See me an hour before your class with me. I know you have a free period.
Bryan opened the note and smiled absentmindedly. Surreptitiously glancing at the head table, he noticed his father's eyes boring holes into him and he nodded. For the first time ever, he wished one of his brothers were in Gryffindor with him. Then he'd have someone to share his happiness with. As it was, things were finally shaping up for him. Better late than never.
"You couldn't have known I was truly free," Bryan boomed jokingly, making himself welcome in the classroom. "What if I had arranged to study with Lia? No doubt she would be confused if I told her I preferred the company of the old dungeon bat over her."
Severus stared emotionlessly, not sure what to say. The boy was always so forward! How dare he call him the dungeon bat? Instead, he settled on a topic that he had some curiosity in. "You and Miss Rogers," he intoned. "Explain."
"You'll have to learn how to better communicate," Bryan said, chuckling. "What is it you want to know? You'll have to elaborate."
"Is it serious?"
"I'm surprised and touched that you care." There was a moment of silence. "And, erm, I think so. I mean, we're only eighteen and seventeen, so we're about as serious as we can get. Do you not approve?" He suddenly looked more solemn and exposed.
"I haven't thought that far," Severus admitted. "I never thought I would have a son, much less a possible daughter-in-law."
"Merlin, now you're just overdoing it. Mum hasn't even used that term. I'm not getting hitched anytime soon."
The potions master looked embarrassed. "Well," he said, coughing slightly, "are you ready for the weekend? It'll be a real test to see how we all fit together."
"Ready as I'll ever be."
Severus nodded. "Take a seat."
"What?"
"You've been standing this whole time. There's no need."
"Alright." He did so, staring at his father expectantly. "Now, why have you really invited me over?"
"Must I have a reason to get to know my son better?" Though the sentiment was meant to be touching, both could hear how awkward it sounded coming from the potions master's mouth.
Bryan bit his lip, unconsciously scooting closer. "It'll be a long journey, you know. Eighteen years' worth."
"I am aware."
"Of course, I'll do my best to supplement you with memories. But I was hoping we could make some new ones, too."
Severus nodded, not trusting himself to say anything else on the subject matter. "What do you plan to do after Hogwarts?"
"Question and answer session, I see how it is," Bryan quipped, attempting to lighten the mood. It didn't work. He sighed. "I recall having this conversation not too long ago with Mum. Truth is, I don't really know what I'm going to do. There's never been that one thing for me, and my plans have been screwed up enough as it stands. I won't be a deadbeat, though. You raised me better than that."
"I never said you would."
Bryan studied his expression, taking advantage of the man's silence. "My turn. What are your intentions with us? With me, with my brothers, and with Mum?"
"I—" The words died in his throat, and he cleared it to try again. "I'll stay by her side, of course. Your brothers will naturally be a part of—a part of—by our side, and you too, if you so desire. I wouldn't want to make any decision for you, given that you are of age."
"Now wait a minute. You'll 'stay by her side'? That's—"
"You know what I mean."
"Do I?"
"You overstep your boundaries!"
That effectively silenced Bryan, who realized that he had indeed been a bit too forceful. "Well," he began, somewhat contritely, "you know what the right course of action is, and I trust you'll follow it."
"Damn it, boy," Severus said, in a voice that wasn't quite a roar but still louder than usual, "I don't need you to tell me to do something I already plan on doing. I furthermore don't want you or anyone to think that I did something merely because someone told me it was the right thing to do. When I ask her to marry me, it'll be because I want her to."
"No one said anything about marriage," Bryan said, though he was beaming and having trouble hiding it. "Certainly not I." He quickly changed the subject. "I've never had you as my professor, you know. It's been quite an experience."
"Why did I stop teaching?"
"You informed the headmistress of your intention to leave the moment you heard that Mum had conceived Roman. Quite the family man." Smirking, he gave his father a conspiratorial look.
"That sounds like a brash decision," Severus remarked, ignoring the boy's playful jabs.
