"I do not care what you do, so long as you are quiet while you do it!" Severus snaps at the girl, perhaps a bit too harshly. She scampers off to the other side of the room and begins chopping ingredients on the small dining table in front of the tightly closed curtains.
She was growing bored, rightfully so. She had been stuck in his living quarters at Hogwarts for the better part of two months. The plan had been to have her stay there, only until she had healed and gained a bit of weight, and then return her to Spinner's End, but then Albus was fired by the Ministry, making Umbridge the new headmistress at Hogwarts, and it was far too risky to move her. The two were getting on one another's nerves. Severus, unused to living with another person full time, her unused to hiding out in a professor's bedroom every moment of her life, both of them unused to married life. Admittedly, he had been speeding less time in the room due to this, which pushed her further into isolation.
Severus tried to make her as comfortable as possible. As soon as her weight reached what it had been prior to her imprisonment, Severus went alone to Diagon Alley one Saturday morning and purchased an entire wardrobe and new wand for her. He purchased things he had seen her wear before, corduroy jumper dresses, striped jumpers in every color imaginable, turtlenecks, stockings, flowing dresses. He bought her undergarments, nightgowns, personal hygiene products, and even a small brewing kit to keep her occupied during the day and had his grandmother's gold wedding band sized down to fit her. He could not bring himself to give the ring to her, yet. The girl was appreciative, but he couldn't help but notice the way her face fell when the realization that she would continue being trapped in this room dawned on her. She had gone from one prison to another, and for this, Severus held deep regrets.
Dolores Umbridge's tyrannical reign has only worsened with the absence of Albus. When he wasn't teaching a highly scrutinized lesson, he was escorting yet another mass group of students into the Dining Hall for the make-shift detention area. Only Umbridge was allowed to be present during these detentions, but he knew what was going on in there by the amounts of students sporting deep gouges on the backs of their hands the next day in class. Severus did what he could to deter her by providing vials of water under the guise of Veritaserum, but there was no stopping her. Thankfully, he no longer was forced to teach Occlumency to Potter, not after the little brat breached his privacy by looking in to the Pensive in his office.
Severus leans back in his chair before the fire and brings the lit cigarette to his lips. While not outright complaining about his smoking, the girl did wrinkle her nose and move to the far end of the room each time he lit a cigarette. It was a nasty habit, but the only thing keeping his nerves in check these days. He watches as the girl chops mandrake root, lavender, and lemon and stews them in honey in the lit cauldron before her. She is making Cough Potions for him to bring to Madam Pomfrey to treat students suffering from springtime allergies.
"Did you always want to be a professor?" She finally asks him, turning her head in his direction as he takes one final drag from his cigarette, he inhales deeply and holds the smoke in his lungs.
"No." He states plainly, his voice husky from the smoke held in his lungs, he allows the smoke to slowly escape from his parted lips as he stubs the cigarette out in the ashtray perched on the arm of the chair.
"Why do you do it, then?" Her hair is tied up in a loose bun, soft curls escape at random and frame her face. Severus watches as she blows at a strand dangling in front of her mouth, sending it waving above her head before softly floating back down again.
"Because, despite what many of your fellow classmates would like to believe, I am good at it." The girl turns and grins at him, the smile reaching her eyes for the first time in months.
"How did you become so good at potions?" Severus watches the slow turn of her elbow from behind, she only has a few more moments left to stir, then she will bottle the contents, and with any luck, she will smirk as she holds the bottles to the light.
"You speak entirely too much."
"Who else am I supposed to talk to?" She shrugs her shoulders and turns her head to grin at him once more.
Severus sits in silence for several seconds before finally taking a deep breath and closing his eyes. He leans his head on the back of the chair as he kicks off his shoes and warms his feet in front of the roaring fire. It has been a long day, and an even longer week. He is thankful that it is the first day of Easter holiday, and he won't have to teach for another two weeks, but several students remain in the castle despite Umbridge's presence, and he is dreading having to pry himself from this chair in a few short hours to begin his midnight patrol. He had hoped to catch a short nap, but it proved to be impossible with her in the room. Severus is exhausted.
"My mother taught me." Severus finally answers, he opens one eye and catches her eyeing him over her shoulder with one brow raised.
"Your mother is a witch?"
"No, she was a Muggle who happened to know how to brew potions."
"You could have just said yes."
Severus watches closely as she fills each vial to the brim, secures the top with a cork, and holds it up to the lights to check her work. One vial, two, no smirk. Five, six, seven, still no smirk. Finally, on the eleventh vial, he watches as the corner of her mouth twitches ever so slightly before turning up. He closes his eyes again, thankful for the smallest bit of progress.
She was not herself, and he doubted she would ever be again. She was a storm far out in the sea, strong and violet, but oh, so beautiful. He was impressed by her strength and resilience, weary of it as well. When he told her that she could not go to St. Mungo's as she had planned, he had to take her wand from her. She hadn't threatened him, nor herself, but the rage that flashed across her face screamed for him to be cautious, to tread very carefully. He could subdue her in an instant, if need be, she couldn't even preform non-verbal magic, but he did not want to have to do that.
