubtfully as he lifted one hand to wipe a few tears from her cheek with his thumb. She winced slightly as the pressure stung her skin.
"Okay," she admitted, "… yes, you hurt me. That hurt. My arse is still burning. But I think... you're still confusing what this is with what you experienced, Sir."
"You told me. Choice. But that still doesn't make any sense to me and… I'm having some trouble with this," he muttered.
Hermione let out a long sigh, her brow furrowed as she struggled to organize her thoughts. Her mind felt… sluggish… focus was hard to come by; Somewhere in a far corner of her brain she realized that she was struggling with coming out of the headspace of her sub headspace to focus her attention on this serious discussion so soon after that fairly intense experience. Intense for her, at least. She was reasonably sure that, if Harry could continue with her, she would one day look back on this and wonder over the fact that she had once found a simple spanking to be such an experience.
"Sir?" she whispered, laying her head back down on his shoulder as she clung tighter to him, holding onto him like a lifeline.
"What is it?"
"We need to… talk... about all this… but… can you be patient with me, please? I'm… focusing is hard right now, so I might need a little time."
"Of course. I'm sorry-"
"No sorry," she murmured, cutting off his apology. "You don't need to be sorry. You did exactly what I wanted you to do, Sir. What I needed from you." She took a deep breath, the scent of his skin filling her nose then let it out in a long slow breath as her body relaxed against him, her muscles going slack.
"Talk to me?" she whispered.
"What about?"
"Tell me… tell me what's bothering you? Let me hear it and I'll try to help. We have to talk to each other… remember, Sir?"
She felt his body move against her, his chest expanding as he pulled in a deep breath.
"I… I just don't get how this is supposed to help. I… how is hurting you not going to end in anything but you resenting me? How is it not… why is what I just did not abuse?"
She could hear the pain in his voice and mentally cursed herself. She knew this would be difficult for him, but she hadn't completely understood just how hard it would be. She hadn't completely connected that it would hurt him just as much, if not more than it hurt her. Her pain was cleansing, while his was… it was just pain. Pain without purpose or direction. How… how could she make it clear to him?
"Have you… have you ever done something wrong and felt bad about it?" she murmured against his neck.
"Yeah, of course I have. I never really meant to but I still felt bad about it."
"And wouldn't you… do you think you would have felt better if you could have made up for it… somehow?"
He seemed to consider that, falling silent for a time before she felt him shrug the shoulder she wasn't lying against. "I guess, yeah," he finally admitted and she smiled.
"That's what you just did for me, Sir. I… earlier, when we laid out the mistakes I made before, especially my trying to take control from you… I felt… I have never felt so ashamed of myself. I… I didn't mean to do that, I wasn't trying to do that, but I still did it. Now… I feel lighter than I think I ever have. I feel… I feel like a weight has been lifted off of me. For the last couple of days I've been carrying around this load. Guilt and shame and… it's all gone now, I feel so much better for it."
She lifted her head again and looked into those intense green eyes that she loved so much, sorrow filling her at seeing the pain and confusion that was so clearly expressed in them. "You let me make up for my mistake. The pain will fade, but I'll always remember this. This is a lesson for me, to learn that my mistakes have consequences. I don't resent you at all, Sir, and I can't remember the last time I felt so clean and free. That's what you did for me. You didn't hurt me, Sir. You freed me from the guilt and the shame that was weighing me down. And taught me that I need to avoid making those mistakes in the future."
He didn't seem entirely convinced, but she was on a roll, her thoughts moving forward and she just let them out in a stream as they occurred to her.
"What makes this different, Sir, is that I know you care for me. You've done this to me, seen me like this… in a way no one else ever has and you still feel that way." Her hand came up to stroke his cheek.
"It's obvious to me how much you care, because of how much this is affecting you. And I still feel the same way about you, even more now because I have at least an idea of how hard that was for you. Our friendship has always been unusually close, and I feel closer to you now than ever. I can't imagine something being as intimate as what just happened between, not even sex.