"Not at all. By the end, you held onto your job simply for the headmistress's sake. As I understand it, you couldn't bear to be away from us. Finding out that you were to have a third child finally gave you the courage to leave. Quite the family man," Bryan repeated good-humoredly.
The boy's gentle teasing reminded him greatly of the way Hermione interacted with him, and it pleased him to be able to see bits of her in him.
"I know what you're thinking," Bryan interrupted.
"You do?"
"Mhm. You're trying to see who I'm like. Well, I'll tell you this—Mum always says that my personality is a mix of her, you, and the man you would've been had you grown up in a happier household."
Once again, Severus was reminded that the youngster in front of him knew everything about him, while he still knew hardly anything. Well, there was time for that. Speaking of which— "The potion you mentioned? Could I…?"
"Of course! I don't have it with me, and neither do I know exactly what's in it, but you can talk to Johnny about that. We'll bring it tomorrow when we go to Cornwall. Step one of 'get Dad back,' you know?"
"If you guys had just come to me about it, I could have assisted you and made the process easier," Severus remarked, a thought that had been in his mind for days now.
"Things are never as straightforward as they can be, are they?"
"Up to you."
"Well, I'm fairly sure that we have a winning antidote. Can I stop by later today with the batch we've been keeping under a stasis charm? You can look over it, but by this point I doubt it's fresh enough; we'll just have to brew it again for you."
"What is this 'we' you speak of? I was under the impression that the majority of the work was done Johnny and Her—your mother."
Bryan reddened. "I—"
"No need." The potions master wore a smirk that, for whatever reason, made Bryan smile back. "Feel free to grace me with your presence again tonight. Eight?"
He watched as the young man grinned, earlier slight forgotten. "Yeah. Eight is great."
Severus glanced at the clock. "It's almost time for your class. Unless you want everyone to know that you were the first one in the classroom…"
"I get it. See you in five." Stepping out of his seat, Bryan walked forward and held out his hand. It was a remarkably odd gesture between father and son, but the potions master took it, sealing a silent agreement between the two.
Severus had nearly forgotten that Hermione was in that class with Bryan. Instead of grimacing when she walked in, he felt himself conceal the beginnings of a smile. The past week had shown him that she was truly his student in nothing but name only. Hell, they shared three children together, and though it was going to be a long, awkward process, he had hope.
When all the seventh years had shuffled in, his gaze lingered on each one of them briefly before he wrote down instructions on the board. Once they got started, he relaxed by his desk, pulling out the sixth year papers to grade while also keeping an eye free to make sure the students weren't in any danger. As this was his NEWT class, he usually didn't have to worry.
"Professor?"
He looked up and sighed at the interruption. Miss Janklin's hand was in the air.
"I was wondering if you could maybe take a look at my potion? The colour is a bit off."
The potions professor made his way over, took one look at the concoction, and knew what the problem was. "Did you remove the stem from the amarillo flower before you put it in? I thought not." The girl was visibly nervous, so he tried to be kinder. "You still have time. Try again." He vanished her potion. Walking away from her, he took the time to observe his other students' progress, stopping at one particular student.
"Miss Granger."
Hermione had been aware of his presence the whole time, so she was not surprised when he appeared behind her. "Yes, Professor?"
"Just observing. Carry on." Visions of his witch lying beneath him tumbled into his mind, and he felt a sudden desire to hold her, to press into her, to have her. Fortunately, he had more sense than that. Making his way back to his desk, he willed himself to focus back on grading. Still, he couldn't get his mind off her, and he couldn't resist finding an excuse to have her stay behind after she handed in her perfect potion.
"What is it this time, Professor?" she asked, teasingly, after she had set her bag on one of the tables and turned to smile at him.
"It's Severus," he corrected. "And you and I are going to make a potion."
"I beg your pardon?"
"That's right. A sleeping draught will do."
"Sleeping draught? That's a second year potion!"
"That is the point," he countered with a smirk, "when we inevitably blow it up, we wouldn't have lost much in terms of ingredients." His insides tightened at the thought, and he wondered if she truly hadn't seen the tent in his trousers yet.
