She sleepily trudged her way up to their room. She was really tired and hadn't gotten much sleep the night before. She got to their room and knocked on the door, she knew better than to just barge into the room after one incident when she caught Jordan, well, doing something a little less than appropriate. She couldn't forget it, not only was the sight scarring, she had sported a black eye for over a month, she then heard them call her in.

"You two wanted to talk to me about something?"

She tried to brighten the mood but obviously, they were angry about something. "Yeah, we did. Where the HELL were you at dinner?" They looked livid. Maybe Severus was right, maybe they were worried about her, after all, last time they saw her she had looked almost suicidal.

She decided to keep her cool; maybe she could make it out of there ok, "I was just in the Garden."

Alex looked very suspicious, "What were you doing in the garden?"

She kept her head down and answered quietly, "I was reading."

"Christine, it does not take you four hours to read a book! You've gotten through thousand page books in three and a half hours! What the hell were you doing?"

Her anger was beginning to rise, but she had to keep herself calm, for her own sake. "Fine, I was with Severus."

Jordan jumped up, anger obviously about to pique, "You were with him?" They had obviously taken the 'with' part wrong. They were after all her big brothers, so they felt compelled to protect her purity and good name, no matter how willing you were to give it away. It was to late though, her anger and reached its peak, and she burst, she could hardly stop the words pouring out of her mouth, much less stop them.

""OH YEAH JORDAN, I WAS WITH SEVERUS, WE FUCKED FOR FOUR HOURS, DAMN GOOD HUMP THAT BOY IF YOU ASK ME! BIGGEST DICK IVE EVER HAD!"

She had aimed to say more but the back of Jordan's hand stopped her. He slapped her across the face and unfortunately for her, he had a few rings on that left three, deep, nasty cuts on her cheek. She wanted to cry and scream in pain but she knew better than that.

"Jordan, did you really have to do that? I'm sure she was joking, you were joking, right Chris?" Alex spoke in almost a bored tone, but then again, he had seen this time and time again.

"Yes, I was joking."

Jordan was readjusting his rings, they had turned around on his finger when they hit her face and he was fixing them. "Good, now, what were you and Severus doing that was so important that you missed dinner."

She was very quiet in her response, hoping not to earn another smack while she felt the blood trickle down her face, "We were talking about potions and Lucius coming tomorrow and I guess we just lost track of time."

Jordan still looked pretty damn livid, but kept his cool for the moment, "Well, next time tell us before you miss dinner, we thought you ran away or killed yourself. Now go and get cleaned up before you get blood everywhere. Goodnight."

"Night Chris."

"Goodnight." As soon as she was back on her floor she allowed herself to fall down, she had to pull herself together, this had happened before and there was no reason she should cry now, no matter how painful it might be. She got up her strength and walked back to her room and prayed that she had some Healing Potion left. Unfortunately she had no such luck. She knew what she had to do since she didn't have the time to make a new one, she would just have to do that in the morning. In the meantime, she walked over to Severus's door. She could tell he was making a potion because she could smell it, it was such a soothing and entrancing smell, she almost forgot what she was there for, until she felt a drop of blood on her shoulder. She knocked on the door and waited for permission.

"Enter" came Severus's voice from inside the room.

She walked into his room to find him with his back to her, and as she had thought, huddled over a cauldron. His room looked just like hers, the exception being the colors; his room was a deep green and black.

She had almost forgotten she was in his room when he spoke up, "Did you want something?"

She tried to keep her composure and tried to make it sound like she wasn't about to cry,"Oh, I um, I, uh, was just wondering if um, uh, if you had an um, an extra, uh, healing potion. I kind of, um, ran out and I um don't have uh time to make one."

No matter, she had tried, she sounded nasal and her voice cracked, she hadn't done a very good job hiding. He didn't seem to care though, for which she was very thankful. For once she was grateful that he could be a heartless bastard.

"For what?"

"My cheek, its cut up somewhat badly and I didn't want to leave it."

