A/N: Hello, my dear readers, and welcome to another Friday, the Thirteenth! (Because it's a day for so many happy occasion, one simply has to go through it twice, right?) I wanted to get this out before my vacation, so when I post this, I'll be somewhere in the depths of my beloved country - hey, know what? Let's make it a small competition:

The first to guess where I am vacationing can tell me one line that I have to include in a future chapter, probably chapter nine or ten. Sounds good? ;)

Also, I believe it came out wrong when I said that chapter five got little attention. I didn't mean it in the way of reviews - those were stunning, and I am greatly thankful for each and every one of them! - but in the way of visitors. That chapter simply had 12% fewer visitors than the one before.

But, I know I haven't acknowledged my faithful reviewers at all yet, and I sincerely think that has to change. Now.

irononmaiden - Thank you for being the only one so far to actually voice a wish for improvement! And thank you for sticking around to see how that worked out, as well.

Smithback - Even your lovely little two-to-three-word reviews brighten my day. :)

viola1701e - I love your thoughts on my chapters, and you're always there with at least a little feedback. It's lovely to have kind of a running feedback to my work, and I greatly appreciate you for it!

McGonagal'sCat - I love you. Need I say more? ;)

aina akkarin- Thank you for repeatedly taking the time to voice your thoughts. I'm glad you like my story so far.

Aurora Jenkins - What I appreciate most about your reviews is that you always point out what exactly you liked about a chapter. Thank you for that.

WRose - Your demands for more chapters are part of what keeps me going. Or writing, as it is.

And - last but not least - AuroraMcGonagall - Thank you so much for reminding me that I am writing for my silently appreciative readers out there, as much as for my vocal ones.

Now, I know that I didn't mention all of you. If you would like to get into contact with me, just write me a PM and I'll always take the time for an in-depth reply, I promise! But, as for chapter seven - here it goes:

Friday, September 13th, 1995

Holy fucking Merlin and his thrice-damned balls, Severus thought. How in seven hells had this happened?

He had spanked the girl.

Spanked her.

Her.

The girl.

The girl.

Hermione bloody Granger.

And he had spanked her.

Her.

The girl.

The – oh fuck it, he really had to snap out of this.

But –

Sweet bloody Morgana, what had he done?

Looking back on the last couple of hours, Severus decided to mentally retrace his steps to discover where it all had gone downhill, when he had taken a wrong turn and ended up where he was now – not the top of the Astronomy tower, no, but the sitting room of Hades, tumbler full of dark golden whiskey in his hand – the colour of her eyes, trustingly gazing into his – as if he belonged there, had belonged there all his life.

And maybe he had, Severus thought. More than maybe. In fact, he was quite certain that Fate had always intended him to walk this path that was laughingly called his life, and that the old man repeatedly telling him that he had indeed a choice in what he did with this path was merely entertainment for the audience that must be sitting somewhere, unseen by him, watching and laughing like in one of those ridiculous muggle TV shows that his father had watched whenever he was too drunk to hit his wife and son, which was less often than one might expect, given how most grown men would pass out and silently die in a corner if they were to drink the amount of alcohol his father used to imbibe before noon only.

Gracious Circe, Severus thought, keep me from rambling lest my mind drive me mad.

But it seemed Circe was unwilling to bestow any of her presumed grace on a poor, unworthy Potions Master – Death Eater, his mind supplied – like him, and he was left alone with his usually so rational mind that, just now, didn't stop sprouting out every ridiculous thought that came to its front, and those thoughts lingering in the recesses of the darkest compartments that he could stow them into as well.

Allowing himself a deep sigh – and how weird was that in and of itself, considering he hadn't sighed in public for years, even if it was in the middle of the night and he was completely alone, as it was now – Severus decided to leave the tower and return to his chambers, lest he come upon someone willing to meddle in his affairs, and had the capacity to read his thoughts, and one never knew what unexpected time and place the Headmaster might choose to prance upon his unsuspecting victims.

