Author's note: Because it's been SO LONG since I last posted, due to a
computer malfunction (my laptop spontaneously combusted), I thought I'd
post an extra long chapter, for those of you still reading. (By the way,
thanks for doing so! Your letters have been nothing but wonderful and
encouraging, and I love to hear that people are being made
happy/entertained/effected in any way, by what I write.).
For disclaimer, read the first chapter, and for my illustration (I'm an art student, It's a compulsion) I'll, uh, get right on that... Just as soon as I pry my scanner out of the toilet, which is where I put it when it's naughty (you wonder just how spontaneous my laptop's combustion was). Don't read this if you're gonna get yourself, or myself, in trouble for it, deal?
-Iphy
ps: an apology ahead of time for the slight cliffhanger....
CHAPTER NINE
It had been obvious that their playing would reveal to their audience, a certain amount of insight into the relationship between these two musicians. It could not pass unremarked, it would seem, when they played.
He, tall and lean and donned in a dark suit lined in silver, played with the same intensity as she, light and fair in a knee length, white wrap dress, contrasting his darkness with a somehow befitting air. The music that reached the ears of the guests gathered was like nothing any of them had ever heard in their long lifetimes, and they had heard a great deal.
The student and the professor had been placed on a small platform at the head of the teacher's lounge, which was decked in golds and deep browns, hung with ornate picture frames of previous teachers, and heavily muffled by the numerous carpets and heavy armchairs that arranged themselves around a room-sized, pleasant fireplace.
It had taken the headmaster a great deal of time to convince the two shy individuals to perform this evening, but eventually, they had agreed. He suspected her work behind his abandoned reluctance, but he said not a word. The professors had gathered expectantly around the high-ceilinged room, and awaited the concert with a polite interest. It was not until they had begun to play that the remaining teachers realized two things.
One: Dumbledore had to have known something about these two people to have so ardently persuaded them to play this night. And Two: There was something elemental about the way they played together. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Since the night of the pantry and the following breakfast debacle, Hermione and Severus had been swept up in the business of everyday life. Hermione's studies persisted, and Severus became tied up in the duties of midwinter reports for his students.
When Dumbledore had begun to bother them daily about their possibly performing for the Professors over the winter break, they had agreed, finally, and set to practicing during their evening sessions. This left little time to talk, and with the expanding time, they found themselves growing more wary as to whether either should broach the subject of their growing intimacy at all. Though the cozy evenings remained pleasant and their actions continued to tend more towards their own feelings for one another, there was little talk or behavior that would signify a drastic change in their friendship.
Which was driving them both slightly mad.
The final night before their performance, they had just played through the entire schedule for the following day, and Hermione stretched her hands over her head. Her cello balanced on her shoulder, she closed her eyes and yawned, leaning back to let her head fall back to ease the tension in her neck. Tension, she admitted, that was mostly due to the man sitting not ten feet away from her.
Her hair brushed between her shoulder blades and she rolled her neck from side to side, thinking of the dream she had indulged in the previous night. She recalled water, and music, and him, smiling and smiling at her, in the way he so rarely used to and how he had begun to grace her with more and more.
"You're exhausted," he said, and her eyes shot open to see him with that same smile, collapsed in an armchair, his violin returned to it's stand. "You need to sleep. Perhaps tomorrow you should take the day off from your research." She returned his smile wanly. "You're just saying that because you've just made a breakthrough in your own research. I've still miles to go." She said, sighing. He chuckled slightly. "A good deal of progress I'm making in the world of potent sciences if I'm just divulging the secret variant on an already established potion."
She couldn't help but admire the way his body folded over the chair, lean and taught. She bit her lip, thinking of that morning. She had saved his place, but how she longed to remind him of where it was. How soon would he take it up again?
