Chapter Five

Severus caught his former student, turned unwanted soulmate's fragile body before she collapsed in a heap on the floor, cradling her against him as she lost consciousness. For a brief moment before she went limp, she nuzzled her face against his chest, pillowing her cheek against his thumping heart.

Tightening his hold on her, he carefully carried her out of the bathroom and into the bright white bedroom, with large windows that overlooked the fields between the manor and the stables. Muttering a charm at the windows, he wandlessly pulled the heavy drapes closed and silently lit the candles that were on either side of the bed so that she wouldn't be blinded upon waking. Walking around the bed to the right side, he had the sheets and duvet fold themselves back so that he could rest her body comfortably against the pillows and Tencel fabric.

Lowering her down to the mattress, he truly looked at her for the first time giving her appearance more than a cursory glance. Her always wild hair was matted and caked with dirt and debris. Ash and abrasions covered her skin and her clothes were worn and soiled from battle and the side effects of her injuries. And though her long lashes worked to obscure it, the circles under her eyes were a violent shade of fatigued purple.

Adjusting his hold on her, he brought her back around to the foot of the bed and sat on the bench, draping her over his lap and leaning her against him as he quietly summoned Mopsey. The elf promptly answered his call with a near silent pop of apparition, dropping herself into a deep curtsy as she greeted him.

"How may Mopsey serve, Master?" she asked, straightening back up.

Her already large eyes went wide with concern as she saw Hermione and the protective, borderline possessive, way with which Severus was holding her to him.

"What happened to Mistress?"

"For the time being, it may be wise to not refer to her as Mistress, Mopsey. She's rather stubborn about house elves and their honorifics to the family they serve.

"As for the state she's in, in addition to my assumption of her being starved given how she has lived for the last year, it would appear that she has suffered a number of injuries, all of varying degrees of severity," he answered, finding it hard to look away from her now that he was no longer looking past her, but actually seeing her.

"To properly treat her I'll need to examine her more closely but as you can see, she is in desperate need of bathing and a change of clothes. I will need to task you with seeing to those needs while I step out and alert the kitchen elves to the change in dinner plans. It will be very helpful to me and preserve a sense of modesty for her unconscious state.

"Please be sure to inform me of any injuries you may find beneath her clothes that I would otherwise not know about though."

"Of course, Master. Mopsey's greatest honor is to be given elf duties for Mistress," she reverently responded, snapping her fingers to begin drawing a bath back in the en-suite.

Relaxing his hold around her, Severus allowed the elf to wrap her magic around Miss Granger and carry her with an easy float back into the bathroom. He watched the two of them disappear through the threshold and when the door shut behind them, he let out a deep suffering groan. Scrubbing his hands over his face, he silently cursed how susceptible he already was to the witch on the other side of the door. The unscratchable itch to be near his soulmate was going to be his ultimate demise and avoiding it's pull was proving to be his newest test in self control. Banishing the faint pull he felt to follow her into the bathroom, he got up from the bench and headed for the kitchens.

After meeting with Meringue about the change in dinner plans and instructing the portly little elf that he would be taking his meals in the lower, stable facing guest suite, he made his way to the rooms he had outfitted into a home lab. Removing his hated frock coat for the last time, he tossed the black garment onto a stool and began to roll up his sleeves. Clearing out a work space, he lifted several cauldrons of various sizes and materials off the wall and arranged them over burners to begin heating as he filled each one with a different base. Working in a methodical manner, he collected ingredients from his numerous stores and began to brew fresh batches of nutrient dense potions for the girl's malnourishment as well as various basic pain relievers, and a light sleep aid to assist in shutting off her overactive mind so her body could heal.

With a productive hour passing as the room filled with fragrant curls of humidity, Severus began to turn a few of the burners down to simmer and others off completely so the contents within the cauldrons could begin to cool for decanting. Setting up alerts to chime from his wand should any of the cauldrons begin to heat too much, he grabbed a plain journal and equally unassuming self inking quill and left his lab.

Heading in the direction of where he had left Mopsey to tend to Miss Granger, he felt cold air cling to his back. Looking down at his Oxford, he saw the amount of sweat that had seeped through his formerly crisp dress shirt and turned for the stairs. With his long stride that would have made his robes billow out and give the illusion of flying, he made his way back to his own chambers and entered the marble bath. The sounds of the elves already beginning work on the adjoining suite carried through what would become her closet along with their excited chatter about the newest occupant residing in Prince Manor. Shaking his head at his over eager servants, Severus stripped out of his clothes and banished them to the laundry facilities.