Recasting the muffling charm he usually kept on his heavy boots and taken off for effect only – and what an effect it had been, her cheeks flushed a most delightful shade of pink, both her lower and her facial ones –, the Potions Master quickly descended the long, winding stairs of the Astronomy tower. With a masterful billowing of his robes that appeared even angrier than usual – if billowing could be described in the way of an emotion, which it obviously couldn't, but hadn't he chosen his robes for this exact reason, that they were an expression of everything his face would rarely show, or, when his face did scowl and frown and scathe, that his robes would support that expression, and why the hell couldn't he stop rambling on and on about his robes, after all they were only robes, though, one had to admit, quite expressive in their billowing, even angry, one might say, and if one chose to describe them as angry, then tonight surely that billowing appeared angrier than usual…

Oh fuck.

With a masterful billowing of his robes, Severus chose the shortest path to his private chambers that he knew, and Occluded heavily in an attempt to keep his mind as empty as possible. The concentration that this feat took from him almost made him run into Mrs Norris, her eyes two bright yellow spots in the darkness of the Castle, far too bright to be attractive, unlike that nice whiskey gold that could be found in –

Torn between the options of controlling where he went and controlling what he thought, Severus wanted to weigh his choices but found that weighing anything was impossible if one didn't want to think of how one would need two symmetrical scales, and how they were sometimes half-spherical, and speaking of symmetrical spheres, tonight he had seen the most symmetrical globes he could remember, and had weighed them in his hands, so soft and smooth and –

Allowing his mind to ramble, Severus forced as much concentration as he could muster on making his way to the dungeons as quickly as he could.

Once there, safely ensconced in the privacy of his chambers, he locked and warded the door, and sank into his small sofa. A wave of his hand had the flames in the fireplace jump to life, and it took only seconds for the warm glow to reach his skin, though none of its warmth appeared to seep into his bones.

Of course not, Severus snorted inwardly, then, remembering that he was in private, snorted outwardly for good measure. Why should I be able to enjoy something as simple as a fucking fire?

Shaking his head as if he could shake off the misery that was slowly grabbing onto him with every randomly rambled thought of his mind – and thinking of it, when had Severus Snape ever needed to physically shake his head to clear his mind, because wouldn't that tip either of his masters off to the fact that he felt the need to clear his mind in the first place, and what would he need to clear his mind of anyway if not to Occlude, and if he Occluded, what was he hiding and why, because…

Obviously, shaking his head had not helped.

Deciding to force his mind's focus onto more important things, he thought back to where his and the girl's paths had met this Thursday – or rather, that Thursday, as it was well past midnight.

During their Potions class, he had ignored her as much as possible, which was easy, considering there were twenty other juvenile students from warring Houses that tried to blow each other apart at every opportunity that he was careful to nip in the bud.

And wouldn't we just love to nip Miss Granger in the butt, his mind supplied, only to be shut off by a fierce growl that came from deep within the Potions Master's chest, although how exactly that sound came to be would remain a mystery, even to himself.

The girl, Severus had gratefully found, had followed his lead that lesson, drawing no more attention to herself than usually, and even less than that if his observation could be trusted, which was a moot point because it always could. (No Great Sorceress would free him of these ramblings, Severus realized, and decided to let his mind run freely as there was currently no way to reign it in, apparently.) After the lesson, she had left without a word, as had all her little Housemates.

When she came to him – to her detention, he corrected, though why he still cared to correct his incorrigible mind (and rightly so, because why would he ever need to correct himself in the first place, seeing as he was always right?) he couldn't say – he had kept his silence for as long as possible, and she had stupidly – bravely, she would probably say, sheepish Gryffindor that she was, calling herself a lion but following their shepherd with the twinkling eyes to the slaughter that this war would be on Potter and his friends – reiterated her request to be tortured – taught, but wasn't it the same thing, particularly in this instance? – by him.

Merlin, had a single sentence ever taken that much energy out of him before?

And then she had bargained away an uncertain favour, setting boundaries he wouldn't have dared to cross in the first place – or would he? Alright, he probably would, under the right (or wrong, to lead to such extremes) circumstances – but leaving him so many liberties in his demand that he almost worried about how much it would be he would ask of her eventually.