Severus heaves himself from the chair with a groan and makes his way to the desk opposite the girl and pours himself a large mug of black coffee from the silver decanter he now kept in the room.
"Will you make me one, too? I'm almost finished labeling these vials."
"It is too late for you to have caffeine." He states dryly, but begins stirring the sugar into her mug.
While he had always taken his coffee black, she preferred hers with two sugars, a touch of vanilla, and as white and creamy as the skin on her neck. The two meet in front of the fireplace, and he passes her mug before they both settle into their preferred chairs.
"Thank you." She wraps her hands around the steaming mug and inhales deeply. "I like the way you make it."
"I make it the same as you make it." Severus takes a deep gulp from his cup, burning the tip of his tongue in the process, and leans his head once more on the back of the chair.
"Is your father a wizard?"
"Why must you talk so much?" Severus sighs and opens his eyes to see her staring at him, a mischievous look on her face. "No. He was a Muggle."
"So, you are a half-blood, too?"
"Tell me, how long did it take for you to work out the definition of a half-blood?"
"I thought Slytherin's were meant to be pure blood?"
"While I was led to believe Ravenclaw's were meant to be intelligent. Yet, here we are." Severus gestures towards her with his mug and smirks, to his surprise, she smirks back at him.
"You aren't nearly as frightening as you used to be. I think you are beginning to lose your edge." She grins at him over the rim of her mug before taking a sip.
"You are much more aggravating than you used to be."
"It's different out there, isn't it?" She nudges her chin towards the door, whether she was referring to Hogwarts, or the world as a whole, Severus did not know.
"Yes." He whispers, wishing he could lie to her.
She takes another sip of her coffee and tucks her legs beneath her in the chair. Severus extends his hand across the distance of the chairs and allows her to take it. This had become their evening ritual, holding hands before the fire while sipping tea, or in tonight's case, coffee. He knew she would wait for him to come in from his midnight patrol, as she did every Friday night, and fall asleep next to him in the bed. Severus had suggested he have two twin sized beds moved into the room, but for whatever reason, she refused. She starts out on her own side of the bed each night, but he wakes every morning in a tangle of her hair and limbs, her warm body curled against his own. Each morning, he wraps his arm around her waist, kisses the top of her head, and pries himself from the bed to begin his day, all while she remains snoring. She wakes sometime between his morning shave and shower; eyes and lips swollen and pink from sleep, hair a wild nest of knots and soft waves. To Severus, the moments after she first wakes are when she is the most beautiful.
The two of them still had not consummated their marriage, and The Dark Lord's patience with the matter was growing thin. Severus had made his excuses, and for a while, they worked. Now, however, He was beginning to doubt Severus. The Dark Lord issued him a final ultimatum; admit that she was too weak to be his wife and hand her over, or finally go through with it.
Severus had begun reading up on the subject in private whenever he could. The fact of the matter was, he was a virgin. He knew, of course, how it worked, he was not naive, he needed to know how to best pleasure her. The thought of actually preforming many of the acts he read about made his face heat with embarrassment, and he crossed them off of the list. This would only happen once; he did not need the theatrics involved with many of the positions he saw. Between classes he brewed a contraceptive potion and stashed it in his sock drawer; he would not risk any chance of children in this marriage. The mere thought of taking her in that intimate way made him feel guilty. He was nearly twenty years her senior, she was barely an adult. Only nine months ago she was his student for god's sake! He knew she was not a virgin, Amycus Carrow made it a point to mention it every time they saw one another. He was furious at Severus for taking what he believed to be his own. Still though, it had to be done, and before the end of Easter break.
It is 3:34 when Severus finally enters the door to find his wife wide awake, a book resting on her knee in the same chair he had left her in hours before. She was freshly bathed, her hair still damp, and wearing the emerald green silk nightgown he had purchased for her; the color vibrant and striking against her pale complexion and intensifying the red color of her hair. She smiles up at him warmly as he makes his way to the bathroom to change into his own night shirt and brush his teeth. His eyes burn with exhaustion, his feet and back ache from standing all day, reminding him that he is no longer a young man. After changing, he finds that she has beaten him to bed, and is snuggled beneath the blanket facing his side of the bed. She had lit the candelabra on his side of the bed but had extinguished the rest of the candles in the room and smoldered the fire. Severus pulls the blanket back and climbs in, sighing deeply when the pressure releases from his lower back as he relaxes before extinguishing his candelabra, plummeting them into near total darkness. The only light was the soft, green glow emanating from beneath the closed curtains on her side of the bed.
"Many troublemakers tonight?" She whispers in the dark, he turns his head towards her, his eyes not yet adjusted to the dark.
"It was quiet." He whispers back to her, barely making out the outline of her face in the darkness.
"Good. Goodnight, Severus." She whispers before turning over to face the opposite direction.
Severus lies awake, arms tucked beneath his head, staring up into the darkness, too exhausted to sleep. The girl, however, had no issue falling asleep and has now backed herself up completely against his body, snoring slightly. Suddenly she rolls over and presses her front tight against him and slings one arm across his chest. He takes his arms from beneath his head and wraps them around her. He is asleep before he knows it.