Stepping into the large white and gold marble alcove that housed his multi headed shower stall, Severus turned the dials nearly all the way up, rapidly filling the room with the scents of vetiver, pepper, patchouli, and light notes of lavender and geranium. He stood under the spray that was turning his alabaster skin pink and allowed the hard pressure of the shower jets to beat into his muscles, working to relax the tense knots out of his shoulders and back. Pushing the wet strands of his hair back, he let the water hit more fully on his face and roll down his neck, chest, and abdomen. Blindly reaching for the soap that matched the scented steam that filled the room, he lathered his hair into a mass of suds, taking care to scrub at the buildup of oil that had become his signature while wearing the persona of Professor Snape—greasy dungeon bat of Hogwarts.

Moving the soap down his body, his hand followed its normal path over the slight indentations of his abdomen and lower still, to his half erect cock. He released a deep sigh as he took himself in hand, running his wet soapy palm over the flared head before closing his fist around his length. With a firm hold, he slowly guided his calloused palm down his length, curling his fingers and twisting his wrist as he went. When the side of his hand met the base of his cock, he released himself and cupped his sac, rolling the weight in his hand while he gently pulled at the sensitive skin. His mouth parted on a hiss that was swallowed up by the pounding of the water as he started his ministrations over in the reverse order.

Severus continued to seek his mindless pleasure, his hips beginning to thrust into his palm as he sped up his strokes. With his free hand, he leaned his weight forward in the shower and rested his forehead to his forearm and looked down. He watched his cock pump into his fist through partially hooded eyes, his breath increasing with each tug and twist. His relaxed back began to tense again as pressure built at the base of his spine.

Closing his eyes he allowed his mind to drift as he began to reach his completion. Within a few moments he was no longer fucking himself into his hand, but driving his cock into the wet and warm embrace of a faceless witch's cunt. One of his hands dug into her hip as he kept her canted back towards him, while his other pinned her shoulder to the shower wall, fingers creeping over to caress her throat. Faint moans and grunts left his throat as he quickened the pumping of his hand and thrusting of his hips.

The hot pressure within him grew, as he began to rhythmically squeeze himself to mimic the feeling of slick, fluttering walls, trying to wring his orgasm from him.

"That's it pet, come for me," he growled, drawing himself deeper into his fantasy.

He could feel his release racing up his length, ready to shoot forth in thick ropes that would paint the shower's wall. Chasing the feeling with a tighter grip and sharper twist of his wrist, he began to lose his rhythm.

Reaching the cusp of release, he half groaned half sighed, "Hermione," as his hand passed over his swollen head one last time, pulling a deep grunt out of his chest as he came.

Severus's eyes flew open when her name registered in his mind, tumbling him out of his fantasy and the hot, languid bliss of orgasm. Letting go of himself as though he had been burned, he hastily stepped back from the wall he had been leaning against.

"Fucking Salazar!" he swore, tilting his head back and tenting his hands over his face as he tried to scrub the image from his mind and deflate his still eager cock.

Shoving the temperature knobs down, he hissed under the onslaught of ice cold water raining down upon him. Staying beneath the freezing spray till his traitorous, hungry prick had given up the will to stay erect, he slapped the knobs again ending his shower, more agitated and tense than when he had walked in. Grabbing one of the warmed plush towels from the rack, he ran it quickly through his hair before knotting it around his body.

Stomping into his bedroom, he left wet footprints and water spots behind him as he went. Backhanding the air, he lit his fireplace, the flames angrily bursting to life, to chase away the deep freeze that had settled into his bones. Throwing the towel onto his bed, he yanked the drawers of his gold trimmed dresser open and pulled out a pair of dark washed jeans. Tugging them on, he opened another drawer and grabbed a close fitting Henley to put on. Slamming both closed, he picked up the discarded journal and quill and headed back for the room that the girl who was inconveniencing his life at every turn was staying in, cursing her for ruining the simplest of pleasures as he pulled his shirt over his head.

Stomping down the stairs, his foul mood followed him making two elves that were dusting the entrance chandelier scatter. With an exasperated sound, he forced himself to stop and take a calming breath before he frightened any more of the staff and creatures under his care. Pushing a lid onto his unfulfilled desire, he resumed his walk back to her temporary chambers, wishing she had collapsed in a room that was either closer to his lab or on the same floor as his own suite.