Had he been wrong to agree to her request? Was an uncertain favour that she would attempt to provide him worth the countless hours of her company? And even if her company in and of itself was bearable, was it worth willingly entering into an agreement where he would hone the girl's endurance level of torture? Had he kept himself out of so many revels, so many missions that the Dark Lord had set simply to cause pain and destruction to those of 'lesser' blood, only to now cause the pain he had avoided to cause in the past to a slip of a girl, and his own student nonetheless?

He probably had. Been wrong to agree, that is. But even if he hadn't…

If he hadn't agreed to her request for his help, would that have kept him from laying a hand on her on top of the Astronomy tower tonight? And he wasn't even thinking of the magical imprints of his hand that he had peppered across her milky white skin. Would he have been able to keep his hands away from her arse, skin touching skin, drawing her to him until he was nestled in that perfect crevice between her perfect cheeks, perfectly surrounding him with the perfect heat of her perfect body?

If Hogwarts offered English classes, maybe he would have been able to spare a more extended vocabulary to the perfection that was the girl's behind, but considering the perfection of said behind, Severus sincerely doubted that.

Damning his lecherous mind, he reminded himself that this was not the point he tried to discern. No, the question was where his path had taken a wrong turn.

Would he have even left his quarters last night if he hadn't agreed to those private lessons? Yes, Severus thought, her request alone had thrown him off track, and even if she had retracted it, he would have been so fazed by the idea alone to leave the dungeons and take a walk through the Castle.

Would he have gone to the Astronomy tower if he hadn't spoken to the Fat Lady? Or if he had known it was the girl waiting for him up there? Yes on the first account, he realized. He had not calmed down enough by far at that point not to take the stairs up the highest tower and see for himself whether everything was quiet up there. Yes on the second account as well, he begrudgingly admitted, because he had been in a wild mood that night, and confrontation would have seemed more reasonable than avoidance, if any of his decisions that night could be described as reasonable.

That night, Severus scoffed. As if it had been ages ago, not mere hours, that he had discovered the girl on the tower platform and proceeded to punish her.

And what was it again – the reason he had elected to punish her in the first place? It wasn't any of her misdeeds, certainly. No, Severus had to admit, none of her actual wrongdoings had been the reason for that punishment. That didn't mean nothing had been wrong, though. No, the girl standing up there, looking as unsuspicious and unsuspecting as she was, her body painting the most delicious curve against the blackness of the cold night – all those had been wrong. So wrong indeed that he had felt the need to punish the wrongness of the whole situation, and since there was only one vessel to soak up all the pain he had to give, the girl had been the one to receive that punishment.

Try again, some way out of line thought in his mind popped up. And this time, try some honesty.

Alright, so it had made his blood rush in a wholly pleasant way to imagine himself causing her pain. Not real pain, mind you, and not to severely hurt her, but merely to teach her in the ways pain could be pleasurable.

Where that intention had come from, he could not say, and would not say even if he did know, which he did not. Severus merely knew that his body had reacted to her soft hands and unruly hair a few days ago, and at the images of her taut nipples and plumpness of her behind – both still carefully hid from the cold air and from his view at that point, he knew –, that reaction had resurfaced. Yes, he had acted on lust, throwing all caution and rationale to the wind, because the highest tower of the castle was obviously the best place in Hogwarts to throw anything and everything to the wind.

He had never taken pleasure from exacting pain before, however. Never had punishment appeared pleasant to him, although that was probably because he had always been on the receiving end of it. He had never caused pain to any of his students before, either, and had avoided causing pain to innocents as far as possible, as well.

He still could not discern what it was that had moved him to spank – spank! – the girl tonight. Her, the very picture of innocence and purity – though most pureblood supremacists (all of his so-called friends, one might say) would disagree with him on that account –; now somewhat tainted by his touch, he felt. Yes, he had reasoned with her that the deduction of House points or the assignment of detention would not leave a lasting impression upon her, but those had not been his real reasons, had they? Of course not. And worst of all, she probably knew that as well, thinking him a lecherous old man.