"Nonsense. The dreamless sleep potion is one of the more well-used potions of our time. It only makes sense that some brilliant mind such as yourself should explore the derivatives of such a mix. And besides," she said, standing to place the cello in it's stand, "I'm terribly fascinated with the prospect of creating one's dreams." They had discussed this before. Severus's research had led him to tampering with the varying ways of dealing with the collective sub-conscious. Dreams came from deep within the human mind, and could unlock forgotten memories, knowledge untold to the dreamer, and even tap into the parts of the mind that were used for the more primal magics such as extra-sensory perception.
"I'm done in," She said, walking over to him as he stood from his chair. "I promise to take it easy, but we'll talk soon, alright? I fear we've both become so busy that it's stealing away from my time with you." Her comment, though lightly spoken, was laced with the inevitability of their impending discussion as to where they were headed. His heart leapt slightly, both in anticipation and worry over whether she had changed her mind or not. "Indeed, then. Sleep well, Hermia. If you need me tomorrow, I'll be here, as always, working." She bent, and kissed him lightly on the lips, each savoring the touch briefly before she stood, and with a sad smile, left him sitting in his living room, her taste on his mouth.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The performance had been an astonishment to the faculty. Mainly wizard born, the teachers had had little to no experience in the subtlety of muggle music. Entranced by the mingling notes of the violin and cello, the audience had sat spellbound until the very end of their playing. The tall, dark man and the light, ethereal woman had both stood to face them, and bowed humbly to their applause. It had been a simple performance, with not any pomp or circumstance, but it had been greeted as though they had played to a crowded Carnegie Hall.
After they had returned their instruments to their cases, and had descended in tandem to speak with their audience and receive the praise they were, indeed, deserving of, MgGonnagal had leaned to whisper to the headmaster, "It is without question that they were made for each other." Dumbledore nodded, smiling slightly, and rising to greet the duet with congratulations and thanks for their time. Severus bowed his head to each compliment, a small and uncharacteristic smile gracing the corners of his mouth. Dumbledore had never seen him look so happy. *******************************
That night, slipping out of his robes for the evening, the tall, lean professor regarded the vial of potion that sat on his worktable, the final conclusion of his last few weeks of research. It was late, and he was longing for the comforts of his bed, but, he realized with sudden apprehension, he needed to pack.
The council of the underground wizard's tribunal had been roughly disbanned at the defeat of Voldermort, but they had remained in contact, discussing the possibilities of further deatheater attacks. Though their dark lord was dead, and many of them had been imprisoned, the few remaining Deatheaters retained a sullen manner towards the newly instated law against the use of discrimination of any form, in any wizard establishment. In the south of France, a training school for pureblood wizards only had been started, quite secretly. There had been a rumor that the school was formed to train up a new dark lord. Some even stated that they had heard that Voldermort had been reincarnated, and was currently receiving his tutelage at the institution.
The group of three wizard spies that Severus was a part of, had decided that a meeting near the south of France, and a covert infiltration of this school was in order to maintain the order that had only recently been established in the wizarding world.
It couldn't have come at a worse time, he had thought, as he had stared into the floo network and the two other worried-looking faces, rimmed in green flame. He had only just begun this torturously slow stumble towards happiness with Hermione, and this separation would only bring him further away from the only person who had ever calmed him enough to sleep at night, or excited his mind and body enough to find happiness in his waking hours. He had yet to tell her, and he was leaving the day after tomorrow.
Reverting to the scowl that had graced his features so often before they had begun to play together, Severus angrily folded some of his robes and garments into a small bag, and threw the bag across the room to land by his bedroom door. He sat, sighing deeply, and rubbed his hands over his tired neck. Her face, unbidden, came to his view, and he felt his frown lessen.
He rose again and wandered to his study, sitting in her chair and breathing in her scent. The smell gradually erased all the lines of stress his face had held since the conversation with the others of the tribunal the previous afternoon. He felt himself harden, swiftly, at the presence of her smell, and he cursed the frustration that had built between them that caused him this near-perpetual state of arousal.