As soon as she mentioned it was cut he turned around. He saw the blood that was covering the right side of her face and came walking up towards her. She looked into his eyes and saw sincere concern which had been mirrored in his voice. This defiantly was not the heartless bastard she wanted.

"What the hell happened to you?"

"Sev, can we not do this? Just tell me if you have any to spare and ill go. You'll ruin your potion if you don't get back to it."

"DAMNIT CHRIS! SCREW THE DAMN POTION AND TELL ME WHAT THE HELL HAPPEND TO YOU!"

She didn't need him yelling at her so she moved to walk away but he caught her by the arm, his eyes were sympathetic.

"I'm sorry for yelling, just tell me what happened."

"Nothing, I was just getting something off of my shelf and it fell on my face and scratched me."

Severus did not look like he bought her story for a second, "And what, may I ask, were you trying to get that left a hand print bruise on you."

Her voice was shaky as she tried to come up with something to tell him, "Sev, I-"

"That's what I thought, here, lets clean you up and we will see if I can get some answers from you, even if I have to slip you some veritaserum."

He grabbed her hand and gave her a slight smile and guided her through his room and to the bathroom. He ordered her to sit on the countertop while he got the stuff he would need. He started by wiping off all of the dried blood as gently as possible.

"So, are you going to tell me what happened now?"

"Sev, really, don't worry about it. It's my fault really."

He again, did not look convinced, "Well then, what did you do to deserve this? I am certain this is not entirely your fault and I will not stop asking you until you tell me the truth."

"Fine, ill tell you. I provoked Jordan and he hit me. It's my fault, my stupid mouth acted before I could make it stop so Jordan got mad and hit me."

"Well, he must have been upset about something in the first place. Chris, you might as well tell me everything, I will find out eventually, and it just makes things easier to tell me straight out."

She sighed, he sure was persistent, "Fine, Fine, ill tell you. I was about to go to bed and I saw a note on my desk. It was from Alex and Jordan asking me to come to their room as soon as I read it, so I did. They were mad because I missed dinner and they thought I had run away or killed myself. They asked what I was doing and I said I was with you. Jordan took that the wrong way being the dolt he is and asked if I was literally with you and me, being the sarcastic person I am, said that yes I was and that you were an amazing fuck with the biggest dick I had ever seen, OW!"

Severus had accidentally pressed down on her scratch. "Oh, sorry, didn't mean to, please continue."

"It's ok. But after I said that he hit me. They told me not to do that again and then I said goodnight and left."

"Ok, I'm almost done. Just have to let it dry."

He took her cheek in his hands and brought it close to his lips and he lightly blew on her cuts. She could feel a slight tingly in her cheek and knew it was working. She couldn't explain, however, why she felt a strange tingle in the pit of her stomach when he was blowing on her cheek.

"Well, all better now. You can get down now, there you go. Now, have your brothers ever done this before?"

"Yeah, a bit, that's why I was out of potion. I mean Alex doesn't ever hit me, he just yells and screams. Jordan hits me, but it's my fault really. I always provoke him or mess up, it's not his fault really, its mine."

"Chris, its not-"

"Severus, I really don't want to get into this right now, besides, you know how bloody stubborn I am."

"Fine, well, anyway, the bruise won't go away but here is a camouflage potion for it. Should hold you over till you can make some yourself."

Christine was a bit taken aback. Severus had been different all day, he was sweet to her in the garden, talked to her without sarcasm, and now he had helped her fix up her cuts. This was way to strange for her, she knew something was up. "Thanks Sev. I really appreciate it. Goodnight."

"Goodnight"

She walked back to her room, put her pajamas on and set the potion down on her counter next to her bed. She wasn't going to take it tonight because it would be a waste to cover something no one would see while she was sleeping, no, she would wait till morning, for now, all she wanted to do was sleep. She grabbed a dreamless sleep vial, gulped it down, and was asleep before she hit the pillow.