A light summer breeze swirled over the surface of the lake, ruffling his hair as he stood at the edge. The sun hovered over the horizon, its dying rays casting shadows on the cliffs of the mountains. He stared at nothing in particular, fighting to calm his erratic thoughts. What would he do if she didn't come? What would he say if she did? Minutes passed, the sky darkened, and he closed his eyes in resignation. Too much time had elapsed. She wasn't coming - he had lost her.

With a sigh, he straightened his back and lifted his chin. He had endured unrequited feelings before; it might even be easier the second time. At least he had his answer, and could move on with his life. Again.

"Severus."

He froze. That voice. Her voice. A voice he dreamed about, awake and sleeping, so real to him in his mind that he couldn't be sure that it was real now.

"Severus?"

He turned. She had changed out of her robes and undone her hair, looking as ordinary as any recent graduate released into the world. He thought she looked beautiful. Her face was hidden by the evening gloom, so he couldn't read her expression, but she had come.

"Hermione," he breathed.

She ran at him, as he had seen her do so many times towards her friends - joyous, unrestrained - and he braced himself. She hurtled herself into his arms with the force of a Bludger, knocking the breath from his chest. Wrapping his arms around her gently, he allowed himself a sigh of relief and an inward grin.

Extracting himself from her grip, he held her at arm's length and lifted her chin toward him. Her eyes were bright, and the first tear fell to her cheek. He used a calloused finger to brush it away.

"You came," he whispered.

"Of course I did," she replied softly. "How could I not?"

He had a list longer than the ingredients required for Felix Felicis waiting on the tip of his tongue, but swallowed his protestations.

"You remember."

"Yes, I remember." She lifted his hand and pressed a kiss against each knuckle. "I remember last summer." Kiss. " I remember the potion incident." Kiss. "I remember why I had to forget." Kiss. "I remember how I feel about you." Her gaze met his, glinting under the early evening stars.

"Forgive me, Hermione," he said softly, pressing his forehead against hers.

"Nothing to forgive," she replied, closing her eyes and breathing deeply. The scent of him - familiar, yet new and overwhelming - washed over her.

He was content, in that moment, but something gnawed at the back of his mind. He drew back, putting distance between them again.

"What about your… friend?"

She mirrored his frown. "What friend?"

"The one you've been keeping company with since winter. Younger… and much better looking…"

"Than you?" she scoffed, but softened it with a smile. "First of all, I wish you'd stop the self-deprecation. It's mildly depressing." He raised an eyebrow at her candor, but she continued, "You don't have to worry about Jonathon. We're just friends."

"Weekend getaway ruin the magic?" he drawled snidely.

She quirked her own eyebrow, the taunt hardly making a dent. "Hardly. For your information, he took me to the Herbology conference in America. I can only assume you were too distracted by your jealousy to realize which weekend that was?" He did not reply. "Besides, I'm not exactly Jonathon's type," she smirked.

"You're every man's type," he muttered sulkily, averting his eyes.

"Not Jonathon's." Her hand cupped his cheek and drew his gaze back. "He's more interested in good conversation, you know? Nothing I have below the neck gives him even a little bit of a rise." She waggled her eyebrows suggestively. He stared back blankly, uncomprehending. She exhaled a sigh, a giggle slipping through. "He's gay, Severus."

His eyes widened. It hadn't been obvious, but his perception had likewise been clouded by a green haze, too focused on the arm around her waist to notice much else. His mind lighter, he responded by leaning down to press his mouth against hers.

The kiss was desperate, months of pent up desire brimming to the surface of their beings. They fought for dominance, tongues dueling fiercely against each other. He hadn't been expecting her to dive back in so quickly, so soon after having her memories restored, but it was a relief that she could still surprise him.

She caressed his face, recommitting it to memory. He responded in kind, running his fingertips down her arms, hardly believing he had the freedom to do so. Mine mine mine. He moved his lips from her mouth down to her neck, inhaling her scent, and was rewarded with a pretty gasp. His lips curled against her pulse and he nibbled, pulling more sounds from her throat. Her hands grasped his cloak as he continued his advance down her body. He was insistent, yet slow and methodical as he mapped every curve and scar across her skin.

She pulled away from him and his heart nearly stopped in his chest. Too much, too soon? A smirk played on her lips, reassuring him, and she raised her hands to the straps of her dress to ease them off her shoulders in tandem. His heart nearly stopped again as her dress pooled at her feet, leaving her bare to him except a pair of lace panties. Gryffindor red, of course. He couldn't even form the words about disparaging her house with her attire choices before she was reaching for him. She pulled him down into another fierce kiss, fumbling for the fastenings of his robe. A whispered spell would rid him of his clothes outright, but he enjoyed the feeling of her hands on him. Slowly his layers were shed, and all the while he did his best to distract her with lips and tongue and teeth. She finally let out a low growl and tore at his pants - the last barrier between her and his skin.