"Why would we blow it up?"
He couldn't tell whether she was purposely being thick or not, but he made his way over to her and brushed a couple fingers through her hair. Realization seemed to dawn onto her, and the 'o' formed by her lips gave him opportunity enough to press his own onto hers. She eagerly responded, and one of her hands immediately found its way into his hair.
With great effort, Severus wrenched them apart. "About that potion—"
"Forget the potion. Did you know I had a free period?" She meant to continue their actions, but he stopped her, leading them both to the storage room. Her question was ignored.
"I'll get the wormwood, valerian, and sopophorous bean while you get the flobberworm, nettle, and powdered asphodel petals. Meet me by the cauldron."
"Severus," she groaned. Still, she followed his instructions and walked over to the storage room with him, both of them fetching their respective ingredients and returning to the cauldron. Hermione looked up at Severus expectantly, heat in her eyes, but he only smirked and gestured for her to begin the potion.
Biting her lip, Hermione crushed the wormwood and added it to the cauldron. While she slowly stirred, she felt Severus hover closer and closer to her from behind until his front was pressed against her back. She excited at the feel of something long and hot insistent against her backside, but she made no indication that she was aware of it save for the gently swaying of her hips against him. He reached forward and covered her hands with his, stirring the crushed wormwood with her.
"The valerian is waiting," he intoned, and that voice was enough to make her ears ring and her legs quake. She reached for the plant at the left of her workspace, doing her best to move only with her hands so that her backside would remain in contact with Severus.
It wasn't the best way to do it.
"Your cuts are sloppy." Once again reaching forward, Severus took the knife out of her hands and did the meticulous chopping himself. When he finished, he gracefully slid the bits into the cauldron and turned the heat on high. Hermione marveled at his ability to remain completely composed. Wanting to prove herself just as competent, she grabbed the flobberworm and juiced it, adding its mucous to the mix. That step done, she turned to face Severus, not caring that she'd turned her back on the potion. The last time she'd done that, Johnny had been three and she'd come out of it with a permanently burned but functional wand. It surprised her that she could think of something so far away while she was smoldering on the inside.
"You forgot to stir," he rebuked, bringing her back to the present. Reaching past her to gain access to the workspace, he gave the brew four vigorous stirs while consciously aware of the warm body situated between himself and the cauldron. "You're in your uniform," he remarked. "It's still odd to digest."
"Uniform, no uniform—I'm still the same person I have been this whole time."
"I know. I finally know." That said, he—at long last!—touched a part of her that wasn't her hands, and Hermione felt the trail of goosebumps he left even through a layer of clothing. Not one to remain still, she immediately reciprocated, pulling open a few of his numerous—too numerous—buttons until she came upon his bare chest.
"The bean," she managed with a throaty gasp, "it needs to be chopped."
"Bugger the bean." With a quick flick of his wand, the knife was chopping the large bean by itself, and Hermione stifled a giggle.
"That's cheating, Severus. What potions master—" He effectively silenced her with a burning kiss, and she was impressed with herself for being able to see past Severus and watch the chopped bean bits sailing into the cauldron. Reaching into his trousers, Hermione found what she was looking for and pulled it out, grasping it firmly with her small hand. Giving him no warning, she dropped to her knees and took him into her mouth, reveling at his hiss in response. His hands flew into her hair.
The potion was the last thing on her mind, but when she heard the sputtering of the concoction on the workspace above her, she felt Severus's hand leave her hair, likely to attend to the potion. He gently prodded her before taking a small step forward, and she recalled that she had been the one in front of the cauldron, not him. He would naturally have to move closer. She was now backed under the table, the top dangerously close to her head. So much for letting it explode, she thought. With her mouth and tongue still working furiously on him, a small part of her hoped that she could break his concentration and cause him to make the potion go up in flames.
When his hands returned to her not a moment later, it was to extricate her from him. Without warning, he pulled her out and lifted her up, placing her on what little open space there was left on the table. She yelped with surprise, but a smile was on her face the whole time.
