Disclaimer: It all belongs to JKR. No infringement intended.

Rating: R for language and sexual situations.

Pairing: Severus/Hermione



Lightning Strikes



by Auror Borealis



Chapter 9



Snape's eyes burned into Harry Potter during the next day's Potions with seventh year Gryffindor and Slytherin. Potter, for his part, stared boldly back. Hermione Granger didn't raise her eyes at all, not that Snape ever saw. Once, the professor saw Potter's hand entwine itself briefly with Hermione's. The jealousy he felt was agonizing. The little bitch moves fast, he thought. Well, you gave her permission, you idiot.

At last the interminable class ended. Relieved to be free of perhaps the most tension-filled potions lesson they'd ever attended, the students quietly gathered their things and filed out. The Slytherins were as subdued as the Gryffindors. Snape ignored them as they left, longing to escape to his quarters and berate himself in peace. He'd already sent Callie to spend the morning with Hagrid; his self-scourging would not have an audience.

"Professor."

So Potter hadn't left with the rest of them. Snape looked up. The bruised look under the boy's eyes advertised his lack of sleep. Snape snorted. As if I didn't already know, he thought.

Harry drew his wand. So, thought Snape, too bitter to be properly amused, he's come to fight me for the girl.

Harry pointed his wand at the door, which closed and locked. Another wave and a muttered incantation, and a silencing charm was cast. No one would be able to eavesdrop on their conversation. He put his wand back in its pocket.

I could be wrong, thought Snape. Unless he means to use his fists.

"I didn't get much sleep last night, Professor Snape."

"I can see that, Potter. You look like hell. Not that you're ever exactly prepossessing."

"Look who's talking."

"Are you here to lose as many points from Gryffindor as possible, Potter? You've made an admirable start."

"I don't give a flobberworm's ass about house points. We win every year. So what if we this year is the exception? I'm a lot more concerned about my friend than about that damned house cup."

"A longing for detention, then? I'd think you would have had your fill by now."

"Just so long as you listen to me. Ask me what I did last night instead of sleep."

Snape's jaw clenched so hard he thought it would break. He said nothing.

"All right, so you're not curious. I'll tell you anyway."

Shut up, boy. Don't say it. You may not survive your recitation.

"I was in the Astronomy Tower with Hermione."

"Damn you, Potter, get out of here NOW!" Harry flinched at the rage in Snape's face, but refused to move.

"Not yet. Last night, Hermione woke me up and asked me to go to the Astronomy Tower with her."

"Do you have a death wish, Potter?"

Harry ignored this. "I know she told you about what almost happened between us, at the Quidditch field. Is that why you told her to take me up there and fuck me?"

"Is that what you did?" Snape's voice was low, almost inaudible.

"Hell, no. If I did, would I be here telling you about it?"

The constriction in Snape's chest eased. Potter, you just may live through this after all, he thought.

"Did she ask you to?" He had to know. He wasn't sure he could bear the answer, but he had to know.

Harry stared at him a moment, loathing mixing with something close to pity.

"No. She told me what happened between you, but she didn't proposition me. She never had any intention of doing so. After last night, I can't believe you would think that she would."

"Then why the Astronomy Tower? If she just wanted to talk to you, wouldn't your common room have done as well?"

"Gods, Snape, she was hysterical. I barely got her out of Gryffindor before she started wailing. I can't believe we made it to the Astronomy Tower without half the school after us, demanding to know what I was doing to her."

Snape smiled with no humor whatsoever. "I told her you would not be disturbed. I simply kept my word."

"Good gods, you are a masochist, aren't you, Professor?"



Hermione alternately paced the circular space, and threw herself into Harry's arms, sobbing into his chest.

"I can't – BELIEVE – he could be so dreadful. How dare he? How dare he tell me to – to –"

Harry was losing his patience. Hermione had wept for a good half hour now, and was no closer to telling him what Snape had done than when she'd dragged him out of bed. This was Snape, he wanted to remind her. Dreadful was his specialty. "Tell you to what?"

"Gods, Harry, he was being such a – such a –" She blew noisily into her handkerchief.

"Hermione, Snape's been saying awful things to us for seven years now. Remember what he said when you got hexed and your front teeth grew down to your collar? What could he say that was any worse than that?"

Hermione sobbed harder. "He told me to come up here and have sex with you," she wailed.

"Snape told you to – "

She nodded. "That beast! He's the lowest, most horrid – "

"Why would he tell you something like that?"

"Because he knows about what happened on the Quidditch field," she cried.

Harry blinked. "Hermione, are you telling me that you've got me embroiled in a love triangle with you and Snape? Oh, god, Ron too. A love quadrangle." He covered his face with his hands. His shoulders began to shake.