Reaching the heavy door that led into her room, Severus took one more minute to center himself. He wanted to be sure he didn't storm in and thus wake her, making the job of examining her health and injuries all the more difficult. The longer he could keep her unconscious, the more thorough he could be without having to fight her. With a final deep breath in, he pushed the handle of the door down and stepped over the threshold.

The nearly all white room was much more soothing with the drawn drapes and offered a deeper sense of relaxation with the faint yellow glow that came off of the candles. It wouldn't be the best light to work with, but given that he now knew she had a head injury, the dim space would not further exacerbate her symptoms.

Mopsey had tucked her into the center of the bed, with her head and shoulders comfortably propped against the pillows and her hands folded primly over the turned down duvet. Coming back to her right side, he set down the journal and quill and began to examine her in her cleaned state.

The bones of her face cut into sharp relief against her hollowed cheeks, hinting further at just how long she had been getting by with barely enough food to sustain herself. Her face that had been so full of loathing and tension earlier was relaxed as her body worked to heal itself while she slept, a soft pout forming naturally on chapped lips. Her head fell to one side, exposing the stretched curve of her neck to him and along her artery, a healing scar that looked to have been cursed.

The mark held his attention as he reached out to further turn her chin away from him and expose the red, angry piercing. Drawing his wand, he traced a series of diagnostic runes over the area and watched as the iridescent rain of magic seeped into her skin. The mark glowed a blinding white before changing into an acidic green and finally a darkening black.

"Bellatrix," he observed, recognizing the pungent tang of her magic as it read out from the wound.

"She has more like that one, Master," Mopsey softly informed, coming into the room from the adjoining bathroom, with a large bowl of steaming water.

His elf—or as she was now Miss Granger's elf—levitated the bowl to rest beside their patient's arm while she climbed onto the bed and rested herself on her knees beside it, submerging several rags into the potion clouded water.

"See?" she directed, lifting up the girl's left arm to expose the underside to him.

Severus's eyes flared wide for a moment before he re-schooled his features and studied the handiwork of Bellatrix Lestrange. Carved against her arm in crude letters was, MUDBLOOD. Drawing out the same runes from her neck, he verified Bellatrix's magic and began studying the curse lingering within her veins. As the runes continued to get darker, he reached for his journal and flipped it open to a random page to begin annotating his thoughts and observations.

When the runes finished turning as black as coal, he murmured a spell with his wand pressed into the first vein he could find on her. A map of her circulatory system bloomed across her exposed skin, the reds and blues snaking along her arms, across her chest, and up her neck and face. Before long he could see her blood moving through her system.

He watched as the flow of her blood worked frantically to fight off her injuries and the curse that was weaving itself through her. The same acidic shades of green and darkening blacks from her neck spread out from her left arm, to encompass a number of her veins, Bellatrix's residual magic working its way into her arteries. Not only had the poor girl been tortured and mutilated under the witch's wand and blade, but even now the after effects weren't leaving her. Instead of healing as her arm would lead her to believe, the curse was slowly trying to strangle her magic from her and render her a squib, as one final parting shot from Bellatrix Lestrange.

"Shite," he swore, tossing the journal aside.

Severus removed his wand from where he had pressed it into her veins and began tracing a new pattern of runes over the scarring wound. A more detailed diagnostic was brought up upon the second rain of magic, his quill scribbling furiously into his journal to keep up with the charmed readings. He had a vague notion of what he would find among the numerous pages, given the slow spread he had seen and when the quill finally dropped back onto the bed, he placed his wand beside it and picked up the notes.

"Don't bother wrapping her arm, Mopsey. Instead I need you to go into my stores and collect a tube of my localized antistatic, two vials of Dreamless Sleep, and ten of Blood Replenisher," he directed, his attention already turning to the notes in his hands.

His eyes sped over the pages of notes, his mind picking out the most important details of his findings. He recalled that she had been taken by Snatchers with Potter and Weasley nearly a month ago and that the Malfoys and Bellatrix had managed to lose not only the Dark Lord's enemy but also the Sword of Gryffindor and Draco as well, not that his godson was much of a loss to the ranks of Death Eaters. The boy had never been cut out for a life like his or Lucius's, let alone had he been capable of bearing the demands of sitting amongst the Inner Circle.

Just shy of thirty days since the cursed blade was used on her... And ten percent of her magic has already been snuffed out... You are one evil and inventive bitch Bellatrix, he thought.