Severus found himself wondering if he could make that smile a permanent thing, especially after what he'd learned about her at Cornwall.
"I wasn't done," she grumped, even though she knew full well why he stopped her.
"Oh, but I almost was." His cock swelled painfully and curved up at just the right angle between her legs, as if it had a mind of its own. His nimble fingers made quick work of her skirt and underwear, finally exposing her to him.
"Now we're fair, wouldn't you say?" He cast a quick contraceptive at her. If that upset her, she didn't show it.
"Shut up and do it already, won't you?"
That was all the encouragement he needed. Pushing into her, he grunted while she gasped in pleasure. He teased her by hardly moving, and he knew that if she were capable of speaking, she'd be telling him to speed the fuck up. Maybe not in those words. Leaning forward, he draped himself over her and gave her a searing kiss. Then, without warning, he pulled all the way out and slammed in with such force that some of the potion sloshed out of the cauldron. She shrieked and wrapped her legs around him, forcing him in further.
"Just like that," she gasped, the words taking a lot of effort to form over the sensations she was feeling. There had to be marks on the back of her thighs by now with the force of them hitting the table behind her, but she took it all in stride.
Keeping one of his hands firmly on her waist as an anchor, Severus made deft work of the other and undid her collar, reaching for a warm mound while keeping her mostly decent. Hermione groaned and arched her back, inadvertently squeezing her inner walls around him. He made a strangled sound.
Just nearby, the cauldron fizzled, but he wasn't about to tend to it this time. Besides, he'd purposely chosen the sleeping draught for its known nontoxic explosions. He was so close, but he didn't want to end it prematurely, so he slowed, pretending to be thinking of something.
It was too bad that Hermione knew him too well, giving him a throaty chuckle and using her own hips to continue the action. From the way her eyelids were fluttering, he guessed that she was nearly there as well. With one last shudder, they both gasped, her a second before him, and he could feel his balls tightening as he released spurt after spurt in her. Spent, he collapsed on top of her, still inside. She looked up at him with warm eyes and lifted up her head the slightest bit so that she could capture his lips with hers.
"Too late to add the asphodel petals and nettle?" she murmured against his lips.
"Obviously."
"What a waste of ingredients."
"On the contrary," he smirked, "that was the best way I could have ever envisioned using flobberworms." Finally sliding out, he quickly tucked himself back in, both dismaying at the loss of contact. In turn, Hermione reached for her tie and refashioned it, slowly removing evidence of their activities. The sweat still gave it away.
"If you hadn't put me on the table, I could've multitasked."
"Oh?"
"You know what I mean." The action over, she always found herself less emboldened and more shy.
"I do, but I won't make you elaborate if you don't want to." He freshened them up with a quick flick of his wand, and Hermione dismayed that a follow-up shower seemed unlikely.
"Now how am I supposed to teach you without wanting to bend you over a desk and take you senseless?"
A tender warmth spread over Hermione's cheeks, but she smiled softly. "Just remember those thoughts and deliver tenfold when you get the opportunity."
Severus ducked his head, also feeling self-conscious now that they were past the high of full-on action. "How are you feeling?" Wanting a more comfortable setting, he gestured for her to follow him into his quarters.
"Absolutely wonderful."
He cleared his throat awkwardly. "No, I mean how are you? I need you to know that I can and will be here for you if that is indeed what you want. There is no need to feel insecure."
Hermione's breath caught at the sensitive turn in topic. "I—I know, Severus, and I really ought to—you know, get past it. Sometimes it just hits me, though I can safely say that I'm honestly feeling better. I just need some time."
"I have time."
She smiled at him, tenderly stroking his cheek.
"Well," he amended abruptly, "My time is apparently capped at twenty-three more years, if not for a potion I've been told you and Johnny made."
"We weren't going to let you go so easily this time."
"I'm glad." He offered her one of his rare smiles, and she beamed radiantly in response, nuzzling her head into his shoulder and leaning into his warmth.