"Harry, I'm sorry…"

He removed his glasses to wipe his streaming eyes. "Oh, Hermione…" He could hardly speak for laughing.

"Harry, you're supposed to be comforting me, not laughing at me!"

He sobered, but it was with an effort. "Hermione, I'm at a loss to understand why this bothers you. You can't stand Snape."

"That was b-b-before." She blew her nose again.

"Before what?"

"Before he kissed me."

"But he's already kissed you," yelled Harry, thoroughly exasperated.

"Yes, but I didn't want him to then!"

"So tonight you wanted him to kiss you, and he did?"

She nodded. She was crying too hard to speak.

Harry had a very difficult time imagining anyone actually wanting to be kissed by Snape, but then, Hermione also liked History of Magic. Some things defied explanation.

"Okay, he kissed you, and you wanted him to. Then what happened?"

"He stopped. And then when I told him I didn't want him to stop, he said I should sh-sh-shag you, if I wanted it so badly. Or something like that. That horrid, awful –"

"Um… maybe he can't, Hermione. He could be impotent."

"He's not."

"How do you know?"

She lowered the handkerchief for a moment, and looked at him. "I know."

"Okay… I won't ask precisely how. But there could be a perfectly reasonable explanation for why he'd snog you senseless, and then make you leave." Put like that, Harry couldn't see what it could be, but he was willing to give Snape the benefit of the doubt, if it helped to calm his distraught friend.





"So basically, you implied that she was some sort of cheap slut. Do you see why she's a bit unhappy with you now?"

Snape was torn, badly torn, between telling Potter to mind his own bloody business, and wanting to defend himself. He did not defend his actions to students, and particularly not to Potter.

"Did she give you any sort of hint, Potter, as to how I could make this up to her?" There, he'd done it. Was it as painful as you thought it would be? he asked himself. He'd just asked Harry Potter for advice. On his love life. No, not painful; bloody excruciating.

"She just wants to know why, that's all."

Oh, well, if that's all; let's see, Hermione, you're a student and I'm a teacher, he thought. I have to look Minerva McGonagall in the face several times daily; let's not even mention Albus Dumbledore. A week ago, we loathed each other. You're Harry Potter's best friend. You just broke up with Harry Potter's other best friend. You've invaded my mind and my heart and I want them back. I lied to you last night; had you slept with Potter, I would have killed him, then you, and then myself. All right, maybe not. But I would have wanted to. I'd give you my soul, Hermione, but I forfeited it long ago. You could never love such as me.

Instead of answering, he asked some questions of his own.

"Tell me something, Potter. You wanted her on the Quidditch field, did you not?"

"Yes."

"Then why not last night?"

"I told you. She didn't ask me."

"Come now, with all the much-vaunted Potter charm, you don't believe you could have talked her into it? What was it you wanted? Ah, yes, I remember. To be able to look at me, and know that you'd had her first."

Harry said nothing.

"So why the restraint? Chivalry, perhaps?"

"Apart from the fact that she's my best friend, and that I would not take advantage of the fact that she needed comfort? Thanks to you, I might add," said Harry brutally. "When she broke up with Ron, they were the only ones who were surprised. Their relationship was habit and expectation. It sure wasn't love. Look at Ron; he's already going after Cho Chang. So I didn't have any qualms about going for it. There wasn't anyone else, after all. No one that I knew of. Why shouldn't I be her first, if she wanted me? I'm not dating anyone, she's not dating anyone. Jacking off lost its charm long ago. What's a boff between friends?"

Each word cut into Snape like tiny, jagged shards of glass. Harry was watching him closely, and was prepared enough to jump back when Snape's hand lashed out to grab his throat.

"You… will… not – NOT – speak of her as though she's a convenient receptacle for your baser urges." Harry was certain that at that moment, Snape could easily have performed Avada Kedavra without a wand, and been more successful than Voldemort had been with one. He was surprised his scar didn't hurt; the hatred radiating from Snape was tangible.

"You've never liked Hermione. What do you care?" Harry knew he was pushing his luck, but really, Snape was hopeless. He still couldn't applaud Hermione's choice, but if this was what she really wanted, he'd do his best to make sure she got it.

"I love her, you smug little bastard! If I ever hear you speak of her like this again, I will forget that Dumbledore thinks you might somehow be of use against Voldemort, and kill you myself."

Harry smiled as though he hadn't just received a very earnest death threat.

"I hate to say this, but I think she loves you, too. You still want to know how to make up for hurting her? Tell her how you feel. I have a feeling it might make up for a lot."

Harry picked up his bag, but could not leave without firing a parting shot. "If you ever need more advice on your love life from a seventeen year old who's not getting any, I'll be around."