A/N: Hi folks, don't worry, no grand preamble today. ;) I just wanted to thank you for the beautiful reviews to last week's chapter, I appreciate each and every one of them. They make me happy.

Unfortunately, my muse still isn't back to her usual form, so next week's chapter is a little uncertain right now. I mean, I know what needs to happen, but things are just - well. I sadly can't promise you an update for next Monday, so please bear with me if I need a fortnight to actually write that piece. I'm sorry for that.

Have fun reading this short little chapter, and let me know what you think! Your kind words have helped my muse in the past, so perhaps they will help in giving her a boost this time around as well? One can only hope. :)

Marcella xxx

Saturday, February 7th, 1996

Dinner had been cut short for Hermione when she had made to leave for her detention. When the boys had questioned her about her early departure, she had been forced to remind them of the very publically announced night of detention for her. She had also used the opportunity to explain to Harry and Ron that they should not wait up for her as she expected this particular detention to be an all-nighter. She did not want the boys lingering in the common room only to find her sneaking back early the next morning.

They had been upset – with Professor Snape, this time, not with her – about her need to attend a detention for that long, but had reluctantly agreed that there was nothing to be done about that. With Umbridge roaming the castle, a simple case of unfair detention was nothing to trouble the headmaster with, and Hermione was glad that the boys agreed with her on that.

And so it came that, at precisely half past six, Hermione knocked three times against the heavy wood of Professor Snape's office door.

"Let me see your wounds," he demanded without preamble after he had magically closed the door behind her and warded it to his usual standards.

Slowly unbuttoning her blouse from the bottom upwards, Hermione left a few buttons closed between her breasts and only parted the fabric enough to reveal her stomach. The professor appeared so satisfied that Hermione couldn't help but follow his gaze.

Up until now, she had studiously avoided looking at the cuts. Awareness brought with it more pain, and so she had attempted to ignore her wounds to the best of her abilities. That had not helped with the hurt in her every step, in her every breath, but it had stemmed the pain a little during the times in which she simply lay in her bed, Occluding.

Startlingly enough, the picture that the professor had 'painted' was beautiful. She had not known that he possessed such skill, although with how meticulous he was in everything else, it really should not have surprised her to find that he was an adept painter, as well, if he put his mind to it.

Over her stomach spanned a delicate and detailed picture of lavender plants.

The cuts were so miniscule that they hardly showed, and most of the picture was made up of the different shades of red that her inflamed skin had turned to. The colour was all off for a sketch of lavender, of course, but somehow it fit.

The professor, it would turn out, disagreed.

"Beautiful," he assessed his own work, for Hermione did not think he would dream of bestowing a compliment upon the flat expanse of her stomach, "but the colour isn't right. The pale lavender is doing nothing for your lack of tan, Miss Granger."

They were both aware that her skin right now was nowhere near pale, nor was the sketch anywhere near a purple colour, much less that fine distinction that was so memorably lavender, but it mattered little. If the professor said that lavender was not for her, then it wasn't.

"I will need to find something more fitting to your tone of skin. Perhaps the Crimson Centella calcaria would be better suited. I believe you are familiar with that particular plant."

Familiar, oh yes. After all, Hermione had spent one and a half hours copying the chapter on that particular plant from 'Asiatic Anti-Venoms', thus cutting the words into her upper leg.

She didn't even bother to respond to that.

"Come, Miss Granger," the professor eventually said when it became clear that the matter of colour would not get a conversation out of her.

Together they went into his private quarters, stopping in the sitting room as they had before, while the professor further warded the entrance to and from his office.

"Why don't you undress so that I may heal you," he suggested, turning back to her.

Hermione scrambled to hide her surprise at the tender offer, and at the manner in which he had uttered the sentence. It astounded her how unusually free of hostility that sentence was. Where before she had been mainly passive tonight, that small sign of kindness stirred her into action.