Turning his head to the fabric of the chair, he smelled her hair there and ran his hand lightly over the growing bulge between his legs. "Oh god..." He muttered, feeling himself respond to his own touch beneath the soft cotton of his black boxer-briefs. Slipping his hand, now, under the waist of his white t-shirt, he ran his fingers over the muscles of his stomach, groaning, his eyes closed, as he thrust up slightly into the empty air. Thinking of the way her breath had quickened that night in the pantry when he had stepped closer to her.
Did she ever think of him like this? Touch herself to his image? Another throaty groan at the thought of her dipping her hand into herself, thinking of him. Somewhere in his mind he felt the logical part of his brain that had commanded him not to do this, slip away, silent.
He thought of her slender neck, and how she would sound when he kissed her there. Her supple body as he had ground himself against her, and the way she had gasped with each thrust, bringing him closer to coming with his clothes still on than anyone had ever done. His erection had worked it's way out of his boxers, and he brushed it softly, thinking, almost humorously, how he wasn't going to miss this when they were together. It had been so many years since he had been with a woman, that he had lost count. They would show up at his door any day with his official "virgin" stamp again, having been inactive so long he'd have regained it.
The idea brought another thought to his mind and he groaned again, tightening his grip on himself. Was she a virgin? She had never had a real boyfriend in school, and though he didn't see her over the summers of her tutelage, she had always returned seemingly unchanged. He thought that he'd be able to tell if she was suddenly devirginised, he surmised that she was still unchanged. How he would love to change her thus. He felt himself release, swiftly, a strained yell resounding off of the stone walls, echoing her name back to him.
Feeling a fool, he tidied himself up. He hadn't come as quickly since he was in his first years at Hogwarts. He smirked, 'what she does to me...' he thought, throwing his boxer briefs into the hamper and donning a new pair to sleep in. He fell asleep soon after hitting the pillow, wishing, in vain, for her presence in his bed for what he was sure was the thousandth time.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
She did, as he had thought, not respond well to his news. Though he assured her that he would be gone a week at the most, she kept the hurt and frustrated expression on her face throughout their playing time.
After they had finished, he had sat on the couch, and she had joined him there. They sat in silence, feeling their hearts wrench at the possibility that the other would forget their place in their steady incline towards a relationship, within a week of separation. She certainly hadn't forgotten his place, unable to hide her flushed face and heady breath at the thought of his hand, climbing the inside of her thigh.
She was grateful for the solitude of the library during her research, as, in her breaks from studying, thoughts of him would cloud her mind and she would find herself breathless and flushed, five minutes having passed without her knowledge as she sat and thought of him.
She had resolved that she would do everything in her power to consummate their growing intimacy by the end of the week. It was just her luck that his little foray had to land directly in the midst of her plans.
She felt his hand land atop her's where it rested on the couch. "It won't be long, really. You'll be so wrapped up in your work, you won't even realize that I'm gone."
"Pish. Of course I will. Stop self-deprecating for a moment and tell me honestly... How dangerous is this mission?" The question caught him off- guard. He hadn't expected her to be worried about his welfare.
"Not dangerous, supposedly. The ministry should arrive by the end of the week, once we've confirmed our suspicions, and then I'm free to come home." He thought wryly of what she would think if she knew that his home was with her.
"...Supposedly." Her tone was slightly cross. A mix between irritation and fear.
She got up suddenly, crossing her arms uncomfortably and going to stand near the enchanted window out to his balcony. The snow swirled against the pane, and because it was dark, he could see her expression reflected in the glass. She looked so forlorn that he was tempted to fall to his knees and beg her for a smile. She sighed, and went to sit on her playing bench.
She lifted her cello from it's stand and cracked her knuckles in preparation to play. He winced slightly at the sound. He berated her often over her habit of knuckle-cracking, but she insisted that it was a necessary ritual. She lifted her bow, closed her eyes, and he felt something constrict inside him as she leaned her head to the side, placing the bow against the strings.
