His first year as Potion Master on staff at Hogwarts was exactly as awful as he had anticipated, though the term had only been in session for a few, short weeks. The children were snot-nosed imbeciles who knew nothing about the safety required when brewing and no matter how much he tried to impress that importance upon them, he still ended up with several exploding cauldrons in his classroom each week.
Severus had never wanted to teach, but it was the price to pay to protect his childhood best friend and her idiot husband from the clutches of the madman he'd tied himself to. It was possible he might enjoy teaching if the children would just fucking listen. But of course, they were too concerned with passing notes and sending secret stinging jinxes at each other.
And if he had to confiscate one more Alpha/Omega sappy romance novel, he would find a hex that would force them not to present until they were thirty. Better yet, he would invent one.
Severus thought about the severe, black teaching robes his own Master of Potions had worn while he was completing his Mastery and contemplated purchasing a set to wear instead of the simple set he currently owned. He knew if he merely mentioned it to Lucius, he would end up with a wardrobe full of expensive, tailored self-sizing robes with matching accessories before he could bat an eye. Given that his best friend had already paid for him to complete his Mastery, he considered it poor form to take advantage of the man's generosity once more.
His friendship with Lucius was one of the few good things in his life. The older wizard wore a facade of arrogance at all times, strutting about like one of his irritating peacocks with that ridiculous cane, but beneath the frippery, he insisted upon, Lucius was generous and kind. He was also intelligent and charismatic, two qualities which made him perfect to throw his money around the Ministry in favor of the Dark Lord's agenda.
It was becoming clear with each passing week that the Dark Lord was slipping more into madness. When Severus had first joined his ranks, taking the Dark Mark with pride, the Dark Lord had been akin to a level-headed politician with grand ideas of the way things should be. Since the revelation of the prophecy concerning whom he suspected to be Lily Potter's young child, it was becoming easy to see the cracks in the Dark Lord's carefully crafted facade.
For years, Severus thought that when Lily reached maturity, he would scent her as his mate. She'd been the one good thing in his life growing up and he'd clung to that hope so desperately that when he scented her and it was all wrong, he threw himself into the Dark Lord's cause with a fervor. When it came out that she was mated to James Potter, of all of the Alphas in the world, Severus nearly lost it. He spiraled into a pattern of destructive behavior and still hadn't managed to pull himself back from it completely. He nearly gleefully practiced dark magic with his brethren while indulging in muggle cigarettes and unnamed potions sold in shady back alleys that caused euphoria and sometimes hallucinations.
There was a time Severus clung to those hallucinations like they were his lifeblood. If he couldn't have Lily for his own, he could hallucinate a life with her. A tidy cottage with a large shed in the back for his potions, two children chasing each other around the garden with her eyes and his dark hair, Lily making lunch for their family in the kitchen.
It was wonderful… and yet, he emerged from each hallucination a broken man.
It was Lucius who forced him to pull back and locked him in a room in Malfoy Manor for a week in a bid to force him into sobriety. He'd screamed himself silent and tore the room to shreds but he came out of it a better man. He shunned the potions and drew back from practicing too much dark magic and focused his anger instead, on his studies.
His muggle cigarette habit was proving difficult to give up, however.
He'd signed up for the service mere days after he presented, but they'd yet to locate his Omega. Rationally, he knew he might never find her— some matched pairs were born into different generations or across the world from the other, but he hadn't given up hope quite yet.
Instead, he buried himself in his work.
Before, it was crafting potions for the Dark Lord, but then he'd been instructed by both of his Masters to take the open position at Hogwarts teaching Potions. It was the price Severus had to pay to Dumbledore in order to try to save Lily's life, though the Dark Lord commanded it of him in order to gather information about the Order of the Phoenix.
Part of him enjoyed the subterfuge, the risks he had to take serving two masters with completely different purposes. It gave him a high akin to the potions but it left him fearing for his own life. Fortunately, there was little to do when the school year was in session save for the occasional meeting, as the Dark Lord had instructed him to remain at Hogwarts as much as possible. How else was he to get close to Dumbledore?
Severus only hoped he made it out of the war alive.
Unfortunately, he was already beginning to doubt that was possible.
Poppy needed more potions for the Hospital Wing. With as many students landed themselves in her beds from his class alone, he'd been surprised when she'd only asked for a few blood replenishers, calming draughts, and burn ointment. It was an easy order, one he could fulfill almost with his eyes closed.
He'd set the potions to brewing in their respective cauldrons and covered them with a shield charm as he stepped away to the other side of his lab. Drawing the pack from his pocket, he slid a cigarette from the packaging and brushed it under his nose, inhaling the warm, spicy scent of the high-quality tobacco. Conjuring a small flame between his thumb and forefinger, he placed the cigarette between his lips and inhaled.
The rush of calm flooded him immediately as thick smoke filled his lungs. He leaned his head back against the stone wall and exhaled, nearly sighing with relief as the tension eased from him.
He took like that for minutes, taking slow drags off of the cigarette while lost in his own thoughts.
The cigarette fell from his hand when the walls of his potions lab began to tremble and groan with a horrifying grind of stone on stone. It ended up crushed beneath the heel of his boot as he quickly strengthened the shield charm over the three cauldrons and cast one over himself, dust falling from the ceiling to cover the tables and the floor.
Just as suddenly as it began, it stopped.