"You know," she murmured, "I'm doubly glad now that Harry and Ron aren't here. They would've waited outside the door if you asked me to stay behind. Could've given their eyes a good melting with that performance when they inevitably burst through the door."
"They never would have made it into my NEWT class," he scoffed.
"True."
"What happened between you three? I sensed a separation earlier on, but the implications are different now given you've had twenty years."
"We simply drifted apart. They went their ways, I went mine. When I chose you, they all but went ballistic. I don't think everyone has the good fortune to have taste in men like I do," she joked.
"And here I thought Potter was a champion for my rights after the war. What changed?"
"Your rights are a different story from your love life."
He made a noncommittal sound.
"It was an amicable parting; they didn't kick me out or anything like that. I simply didn't care for their not-so-subtle undertones and wanted to focus more on you. Like I said, my time with those two had run its course."
"Do you foresee events repeating themselves?"
She didn't answer right away as she thought about it. "I'll be honest with you, Severus. If you're speaking of Harry and Ron—well, I really don't know if I want them back in my life again. If by some miracle they react completely differently to you this time around, then sure, I'll give them a chance. As it stands, I had a completely satisfying life with my little family without those two. What could they possibly add?"
Severus nodded. Not having to spend time with those two dunderheads sounded like a good deal, though he knew it was a price he would be willing to pay to be with her if needed.
"You have to understand," Hermione said thoughtfully, "we were pretty isolated, now that I think about it. Apart from my parents and sometimes Draco and Astoria, we didn't really see others that often. Most of our friends were new ones that we made in Schwalmstadt. Most were muggle. But perhaps that's a result of neither of us having loads of friends to begin with."
"That sounds logical."
There was a comfortable lapse in the conversation.
"It feels wonderful," she said softly, out of the blue. "Having everything out in the open and being able to speak freely around you. It all seems silly now, my worrying over how much information I could release to you at a time. Why should I have thought you any less than the good man I know you are?"
"Thank Merlin for the first part. Any more lies and I might have just thrown you over." He gave her a look. "And I am far from a good man, or have you forgotten what I did to you in your other form?"
"I swear, you bring that incident up so much when it should be me."
He hung his head in apology.
"I still can't get over your thought process," she piped up, trying to lighten the mood. "You thought I was involved with our son—" Here, she shook her head and rolled her eyes exaggeratedly— "and so, in a fit of rage, you decide to get revenge on both of us: on Bryan by—by taking his mother, and on me by taking another the way you thought I did with our son."
"When you say it that way—"
"That's exactly the way."
He didn't respond, though it was clear he was contrite.
"What are we going to do now?"
"Now? Surely you're not up for another perf—"
She giggled, giving him a playful nudge. "I mean going forward. The little bits are falling into place. We just need to connect them all."
"Speaking of that," he began, and he watched as she automatically chewed on her lower lip nervously. "Stop fretting. You should know by now that we're going to be fine." He paused. "I have arranged for not just you and me but also the—the three of them to spend the weekend in Cornwall together. I know it's not my place to suggest it, but I was hoping you wouldn't mind."
"Of course I don't mind. I'm touched, actually. What brought this on?"
He looked embarrassed. "There's only so much the five of us can do at Hogwarts. As for the location, Bryan suggested it."
"You and he have been plotting! Was that why he was so sure that I had misunderstood you the other day?"
"I don't know the inner workings of his mind." He looked away, suddenly embarrassed. "What did he tell you?"
"Nothing I didn't already know, even if I was too blind to realize it. I'm glad to hear that you two have evidently spoken. Do you call him by his name now?"
Severus appeared relieved. "I'm getting there. As you heard just earlier, I can refer to him, but I haven't been able to address him directly. Soon."
Hermione gave him a thumbs-up. "Well, I certainly am looking forward to the weekend now. I can't wait for the boys to charm you."
He nodded, but his feelings toward the upcoming weekend were understandably filled with a lot more anxiety than hers.