Under the professor's smouldering gaze, Hermione undressed. At first it was only her blouse that fell away from her shoulders, dropping unceremoniously to the ground. Her bra soon followed, as the professor made no sign for her to stop, and the wounds did reach up high on her front.

Still, no command to stop undressing was issued, and so Hermione continued to let items of clothing fall from her body. Her skirt was next, followed by her knickers, a stormy-bluish shade of grey tonight. Only when she had stepped out of her shoes, did the professor think to halt her.

"Stop," he demanded, his voice barely above a whisper, when Hermione made to dislodge the stockings from her legs.

Hermione was strongly reminded of another time when he had requested that her stockings remain on, that one time, that first time, that now seemed such a long time ago.

Acquiescing to his request, she stilled.

"Since you were so relaxed about combining pain with pleasure last Thursday," he began, "I thought that we might combine pleasure with pleasure tonight."

Hermione was thoroughly confused. Combine pleasure with pleasure?

"It will not do for me to get aroused with Lord Malfoy present, as he would expect that I relieve that arousal with you, in front of him. I have already proven to him that I am not beyond taking you under his eyes, but I would rather avoid that as much as possible. Of course, it won't always be doable, and rather more often than not will you need to make yourself available to me with Lord Malfoy in the room, but for tonight, I am counting on a different outcome. Is that agreeable to you?"

Hermione hastened to agree, vigorously nodding her head when words were not quick enough to come to mind, so surprised was she by this turn in conversation.

"As it is, it might be better to wear myself out as much as possible before he arrives. And that is where double the pleasure comes into play."

Walking over to his desk, the professor casually opened his slacks that Hermione now found to be failing at hiding the hard bulge that had formed behind the fabric. As he sat down in the high-backed chair, his finger crooking was all the demand Hermione needed to follow him.

With his help, she climbed onto his lap, straddling him. The professor gave her a hand in raising herself up far enough for him to slide into her tight channel. Sinking down onto his hard length, Hermione's moan drowned out the quiet sigh that escaped from the Potions Master's lips.

"Now lean back and brace yourself against my desk, Miss Granger," the professor commanded before Hermione could so much as think to begin moving on him. "I need your stomach as straight as possible if I am to heal it."

And finally things clicked into place for Hermione. He was giving her the pleasure of healing the multitude of wounds on her sore stomach, and she returned the pleasure by riding him. Well, grateful as she was for his expertise and especially his approval in healing her, who was she to deny him his own pleasure?

A content smile on her face that only hinted at the satisfaction that was to come for both of them, Hermione raised her hips and started to move.

After Severus had come with a slight shudder, and the girl with a wail that her lips, shutting closed in surprise at the sound coming out of her own mouth, could barely cut off, they remained seated where they were. Her stomach had long been healed, but Severus had had little desire to cut off her pleasurable venture into despoiling his desk chair.

Watching the girl come down from her high, as her eyes slowly opened after having been closed in her languor, helped remind Severus why exactly he had originally ordered her here.

"May I –"

The girl hesitated. He both hated and looked forward to her hesitation. Either something extremely insulting might come out of her mouth, or some very inappropriate request that he would be only too glad to grant her.

"May I clean you, sir?" she eventually dared ask. "With my mouth, I mean?"

Fortunately, it was the latter option of the two tonight.

"If you must," Severus drawled, but the embarrassed kind of excitement in the girl's eyes made him wonder if she hadn't noticed his joy at the question.

She was both hesitant and gentle, and the innocent air with which she took to licking his cock clean of their combined juices held an entrancing allure. The act endeared the girl to him in the way of already wanting to fuck her again.

"What if I cannot satisfy the Lord Governor this way?"

If he hadn't watched her mouth so very ardently, Severus might have missed that the girl had even spoken. Noticing the movement of her lips that had nothing to do with the kisses she was bestowing upon his quickly hardening manhood, he realized that perhaps words had come out of her mouth, and he tried his damnedest to remember what she might have said. Luckily, his mind was trained to splitting its focus many-a-ways, and had saved up her question, repeating it now so that Severus might become fully aware of its meaning.