The truth was, however, that pleasure was hard to come by in either of his masters' service. Few of the Order members would even look at him in as much as a friendly way, and none of them would lower themselves to sleep with him. Not that he would want them to, either. There were few women there, after all. Those that had survived the first war had been old then already, now almost fourteen years in the past, and the rare new female members were – well – the one new female member he knew was a Black by blood, if not by name, and a child by behaviour, if not by age. No, none of them would do.

It wasn't much better among the Dark Lord's ranks, either. The one female Death Eater he knew was Bellatrix Lestrange, and that was all that needed to be said on that account. What other women were treated civilly in that closely-knit society were the wives of the male Death Eaters, and those were untouchable for obvious reasons. Any daughters were either too young, or already betrothed, or both. (Mostly both.)

Baring family members, any and all other women that were somehow unfortunate enough to make it into the presence of the Death Eaters alive – barely, on most occasions – were victims, to be used as one saw fit. Severus had never forced himself on a woman in his life. In fact, most of his comrades (he mentally shivered at the word) probably thought him asexual, which was all the same to him. He couldn't have anybody suspect that he avoided violence for any Light reasons.

Severus still wasn't any closer to discovering why he had felt the need to spank the girl. It had taken all of his willpower not to spank her physically, using his very own hand, though no willpower of his could keep him from shaping the magic that hit her beautiful behind after his hand, rather than just place obscure slaps on her arse. It had surprised him what large amounts of pleasure he could derive from seeing his imprints on her soft globes, the pattern of red fingers and palms on the white canvas of her skin.

He had not intended to touch them, he truly hadn't. But he had come close enough to heal her, and if he needed to heal her, then why not use a hands-on approach that was said to be far more effective than some wand-waving from miles away, and a few inches could make a very significant difference, on that point many experts agreed, and healing magic travelled faster and more efficiently and effectively if there were no barriers, not even air, between recipient and donor, and –

Merlin's blue balls, his mind really needed to get a grip on itself. But then again, Severus thought, the paths his mind had taken in those minutes alone with the girl on top of the Astronomy tower were more obscure than anything his usual rationale could come up with, and he was trying to follow those paths, so it was alright for them to be completely confusing – wasn't it?

No, it wasn't, Severus knew. It wasn't alright for his mind to lose its rationale. He counted on the clarity of his mind, most precious of his assets, and for it to abandon him in his time of need, and for need to overpower the clarity of his mind – it was unspeakable. Yes, he realized, it was his own uncontrolled lust and the subsequent failure of his mind that had led him down that path, across the finely drawn line that should always separate teacher and student, and had allowed him, prompted him even, to spank the girl.

Spank her.

Her.

The girl.

The girl.

Sweet bloody Morgana, what had he done?

And what had she done? Severus had been so elated to see those goose bumps appear on the otherwise so smooth skin of her behind, so certain had he been that they were from anticipative excitement. Had he been wrong? Had she not looked forward to their spanking – and theirs it had been, for it would have been a completely different affair had either of them not been the one they were – but had feared it? Had those goose bumps on her innocent flesh not been from the heat he interpreted she must have felt at the thought of being spanked by him, but from the cold of the night and the threat of his body punishing hers?

Holy Circe, Severus thought, had he assaulted her?

Frantically thinking back to their encounter, Severus fought to scan their interaction as thoroughly as humanly possible, searching for any word he might have missed, telling him to shove off; any sign he might not have noticed, begging him to stop.

He found none.

But would he have stopped? Or would he have carried on under the pretence of their lessons that had yet to come, not caring for her wish to let her go?

Severus did not know.

However, she had not asked him to stop, as far as he could tell, so it really was a moot point – wasn't it? But why hadn't she asked him to stop in the first place?

That question left only very few possible conclusions.

One – she had been too shocked to defend herself.

Two – he had been too caught up in his actions (your lust, his mind readily supplied) to notice.

Three – and this was the conclusion he would settle on until proven wrong, simply because it was the most gracious and, if one might say so, pleasurable conclusion of the three – she had indeed enjoyed his attentions very much. His spanking.

He had spanked her.

Spanked her.

Her.

The girl.

The girl.

Sweet bloody Morgana, what had he done?

