See disclaimers on Chapter 1

A/N: Please note that this chapter contains elements of both spousal and child abuse. If you are easily bothered by such things, you might want to pass this one by.

Chapter 8

Hermione awoke the next morning with the bitter taste of Snape's grief still fresh on her tongue. The night had not been a restful one – there were too many images to process, too much raw emotion to churn through, and true to her nature she spent entirely too much time thinking about it. When she finally did manage to shut her brain down far enough to fall into a troubled sleep, she was plagued by dreams. First, a nightmare about her own father dying. And then a strange, sad dream of Snape, his body stiff with the effort not to weep as he struggled to tell her… something… for which he could not find the words. Just as it seemed he was finally able to give voice to his thoughts and was about to pour his heart out to her, she woke up.

She was heavy with his emotion and spent much of the morning simmering with low-grade resentment over the way he had been treated, even though surely to him the events she had witnessed the night before were ancient history. How many times had she heard people scoff at how cold and unfeeling he was? Amazing how even so superficial a scratch below the surface revealed just how wrong that assumption was. The man boiled with feeling as violently as any potion that had ever been prepared in his class, would have overflowed with it like one of Neville's cauldrons if not for the relentless death grip he kept over it.

"Are you all right, dear?" Minerva asked later that morning, her face a mask of concern. The two women were seated in her office for their usual morning meeting, a stack of books on the desk between them. "You don't look at all well this morning."

Hermione smiled weakly. "I'm fine," she replied. She imagined she must look a fright. Lack of sleep always shadowed her face with heavy bags under the eyes, and on this morning in particular the bags felt big enough for a family of four to pack comfortably for an extended vacation. For a moment she considered telling the older woman what was happening to her, unburdening herself in the hopes of receiving a bit of encouragement. But she quickly realized it would be a betrayal of Snape's trust to do so and decided to keep it to herself. "I just didn't sleep well last night is all."

"Well then we won't do anything too taxing today," McGonagall said, and Hermione was relieved that she did not ask any further questions. She gestured toward the books on the desk in front of her. "These are a few of this year's newly published Transfiguration texts. I'd like you to review them and make a recommendation as to which is best for the third-year classes based on the coursework we discussed last week."

Hermione gratefully scooped up the pile of books. A few days spent in reading low-level textbooks sounded like the perfect escape right now, especially after over a week of reading the (very dry) educational psychology books Minerva had assigned earlier. Returning to her own office, she dutifully set all other thoughts aside and applied herself to her task.

It was not until much later in the day that the memory of Snape's reaction to their dance at the Yule Ball returned to her. She had been so preoccupied by his child self's display of grief that the impression of his adult self's display of happiness had been driven from her mind. Cleverly done, Severus, she thought wryly, mentally awarding points to Slytherin. No doubt that was precisely what he had planned. You knew just how to divert me from exploring that bit of intrigue any further, didn't you?

The thought of precisely what might have been going on in his mind that December evening was a distracting one, and she soon found she could no longer concentrate. After re-reading the same paragraph three times without absorbing a single word, she recognized it as a lost cause and shut the book. A quick glance at the clock told her it was close to the dinner hour, but she was not the least bit hungry. The room suddenly felt very confining. Some fresh air was in order.

Late afternoon was giving way to early evening as she stepped outside. It was a beautiful July day for this part of the world and she breathed the warm air deeply, gratefully clearing the musty smell of the castle from her lungs. The lake was calling to her and she answered it, circling it twice before eventually sitting cross-legged on one of the carved benches on its eastern bank. She closed her eyes and tipped her head back, inviting the sun to caress her throat as she allowed her mind to wander, once again, to the events of the previous evening.

Sometime later – fifteen minutes? An hour? She had no idea, so lost in her daydreams was she – a shadow fell across her face. She'd heard no footsteps approaching, had no warning at all that someone was nearby, but as soon as the cool darkness kissed her neck she knew who was there. Without opening her eyes she said, "I was thinking about you. Did you know?"

"No," came his response. "But given your overly analytical nature I can't say I'm surprised."

She smiled and opened her eyes, tilting her head forward so she could level her gaze on his face. His expression was stern but his dark eyes sparkled in the fading light. "Flattery will get you nowhere," she said lightly, tapping the empty seat on the bench next to her. "Will you sit with me?"