Severus grumbled to himself and pulled another cigarette from the pack after tucking his wand away, but it made it no further than halfway out of the paper wrapper when he stilled. Lying on the floor of his potions lab was a woman clothed only in a man's shirt. Dark, wild curls fanned out over the floor and obscured her face from view. The palms of her hands bore fresh scrapes and scratches while bruises dotted her bare knees.
Apparition within the grounds of Hogwarts was only allowed for the Headmaster, but Severus had no other explanation for why a young woman had appeared out of nowhere in the middle of his potions lab.
She clutched her stomach and drew her legs up towards her chest with a groan.
She was alive, at least.
He approached her, slowly, pulling his wand from where he kept it secured to his forearm. He'd need to inform the Headmaster of her presence. The spell died on his lips when he was suddenly overwhelmed by her. Something settled deep within his chest as he breathed her in. She was like sunshine after a rainstorm and the bright scent of a garden on a hot summer day.
And somehow, he knew she was his.
And Gods, she was tiny. A little scrap of a thing with tanned skin and wild curls. He knelt beside her and brushed the curls from her face to reveal freckled cheeks and full lips. His hand settled against her cheek.
She was burning up.
"It hurts," she whined. Her voice was quiet and pained and it called to him. It begged him, in those two words, to take away the hurt and was helpless to resist.
Omega needs you.
"I know, little one," he crooned softly. His eyes roved over her body, studying her injuries. He couldn't see any other external ones apart from the bruises on her knees and the scrapes along her hands.
Her face grimaced in pain once more and she clutched her abdomen, curling into herself once more. The small movement was enough for the scent of her arousal to fill his nose. When he looked closer, he could see the glisten of slick between her thighs.
His Omega was in heat.
Knot her. Bite her. Mate her.
Yours.
If it hadn't been months since Severus had taken a euphoria potion, he would have thought her a figment of his imagination, a hallucination, some ethereal spectre come to torment him. But she was real, and warm, and so lovely.
"How do I make it stop?" she cried, tears welling up in her eyes. "It burns."
He threaded his fingers into her wild curls, mesmerized at the softness of each tiny ringlet. She was perfect, and she was his, and she was here. He couldn't think about the circumstances of her appearance in his lab when concern for her laced through him like a hot knife.
"Let me take care of you, Omega," he begged.
He would not be like the man who sired him. Claiming the first unmated Omega he'd come across and leaving her a miserable husk of a woman when he'd found out she was a witch. He needed her to say she was his, to trust he would take care of her, guiding her through her heat. He needed her consent and he would beg her for it if he had to.
His instincts were begging him to gather her in his arms and whisk her away to the safety of his bedroom. There were pillows and blankets and it would be perfect. He needed to press soft kisses against her cheeks and coat her in his scent. To knot her and claim her is his own.
Her choice.
Mine.
Severus quickly pulled gentle shields around his mind to dampen the instincts warring with what he knew was right.
The dark lashes surrounding her eyes fluttered open and he was greeted by a set of amber-colored eyes with flecks of gold and dark brown. It would have been easy to drown himself in her gaze but they closed once more just as quickly as they had opened.
"Alpha isn't coming," she whimpered, her face pressing against the cool stones of the floor.
Severus was struck with confusion. Her scent was unlike anything he had experienced before and he knew with every fiber of his being that she was meant for him. The moment his hand pressed against her cheek, it was like the broken pieces of his soul were suddenly made whole. She filled in all of the cracks and crevices in a single touch.
He knew in an instant. Did she not realize? Had she not felt it?
"I'm here, Omega," he pressed, stroking his thumb along the curve of her cheek.
Her eyes flew open and one of her tiny hands, dark with dried blood, pressed against his cheek and he couldn't help but lean into her. The relief in her eyes was palpable, something he could almost hold. It was as though she was just now realizing he was real.
"Severus."
The way she said his name made his soul sing. The way it rolled off of her lips, her tongue caressing each syllable with a reverence he never thought possible. It made him want to wrap himself around her and never let her go. He wouldn't have to. She was his, was she not?
Her name was poised on the tip of his tongue when he stilled. He didn't even know her name. He didn't know her. He couldn't recall having ever set eyes upon her before as he scanned through the catalogue of faces in his memory.
How could she have possibly known who he was?
She noticed the confusion written across his features because she drew back, a tiny furrow wrinkling between her sweat-soaked brows. "You… you don't know me."
He shook his head, confirming her suspicions. He didn't know her, but he didn't need to. He had plenty of time to learn everything about her. Ages to find out how she came to him. Years to learn every inch of her body. A lifetime to love her.
"I know you're mine," he said, his thumb trailing over her lips. A myriad of emotions swirled within her amber eyes but when he'd uttered the last word, the desire within was unmistakable.
"I know you're in heat," he said, breathing in the scent of her arousal as his other hand came to rest between her shoulder blades, gently lifting her up from the floor.
"I know you're injured," he said softly, the corners of his lips pulling down in a frown.
Severus pulled her into his lap and settled her against his chest, lifting the palm of one of her hands so he could inspect the scratches there more closely. They weren't very deep, a simple cream would heal them after they were cleaned, but the idea of her being harmed made something within him rage. The idea that he wasn't there to protect her from whatever bloodied her palms and bruised her knees forced the current of his magic to bristle just beneath his pale skin.
He pressed his lips against the crown of her head and she leaned into him, forcing all of the rage bubbling just below the surface of his skin to dissipate.
The way she pressed herself against him, the soft smile on her lips, and the overwhelming scent of contentment rolling off of her was all the consent he needed.
"And I'm going to take care of you."