A solitary note drifted out from the instrument, and he watched, enrapt, as her face changed with the sudden sound. The note drifted into a string of notes, and he recognized it as the easily-identifiable Sonata No. 3, Adagio. Arguably one of the most telling and beautifully sad pieces of music ever created. Hayden had truly broken the mold with that one, and though Severus had never had the pleasure to play the piece, written as it was for cello and harpsichord or piano, he considered it one of his favorites.
Her beautiful, tall, white column of neck, bent to the side with melancholy, proved too much for him, and he stood, walking over to stand behind her, admiring her hairline as she dipped her head with the swells of the music.
He straddled the bench behind her, and came to sit there, his front facing her elegant back, her perfect posture unchanged by his nearness. His hands, he placed at her waist, careful not to jar her elbows in the process, and he let his head drop to the expanse of skin revealed by the neckline of her sweater, which narrowed to her neck. Her cool skin against his forehead felt like satin.
The sonata continued, the note wavering slightly as Severus began to drag his lips against the back of her neck. She slowly leaned back against his chest, and his hands slipped around to caress her stomach, smiling slightly against her skin when her bow slipped a little on the strings.
Her head tipped back, her eyes still closed, and displayed the smooth expanse of the front of her neck, so trustingly, to him. His breath was insistent against the back of her ear, then down the front of her chest, and she realized, at around the same time she could detect his hard length pressing into her lower back, that her hands had stilled at her playing, and her arms now lay at her sides.
Her bow made a clicking noise as it hit the floor, and her bowing hand moved to caress his thigh through the fabric of his trousers. With her mouth parted, her breath coming shortly, she was exquisite. He felt himself harden impossibly against her, and a low grumbling moan resounded from deep in his chest, echoing into the spot between her neck and shoulder. Her breath rose another notch.
She slowly inched back along the bench, flush against his body, and began to move subtly and rhythmically against him. Somehow, their discussion, which had bordered on becoming an argument, had turned into this.
As his hands began their gradual ascent to the graceful curves of her breasts, slowly, slowly, a sudden noise from the fireplace interrupted their muted reverie. "Severus??" The familiar voice of the headmaster sounded hollow in their ears, their heads too full of the gentle pounding of their lust and gasps to understand that Dumbledore was on the floo.
For disclaimer, read the first chapter, and for my illustration (I'm an art student, It's a compulsion) I'll, uh, get right on that... Just as soon as I pry my scanner out of the toilet, which is where I put it when it's naughty (you wonder just how spontaneous my laptop's combustion was). Don't read this if you're gonna get yourself, or myself, in trouble for it, deal?
-Iphy
ps: an apology ahead of time for the slight cliffhanger....
CHAPTER NINE
It had been obvious that their playing would reveal to their audience, a certain amount of insight into the relationship between these two musicians. It could not pass unremarked, it would seem, when they played.
He, tall and lean and donned in a dark suit lined in silver, played with the same intensity as she, light and fair in a knee length, white wrap dress, contrasting his darkness with a somehow befitting air. The music that reached the ears of the guests gathered was like nothing any of them had ever heard in their long lifetimes, and they had heard a great deal.
The student and the professor had been placed on a small platform at the head of the teacher's lounge, which was decked in golds and deep browns, hung with ornate picture frames of previous teachers, and heavily muffled by the numerous carpets and heavy armchairs that arranged themselves around a room-sized, pleasant fireplace.
It had taken the headmaster a great deal of time to convince the two shy individuals to perform this evening, but eventually, they had agreed. He suspected her work behind his abandoned reluctance, but he said not a word. The professors had gathered expectantly around the high-ceilinged room, and awaited the concert with a polite interest. It was not until they had begun to play that the remaining teachers realized two things.
One: Dumbledore had to have known something about these two people to have so ardently persuaded them to play this night. And Two: There was something elemental about the way they played together. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Since the night of the pantry and the following breakfast debacle, Hermione and Severus had been swept up in the business of everyday life. Hermione's studies persisted, and Severus became tied up in the duties of midwinter reports for his students.