The blade had been two fold in its design. On the surface one would see the wound and know the object that inflected it had been impregnated with dark magic. While the cuts would eventually heal and stop reopening—if given several months, possibly years depending on depth—it was what was underneath that was truly insidious. The magic that seeped into the bloodstream with each incision was made to be carried throughout the victim's system. It would make its way into the arteries and travel to the heart, where it would then latch on and begin to pump itself into the very magical core of its host, eating away at them like a cancer. Over time the person's abilities would weaken, going unnoticed until it was too late to reverse or stop. And given the number of cuts it had taken to spell out MUDBLOOD, plus the cut in her neck, he would estimate she would have begun to notice something was amiss by Yule and rendered completely muggle within a year from then.

Scanning the details about what the curse had already begun to eat away at, Severus started to draft several formulas with open variables for her other injuries. Starting with her head—since he now knew she had suffered a concussive blow—he began a thorough examination of her body so he could properly calculate how much of the curse he could remove in a single treatment without further harming her.

His magic curled out from the end of his ebony wand and swirled around her head, caressing the loose braid Mopsey had woven over her shoulder, making him scowl at the iridescent manifestation. As it sank into her skin, her long eyelashes fluttered against the tops of her cheeks, the small pout of her lips parting open on a soft sigh. Her hand came up and heavily traced where his spell had caressed her, her fingers pulling at her bottom lip as she lowered her arm back down.

He absently annotated that her brain had been hit with enough severity to cause a Grade Three Concussion and the resulting symptoms she had been experiencing, while he watched her. A soft sound of contentment vibrated from her as she turned her right cheek towards him, seeking out another warm touch of magic.

Not believing it even as he did it, Severus lifted his wand and answered her silent request for more, the pleasured smile that graced her lips making his damned cock jump to life again.

Closing his eyes, he willed his body back into submission to no avail. Growling at his blatant lack of control, he reached down and adjusted himself, just as her eyes started to flutter again. Once again jerking his hand back as though he had touched a burning cauldron, he cleared his features as best he could, summoning a look of boredom as he began to run his examining wand down her neck, chest, and abdomen.

"Hold still," he coldly admonished, when she laced her fingers together and began to stretch her arms up.

Her body froze mid action, her eyes flying open with comical speed as she looked up at him from the bed.

"What are you doing?" she tried to demand, though her nervousness bled into her words.

"I thought that obvious," he sneered, brandishing his wand in front of her face. "Clearly I need to reexamine your head though if you don't know."

"Examine my... wait a minute... Where the fuck are my clothes?" she yelled, yanking the sheet and duvet up her body before roughly slapping his hand away from her.

He snorted as she pulled the bedding back from her to take a peek, her shoulders slumping with relief upon finding herself clothed.

"There are many things you can vilify me for, Miss Granger, most of which would be true and well within your right. However, bedding unconscious and unwilling witches isn't one of them.

"Though I must admit to never having tried either of the other two, I think I can safely say that I much prefer the company of those that eagerly hand over their submission to me. In my opinion, earning the privilege to bend a witch to my whims is half the pleasure."

A dark, rich laugh left him as he looked at her wide, scandalized eyes, pleased with himself for throwing her off so quickly. However, the victory he felt at a game she didn't know they were playing was short lived as her pupils began to dilate, betraying an inner craving he was sure she didn't know she was in possession of. He didn't take his eyes off of her as her throat worked to force a dry swallow down, his cock twitching with the need to feel the subtle constriction of her mouth around him.

Watching her, Severus knew he was right in his earlier guess that he would be able to play her need to please to his advantage, but this was a new development. Her involuntary reactions when coupled with that need painted a picture that was more tempting than he would have liked given the draw he already felt from their awakening soul bond.

It would appear Miss Granger is a natural submissive, he observed, storing the information away to use later.

"And is that what you plan to do with me?" she asked, clearing the fog that had begun to grow in his mind. "Bend me to your whims?"

Once more meeting her eye though he wasn't sure when exactly his gaze had left hers, he smirked.

"If I did, you can be sure we would both receive immense satisfaction from such an arrangement."

Looking away from her, he returned his focus to studying her ravaged state, frowning at his findings regarding her malnourishment. He knew her time on the run had been rough, the toll it had taken on her body having manifested in her physical appearance. The results from his spells though gave a deeper look into how far the hunger that had turned to starvation ran within her. Based on the mapping of her digestive tract, she had only eaten once in the last thirty-six hours, a pathetic spread of bread and cheese at that. His best guess based on how much her stomach had shrunk and the depletion of vitamins and nutrients in her blood and lack of fat stores was that even before the events at Malfoy Manor occurred, she had been eating once a day at best and most likely meager portions that had no hope of sustaining her. No doubt an act designed to provide her male counterparts with more.