"No matter who we grow into, no matter where our relationship goes... what we just shared is something that can't be duplicated with anyone else. I can't ever have that same kind of bond and intimacy with someone else, even if we don't work out and we end up meeting other people… in that case, there might be others I ask to punish me, but no one else would ever be the same."
Harry's expression morphed into a scowl when she mentioned the possibility of their relationship not working out and at the idea of someone else punishing her, his arms tightened possessively around her.
"I'm not saying that will happen," she assured him, quickly leaning in to press a gentle kiss to his lips. "Right now, I can't imagine being this close to, or trusting, anyone this much but you. But we are pretty young. We don't know what the future will be.
"The parts of your soul and mine that this experience exposed lets us know each other, and ourselves, in a way that nothing else can, and that's what lets us both truly forgive. I can forgive myself because of the parts of me that got laid bare emotionally through this experience... and now, hopefully you can forgive yourself by those parts I'm sharing with you right now."
She finally stopped talking, suddenly worried that she might have rambled too much by the blank expression on his face. Had she confused him, or worse upset him, by saying they might not last? Did he think she might not want to be with him?
Eventually he pulled her closer to him and kissed her, a kiss that she returned wholeheartedly, trying to show him just how she felt through that simple yet intimate contact.
"I think," he murmured after they separated. "I think I actually understand now. I feel a little better about the whole thing at least. I honestly think that was probably the hardest thing I've ever done, Mine. I don't want to have to do that very often… but I… I don't think it will be nearly as difficult in the future if I have to."
She beamed at him and kissed him again, a much more intense sort of kiss than the few they'd so recently shared, before she pulled back, secretly enjoying the slightly dazed look on his face, and rested her head on his shoulder again, shifting to a more comfortable position in his lap.
"What else do we still need to talk about?" she asked from his shoulder as she closed her eyes and just let herself relax, basking in the comfort she always felt with him.
"I'm not entirely certain, really," he muttered after taking a minute to think, humming quietly to himself all the while. "Why don't we… what if we break down everything that happened today? See how we each feel about it?"
"How do you mean?"
"Well, everything I had you do today. How did you feel? Did anything make you uncomfortable at all, or did you think you particularly liked something?"
She could feel her face warming, nearly to match the heat in her other cheeks, and was rather glad that she was already resting her head so she didn't come up against his order not to hide from him. The urge to hide her face against his chest was bad enough as it was.
"I don't think there was anything I didn't enjoy in some way," she muttered, embarrassed to admit it aloud. "Having to bend over to write our contract… Merlin, that was so embarrassing, but exciting at the same time."
His body shook under her and it took her a moment to realize that he was laughing.
"I've noticed that," he admitted. "I've been trying to figure out what to do with you, and I've noticed the more embarrassing something is, the more excited you seem to get."
"How can you tell I'm excited? It's not like it's incredibly obvious like with you boys."
"You move."
She lifted her head at that, utterly confused by his response. "I move?" she asked incredulously, to which he laughed louder.
"Yes, you move," he said, a broad smile on his face. "When I had you write out your fantasies? The longer it went on, the more you shifted around in your seat. I've noticed when you're turned on, you seem to have trouble sitting still."
Her face suddenly got even hotter and she had to fight the urge to look down, away from those bright green eyes of his.
"Oh," she said in a small, surprised voice.
"I think it's only because I know you so well that I figured out what it meant honestly," he continued.
"You certainly do seem to like making me blush," she pointed out teasingly, and he shrugged.
"What can I say? You look so beautiful with that red in your cheeks," he told her, lifting one hand to touch her cheek before letting his fingers trail down her skin, over her throat and across her upper chest where her skin was slowly turning a brighter red. "I didn't realize just how far that blush of yours extended under your clothes though," he murmured. "That's certainly a fun discovery."
Hermione bit her lower lip as a shiver ran through her body at his gentle touch. A moment later she noticed his eyes weren't on her face anymore, instead he appeared to be looking at her hair, when both of his hands came up and reached around her head.
