A/N: Once again thank you all for reading! I'm glad you enjoyed the last chapter, it was really exciting to write and the next chapter (46), will include a bit more about Dumbledore's plans.
A/N: Chapter Warnings – Mentions of sexual situations, bad language, violence and sexual assault.
Chapter 45 – Embarrassing Morning, Harry's Mistake, and Severus' Idiocy
Hermione woke in the arms of her Severus, she felt groggy and tired. She shifted so that she was pressed up against her Severus, her leg slung over his hips.
Severus woke to his Hermione readjusting her position so that she was more comfortable. He loved this intimate position, he could feel every inch of her and he could feel wetness on his thigh. Severus moved his thigh so that she could feel it too.
"Have you been having naughty dreams?" Severus smirked at her.
Hermione, still groggy, opened her eyes, confused at Severus' comments. She could feel the wetness and frowned. Had she had a sex dream and not remembered it?
Severus, upon seeing her confusion, slyly trailed his fingers under the duvet and across her body and down to the designated area of interest. Hermione gasped at the sensation of his fingers on her as he teased her. She was really responsive this morning, it must be a surge of hormones that she was experiencing, she felt so sensitive.
Severus could not believe how unbelievably moist she was. He brought his fingers back from under the duvet so that he could get into a better position when Hermione squealed.
Severus, panicked, moved so quickly that he lost his balance and ended up nearly falling off the end of the bed. He looked back up to where Hermione was, wondering what the hell had caused her to react like that, when he saw that she had buried herself underneath the covers and almost curled up like a ball.
Now Severus was alarmed, he started to remove the covers off of his Hermione; maybe he had overstepped the line. But Hermione was fighting back, trying to keep the blankets covering her all over, Severus was beside himself, he hadn't meant to cause her any harm and he would never forgive himself if that is what he had done.
"Hermione talk to me" he whispered, almost begging her to give him a response.
When she did not respond after a few moments, he tried again.
"What's the matter?" He asked her in the gentlest voice he had probably ever used.
"I'm sorry Severus" she mumbled from under the cover.
"There is no need to apologise Hermione, it should be me that is apologising for putting you in a clearly uncomfortable position, now come out from under there, please, and talk to me" he begged her gently.
She slowly unravelled herself from the bedsheets and her head eventually poked out from under the covers. She looked sheepish and her face was flushed bright red.
"Hermione what's the matter?" He asked her again, still worried about her.
She buried her head in her hands and looked as though she was about to cry.
Severus went from worried to feeling guilty. She had clearly not been awake enough for him to be taking the liberties that he had.
"I'm sorry Hermione, I should've asked you if it was alright. I didn't mean to frighten you" he said in a small, guilty voice.
Hermione's head snapped up immediately and she looked at him in shock.
"No Severus, you have done nothing wrong, believe me, I have no complaints about that" she said gently.
Severus frowned.
"Then what was that all about?" He asked her again.
She mumbled an unintelligible response.
"What was that?" Severus asked her.
She sighed, cheeks still bright red and she still looked near tears.
"I have a bit of a...situation...going on" she muttered highly embarrassed.
"What situation?" He asked now thoroughly bewildered.
"It appears that I may have come on my menstrual cycle overnight" she whispered quietly whilst looking down interestedly in the bedsheets.
When she got no immediate, outraged response from him, she wondered if he had even heard her. However, out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Severus stiffen for a second and she realised he had heard her.
.
.
.
As soon as the words had left her mouth, Severus froze. Not out of disgust, of course not, he was more mature than an adolescent male. He froze out of sheer relief; he had honestly thought that he had done something seriously wrong to cause her to react like that.
He looked down at his hand, more specifically the fingers he had been teasing her with and noticed the slightly red tinge on the tips of his index and middle finger. There were also some small patches of blood on his thigh from where she had been laying with her leg slung over his hips.
He didn't care about the situation, he had been tortured, and seen torture, at the hands of Voldemort many times, so blood no longer bothered him. But he knew this situation would bother her. He had to be careful here, he knew he was walking on eggshells this morning.
"Love…" he said gently.
Hermione refused to look up at him, she was absolutely mortified.
Severus sighed and went and scooped her up in his arms. He sat back down on the bed with her placed on her lap.
"Look at me, silly witch" he said adoringly.
She hesitantly looked up at him.
"Why are you embarrassed? I assure you, you have absolutely no need to be. Why don't you go and get a bath or shower and get ready for classes?" Severus asked her.
She nodded in agreement.
"Alright, but promise me you will stay in the living room until I'm done so that I can deal with everything. I don't want you to see any of this" she told him.
Severus was about to tell her that she was being awfully silly but he decided that he had better not, he didn't want to upset her, not at this moment anyway. As a man, he was certain that he would lose against the female hormones.