"The Gryffindor princess, Miss Know-It-All herself, doubting her ability in something?" Severus scoffed. "Please, Miss Granger, do get a grip on yourself. With the proper instruction, anything should be possible for you, certainly?"

He made it a question, as if this statement was something the girl would say of herself, not as if he himself had the fullest confidence in her learning and adapting skills.

"I am afraid of the Lord Governor's way of instructing me, sir," she quietly confessed, her voice smaller than he had ever heard her.

Reaching down to cup her face in a way that never failed to remind him of that first, almost innocuous blowjob she had given him these days, Severus replied, "Who said anything about the Lord Governor being the one to teach you?"

And so his instructions began to rain down on the girl. At times, she seemed to struggle a little in following his commands, but all in all she did very well. Apply more pressure with your tongue underneath the head, Miss Granger; lick the underside more liberally, Miss Granger; lightly, very lightly use your teeth to graze along the length, Miss Granger; Miss Granger, don't forget to maintain constant suction; and – his personal favourite – suck my balls, Miss Granger.

She was more adept at swallowing his ejaculate this time and did not end up with his come all over her face. Some of it dribbled down her chin, as she had been a little slow to swallow, but she casually used her fingers to scoop it up and into her mouth, licking the digits clean after she was done. Severus had to look away for a moment, for he did not trust his face to remain impassive at her actions.

"This is all and well," the girl spoke again, still kneeling between his legs, as if the last few minutes in which she had vigorously blown his cock had not happened, and as if she had not just cleaned her own face of his come after swallowing the lot, "but what if the Lord Governor won't be satisfied by my mouth, no matter what I do?"

"Lord Malfoy will not have you in that way, Miss Granger," Severus dismissed the fears he himself carried as well, although he would never admit that to the girl. "His fear of accidentally impregnating you is far too great."

"But he knows that you are a great Potions Master, sir," she insisted. "What if he demands the same means of contraceptive that you yourself are using?"

Severus was unsure for a moment. Was the girl merely carrying on the lie he himself had spun for Lucius, not falling out of character even when it was just the two of them? Or had she actually believed him when he had implied that he was using some form of contraceptive in order to avoid getting her with child?

He hoped that the latter option was the case, for that would work in his favour. If the girl was convinced that Severus was taking on the task of preventing her falling pregnant, she would not think the need to resort to measures of contraception herself.

"Lord Malfoy will not have you."

Hermione was somewhat touched by the possessiveness in the professor's voice as he impressed his desire never to allow the Lord Governor to take her. It also added to the relief that had coursed through her at the fact that Professor Snape did not contradict her assumption that he was utilizing some method of contraception. She was glad to be doubly protected if both of them were seeing to this issue, and she was glad not to have been wrong in her action of asking for the long-time-working dose of the Contraceptive Potion.

No matter how relieved she was with the issue of an unwanted pregnancy being settled, or how moved by the professor's possessiveness towards her, she could not quite shake the fear of Lord Malfoy owning her in another way. In a way Lavender and Parvati had talked about in hushed whispers that she now wished she had never overheard.

"What if," she asked, her voice carrying her fear quite audibly, "what if the Lord Governor demands to have me in a way that even you have not had me yet?"

To say that he was shocked that the girl would bring up such advanced sexual procedures, would have been a gross understatement. Of course, her question was, unfortunately, a very valid one, and Severus counted himself lucky that at least he had not had to be the one to bring it up.

"That might indeed happen," he agreed quietly.

He watched as the girl visibly braced herself.

"And what then?" she asked. "Does an untouched orifice count as innocence, even if it is not protected by a barrier? Is it possible for the Lord Governor to gain power from that? Over me?"

"Only a very small amount of power," Severus answered, "and only if he were to draw blood on his entrance."

The girl swallowed thickly, that much he could see.

"Can we be sure that the Lord Governor will not seek to exploit that power?" she asked further. "Especially if he might have noticed how you protected me from him last weekend?"