When Dumbledore had begun to bother them daily about their possibly performing for the Professors over the winter break, they had agreed, finally, and set to practicing during their evening sessions. This left little time to talk, and with the expanding time, they found themselves growing more wary as to whether either should broach the subject of their growing intimacy at all. Though the cozy evenings remained pleasant and their actions continued to tend more towards their own feelings for one another, there was little talk or behavior that would signify a drastic change in their friendship.
Which was driving them both slightly mad.
The final night before their performance, they had just played through the entire schedule for the following day, and Hermione stretched her hands over her head. Her cello balanced on her shoulder, she closed her eyes and yawned, leaning back to let her head fall back to ease the tension in her neck. Tension, she admitted, that was mostly due to the man sitting not ten feet away from her.
Her hair brushed between her shoulder blades and she rolled her neck from side to side, thinking of the dream she had indulged in the previous night. She recalled water, and music, and him, smiling and smiling at her, in the way he so rarely used to and how he had begun to grace her with more and more.
"You're exhausted," he said, and her eyes shot open to see him with that same smile, collapsed in an armchair, his violin returned to it's stand. "You need to sleep. Perhaps tomorrow you should take the day off from your research." She returned his smile wanly. "You're just saying that because you've just made a breakthrough in your own research. I've still miles to go." She said, sighing. He chuckled slightly. "A good deal of progress I'm making in the world of potent sciences if I'm just divulging the secret variant on an already established potion."
She couldn't help but admire the way his body folded over the chair, lean and taught. She bit her lip, thinking of that morning. She had saved his place, but how she longed to remind him of where it was. How soon would he take it up again?
"Nonsense. The dreamless sleep potion is one of the more well-used potions of our time. It only makes sense that some brilliant mind such as yourself should explore the derivatives of such a mix. And besides," she said, standing to place the cello in it's stand, "I'm terribly fascinated with the prospect of creating one's dreams." They had discussed this before. Severus's research had led him to tampering with the varying ways of dealing with the collective sub-conscious. Dreams came from deep within the human mind, and could unlock forgotten memories, knowledge untold to the dreamer, and even tap into the parts of the mind that were used for the more primal magics such as extra-sensory perception.
"I'm done in," She said, walking over to him as he stood from his chair. "I promise to take it easy, but we'll talk soon, alright? I fear we've both become so busy that it's stealing away from my time with you." Her comment, though lightly spoken, was laced with the inevitability of their impending discussion as to where they were headed. His heart leapt slightly, both in anticipation and worry over whether she had changed her mind or not. "Indeed, then. Sleep well, Hermia. If you need me tomorrow, I'll be here, as always, working." She bent, and kissed him lightly on the lips, each savoring the touch briefly before she stood, and with a sad smile, left him sitting in his living room, her taste on his mouth.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The performance had been an astonishment to the faculty. Mainly wizard born, the teachers had had little to no experience in the subtlety of muggle music. Entranced by the mingling notes of the violin and cello, the audience had sat spellbound until the very end of their playing. The tall, dark man and the light, ethereal woman had both stood to face them, and bowed humbly to their applause. It had been a simple performance, with not any pomp or circumstance, but it had been greeted as though they had played to a crowded Carnegie Hall.
After they had returned their instruments to their cases, and had descended in tandem to speak with their audience and receive the praise they were, indeed, deserving of, MgGonnagal had leaned to whisper to the headmaster, "It is without question that they were made for each other." Dumbledore nodded, smiling slightly, and rising to greet the duet with congratulations and thanks for their time. Severus bowed his head to each compliment, a small and uncharacteristic smile gracing the corners of his mouth. Dumbledore had never seen him look so happy. *******************************
That night, slipping out of his robes for the evening, the tall, lean professor regarded the vial of potion that sat on his worktable, the final conclusion of his last few weeks of research. It was late, and he was longing for the comforts of his bed, but, he realized with sudden apprehension, he needed to pack.