Canceling his spells, he once more tossed his journal aside, and summoned the armchair by the fireplace to her bedside.

"What are you doing now?" she asked, the trace of lust gone and in its place her old, reliable friend, skepticism.

"Sitting," he drawled just as Mopsey popped back into the room.

"Mopsey has Master's potions for Mist—Miss Granger," the elf announced, quickly covering her honorific for the witch when she saw that her new mistress was no longer sleeping.

"Thank you, Mopsey. Would you please check on dinner and see if Meringue has something suitable for Miss Granger to eat in the meantime?

"And please bring this to her so she can direct the other elves to Miss Granger's temporary dietary needs," he added, duplicating a section of his notes for her.

Mopsey took the lined pages with reverence and gave a deep curtsy to Severus, before bestowing another to her mistress, saying, "Right away Master."

"Close your mouth before I take its opening as an invitation," he mused, glancing at her flabbergasted state.

Her jaw snapped shut with an auditable click as she crossed her arms over her chest with an indigent huff that made him chuckle more.

"You are far too easy to rile up and yet, I enjoy myself when doing it nonetheless."

"You told your elf, thank you."

"Having grown up in the Muggle World until I was fifteen, I know such a thing as manners exist there. So, why are you so taken aback by my possession of them?"

"She's an elf," she stated dumbly.

"And you're a witch, what's your point?" he asked, enjoying his chance to tease and toy with her.

"In my experience, people like you generally find magical creatures beneath them," she said in reproach.

"In your limited experience, you mean. You may have fought in a war, but don't forget, your actual involvement and exposure to our world has been rather minimal.

"You don't know nearly half as much as you think you do. So if I were you, I would dispel myself of those notions sooner rather than later. You'll find it'll make understanding what I have to teach you that much easier if we aren't stopping every other sentence to remind you of that fact.

"And on that note, we may as well begin your education now while we wait for dinner. There is much for you to learn and not a lot of time in which to convey it all."

She harshly sucked in a breath before blowing it out in defeat as she reluctantly requested, "Can we start with the ludicrous concept of soulmates?"

"Just because you hadn't heard of such a thing until this morning does not make it ludicrous. After all, you're a muggleborn witch. That revelation in and of itself should have stripped you of finding anything to be outlandish ever again," he chided. "But yes, we can start there. Your understanding of it will be nearly as important as learning to properly navigate your way around the other Death Eaters at social gatherings with the Dark Lord. Where would you like to start?"

Severus firmly wanted to control the information she received until he could have time to clear the manor's library of any of the text that would send her on the path to finding out just how much choice she really possessed in their dynamic. It would be best for him—for the time being at least—if she believed their bond was a forgone conclusion. And he had every intention of manipulating things between them to keep that illusion in front of her eyes. Thus by allowing her to ask specific questions, he fed her the false idea that he would be free with educating her while maintaining an upper hand in knowing her train of thought so he could guide her before her mind went anywhere he would rather it didn't.

He watched her think on the question and he relaxed back into the armchair, spreading his legs a bit wider to accommodate the annoyance that was his relentless prick. Then after what felt like an age she finally settled on her first question.

"Is everyone born with a mark?"

Interesting choice...

"There was a time when yes, everyone was—at least those of pureblood. When witches and wizards began to marry muggles and muggleborns, creating half-bloods, their children were as the name would suggest, half as likely to bear a mark but it was still common."

"So muggleborns aren't born with marks?" she clarified, the hesitancy in her question making him lean into her, his curiosity piqued.

"No... to my knowledge you are a rather unique case seeing as you have one. In fact, you may have just given credence to the theory that muggleborns don't actually exist, but in fact are born as descendants from long forgotten squibs.

"Why do you ask?" he questioned, sensing there was a trail he would do well to follow.

"No reason," she answered too quickly, breaking eye contact in favor of looking at the heavy drapes opposite the bed.

"Mmhmm..." he mused, leaning back.

"So, does your mark match mine? Is that how you knew?"

"Not for a very long time now, but it did once," he bit out, grinding his teeth.

Quietly she asked, "What do you mean? Can I see it?"

Knowing it was only a matter of time before she saw it anyways and asked after it, Severus got up from the chair and sat on the bed beside her. After a moment of pause to lock away the memories that were threatening to resurface, he lifted his Henley, praying she wouldn't feel the pull to touch him and complete their bond. If he was lucky, what was done to him all those years ago, would dull the effect of her touch.