"Let's fix this," he muttered and she felt a light tugging at her hair as he untied the ribbon and pulled it loose. Immediately she turned in his lap and presented her back to him, lifting both hands to gather up her hair and hold it out of the way, so he could easily tie the ribbon back around her throat.
When he wrapped it around her neck and started to tie it, she shivered again at the pressure against her throat.
"How's that?" he asked.
"It can be tighter, Sir," she whispered, her heart racing as he slowly increased the pressure. "Right there, that's… that's perfect, Sir," she said when it was just a bit tighter than she had had it before.
She leaned back against him as his arms came around her middle, both of his hands resting on her bare stomach. Her eyes slid closed and she sighed again.
"I love how that feels," she admitted, letting the fingers of one hand brush against the soft silk around her neck. "I don't know why it's just…" She trailed off and felt more than heard him hum something as his chest rumbled against her back.
"What about your punishment?" he asked suddenly, and her eyes opened, staring at the wall across from them for a moment.
"How do you mean?"
She felt his body shift as he shrugged behind her. "Well… I tried to find something that would be a mix of physical and mental. How did you feel about it? Have you learned anything about yourself because of it?"
She had to think about that for a while, comparing her thoughts just before it to how she'd felt during. As she'd thought when he'd first said what her punishment was going to be, it had been humiliating, laying sprawled across his lap that way. They way he'd held her in place during and the actual pain of it…
"I think… honestly I think I actually enjoyed some aspects of it," she admitted slowly. "It was humiliating, like you were treating me like a child that had misbehaved or something. I don't know… it... it was exciting for some reason, and then I felt ashamed that I was getting excited by it, which just made it more arousing. The way you held me in place, and the pain itself…" She let her eyes fall closed again, blocking out the room around them to just focus on her thoughts, and what she'd felt. "I'm not entirely certain how to describe it," she finally let out, frustrated that she couldn't seem to articulate her feelings.
He hummed again, a noncommittal sort of sound, and his arms tightened slightly around her, pulling her up a bit so her body fit closer against his.
"Hey, what'd you mean earlier?" he asked and she tilted her head back against his shoulder in an attempt to look up at him.
"What'd I mean what earlier, Sir?" she asked, a small smile playing around her lips. "We've said a lot since we came in here."
"Okay, point to you on that," he chuckled. "I mean when you said you wanted less control. What'd you mean?"
She blinked several times, her mind flashing back to that part of the discussion. She'd almost forgotten it in the haze of her punishment, and the near terror she'd felt at that time when he'd suggested renegotiating their agreement again to give more control to her, she couldn't stop a shudder that ran through her at the memory, one of discomfort as opposed to the frequent pleasured tremors that she experienced around him.
"At the time, I honestly didn't have the slightest clue. I didn't really consider what I was saying, just that it was true. I'm just…" Her mind spun as she fell silent, trying to piece together what she might have meant, or how they might actually achieve the result of giving her less control than she currently had. However she kept coming back to the same problem. How could she have less control in a situation where she had none save ending it by using her safeword? She had no control left to give to him there unless they really did away with any limits they'd decided on, but even then they'd both agreed entirely to the absolute 'no's' so there wouldn't be any change.
"You… you were frustrated with the limitations by confining everything to while we're in this Room," she absently pointed out, and she could almost feel him raising a brow behind her in a quizzical manner even though she couldn't see him.
"Yeah?"
"What if… what if we extended things beyond the Room? Just a little?"
Now it was official, she could literally feel his confusion.
"Doesn't that sort of violate the keeping things separate rule?"
"We don't actually have a rule about keeping things separate, Sir," she pointed out. "We have one about not bringing in things from outside into what happens here. And we have the terms we use for each other in here, or when we're otherwise actively in the dynamic we're building, 'Sir' and 'Mine'. But none of the rules specifically state that only in here are we in the dynamic, and outside we're not. If that were true you'd have broken that rule yourself several times. Our first session that you surprised me with, the note you sent me at lunch the other day, any time you've called me 'Mine' outside of our space… even the homework assignment you gave me would have violated a rule like that."
As she spoke she was very careful to take note of her tone to ensure she didn't slip into her usual 'lecture mode' as her Sir liked to call it.