The council of the underground wizard's tribunal had been roughly disbanned at the defeat of Voldermort, but they had remained in contact, discussing the possibilities of further deatheater attacks. Though their dark lord was dead, and many of them had been imprisoned, the few remaining Deatheaters retained a sullen manner towards the newly instated law against the use of discrimination of any form, in any wizard establishment. In the south of France, a training school for pureblood wizards only had been started, quite secretly. There had been a rumor that the school was formed to train up a new dark lord. Some even stated that they had heard that Voldermort had been reincarnated, and was currently receiving his tutelage at the institution.
The group of three wizard spies that Severus was a part of, had decided that a meeting near the south of France, and a covert infiltration of this school was in order to maintain the order that had only recently been established in the wizarding world.
It couldn't have come at a worse time, he had thought, as he had stared into the floo network and the two other worried-looking faces, rimmed in green flame. He had only just begun this torturously slow stumble towards happiness with Hermione, and this separation would only bring him further away from the only person who had ever calmed him enough to sleep at night, or excited his mind and body enough to find happiness in his waking hours. He had yet to tell her, and he was leaving the day after tomorrow.
Reverting to the scowl that had graced his features so often before they had begun to play together, Severus angrily folded some of his robes and garments into a small bag, and threw the bag across the room to land by his bedroom door. He sat, sighing deeply, and rubbed his hands over his tired neck. Her face, unbidden, came to his view, and he felt his frown lessen.
He rose again and wandered to his study, sitting in her chair and breathing in her scent. The smell gradually erased all the lines of stress his face had held since the conversation with the others of the tribunal the previous afternoon. He felt himself harden, swiftly, at the presence of her smell, and he cursed the frustration that had built between them that caused him this near-perpetual state of arousal.
Turning his head to the fabric of the chair, he smelled her hair there and ran his hand lightly over the growing bulge between his legs. "Oh god..." He muttered, feeling himself respond to his own touch beneath the soft cotton of his black boxer-briefs. Slipping his hand, now, under the waist of his white t-shirt, he ran his fingers over the muscles of his stomach, groaning, his eyes closed, as he thrust up slightly into the empty air. Thinking of the way her breath had quickened that night in the pantry when he had stepped closer to her.
Did she ever think of him like this? Touch herself to his image? Another throaty groan at the thought of her dipping her hand into herself, thinking of him. Somewhere in his mind he felt the logical part of his brain that had commanded him not to do this, slip away, silent.
He thought of her slender neck, and how she would sound when he kissed her there. Her supple body as he had ground himself against her, and the way she had gasped with each thrust, bringing him closer to coming with his clothes still on than anyone had ever done. His erection had worked it's way out of his boxers, and he brushed it softly, thinking, almost humorously, how he wasn't going to miss this when they were together. It had been so many years since he had been with a woman, that he had lost count. They would show up at his door any day with his official "virgin" stamp again, having been inactive so long he'd have regained it.
The idea brought another thought to his mind and he groaned again, tightening his grip on himself. Was she a virgin? She had never had a real boyfriend in school, and though he didn't see her over the summers of her tutelage, she had always returned seemingly unchanged. He thought that he'd be able to tell if she was suddenly devirginised, he surmised that she was still unchanged. How he would love to change her thus. He felt himself release, swiftly, a strained yell resounding off of the stone walls, echoing her name back to him.
Feeling a fool, he tidied himself up. He hadn't come as quickly since he was in his first years at Hogwarts. He smirked, 'what she does to me...' he thought, throwing his boxer briefs into the hamper and donning a new pair to sleep in. He fell asleep soon after hitting the pillow, wishing, in vain, for her presence in his bed for what he was sure was the thousandth time.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
She did, as he had thought, not respond well to his news. Though he assured her that he would be gone a week at the most, she kept the hurt and frustrated expression on her face throughout their playing time.
After they had finished, he had sat on the couch, and she had joined him there. They sat in silence, feeling their hearts wrench at the possibility that the other would forget their place in their steady incline towards a relationship, within a week of separation. She certainly hadn't forgotten his place, unable to hide her flushed face and heady breath at the thought of his hand, climbing the inside of her thigh.
