Chapter 35

I enter the room and fall onto the couch, laying my head on Severus' lap. His fingers play with my hair and the other hand holds the book up, propping his elbow on the sofa's arm. "God, I want some chocolate," I say.

"No. No chocolate," Severus reminds me. He's got me on a "chocolate probation." No chocolate. At all.

I went on a chocolate binge a couple days ago and was bouncing off the walls (a little too literally). I accidently bruised his back when I tackled him when he came back from classes at lunch, knocking him onto the floor.

"Please?" I look up at him, pouting.

"No."

"Please?" He shakes his head. "I'll get it from the kitchens," I threaten.

"How was your visit to prison?" he asks instead in an attempt to get my mind off caffeine and sugar bars with nuts or crispy rice. Or plain old milk chocolate—I'm not a fan of dark chocolate, but I wouldn't say no to a small fun size bar.

"I don't ever want to go back there," I say. "It was awful. Just to walk the halls I had to focus on you. I'm still freezing." I nuzzle closer to him.

Severus puts the book down and takes my hand, kissing it.

"But what I needed to tell Rousseau is out of the way. He's not leaving or getting out of Azkaban any time soon, so that's…one thing to check off the to do list."

"True," Severus said, kissing my hand again. "What's next? Any other mad ex-mates of yours that I should concern myself with?"

I grin. I have to take the bait. "Well, there is one other ex," I say, looking at him with a mischievous grin. "He's not a werewolf. But he's tall, kind of thin and rather pale. Doesn't help that he refused to wear color except green and white and silver—but that's only because they're part of his uniform."

"So a Slytherin," Severus laughed.

"Yeah. Easy to recognize. Black hair and eyes. Big nose. Damn good kisser. Yeah I think you got another person to worry about."

"Yeah. He sounds intimidating," Severus said, lifting my head so he could stand and put the book back on the shelf. "I think I know the guy." I sit up.

"You do. Pretty well."

"That's makes it harder to beat the crap out of him," Severus said, smirking. "Really, leaving you? Stupidest thing he's ever done."

My smile falters. "Severus, please forgive yourself. I'm not mad at you."

"I know. That doesn't make what happened over the summer any less my fault."

"None of it is. Neither of us could have known at the time that I'd join the pack. No one forced me to join. I actually chose to join after consideration. I won't say 'careful consideration.' It wasn't. Now I want out, but there's no way out that I can find."

Severus opens his mouth to argue. I hold my hand up to silence him.

"Don't try to convince me otherwise. It's not your fault." I stand and approach him, wrapping my arms around his waist and kissing his lips. "We'll find a way out. I will get out of Fenrir's pack. I'm that determined. He can't keep me there."

"He'll try."

"He can try all he likes. I'm not staying. And I can't be killed. I didn't kill Rousseau. I can find a way out of the pack without killing any of them and without passing the curse on to a first year."

Severus runs his fingers through his hair, agitated.

"Can we not…worry about that now?"

"Time is running out, Remus."

"Rousseau has been dealt with," I tell him. "I don't want to focus on what's left to do. Can't we check what's already done off and take a few minutes to relax? Homework's done. Halloween is tomorrow—Meaning Sevie Pranks."

It's a school tradition to prank as many underclassmen as possible during Halloween that began about sixty or seventy years ago. It's all fun and games. No one gets hurt because if someone does, the pranks will be banned.

Filch hates them, but there's always a cleanup crew for that night preselected a month ahead of time because that's how long it takes to get the prank up and running.

All in all, there's no reason for anyone to complain except for the first years—who tend to be the brunt of the joke.

"Rousseau is in prison. This is our last year. I know you haven't had a good time at school, but this year will be different. I promise."

Severus removes my hands from his hips. "Why do you think this year will be any less hard?"

I smirk, "Kind of one of the perks of dating a Hogwarts Marauder."

"What? Smooth sailing?"

"Well, we are the guys who caused you so much trouble, so…" I shrug. "Think of it as payback against Sirius and James if you want. The point is that no one messes with my partner without risking the consequences." I cross my arms. "They are very severe consequences."

Severus arches an eyebrow. Then he shrugs. "Yeah," he agreed. "They are severe. Never mess with a werewolf's mate. It's an actual proverb."

I furrow my brow and shake my head. "There's no proverb about werewolves except this one: beware."

"Well, there should be one about what happens when you mess with a werewolf's mate."

"It would still mean beware."

"Yeah. But it'd be more detailed," Severus said, sitting on the couch again. I joined him and he wrapped his arm around my shoulder. "Werewolves make great lovers but bad enemies."

I let it circle around my head.

"Admittably it sounds like something out of a fortune cookie."

"No. That's a good proverb. They're supposed to be short and fortune cookie like. What is a fortune cookie? I've never heard of them."

"Neither did I until Lily's dad returned from a business trip to America with a bag full of these biscuits. You break the biscuit and inside is a slip of paper that tells you something ambiguous about your future."

"What did yours say?"

"I don't remember. It was ten years ago. Lily and I didn't even eat them. We just kept breaking the biscuits apart and reading them out aloud."

"That's a waste of biscuits."

"We were eight and we weren't sure if they were edible. We only wanted the fortunes inside."

"Did any of them come true?"

"I don't think so."

"Why didn't you bring this up before? It would have made a great prank just to hand them out and tell them they tell accurate fortunes."

Severus shook his head, trying not to laugh. "No. Remes, you've had some really fine moments, but that was not one of them. That was too cheesy. I would have expected that from Pettigrew, but you?"

I grin, "Which brings us back to chocolate..."

"No!"

"But it helps me think clearly!" I shout. "I'm going to get bad grades if I don't get some chocolate." Severus threw his head back and laughed. "Shut up, it's not funny!"

"You're not going to fail your classes by not getting chocolate," Severus reasoned. I pouted. He kissed my forehead. "Only if you keep complaining about not getting any chocolate."

I still pout. You can't take a man's chocolate away. You can't. It's cruel.

"Not even a fun sized bar?"

"Remes my back still hurts from when you rammed me to the floor."

"That was a chocolate binge," I say in my defense. "I'm asking for a little half inch of chocolate at least."

Severus refuses to look at me, not wanting to see the Look. Yeah. I have a look. It's difficult for him to resist it.

I smirk inwardly and straddle his lap. He refuses to look at me, no matter how much I stare. Our position probably makes it more difficult for him too. I kiss the corner of his mouth.

"Please, Sev?"

He's mumbling, "I'm stronger than the look," under his breath.

We'll see about that.

"Please?" I whisper in his ear.

"No."

"With a cherry on top?"

"No."

"What about strawberries?"

"Goddamit, Remus, no."

I frown. Then I get an idea and I smirk. I get off his lap. "Fine," I say, crossing my arms and looking the other way. "All this over a little accident? It's ridiculous, Severus. It's just some chocolate."

"Then you can go a few days without it," he tells me.

I don't look at him, pretending to be the hurt lover. I will get my chocolate if it's the last thing I do.

#Severus#

I glance at him once. He won't look at me.

For crying out loud, it's just a stupid chocolate bar, I tell myself. Throw him a bone.

But if I do that, then there is sure to be another binge. I know there's a chance this could backfire. Remus could get chocolate from another source and binge again anyway.

I sigh.

"Remes, I'm not trying to be mean," I assure him. He still won't look at me. "Look, tomorrow's Halloween," I say. "You can have some chocolate tomorrow."

He spins around and hugs me, grinning widely. He's so spoiled.