"Huh. You're right, I hadn't considered that. We'd have both broken that a dozen times over by now," he muttered thoughtfully. "So, did you have a suggestion then?"
I just might, she thought, idly chewing on her lower lip for a moment until she suddenly blinked in surprise when she felt him gently tugging her lip from between her teeth.
"You really need to stop doing that," he whispered. "You have no idea how sexy you look when you do that, and I can't have you distracting me right now, Mine."
She blushed again and squirmed slightly in his lap as the low tone of his voice seemed to send a shiver of pleasure through her body, then she suddenly froze as another thought clicked into place. Holy… he's right, I can't sit still when I'm turned on.
He laughed again, low in his throat as if he knew what she'd just realized and she turned in his lap until she was sitting sideways so she could wrap her arms around his shoulders again.
"You're terrible," she muttered.
"You love it."
She didn't say anything. Honestly, there wasn't anything she could say. He was right. She absolutely loved what he did to her, as much as the entire thing continued to amaze her. That he held so much control over her and her body's reactions was mind boggling, especially considering they were really only scratching the surface still.
"Suggestion?" he prompted a moment later, causing her to shake herself out of her thoughts and back into their conversation.
"Right. The only thing I can really think of is… well what if you started giving me orders to follow outside of here?" she waved absently at the Room with one hand, "Simple things that wouldn't draw attention to us, things that only you and I would know about? You could even give me new orders out there too, just whisper them to me, and as long as they're not something that would draw attention..."
"How would that work? Outside here, in the rest of our lives you're not my sub, you're my girlfriend, and I don't order my girlfriend around."
She frowned at that and sat up so she could see him. "But… I said it before, Sir, I'm your sub and your girlfriend. I don't stop being one or the other just because of where we are."
Once more, abject confusion was clear on his face and in his eyes. "But… but if we're keeping things separate, like you insisted, how does that make sense?"
Just like the day she figured out just what it actually meant to be submissive, and that she might have such a side within herself, she felt a fevered sensation growing inside her. A thrill at finally understanding something that had eluded her, as she started to realize just what might be the main cause of Harry's issues with their dynamic.
"Sir, have… have you been trying to keep me separate in your head like that this whole time? Almost like thinking of me as two different people?"
"Well of course I have. We're only in this dynamic in here, or if we're outside it's a lead up to coming here, or to our other room before now. When we're just sitting around with Ron, or in classes or doing our homework, you're my girlfriend, not my sub and I'm not your Dom."
"Yes... you are," she insisted, several things clicking forcefully into place in her mind. "Merlin, Sir, I'm so sorry. I… I didn't realize the whole idea of separation was confusing you like this," she muttered. Dammit, why hadn't she seen that? Emotional things were confusing for him, she knew that from the time he spent talking to her when she was petrified.
"What are you talking about?"
"Oh, how to explain it so you'll understand… not that I don't think you're capable of understanding," she hastened to add the last part. "I'm just… I'm not entirely certain how to explain it…."
She thought furiously, her brain on fire once again as thoughts raced around chasing about each other in a chaotic mess that only she would've been able to make any sense of.
"Sir… have you been having difficulty in keeping that separation you were trying for?"
"How do you mean?"
"It's something I was thinking when i read your note here. The order not to use the cushioning charm. I was thinking that you still treated me as a sub with the same kind of tenderness and care that you use with me as your girlfriend."
"Okay, now you're making even less sense. First you're saying that you're both sub and girlfriend, but now you're separating how I treat you depending on which one you are at the time."
"I think I can explain it," she said. "I just… can you please answer a couple more questions for me? Help me understand your thoughts, so I can explain mine?"
He sighed, clearly frustrated, but nodded for her to continue.
"Hey, this is part of us communicating better, right?" she reminded him. "We need to talk about our concerns with each other. And actually this leads me rather well to something that's been bothering me a little."
He considered that for a moment before he sighed again, though more in resignation than frustration. "You're right, and that was at my insistence too, that we talk more. So I'll try to be patient. What was your concern?"