"Too many clothes," she mumbled against his lips. He chuckled.

Finally he stood before her, completely nude. She let her eyes roam his naked skin hungrily, although his eyes shifted under his scrutiny. His gaze was on the rocks, such that he was startled when her lips brushed his chest, tongue darting out to taste him. His hands came up - possibly to push her away, possibly to pull her closer - but she caught his wrists as he moved. She kissed her way across his pectorals, paying special favor to his nipples along the way - smirking at the quiet groans that unwillingly fell from his lips - down his arm, turning it to mouth at the sensitive crook of his elbow, the strong cords on the inside of his wrist, and even further to lay delicate kisses on the pads of each of his fingers. His pinkie she let slip into the warmth of her mouth, tongue laving the swirls of his fingerprint. Her eyes lifted and caught his heated gaze with her own, sparkling with lust and mischief.

He twisted out of her grasp and pulled her flush against him, eliciting a gasp from her throat as their bodies collided. He dove into her lips hungrily and swept her down to the fabric of his robes, laying her gently as though she weighed nothing. She squealed, laughing. The sound echoed over the lake and bounced back so they were surrounded by her mirth. He couldn't help the smile that spread across his face to match hers. She stared - had she ever seen him smile like that before?

He took advantage of her musing, swooping in to take one of her pebbled nipples in his mouth.

"Oh!" she gasped, arching into the touch. He circled the nub with the flat of his tongue, then traced a path between the valley of her breasts until he was able to give equal attention to its twin. She gasped his name, fingers twisting in his hair. Her grip tightened sharply when he bit down, gently, and she swore aloud.

"Language," he murmured against the curve of her breast.

"If you would stop being a fucking tease -" she hissed through gritted teeth. Her knees jabbed into his ribs, trying to pull him back to eye level.

He sat back instead. Despite her protests, she allowed her hands to fall to her sides. His eyes glowed as he drank her in - from her untameable curls, to the flush of her cheeks, her pouty lip caught between her teeth. His mouth curved wickedly.

"My dear," he said as he curled over her, "I have not even begun to tease."

He took her wrists and pressed them to the earth below.

"Stay."

His hands moved to the curve of her waist, thumbs tracing senseless patterns into her skin. His mouth descended to her belly button, tongue flicking around the edges; she squirmed, fingers clawing into the grass as she struggled to keep her hands where he had put them. His mouth skimmed over her, tongue tracing the lines of each rib - up, toward the fullness of her breast; he smirked at the hitch in her breath - then down the other side, touch light and teasing as promised. He sucked suddenly at the valley just above her panty line and she moaned, wiggling beneath his mouth, body caught between pulling away and moving closer. When he had satisfactorily marked her skin he sat back again and waited for her to meet his eyes.

Her gaze struggled to focus on his face, and he rewarded her with a smirk when she succeeded. Keeping their eyes locked, he hooked his fingers into the waist of her panties and slowly dragged them down her legs. She flicked her feet when he reached her ankles, flipping the scarlet fabric into his grasp. He chuckled.

"Impatient?"

"Tease."

The venom in her reply was undercut by her breathlessness.

He dropped the lace behind him and settled between her legs, lowering his gaze to the juncture of her thighs. She was glistening between her folds, and he caught the scent of her arousal on the breeze that ghosted over the lake and across her body. He licked his lips and leaned in, feeling her body tense in anticipation.

He deliberately avoided her sex, instead tracing along the crux of her thigh. The muscles beneath quivered under the laving of his tongue. He kissed the mark he'd made near her hip, then moved across her belly to her other hip bone. Her head thrashed.

"Please!"

He kissed the top of her thigh. "Hm?"

"Touch me!"

He squeezed the flesh of her hips. "Am I not?" he drawled, lips skimming her skin with each word. She growled.

"You know what I mean, please, touch me, touch me, please, you -!"

He lowered his mouth to her sex, granting her mercy, and was rewarded with her breathy, beautiful gasp. Forgetting his command, her hand flew up to grasp his hair, tugging at the roots almost painfully. He continued his assault, lapping at her essence with slow, persistent strokes, randomly swirling up around her engorged clit. She was powerless to stop the litany of sounds that escaped her - beautiful cries, gasps, moans, his name. He would risk much to hear his name on his lips forever; it then dawned on him that that wasn't outside the realm of possibility.