Slowly, Severus opens his eyes. His body is melted into the mattress, his brain blurry with sleep. Before him, the girl sleeps on, her head tilted ever so slightly up to him, mouth slightly open. His arm heavy and throbbing from being stuck beneath her head. He slides it carefully from beneath her, rolls on to his side to face her, and pulls her in to his chest. She smells of coconut and the acidic sting of morning breath, but he does not mind. He kisses her forehead and rests his chin on top of her head.
"Good morning." She murmurs, causing him to jerk slightly.
She wraps her arms tightly around his waist, not allowing him to pull away from her. Finally, he relaxes and melts back into her body. Her body is warm and soft, and he feels himself begin to harden involuntarily. He attempts to quell it, to breathe deeply and relax his mind, to no use. Finally, he angles his lower half away from her, desperate for her not to notice. She instead takes this as an opportunity to gain even more space and warmth in the bed, and scoots further into him.
"How did you sleep?" She whispers again, her voice heavy with sleep as she yawns deeply.
"Go back to sleep." He urges, desperate to get himself under control before she takes notice of his early morning urges.
Suddenly, she lifts her head from the crook of his neck and lays it on the pillow next to his own, their noses almost touching. She looks deeply into his eyes, and before he can stop it, kisses the tip of his nose. Severus had always been self-conscious about his looks, his nose primarily. Why she should choose there, of all places, to land her lips was beyond him. He's taken aback, but she smiles shyly at him, softening his fear and paranoia. Her eyes are as blue as the sea, the sky above him on a beautiful summer's day. The outer rims of her iris' glint a striking yellowish color that webs out into her pupil, he had never noticed this before, he had never stared into her eyes so intently before. He swims in the depths of her eyes, when she leans forward and presses her lips against his. They are plump and soft, and taste slightly of sleep. Panic flashes through his mind briefly before he closes his eyes and leans into her, before he knew it, he was kissing her back, their mouths opening slightly to great each impact.
She moans against his lips, the sound sweet music to his ears. He rests his hand on her warm, supple thigh and rubs the seam of her nightgown between his thumb and forefinger. Her kisses become more passionate, more forceful, she swipes her tongue across his bottom lip, then sucks it between her own, eliciting a deep moan from his own throat. Timidly, he moves his hand further up her thigh, pushing the silky fabric of her nightgown with it, and removes his lips from hers. She pants and rolls over on her back. Severus props himself up on his elbow as she arches her back and pulls the thin nightgown above her head, throwing it to the floor. He looks down at her body in awe, her skin milky and soft, her nipples erect, he places his lips behind her ear and kisses down to collarbone, his hand traveling from her thigh to her ribs. He swipes his thumb across her nipple, she moans once more as she brushes the hair from his face and tucks it behind his ears. She grips the thin fabric of his own nightshirt and tries to pull it off, but he stops her, not wanting her to see the Mark on his arm. Instead, he pulls it up to his hips and rolls on top of her, looking down in to her eyes. He moves back to her neck, flicking her skin ever so slightly with the tip of his tongue, which he found brought the biggest reaction from her.
"Do you….would you like to continue?" Severus whispers against her neck, right below her ear.
"Yes." She pants, gripping his shoulders tightly and arching her body into his stomach.
Severus reaches down and grips himself with one hand and rubs himself against her, spreading both of their juices. He lines himself up and carefully nudges the head inside of her, the softness and warmth of her already proving to be much more intense than he had anticipated. Finally, he is fully inside of her, struggling to keep from spilling before he had even started. He had masturbated, he wasn't a Monk, that feeling was much different than this. This was all consuming, almost too intense to handle. Severus looks into her eyes, looking for any sign of regret or discomfort. Her eyes are closed, cheeks flushed, lips slightly parted and swollen from kissing him. Finally, he begins to move in and out of her as he buries his face in her neck. He moans deeply each time he buries himself fully inside of her.
Everything he had read in the book was suddenly fascinating. The acts and positions he had previously believed to be too embarrassing to preform now made perfect sense to him. He wanted to explore every inch of her body, needed to taste her most imitate areas, needed to feel her reactions. One thing he had read about was clitoral stimulation and had been interested in it since reading the chapter on how to preform it. Severus runs his hand down her side and reaches between their bodies to press the pad of his thumb against her swollen clitoris. The sounds this simple act illicit from her as she squirms and wraps her leg around his waist are enough to push him over the edge. He moans deeply against her neck as he fills her with his semen, just as she clenches around him and digs her fingernails into his back.
Severus rolls off of her and lies on his back, eyes closed, the feeling of removing himself from her leaving him hollow. It had been done, he no longer had to worry about performing. Now, however, he lies next to her feeling guilty and self-conscious. Had he done it correctly? Had he hurt her in some way? Finally, he opens his eyes and looks over at her, she's facing him, eyes closed. Her face peaceful, a slight smile on her lips. He rolls on to his side to face her.
"Was that okay?" He asks, clearing his throat.
"It was more than okay." She answers in a husky tone and opens her eyes to smile at him.
She moves closer to him and wraps her arms around his neck, pressing her forehead against his own. She kisses him gently, her lips nothing more than a feathery brush against his own.