He nodded briefly, gathering his robes about him before folding his long body down onto the hard seat. They sat together in silence for a long while, watching the wind carve ripples in the surface of the lake.

"Do you know how to skip stones?" she asked suddenly, surprising both of them with the question.

He glanced up at her with a frown. "Don't be ridiculous."

"Oh, unclench a bit and try it. It's fun!" She knelt and scratched in the dirt at the edge of the lake, digging up a few small rocks. Her first throw bounced along the surface of the water twice before dropping into the lake with a hollow kerplunk. The second managed just one hop before it also fell to the bottom. She turned and grinned at him sheepishly. "It's been a long time since I've done this," she explained.

"You need flatter stones," he replied, getting to his feet. "And you're holding your arm wrong. Let me show you how to do it properly." He bent over and retrieved a stone of his own, tossing it gracefully out over the water. To her amazement, it skipped five times before disappearing into the depths.

She shook her head and laughed. "Wonders never cease," she said, throwing another stone. It gave a rather half-hearted skid across the surface and sank.

"No, no. Try it like this." He stepped up behind her and grasped her forearm, demonstrating the side arm motion he had so successfully employed. His long fingers were warm against her bare skin and the movement of his pectorals across her upper back was a tantalizing sensation. She shivered. Bugger the stones, she thought. The lessons are wonderful.

She tried again – with only marginally better success – and they spent the next few minutes peppering the water with rocks. Hermione was nearly breathless with laughter by the time they finished.

"I win," Snape declared, clapping the dirt from his hands.

"You git," she replied amiably, collapsing back down into her seat. "You're impossible."

"So I've been told." He rejoined her on the bench with just the slightest hint of a smile on his face. On impulse, she reached for his hand and drew it to her lips. Their eyes met as she lightly kissed the tip of each finger.

"What happened after your father's funeral?" she asked softly, curling her fingers around his and pressing their joined hands to her heart.

He sighed and turned his head to look out over the water once again. "Rather a lot, really."

"Will you show me?"

He nodded, squeezing her hand firmly by way of reply.

***

Benjamin was yelling again.

It was the third night in a row Severus had been awakened by the angry sounds coming from his mother's bedroom. He could never quite make out exactly what Benjamin was saying – the wall between the two rooms was thick, and more likely than not one of them had invoked a charm to keep the worst of their row from reaching his ears – but there was no doubt about the tone of Benjamin's voice. He was furious.

Severus cringed and curled the pillow tightly around his head, trying to muffle the sounds even further. If the pattern of the previous two nights held true, the hollering would be followed in short order by a silence punctuated with his mother's sobs, and then by the rhythmic thumping of his parent's bed as the headboard banged against his bedroom wall. Slowly at first, then gaining speed and force for what seemed an eternity before it finally ended. That was the worst part. He may have only been nine years old, but he was a precocious child. He knew exactly what that thumping was all about.

Benjamin was fucking his mother. They were together, in the very bed where his father had lain ill for all those years, where he had died just over a week ago, and they were fucking. "Shagging," his cousin Alistair liked to call it, Alistair who had explained the entire process to Severus in horrific detail one hot, hot day the previous summer, stabbing the index finger of one hand through a ring made by the thumb and index finger of the other by way of demonstration.

"It feels bloody wonderful," Alistair assured him, apparently delighted with the expression of wonder, disbelief and – yes, more than a bit of disgust – crossing his younger cousin's face.

"You've tried it, then?" Severus asked incredulously. The whole thing seemed a bit farfetched to him. He certainly couldn't imagine his parents doing it, and if what Alistair said was true they'd have to have done it at least once in order for him to be walking about.

"Well… no," Alistair confessed, his cocky smile fading a bit. "Not with someone else, at any rate. But I've had a wank, haven't I? And that was bloody amazing by itself. I imagine it feels a hundred times better when you stick it up some nice wet twat."

Was that all Avis had become? He'd never heard his parents going at it like this, not once. Perhaps they never did it with such vigor as Benjamin was now displaying. Or perhaps his father had just been too ill. Whatever the reason, Severus was grateful that he'd been spared the ordeal of becoming a silent witness to his parents' physical relationship. It seemed somehow wrong – not to mention disrespectful – for Benjamin and Avis to be behaving this way now, with Dunstan hardly cold in his grave. How he wished Benjamin would just go back to Paris, get the fuck out of their house and leave his poor mother alone.