Well, Severus thought, it did little good to ponder on what he had already done now. It was, after all, very much too late to change any of that. What was left to do now was to decide how to treat the girl from here onwards.

His options were few.

One – he could apologize. Severus almost had the urge to laugh at that thought, but remembered in time that he never laughed (just like he never apologized), and didn't (just like he wouldn't).

Two – he could act as if their meeting on top of the Astronomy tower had never happened. That would work well for him, he supposed, but what if the girl decided to confront him about it? It would be hard to play it off as a figment of her imagination, much as he might desire to do so. No, there had to be another way, leaving him with option…

Three – treat it all as a joke, and make her the victim of it all. It was, after all, what he did best in all matters Gryffindor. Also, it was what she had come to know from his behaviour with her Housemates, and she would thus be prepared for it. After all, wasn't it her struggling to keep Potter back when Severus riled him up enough to explode? And wasn't it her comforting Longbottom when he was close to fainting from the Potions Master's scathing remarks? Surely she would be able to cope with this far better than her dunderheaded Housemates.

And with this conviction firmly in his now far more calmed down mind, Severus made his way to his office and sat down to grade the rest of the Ravenclaw essays. The one that had prompted him to leave his chambers earlier that night received a firm T.

Apparently, riling the girl up was even easier than rilling up Potter.

As he had promised the girl earlier – well, not exactly promised, as he never promised anything, but he had certainly informed her – he had sent her a list of her reading assignments for the weekend, lest she read halfway through the library, or even – Merlin forbid! – ask Madam Pince for guidance on the subject. True to his decision much earlier that morning, he had included a snarky quip about their meeting.

Apparently, it had been too snarky for the girl.

The enraged look she shot him across the Great Hall almost made him smirk, which she seemed to have caught, he noticed with both unexpected pride and surprised worry. Was it only the girl who was so perceptive, or should he take more care to school his expressions into unreadability? And why did he treat those two options as exclusives?

He had little time to ponder that thought, however, as the dunderheads the girl perceived as her friends grew restless. Weasley seemed to be worried mostly about Potter, though, and rightly so, as Potter was close to jumping up from his seat and shouting at the girl.

Close?

Well, that escalated quickly, Severus thought, as the Potter boy did exactly that.

"JUST ANSWER MY BLOODY QUESTION, HERMIONE," Potter could easily be heard shouting through the Great Hall. Every student's head turned, and most of Severus's colleagues elected to bestow their attention on Potter as well. Severus himself, however, chose that moment to stand from his seat and sweep down the aisle between the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables, hoping to silence Potter with his mere presence alone.

Apparently, the Potter boy was too caught up in his own drama to even see the Potions Master billowing his way to their spot.

And, obviously, Severus was too late to keep the girl from shouting her distress all over the Great Hall.

"I'M IN DETENTION WITH PROFESSOR SNAPE, ALRIGHT?"

Well, Severus thought dryly as the students body (and quite a few teachers, if he was right, which he always was) erupted in a collective gasp, at least even in anger she remembers to be respectful towards her teachers.

The thought struck him as odd. It took him a moment to discern why exactly that was, though. Then he remembered.

He had called her a liar for supposedly wanting to treat him with all the respect he was due, to her opinion.

Had he been wrong? Had she indeed merely attempted to be polite – Severus refused to even think the word 'nice' – to him? To make up for her many shortcomings in providing him her all due respect?

Unwilling to think on even the possibility of him being wrong, Severus lengthened his strides once more and was with the bickering students in time to hear Potter incredulously ask, "Whatever did he give you detention for?"

"Insolence, Potter," Severus drawled in response. "Impudence. Impertinence."

It gave him no small amount of pleasure to watch the girl turn around and have her face fall at the sight of him. It was, however, a far smaller amount of pleasure than it usually was.

And when exactly had that changed?

Making up for his short lag, he pressed on, "Take your pick, Potter, I'm sure you are well acquainted with all of them, as your and Miss Granger's display here clearly demonstrates."

The girl's whole posture sagged even more, starting with her shoulders and not stopping at her plummeting mood. Potter behind her, however, bristled with barely contained rage.