She was grateful for the solitude of the library during her research, as, in her breaks from studying, thoughts of him would cloud her mind and she would find herself breathless and flushed, five minutes having passed without her knowledge as she sat and thought of him.
She had resolved that she would do everything in her power to consummate their growing intimacy by the end of the week. It was just her luck that his little foray had to land directly in the midst of her plans.
She felt his hand land atop her's where it rested on the couch. "It won't be long, really. You'll be so wrapped up in your work, you won't even realize that I'm gone."
"Pish. Of course I will. Stop self-deprecating for a moment and tell me honestly... How dangerous is this mission?" The question caught him off- guard. He hadn't expected her to be worried about his welfare.
"Not dangerous, supposedly. The ministry should arrive by the end of the week, once we've confirmed our suspicions, and then I'm free to come home." He thought wryly of what she would think if she knew that his home was with her.
"...Supposedly." Her tone was slightly cross. A mix between irritation and fear.
She got up suddenly, crossing her arms uncomfortably and going to stand near the enchanted window out to his balcony. The snow swirled against the pane, and because it was dark, he could see her expression reflected in the glass. She looked so forlorn that he was tempted to fall to his knees and beg her for a smile. She sighed, and went to sit on her playing bench.
She lifted her cello from it's stand and cracked her knuckles in preparation to play. He winced slightly at the sound. He berated her often over her habit of knuckle-cracking, but she insisted that it was a necessary ritual. She lifted her bow, closed her eyes, and he felt something constrict inside him as she leaned her head to the side, placing the bow against the strings.
A solitary note drifted out from the instrument, and he watched, enrapt, as her face changed with the sudden sound. The note drifted into a string of notes, and he recognized it as the easily-identifiable Sonata No. 3, Adagio. Arguably one of the most telling and beautifully sad pieces of music ever created. Hayden had truly broken the mold with that one, and though Severus had never had the pleasure to play the piece, written as it was for cello and harpsichord or piano, he considered it one of his favorites.
Her beautiful, tall, white column of neck, bent to the side with melancholy, proved too much for him, and he stood, walking over to stand behind her, admiring her hairline as she dipped her head with the swells of the music.
He straddled the bench behind her, and came to sit there, his front facing her elegant back, her perfect posture unchanged by his nearness. His hands, he placed at her waist, careful not to jar her elbows in the process, and he let his head drop to the expanse of skin revealed by the neckline of her sweater, which narrowed to her neck. Her cool skin against his forehead felt like satin.
The sonata continued, the note wavering slightly as Severus began to drag his lips against the back of her neck. She slowly leaned back against his chest, and his hands slipped around to caress her stomach, smiling slightly against her skin when her bow slipped a little on the strings.
Her head tipped back, her eyes still closed, and displayed the smooth expanse of the front of her neck, so trustingly, to him. His breath was insistent against the back of her ear, then down the front of her chest, and she realized, at around the same time she could detect his hard length pressing into her lower back, that her hands had stilled at her playing, and her arms now lay at her sides.
Her bow made a clicking noise as it hit the floor, and her bowing hand moved to caress his thigh through the fabric of his trousers. With her mouth parted, her breath coming shortly, she was exquisite. He felt himself harden impossibly against her, and a low grumbling moan resounded from deep in his chest, echoing into the spot between her neck and shoulder. Her breath rose another notch.
She slowly inched back along the bench, flush against his body, and began to move subtly and rhythmically against him. Somehow, their discussion, which had bordered on becoming an argument, had turned into this.
As his hands began their gradual ascent to the graceful curves of her breasts, slowly, slowly, a sudden noise from the fireplace interrupted their muted reverie. "Severus??" The familiar voice of the headmaster sounded hollow in their ears, their heads too full of the gentle pounding of their lust and gasps to understand that Dumbledore was on the floo.