One final, particularly loud whack! sounded against the wall, and then there was blessed silence. It was over for another night. Severus kept the pillow wrapped around his head for a while longer, just in case, but heard nothing more. He fell asleep still clutching it loosely around his ears.

***

The nuthatches woke him the next morning. There was a nest of hatchlings in the tree just outside his bedroom window, and for weeks now he had been awakened each morning by their high-pitched squeaks. It was oddly comforting to hear them out there, knowing that within a few minutes he would hear the answering chirps of their mother as she arrived with their breakfast.

As usual, he was sprawled horizontally across his bed on his stomach, the duvet and one of his pillows on the floor in a heap and the sheets in a tangled mess around his legs. He had always been a restless sleeper – in fact, Avis used to tease him that she wasn't sure how he could ever awaken feeling the least bit rested, considering the manner in which he fought his way through every night. That was back in the days before Dunstan's illness had worsened to the point where every bit of light seemed to fade from his mother's eyes.

She didn't tease him anymore.

The act of thinking about his mother seemed to summon her, as a moment later his bedroom door swung slowly open and Avis stepped into the room. "Severus?" she called softly. "Are you awake?"

He considered feigning sleep, embarrassed and angry with her for unknowingly opening his eyes to her nocturnal activities. But the game ended quickly as she sat down on the edge of the bed and placed her hand lightly on the small of his back. "Severus?" she said again, and he was forced to roll over.

Her cheekbone was striped with a long, purplish bruise extending nearly from her nose to her hairline. It was still red and puffy along its edges. He sat up quickly and scrambled away from her until his back hit the wall behind him. "Mum! What happened?" he cried, alarmed.

"What?" she replied evasively, her back stiffening.

"Your face!" he said, trailing his fingertips along his own cheek. "You've got a nasty bruise just there."

Her fingers fluttered to the spot and touched it gingerly. "Oh, have I?" she said, turning away slightly. "I didn't realize it was bruised… I – I fell last night, that's all."

"Are you all right? Does it hurt?"

She tried to smile, but the upward tug on her obviously sore cheek muscles twisted it into a grimace. "No. I'm fine."

She was lying. He knew she was lying but didn't pause to analyze why. In the selfish manner of nine-year old children everywhere, he dismissed the insignificant problems of the adult world and plunged headlong into an issue of vastly greater importance, at least from his point of view.

"Mum, when is Benjamin leaving?"

Avis sighed and clutched one of his hands. "That's what I've come to talk to you about, Severus. He's not leaving. He and I are to be married."

He could feel the color draining from his face as his mother studied him. A hard knot was forming in his stomach. "Married?" he whispered.

"Yes. At Christmas time." She stroked the back of his hand comfortingly. "I know it's a bit of a shock, Severus, but Benjamin and I have talked it over and decided it's for the best."

Talked, Mum? Or argued? he thought, remembering the shouting and crying he'd heard the past few nights. And then sealed the bargain with a fast shag?

"I hate him," he hissed violently, jerking his hand from his mother's grasp. "I don't *want* you to marry him!"

Avis's face paled. The bedroom door was still ajar and she quickly flicked her hand at it until it clicked shut. "You mustn't say such things, Severus," she said nervously. "You've no reason for hating Benjamin. He… has been very good to us." She reached out to him again but stopped in mid-gesture as he folded his arms across his chest and glared at her. "I know you're still upset about Father's death. You'll feel differently about all this by the time the wedding comes 'round, I promise."

He said nothing. Avis regarded him helplessly for a moment, then stood and started toward the door. "Come down to breakfast, love," she said over her shoulder.

Severus threw himself down on the bed and pulled the sheet up over his head. "I'm not hungry," he snapped.

A moment later, the cry of the baby nuthatches was the only sound left in the room. They were still hungry – apparently their mother had let them down, as well.