Not giving Potter a chance to explode, Severus continued to mock the girl's attitude towards her detentions. It seemed that it was easier to get her angry in private, however. While in public, she would fall in on herself, unwilling to submit to even more public humiliation by drawing more attention on herself in a tantrum. Severus stored that knowledge away for future reference, not taking the time to think on occasions when it might be desirable to set her passionate anger on fire when it was just the two of them.

Instead, he offered more detention.

"…prolong your detention, to be served with Mr Filch, as I have little desire to punish myself with more time in your presence than absolutely necessary. Would that be to your liking?"

His mention of the word 'punish' seemed to strike a spark, though none bright enough to light her fire. Her eyes shot upwards to meet his, him falling into her whiskey gold while she was close to drowning in his black pools. Her fear of drowning was not strong enough to win out over her memories of last night, however, as it seemed. Her hand inched towards her backside, now unfortunately hidden from his sight as she had turned around to face him.

Her hand had not really moved much – enough for him to see, of course, but no one else had noticed, he was certain – when she snapped out of her thoughts and abandoned the movement. Severus longed to continue on the path her hand had almost gone on, and place his own hand to rub over the skin that had mere hours earlier felt his slaps. When her eyes mirrored a flicker that must have been his, he almost started.

She shook her head, as if in answer to his wish to touch her once more. When she spoke, Severus realized his error in that perception.

"No, sir," she replied in little more than a whisper. As if in an afterthought, she added, "Thank you."

Severus sneered. Why did the girl insist to thank him whenever he sought to denigrate her? Did her sheepishness know no limits? Did she not realize that he was not a nice man, to be thanked regularly and, as it seemed, sincerely?

He stepped closer to the girl, towering over her insignificant height. Her eyes swiftly met the floor as she seemed to remember his advice to avoid eye contact. Severus felt the sudden urge to lift her against a wall and keep her there. Luckily, the Gryffindor table was in the middle of the Great Hall, and even if it hadn't been, the mere fact that there were onlookers around, not to mention their sheer number, would have kept him from doing so.

Only the onlookers? Severus questioned himself. Would it not have mattered what she wished in this instance?

It was of little matter what she would have wished, Severus decided. There was no reason for him to pin the girl to a wall, preferably at a height where her thighs could support her own weight by wrapping around his hips, and her lips – no, eyes! – on a level with his.

No reason at all.

"Fifteen point from Gryffindor for shouting in the Great Hall, for both of you," Severus snarled, snapping out of that treacherous thought. "And now I suggest you two sit down again – unless, of course, the hard wood is too uncomfortable? I would not wish to cause any imprints on the soft skin of schoolchildren."

And with that last quip, he saw her turn away from him, hiding her face from him once more but in the same movement exposing her behind to his perusal. Anxious to leave her company, if only to feel a little more like himself again, Severus swept from the Great Hall, his robes billowing behind him with less anger than they had shown that night.

He made his way down to the dungeons. He had an hour left before he would need to sit through his first class of the day, fourth year Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs. They would get their essays back, but he had finished that marking before breakfast already. No, this hour would be spent for something else.

He had a private tutelage to plan.

A/N: I know, I know, Author's Notes can get really annoying, but bear with me here, please. I just wanted to say that even though Severus promised to teach Hermione in enduring pain, that is not what the Astronomy Tower Incident (thanks to McGonagal'sCat here once again, for dubbing chapter five that) was about. That was about mutual pleasure, even though Severus didn't see it as such at first.

Now, please keep in mind that Hermione admitted to herself that she enjoyed the Astronomy Tower Incident (can't get enough of saying that now, sorry-not-sorry). And Severus may not have paid attention to her possibly telling him to stop, but I fancy thinking that he would have stopped, had she asked him to. However, even though chapter five may have been about mutual pleasure (and that's in no way perverse, as long as both participants understand it and enjoy it), remember that this story will go down darker paths in time. I will not post individual warnings of possibly upsetting scenes at the beginnings of such chapters, so let this be your warning - there may be dub-con and non-con content ahead!

Coming up: Chapter eight, wherein hidden meanings are deciphered.