Now that the moment was on her, she found herself suddenly extremely nervous, but if they wanted to move past this, they couldn't avoid talking about uncomfortable topics.
"I've… I've been wondering why you haven't been… haven't been using me, Sir," she mumbled, blushing furiously, but she absolutely refused to look away from him.
He didn't seem to be in much better shape thankfully, his own cheeks blooming with a brilliant red as he shifted nervously under her. "You mean… uh…."
"Sexually," she said bluntly. "Every session I've been fully dressed, until this one." She glanced down at her naked body, his eyes following her gaze until stopping on her bare breasts for a moment. She grinned as he tilted his head back up to look her in the eyes. "Exactly, Sir," she teased, her grin widening as he growled at her. "But really, it's things like that, that have been confusing me. You know I'd get on my knees right now and suck your c-cock if you ordered me to, Sir. And I've seen that you like looking at me, so why haven't you done anything? Using me for your pleasure and mine is a part of this whole thing."
His mouth dropped open slightly when she said 'cock', even though she did stumble a little over the word, overcoming her natural inclination not to use crude language, and she felt a thrill of pride that she was able to surprise him. He recovered quickly though, leaning back more against the corner of the sofa.
"I haven't really been sure," he admitted. "That's actually one of the things I wanted to talk to you about. One of my issues with this... what I mentioned the other day... and after we first wrote out the contract and discussed all this... later that day, I was wondering about it. You… you seemed so insistent on wanting a more sexual aspect to this. But outside of our space, whatever room we're using, I haven't seen that same kind of… desire, I guess? I mean. As my sub, you want this, obviously. But as my girlfriend? Outside of here you haven't seemed interested. Or maybe it just… I don't know. I wasn't sure if you only wanted to do things together in here, or what… I don't know that I'm making any sense at all now."
"No… no that does make sense, Sir," she disagreed. "I think I understand at least. And I believe part of that problem is a matter of balance. I mean… really, outside of when we get away for a session, or when we'd discuss the aspects of this dynamic, when are we ever really alone? Just the two of us, with no one else around?"
He thought about that for a moment before he shrugged. "Never really."
"Right. We haven't been able to… oh say... go on a date or something, since your awful Uncle wouldn't sign your Hogsmeade slip. So us spending time as a couple has kind of been overshadowed by us being in this dynamic. Although… you realize that I could be your sub and us not actually be a couple, right?"
A hurt look flashed across his face for a moment.
"Not to say I don't want us to be together, I do, Sir. I… I think I've wanted it for a long time actually, I just kept trying to convince myself otherwise. My point was, that other people could just have the dynamic if they wanted, without being in an actual relationship. They could limit themselves to simply using each other in a scene or session, however they want to define it, and otherwise they could not even be friends for all we know. I don't think that would be a lasting thing, but it could be done.
"The difference here is we are a couple. What I want as your sub, I want as your girlfriend too. I want to kiss you and more. We just haven't really gotten away except for these times."
By the time she finished he was smiling again, and she couldn't help but answer with a smile of her own as she leaned forward to kiss him. "I wish you'd said something sooner," she murmured against his lips. "We really haven't been making this easy on ourselves."
"We're getting better though," he pointed out, and she backed away, nodding her head.
"Okay, so… we'll come back to that in a moment," she said, causing him to give her another quizzical look but she'd already moved on. "As far as the separation goes. What I most meant was outside of this Room, or wherever we happen to be when you're controlling me, or commanding me… well, wouldn't it seem odd if you gave me an order around Ron, and I just obeyed you without question? Or if you spoke to me the way you do in here? People would ask questions. They'd wonder what was going on, and we don't want everyone knowing our personal business, right?
"I meant it more as a way to try to stop us from accidentally falling into the habit of order and obey, so that when we're in public we don't do or say something that gives us away… does that make sense? I didn't mean that, outside of here that I'm not still your sub. I am always your sub, Sir. I am always going to be yours to control. I… being submissive to you… that isn't something I just decided would be fun, though I certainly do enjoy it.