He kissed her forehead, her cheek and then her lips and stood up and walked towards the bedroom door.
"I will get breakfast ready" he agreed and he smiled at her before leaving the room and out of sight.
Hermione breathed a sigh of relief, now she could sort this whole mess out.
She stood up and removed the covers to survey the damage. There was quite an extensive amount of blood on the cover and she hoped that it hadn't stained the mattress underneath. She was so annoyed with herself, she wasn't even due for another three days. She wanted to cry at the humiliation she had felt when she had realised what was going on.
She decided to bathe first and deal with sheets after and she left to go and clean up.
As soon as Severus heard the bathroom door shut and the water start running, he went back to his bedroom and stripped the bedsheets and put them in the wash basket that sat in the corner of his room. Immediately the sheets disappeared, the elves had taken them to be cleaned and with a flick of his wand, he had redressed his bed in new, fresh sheets. He then left the room.
.
.
.
A short time later, a freshly showered and dressed Hermione sheepishly entered the lounge and sat down ready for something to eat. The elves had delivered the breakfast and it smelled amazing as always.
"Thanks, I thought you were going to be so angry" she said to her Severus as she sat down.
Severus looked at her.
"Nothing to thank me for. I'm not an immature schoolboy and I understand the biological processes of the female body. Hermione, please don't be embarrassed or scared, I would never be angry at you for that" he told her. He couldn't understand why she would even consider the notion that he would yell at her for it. Then he had a sudden realisation.
"But someone else has been angry at you for that before, haven't they?" He stated rather than asked her.
She looked at him and nodded.
"Second year, I was staying at the Weasley's during a holiday and it was the first time I had stayed there. I was scared and unsettled so I went and stayed in the boys' room. I climbed in with Harry and went to sleep. I woke up the next morning to a worried Harry, he didn't really know what had happened but thought I was hurt. Ron understood and he made a huge deal out of it and screamed the house down calling for Molly. Needless to say the whole house knew within seconds. I felt so bad and thought Molly was going to be angry but she wasn't, she was super nice about it and helped me. She told me that she had dealt with many soiled bedsheets especially since Ron, at the time, still had bedwetting issues" she told Severus. Then she froze.
"And that is never to be repeated; I promised Ron I would never tell anyone about that as long as he stopped making a big deal about my situation. Please don't say anything or use it to mock him in class. I don't need him hating me again" she said.
"Hermione, sweet, calm down. I promise I will never repeat a word. Although the little shit deserves it sometimes" Severus grinned at her whilst secretly filing away the information in case he needed to use it later.
She chuckled back and they ate their breakfast. Afterwards Hermione left, she had to return some books to the library before class and Severus needed to shower himself. He bid her goodbye and the pair of them separated to start their day.
The humiliation of the morning had worn off, and Hermione went through her classes in a hurry. The days were going so quickly now that it was getting closer to exams. Only two weeks until the Easter holidays and then before she knew it, there would be exams.
.
.
.
She didn't see Severus for a few days after that but that all changed when Harry burst into the common room one night, looking like hell had frozen over.
Luckily it was only Hermione and Ron who had stayed up late in order to see Harry after his weekly occlumency lesson with Severus.
"Harry? What happened?" Hermione asked when she saw how pale he was.
Ron was also trying to get his attention.
"Harry, talk to us mate" Ron said.
Harry looked up at his friends and noticed their worried looks. He then revealed what had taken place between him and Snape and how he had learned everything that he needed to know and that his lessons were no longer needed. Ron believed Harry and then headed for bed, now that he knew Harry was back, he could get some sleep.
Hermione knew Harry was lying through his teeth and once they were alone she whirled on Harry and demanded answers.
"Cut the bullshit Harry, what happened? Or do I go and talk to him myself?" She asked him.
"I looked at his memories, on purpose and saw some of his most personal moments" Harry told her, not even bothering to try and lie to her.
"And you're still alive? Shit Harry! What the hell were you thinking?" She exclaimed. She really was surprised that Harry was still walking.
Should she go and see Severus? She immediately chased that thought out of her mind. If Severus was angry then he would want some time to himself to calm down.
"What did you see?" She asked him.
Harry hesitated; he wondered how much of Severus' past she knew about. Harry decided to tell her.
"I saw my father, Sirius, Remus and Pettigrew and how Snape was bullied mercilessly by them for the whole of his school years. I saw a prank Sirius played on him, luring Snape to the whomping willow on a full moon. Sirius knew Remus would be turning and the wolf almost got Snape. Snape looked absolutely terrified, he was crying in fear and Dumbledore did absolutely nothing. I mean, what must that have been like? Having all of that done and then the one person who was supposed to help you does nothing about it. Can you imagine?" Harry said.
"I know that feeling very well" Hermione noted dryly.
Harry froze and almost swore. Of course Hermione knew the feeling of an idle Dumbledore.