He doubled his efforts as the thought settled in his mind. She was close, if the canting of her hips and the pleading of her voice were any indication. A fluttering tap-tap-tap on her clit and she shattered beneath him, a scream torn from her throat. He followed the roll of her hips, drinking her release as it flowed from her body, fingers clenched into her skin and sure to leave bruises come morning.

With a shudder, she finally rode out her orgasm and slumped onto his cloak, panting. The sun had dropped below the trees and the first nighttime stars glimmered in the sky. Her eyes sought to focus on those stars as she struggled to form words. He waited patiently, smirking. She licked her lips before she spoke.

"I don't remember that the first time around."

" A new memory for you then," he replied softly. He languidly slithered up her body like his house's namesake, kissing her deeply. She licked the taste of herself from his mouth and he groaned.

Small, nimble fingers danced down his torso, tracing planes of muscle as they went. Occasionally her fingertips got caught up on roughened scars, and she traced their patterns even more carefully. She drew back from his mouth -

"One day," she whispered, "I am going to map every line on your body."

He shivered. "Not tonight?"

She laughed softly. "Not tonight," she confirmed. Her hand continued to trail down his belly before wrapping around his length.

He moaned, canting his hips up into her touch. She stroked him from base to tip, skin rolling under her fingers. A bead of fluid welled at the head of his cock where it threatened to fall. She caught it with her fingertip and brought it to her lips, holding his stare as her tongue darted out to taste him. He unconsciously licked his own lips, mirroring her actions. He saw the mischievous spark light in her eyes as she pushed his shoulders, encouraging him to turn onto his back. He let her.

On his back, his cock jutted proudly toward the sky. She slipped down his body, lips trailing over his skin and leaving fire in their wake. At his hips, she stopped to nip; he grunted in surprise. She leaned in and sucked, soothing the bite, marking him the same as he had done to her. He thought the entirely self-satisfied smirk on her face when she finally released him suited her well.

She drifted over, mouth hovering over the head of his cock. He knew her next move, but still wasn't prepared for her heat when she took him in. His hips jerked of their own accord; to her credit, she only allowed her deeper into the warmth, the wet, the rapture of her mouth. Her tongue flicked over his velvet skin, her eyes alight as she watched the expressions on his face morph with each movement. It was a sight she could get used to. After a particularly artful swirl over his head, he suddenly seized her shoulders and dragged her off. She frowned but allowed him to pull her face to his.

"Too much," he grunted, kissing the pout of her lips. "I won't last, Hermione, you are too much. I wish to be inside you at completion. I have wanted it for months," he confessed.

A beat, then a sly smile slid onto her face. "Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay," she repeated, swinging a leg over his body. She stroked him once more before guiding him into herself. "Oh," she breathed.

She lowered her hips until they were flush against his, until he was seated fully inside her. Her eyes had closed and her lips had parted, hands braced against his chest. She paused, feeling him twitch inside her.

His face scrunched - the memories he had kept over the past year were nothing - nothing - compared to the reality of being inside her again, looking up at her face, framed by the night sky, her joyous expression echoing the feeling in his chest. He was, however, only human. His hips rocked once.

"Move," he whispered, reaching for the swell of her hips.

She glanced down at him, smiling. "Impatient?"

"Tease."

Her smile broadened. Her hips rocked, languidly moving forward and back; her thighs flexed, lifting her hips until only the tip of him remained inside, then slid back down. He held her as she moved, struggling to keep his eyes open, to keep her gaze as she surged over him instead of closing them against the onslaught of feelings bursting in his head and in his groin. She was extraordinary. His thumbs circled against her skin, feeling it ripple as she moved, taking in her bewitching figure framed by the stars.

Soon, her undulations sped as she chased her high. He gripped her hips and thrust, eliciting a gasp and a moan. Then they were moving together, the rolling of her hips met with the sharper snaps of his.

"Yes…" he hissed. "Come for me. Let me see you."

She moaned in response, meeting him thrust for thrust. He saw the moment she fell over the edge again - her body seized, her mouth dropped open, a guttural scream pulled from the depths of her insides. She shuddered as he held her through the waves of pleasure, hips jerking against his. He closed his eyes and let his own pleasure well up, a cresting that culminated in his spilling inside her as a soft, hoarse cry escaped his lips.

She collapsed onto his chest, breathing harshly, trembling and too unsteady to hold up her own weight. He wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her hair while he panted. For a while they lay together, heartbeats slowing until they pumped in tandem, their breath and the soft hooting of a nearby owl the only sounds breaking the stillness of the air.

At long last she shivered as the lake's coolness blew over their naked bodies; he pulled his cloak over their entwined forms and she cuddled closer into the crook of his arm.

They stayed that way through the night, tangled in each other, and in the morning he kissed her awake so they could watch the golden hues of daylight paint the sky over the castle.

Together.