"It's a part of me, it's a part of who I am, and what I am. I didn't really understand that at first, but I'm starting to. I don't want you to control me, I need you to. I feel… it makes me feel wonderful when you take command of me, and when I know what I've done pleases you. I… I can't think of how to explain it other than that."
By the time she finished there was a desperate, almost pleading tone to her voice, as if begging him to understand what she was saying and he placed his hands on her shoulders before he pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly.
"So," he asked quietly a few minutes later. "Let me see if I understand this all correctly. I've been worrying over how I treat you as my girlfriend versus as my sub… for no reason, basically? Just a misunderstanding of what we each understood 'separate' to mean in this situation?"
She nodded, her face pressed against his neck, slowly breathing in the scent of his skin. "That's pretty much it. Whatever we would do in here, I would be just as willing to do as your girlfriend somewhere else, since I'm always your sub and always your girlfriend at the same time."
He let out a long breath followed by a rather self deprecating chuckle. "Well… damn, I feel kind of stupid. I really should have asked this weeks ago, I just… I wasn't really sure how to do that."
"So… does this mean you're going to stop worrying, and stop holding back with me?" she asked hesitantly.
"Might not just get better overnight, but I'm certainly going to try. It'll be easier, I think, knowing that treating you differently depends on where we are, not what role we're each playing. Because it's not a role for you, is it? Like you said, it's a part of you, not something you're pretending."
Hermione nodded again, smiling though something about what he said tickled her attention, she just wasn't sure what, yet.
The alarm on Harry's watch started beeping and his head fell back as he let out a groan.
"It's nearly time for dinner," he muttered, reaching over to silence the incessant noise.
"I should get dressed then," she said, disappointed that their time was up. She was tempted to use the Time Turner, but then they would have had to find a different room and none would be as secure as this one. Better to wait, she thought and reluctantly climbed off of Harry's lap. She very carefully did not smirk or grin when Harry attempted to subtly adjust himself, but she noticed and loved the effect she had on him.
Walking over to the chest she pulled out her clothes, slightly surprised that she wasn't feeling at all embarrassed to just be standing there naked in front of him as she laid each item out and started dressing. She moved almost on auto-pilot, her mind analyzing everything that had happened, and everything they'd discussed as she dressed, first pulling a red pair of her boyshort knickers up her legs and over her hips before she reached for the matching bra. Her skirt followed, and she'd pulled on her blouse, but had yet to button it when she suddenly froze in place, her eyes taking on a distant look for a few moments before she suddenly turned to Harry, her blouse hanging open still.
"You said 'it's a part of you. Not something you're pretending.'," she blurted out, and Harry turned from where he'd moved to roll up their new contract so he could tuck it into her bag for safe keeping.
"What was that?" he asked, looking up at her with a confused expression coming over his face.
She started buttoning her blouse, a distressed feeling growing in her chest. "When you were talking about it being easier in the future, not having to think of the roles we're playing so much as where we are. You said that it wasn't a role for me, and that it was a part of me."
His eyes moved toward the ceiling as he thought back for a moment, and finally he nodded. "Yeah, I think that's what I said. Why?"
She didn't answer at first, taking time to tuck in her blouse and then placed her Time Turner back around her neck, tucking it under her clothes, and then pulling on her robes.
"You didn't say anything about you, Harry," she pointed out. "You didn't say that being a Dom is a part of you. I know when we started, you really didn't choose it because you wanted to, but because you wanted to help me. I appreciate you wanting to help, Harry, but I said it before it won't work, not in the long run if this isn't something you want. If it's not a part of who you are, do you think you'll be able to keep being my Dom? Or will you get tired of the 'role' eventually."
The expression on Harry's face she thought she might have easily reproduce by punching him in the nose without any reason or warning. It was a pained, confused expression, and she really didn't like seeing it. Silence filled the room as she finished dressing, and gathered the rest of her belongings, slinging one strap of her bag over her right shoulder.
"Don't answer me right now. Please… think about this very carefully, Harry. I… I really need you to know… to truly know that you want this. Not just that you're willing to do it for me, but that you want to do it for yourself, too. Does that make sense?"