***

That Fall passed by in a blur. Marinall returned to France to continue at Beauxbatons, and in her absence Benjamin became very nearly unbearable. Severus wasn't sure if it was because Benjamin missed the girl or if he simply felt freer to be himself now that he need not worry what his daughter might think, but he did not have a kind word to say to anybody these days. He seemed to have only two modes of communication – these being a belligerent grunt and an angry roar – and neither visitors to nor residents of the household went long without suffering one or the other. If not both.

Severus quickly learned to stay out of Benjamin's way. He emerged from his room only at mealtimes, and even then just long enough to bolt his food and leave the table before Benjamin could finish eating and turn his attention to the boy. He spent the rest of his time reading or sleeping in an attempt to escape both the depression which consumed him in the wake of his father's death and the towering resentment he harbored about the upcoming nuptials.

Avis surely saw that her son with withdrawing but could offer him no solace, frantic as she was with the wedding plans. It was shaping up to be quite a large affair. Both Avis and Benjamin came from venerable wizarding families, and the number of their relatives alone was staggering. No one was overlooked for fear of giving offense, not even those whom the bride and groom had not seen for years. Add to that their many friends and business associates, and the guest list topped out at more than 300 people.

For weeks, the air was thick with owls delivering invitations and returning RSVPs. The wedding was to be held at Snape Manor, and as very little attention had been paid to the house during Dunstan's illness there was a great deal of work to be done in preparation. And Benjamin's demands for perfection down to the smallest detail added a great deal more weight to the yoke already on Avis's shoulders. The tension was having strange effects on her. She grew distant and seemed very distracted. Worse, cuts and bruises showed up on her face and arms with increasing regularity – the result, she assured Severus, of clumsiness brought on by fatigue and stress.

The day of the wedding finally arrived, and the old house nearly groaned with its burden of visitors. Severus stood next to his mother and looked at his feet as she spoke the words that bound her to Benjamin until death. The assembly burst into applause as the newlyweds kissed, and he glanced up in time to see an expression of disgust flit across Marinall's face. Apparently, she felt the same way about the whole mess that he did, and inexplicably this made him angry. She was certainly getting the better end of this particular bargain, to have Avis as her new mother!

The reception was unbearable. As was customary, the youngsters sat together at the feast, and he was forced to listen to Lucius Malfoy describe his exploits at Hogwarts in excruciating detail. You'd think he'd invented Quidditch, to hear him talk about the successes of the Slytherin team that term, and GODS if he said one more thing about how popular he was Severus was going to vomit. Marinall was no better, prattling on about the superiority of Beauxbatons over Hogwarts until Severus thought – hoped? – that the two would come to blows. He hated these people. He picked at his food listlessly, wanting nothing more than to turn the clock back a few years and have his family back, whole and real and unblemished by death.

He ate very little and slipped away from the table at the earliest opportunity, heading for the sanctuary of his room. He turned the corner and entered the empty hallway leading to the staircase, grateful to have gotten away unobserved. But before he could make his way up the steps, Benjamin's voice stopped him.

"Where do you think you're going, boy?" his stepfather asked coldly.

"Just heading to the loo," he lied.

Benjamin regarded him with narrowed eyes. "I see. Don't be long. The photographer wants to take some snaps of the family in a few minutes."

Ugh! Photographs! Every photo that had ever been taken of him was unflattering. He hated having his picture taken, hated looking at his face with its overly large nose and crooked teeth. And the idea of standing next to this man and trying to "smile for the camera" was too much to bear just then.

"I don't *want* to have my picture taken," he pouted, and turned to run up the stairs. But before he got to the third step Benjamin grabbed him from behind, wrenching his arm up across his back so hard it felt as though it were being torn from its socket.

"Don't cause trouble today, boy," he hissed in Severus's ear. He tugged on the child's arm harder, causing tears to spring up in his eyes from the pain. "I don't *care* what you want." And then he released his grip and turned on his heel, stalking away without looking back.

Severus posed for the photographs. He stayed close to his mother throughout the ordeal and did not look at Benjamin. Nor did he smile. His shoulder hurt and his heart ached and he was tired and angry and sad. And all of these emotions were captured forever in pictures that would be placed on the mantelpiece in the sitting room, reminding him of the pain he'd suffered at Benjamin's hand every time he looked at them. As soon as the photographer was finished Severus escaped again, desperate for some time alone to nurse his arm and distance himself from Benjamin's cruelty.