"Sorry H., also you know about these incidents then, as you don't seem very surprised" Harry said.
Hermione nodded.
"Yep, I knew" she said gently.
"You never told me" he replied.
"I made a promise that I would never repeat what I'd heard or saw" she told him.
Harry nodded in acceptance; he knew that she would never betray Severus' privacy like that.
"Will you be alright Harry? I need to send a note to him to make sure he is alright" Hermione said.
Harry nodded and they wished each other goodnight.
Hermione went to her bed and drew the curtains around her before pulling out her charmed coin and sending Severus a message, hoping that he was alright.
She waited up for hours, waiting for a reply. The reply never came and she fell asleep out of exhaustion.
.
.
.
Over the course of the next few days it became apparent that Severus was avoiding her like the plague. He had even snapped at her a couple of times in lessons and she knew that he had meant to do it.
She was upset, she knew that Severus was devastated that Harry had seen part of his past memories that he had purposefully pulled from his head in order to forget them. There were thousands of memories that Severus did not want and it had been Harry bloody Potter who had seen one of the very worst and humiliating memories of all.
Draco had been bewildered by this turn of events and chose to approach his godfather about it. He had been acting so cold and withdrawn, it was obvious that his godfather and Hermione had a fight of some sort and were not speaking to one another.
Draco approached Severus' rooms and entered without knocking. Draco froze when he saw the state of Severus' quarters. There was splintered wood, ruined furniture and broken glass everywhere. Draco just about managed to stop himself from gasping; he had been stunned into shock. For a dreadful second the thought crossed Draco's mind that Severus may have hurt Hermione. Draco quickly chased the thought from his head, his godfather was nothing but respectful towards women. The likely scenario was that Severus and Hermione had an argument and then Severus had turned to his furniture in his rage and used them for target practice.
"What do you want?" a cold voice snarled from across the room.
Draco's attention turned from the destroyed room to his pale and tired looking godfather.
"Don't use that tone with me godfather. What the hell happened?" he asked Severus in a 'I'm in no mood for your shit' kind of tone.
Severus narrowed his eyes in a glare at his godson and stomped like a petulant child to his bedroom.
Draco almost laughed at the scene, Severus Snape, the most ferocious man Draco had ever met, had just thrown a mini childish fit.
Draco sighed and went to make room so that he could sit down. As he did, he noticed a pile of small pieces of parchment on the remnants of Severus' coffee table and he picked them up.
He felt slightly bad for looking at his godfather's personal correspondence but as a Slytherin, he got over it quickly. As Draco read through the notes he quickly noticed that they had all been from Hermione over the course of the last few days. They all said similar things, asking Severus if he was alright or if he needed anything. Draco wondered if any of these letters had been replied to. Draco put the letters down where he had found them and made his way to Severus' bedroom.
"What's with the stropping about?" Draco asked.
"None of your business" Severus snapped back.
Draco just raised an eyebrow at him and waited for him to reply.
Severus eventually backed down.
"Fine! Potter saw some of my pensive memories" Severus muttered, still angry.
"That's awful! Potter really does have a death wish doesn't he? But if this is all to do with Potter then, you're avoiding Hermione because..." Draco trailed off hoping Severus would finish that thought for him.
"Well she's obviously going to be supporting her precious Potter over me, isn't she?" He asked rhetorically.
"Umm...no, I don't think so actually. The letters she had sent you clearly suggest otherwise" Draco said.
"You looked at my correspondence!" Severus exclaimed.
Draco swallowed, he hadn't meant to let on that he had rifled through Severus personal letters.
But Draco stood his ground, he nodded.
"You need to talk to her. She has been worried about you all week and has been trying to find a way to get you to talk with her. Have you been part of the potions class this week? She's messed up her work and said things out of character on purpose as a way of trying to get you to hold her back after class" Draco told her.
Severus admitted that he had acted extremely foolishly but, especially with the memories that Potter had seen, he couldn't stand the thought of another woman he loved choosing a Potter over him. That would truly destroy him once and for all. But Draco had been right, her letters were laced with obvious worry on his behalf and he moved to get a piece of parchment and wrote a few words down on it.
He then folded the note up and gave it to Draco.
"Can you make sure she gets this without gaining any attention?" Severus asked Draco.
"I'm a Slytherin, in case you forgot" Draco stated, taking the note from his godfather.
Draco left his godfathers rooms in search of Hermione. He found her, walking down a deserted corridor with her nose in a book. He discreetly placed the note on the book as she walked by him. She turned, to look at the person who dared interrupt her reading and saw that it was Draco who had given her the note.
She walked a few paces down the corridor before stopping, pretending to mark the page of her book before putting it in her back whilst secretly reading the note.
She immediately turned on her heel and headed towards the dungeons.
Severus needed her.