Frowning, he nodded slowly. "Yeah, I think so," he muttered.
Moving over to him she pulled him into a hug and kissed him gently. "Please, think about this," she repeated, looking into his eyes the entire time. "It's extremely important. Once you have an answer, let me know, and we'll figure out what we can do from there, okay?"
"I understand, Hermione," he said quietly. "I'm sorry. I obviously didn't think all this through well enough at the beginning. But I promise, I'll consider it extremely carefully now, and I'll get you your answer as quickly as I can."
Merlin, she hoped that he truly did want this dynamic. If he didn't… she honestly wasn't sure if their relationship could survive it. She understood, finally, that she honestly needed the dynamic they were building, and if he couldn't fulfill that role, she didn't know how they could work things out.
"Come on," she said, forcing a smile onto her lips so as not to worry him. "We need to go down to eat, and I have a question for you." She hooked her arm through his and the two of them left the Room, the door vanishing behind them as they walked away.
"I've been wondering since earlier. How did you summon the chest that had that paddle in it? And then how did you send it back? We haven't learned the summoning charm yet, and you shouldn't have been able to do either of those wandlessly."
He looked at her and grinned, that lopsided boyish sort of grin that was such a trademark of his it was nearly more recognizable, to her, than the lightning bolt scar above his eye. "The Room did that."
"Wait, what? How?"
"I requested the Room, so I control it while I'm there," he explained as they made their way toward the Great Hall. "I needed the chest by me, so the Room made it happen."
She considered that for a moment. "So… waving your hand…"
"Complete theatrics," he confirmed. "I could have sat there completely motionless and the thing still would have come flying over when I wanted it to."
Hermione shook her head, dumbfounded by the changes the last few weeks had wrought in her boyfriend. He'd never been one for that kind of sleight-of-hand showmanship. He wasn't one to showboat or to do something simply because of how it would appear to someone else. He was a straightforward type of person, but she had to admit this new side of him was certainly entertaining.
By that time, the halls around them had become more populated, and they joined a small stream of students heading toward the Great Hall, forcing them to turn their conversation to more mundane topics. Harry started asking about the day's Ancient Runes lesson. He was still behind the rest of them, but Professor Babbling had commented that it was built off of a lesson from the previous term that he'd already covered so they were able to lobby ideas and concepts back and forth while they walked.
"'Bout time you two showed up," Ron complained when they sat down across from him at the Gryffindor table. "Haven't seen either of you since classes ended."
"Did you check the Library?" Harry asked, and the look on Ron's face told them both clearly that no, he had not.
"We were there for a little while, had to do some classwork, and then we went out walking," he said as he passed a platter of steak and kidney pie down the table. Hermione mostly tuned them out at the point, turning her attention to her meal as she was quite suddenly ravenous. Idly she supposed that had something to do with the strain she'd been put under earlier; physically, emotionally, and mentally, the entire experience had been draining, satisfying, and completely worth every bit of pain, but now she was starting to flag.
She shifted slightly in her spot on the bench, holding back a wince as the movement reminded her that her arse still burned like the dickens. She'd have to check in the morning and see if she had any bruises, she supposed.
Or maybe Sir could check for you? she thought, then dismissed the idea as she still wasn't sure what Harry was going to decide. She sighed when she suddenly felt Harry's arm wrap around her, allowing her to lean into him just a bit.
A moment later his chin was resting on her shoulder, and she felt his warm breath brush across her ear, as he quietly whispered, "Mine?"
She was fairly positive her entire body went completely rigid as that single word registered, her eyes darting wildly back and forth for a moment before she realized that not a single person was paying them the slightest bit of attention. A hopeful sensation grew, and she very carefully restrained her reaction to an equally quiet, "Sir?"
"We'll be having our next session this Saturday, we'll work out the time later. When you get to the room, I want you to wait for me, just as you were today. I think that will be standard from now on. Do you understand."
Kneeling naked, waiting for you? "Yes, Sir, I understand," she replied, feeling practically giddy as she realized that this was his way of letting her know his decision. He really did want what they had.