He knew better than to go back to his room. That would be the first place they would look once they realized he'd gone missing. No, he would go instead to his favorite place in the old house: his father's study.

The room was filled with reminders of Dunstan – his pipe stand, his book collection, a few awards from his days at Hogwarts, the chair with the worn upholstery where he spent so many hours sitting in front of the fire. The room also housed Dunstan's small art collection. Over the years of his illness, he had been forced to sell off several of the more valuable pieces to keep house and home together, but many of the smaller sculptures and paintings remained. Severus did not go into this room very much anymore because it brought back too many bittersweet memories. But on this day he needed to be there.

Sirius lifted his head and thumped his tail on the carpet when his young master entered the room. The dog had been banished to this room for the day to keep him out from underfoot. Severus stayed there for a long time, curled up in his father's chair, absentmindedly stroking the animal's side with his foot. He had nearly fallen into a light sleep when he heard voices in the hallway, heading this way. Startled, he leapt from his seat and hid behind the floor length draperies that covered one set of windows.

The door opened and two women entered. He recognized one of the voices as belonging to Lucinda Malfoy, Lucius's mother. The other voice was unfamiliar to him.

"Dunstan used to have the most delicious collection of paintings, darling," Lucinda drawled to her unknown companion. "Here, look at this one. An original Sweeney, if I'm not mistaken."

"Lovely," the other woman replied. "Such a shame to keep it buried in this horrid old house. It should be on display somewhere."

Severus bristled. How dare the stupid cow talk about his home like that?

Lucinda sighed. "Quite. This used to be such a lovely estate, too. Poor Avis. Well, now that she's married Benjamin, perhaps she'll fix the place up a bit."

"He's frightfully rich, isn't he," Lucinda's companion whispered, as though the shameful subject of money was too, too vulgar to discuss in louder tones.

"Oh my, yes! Diablo's being doing business with him for years. He's absolutely rolling in it. She's set for life!"

"Well, that's something, at least. I think it's lovely that he's decided to look after Avis and Severus now that Dunstan's gone."

"Oh, it's not just that, my dear. She owes it to him! I mean, he did support the family all those years while Dunstan was sick, didn't he?"

Severus's blood ran cold. It had never occurred to him before to wonder how they had continued to live such a comfortable lifestyle after his father's illness had forced the closure of the family Potions business. His stomach roiled at the idea that they owed such a debt of gratitude to Benjamin that his mother had sold herself to him in marriage as repayment.

"Are they going to sell the house?" the mystery woman asked.

"No, I don't believe so. Avis told me Dunstan left it to Severus in his will. I think they're planing to stay here until he's old enough to take possession of it. Oh! You must see the library, my dear. Dunstan had a few marvelous first editions…"

The voices faded as the two women left the room, closing the door behind them. He waited a few moments to make sure he was alone before coming out of his hiding place. He felt nauseous. And worse, he was suddenly furious with his father for getting sick and relying on Benjamin to take care of his family. For putting them under obligation to a man who he knew to be brutal and vindictive. For dying and leaving Severus alone…

He sank to the floor beside Sirius and scratched him between the ears. "You watch, Siri," he said. "This is *my* house now, and I won't let him hurt me again. Someday I'm going to throw him out of here on his fat arse."

It was a lovely fantasy, and for the first time that day, he smiled.

More A/N: Thanks again to all my wonderful reviewers. I'm thrilled that this story has found a home in your hearts!

As you may have noticed, the emphasis of this piece has shifted a bit now and will be exploring Snape more in-depth for the next several chapters. But don't worry, Hermione is still a major character here and she will be moving back into the limelight as things progress.

To CosmicCastaway: I won't be getting much into specific details about the war. But there will be a bit of Snape/Harry interaction toward the end of this story that will shed a bit of light on what happened, I promise. *tease, tease*

To konny: "WIP" means this is a work in progress, as opposed to being a finished product. For the time being, anyway!

To LadyDien: You'll find out more about Brigid in a few more chapters…. and that's all I'm going to say for now. Heh.

To tnf: Snape will eventually do the right thing by Hermione in bed, I promise. And no, Empathy as I've defined it only runs in one direction (i.e., from Snape to Hermione, in this case), and Empath and Object do not have to be love for the connection to happen.

Keep the reviews coming! I live for them!