"It was not protection that he saw," Severus corrected her, "it was possessiveness, a very Slytherin trait. I do not share my toys, nor does Lord Malfoy share his, much as he likes stealing and occasionally breaking the toys of his comrades."

Perhaps talking about how much Lucius enjoyed breaking his playthings had not been the best course of action, Severus had to admit to himself, as the girl's eyes filled with salty water that she somehow managed not to spill.

"The fact that you do not share, combined with the fact that I must be what he would probably label a worthless toy," the girl carried on as if Severus had not been talking about the man who was coming tonight to use her mouth for his own pleasure, and about that man's proclivity to damage the women he used, "might that not be all the more incentive for him to b-break me?"

He had to give it to the girl, if only inwardly, of course; she was brave. Stupidly so, as every Gryffindor was stupid in their bravery, but still, she was braver than most of the lot.

"I agree, Miss Granger," Severus said. "I suggest using a strengthening spell on your skin. He can only gain power from your innocence if the blood he draws comes from a naturally caused wound, without blades or magic involved. The penetration will hurt more when the skin involved is magically strengthened, being less flexible and diminishing its ability to stretch that way, but if I cast it strong enough, there is no possibility that any of your blood might be drawn. You would be safe."

He did not need to add that the girl's safety would lie in the aspect of Lucius not gaining any power from her innocence only, and that she would still be subject to the pain he would doubtlessly inflict upon her. Severus could simply take the girl that way first, of course, but there was not enough time. He did not wish to hurt her, and preparation would take too long. Besides, he was almost certain that the matter was too delicate for the girl not to give away her lack of experience in that aspect. Inexperience with her mouth, she might be able to fake, and convincingly so, but her bum was a wholly different matter altogether.

"I agree."

The girl's breath brushed against Severus's manhood that had somehow, miraculously, managed to rise itself from its post-orgasmic languor. How it was possible for his cock to be ready for more action after having spent itself twice in quick succession already, Severus did not know, but he was glad that it was happening now and not later, with Lucius present. He knew that it was far more pleasant for him to get hard from the sight of the girl kneeling between his own legs, rather than watching her kneel between Lucius's.

"Shall we adjourn to the sofa, Miss Granger?" he asked, but did not wait for her to reply. Grasping her offered hand in his much stronger one, he pulled her up and with him towards the couch. The girl was intent on making her way to the seating, but Severus was having none of that. Instead, he directed her to sit on the backrest, her front to him, her legs hanging over the back, and bent her backwards. The girl appeared uncomfortable with how close her shoulders came to resting on the seating, and with how high in the air her bum was. Her back was bent at an angle that must be awfully uncomfortable, as well, as she raised her legs into the air. Severus caught them before she could slide fully onto the seating.

"Have I told you yet, Miss Granger," Severus spoke, "that we will soon begin to introduce pain into this part of your teaching?"

The girl's eyes widened, almost comically so, and he continued to explain.

"We will start first by exploring how pain may perhaps even be a little pleasurable. But you've been aware of that fact for a few months now, haven't you, Miss Granger?"

Thinking back five months, they both knew he was talking about that interesting incident atop the Astronomy tower. To remember now how he had fretted about having spanked the girl, and magically at that, Severus wanted to laugh at himself in retrospect. Little had he known at the time that only a few months later, he would be taking the girl's virginity, thus beginning a highly inappropriate, definitely forbidden, and surprisingly satisfying liaison with the girl. His cock twitched thinking just how satisfying exactly these past few weeks with her had been, especially since Saturday last.

He was inside her before she could give any kind of witty retort.

"I will not set a limit today, Miss Granger," Severus said as he slowly pushed further into her tight core, until he bottomed out. "But I want you to count anyway. Count for me, Miss Granger," he hissed, beginning that beautiful rhythm that seemed so natural when she was the one he was sharing it with.

His hand made impact with the girl's full right cheek.

She gasped.

"One."