"One more thing. Between now and then, I want you to prepare a list, Mine."
A list? Where's he going with this?
"A list of what, Sir?"
"Five things that you want to try. I'll decide what, if any of them, we actually do. But you'll have that list ready for me come Saturday."
Almost immediately she couldn't help but shift her weight slightly in her seat, and she swore she could practically hear him smirking as she moved.
"Yes, Sir," she practically squeaked out.
"Good girl," he whispered and she closed her eyes for a moment, biting the inside of her cheek to distract her.
His arm tightened in a quick squeeze around her middle before he straightened up, turning away from her to speak to Neville, whom was sitting on Ron's other side and across the table from them.
"Hermione? Are you okay?"
Startled, her eyes opened and she turned to see her dorm mate giving her a curious look from a few seats away on her other side.
"I'm fine, Lavender," she choked out. "Just… bit my tongue accidentally."
The giggly blond didn't seem entirely convinced, but she shrugged anyway and turned back to her conversation with Parvati, leaving Hermione to turn back and level a glare at her boyfriend. He wasn't looking her way, but she could tell he was smirking.
You enjoyed that, didn't you, Potter? she thought, entirely too thrilled with him to be in any way upset with how smug he was acting.
She returned to her dinner, considerably more cheerful than she'd been moments before. With the concern over what Harry would decide alleviated, she turned her thoughts to something else. How could she show him just how much she wanted him as her Dom while everyone else still just saw her being his girlfriend in public? She considered several different ideas throughout the rest of the meal, and they were making their way toward the Tower to relax before bed, when she struck on something that she felt would properly convey her commitment. She only wondered if she would have the nerve to actually do it.
Entering the Common Room, she followed him over to their usual sofa by the fire. As they sat she checked her watch, quickly doing some math in her head. Since she'd left for her punishment immediately after class, she hadn't gotten around to any of her assignments yet, and there was no way that she was willing to let them sit, wasting the time she had and could be working on them. A look around the room showed that it was still fairly crowded, early enough in the evening that most of the Tower's occupants were present, either lounging around or doing their own classwork. She chewed on her lip thoughtfully as she tried to decide what course to take.
"You need to stop doing that," Harry murmured, and she blinked in surprise when she felt him gently tugging her lip from between her teeth. "I already told you what that does to me, Mine."
"Sorry," she muttered, blushing slightly, but grinning in spite of herself. She looked around again then leaned against him, pulling her legs up so that she was half laying down, her upper body propped up against him as his left arm came around her. She rested her head on his shoulder and tilted her head back so her lips were close to his ear.
"Sir?" she whispered.
"Hmmm?"
"I'd… I'd like to show you what I meant. About wanting you as my Dom but still being your girlfriend."
He turned his head slightly, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye.
"How so?"
At that she nearly bit her lip again, but stopped herself, unsure if he really meant it as an order, or if he was just teasing her about that habit.
"If… if I tell you it would sort of lose some of the impact, Sir."
He turned back to face the fire, relaxing back into the sofa as he thought before slowly nodding his head.
"Go ahead then, Mine," he whispered, and she nodded, lifting her head for a moment to make sure no one was looking in their direction. When she was certain they weren't being observed, she laid her head back down, and with her left hand she quickly reached under her skirt and grasped the edge of her knickers. A quick press of her legs to lift her hips slightly, and a tug of her hand, and she was sliding them down her legs until she was able to pull them off over her shoes. Reaching over she stuffed them into his robe pocket and leaned her head back again to look up at him, noting the shocked expression on his face with more than a little satisfaction.
His shock slowly morphed into that tiny smirk that she'd come to both love and view with a sense of trepidation, as he patted his pocket with his free hand for a moment.
"Well… you gave them to me, Mine. They belong to me now, and you're not to wear any more until I say you can. Do you understand?"
She was positive that her face probably mirrored his shocked look from moments before, as she ducked her head slightly, while still keeping eye contact with him. Slowly a small, pleased smile turned up her lips and she murmured, "Yes, Sir."