Pulling the soft cotton up his back, he reached his left arm around and tugged it above his right shoulder blade to expose what was supposed to be the mirror image of her own marking.

"Oh my God," she gasped, alerting him to the fact that she knew right away—or at the very least could guess—what happened to him as a child.

Before he could even prepare himself for it, her fingers ran over the muscles of his shoulder, tracing the puckered and cratered remains of the shooting star that graced his shoulder and the gnarled burn scars that mangled it. The moment her soft fingers completed their path, a shock that felt like lightning raced through his system, closing the first seal of mating around them. His breath hissed in through his teeth as she let out a soft moan, her fingers curling into his shoulder as the waves of hot pleasure he felt, crashed over her as well.

Severus's heart beat an erratic rhythm against his rib cage while his free hand dug into the sheets of the bed pulling them from the mattress. His cock strained uncomfortably against the tight confines of his jeans, throbbing and twitching with the desire to be freed so he could bury himself inside of her and further seal them together. He couldn't help the groan that escaped him as she moaned again, her mouth somehow closer to him than before, her warm breath making him shiver.

"Fuck..." he swore when her breasts pressed against his exposed back, the thin materiel of the night clothes Mopsey dressed her in, doing nothing to shield her erect nipples from grazing his scared and mangled flesh.

His control finally broke when her tongue darted out to lick up the cord of his neck. Releasing his grip on the bed, Severus turned to face her, shoving his fingers through her braid as he crashed his lips onto hers, his tongue forcing its way in as she gasped. Running his other hand down her side, he hooked her knee to his hip and draped her leg around his back, pinning her to the bed.

He ran his tongue up the roof of her mouth, tangling it around her own, and fucked her mouth in mimic of what his weeping cock was begging to do inside her. Her nails dug into his skin and dragged up his back, as she arched against him, moaning and sighing into his mouth.

Leaving her lips in a hurry, he kissed a wet path across her jaw and down her neck, lowering the silky strap of her top, to expose the upper swell of her breast to his mouth. Pulling the bodice down to expose her further, he groaned at the sight of her dusty pink nipple, puckered and erect before him. The tip of his tongue came out to flick at her excited flesh, making her whimper as she thrust herself closer to his mouth. He circled her nipple several times, reveling in how responsive she was before he sucked it into his mouth, allowing his teeth to graze her with just a hint of bite that made her keen.

Severus was urged on by her rapid panting beneath him and the beating race of her heart as it thumped against him. Pushing things one step further, he began to rub himself against her thinly covered cunt, the space between the top of her thighs so hot he could feel the heat of her arousal through his jeans as she answered back with equally desperate humps.

"Oh fuck... YES!" she shouted, as her body went stiff with the tell tale signs of orgasm under him before collapsing back onto the bed in a limp heap.

He roughly sucked at her nipple, drawing out a delicious hiss before allowing it to fall from his mouth with a loud pop that made her moan with further satisfaction.

Leaning back from her, he took in the flushed state of her body and her glazed eyes, thinking the only thing that would make the sight of her beneath him more beautifully debauched was if she were completely naked. Naked with her arms and legs bound to the bed by crimson silk ties and her arse as red and delicious as a strawberry, while his hand tingled with the residual sting of having spanked her into a pliant, wet, needy mess.

"Oh no," she said, panic flooding her voice and kicking him out of his fantasy. "What the fuck just happened? What did you do?"

Pulling her top back into place and tucking the rumpled sheets and duvet around her, Severus calmly retook his seat in the chair as though his erection wasn't on full display, straining against his jeans, with a small, damp spot where both their combined arousal had leaked.

"I didn't do anything. That would be the soul bond wanting to make itself known. Our markings are highly sensitive when stroked by our match. Especially when it's the first time.

"What we just experienced would be the sealing of agreement to explore our connection as soulmates. There are several more before we become what is considered fully mated though."

"You tricked me!" she accused. "You knew this would happen if I touched you!"

Rolling his eyes at her theatrics, he replied, "Yes I was aware of what could happen, but you touched me of your own free will, Miss Granger. At any point when the soul bond was tempting you, you could have rejected it but you didn't. You being weak does not mean I tricked you. Besides," he seethed, "I wasn't even aware that my marking was capable of being responsive, let alone to a level of that magnitude, given the state it has been in since I was four years old."

The anger washed away from her face at his words.

"Four?" she repeated quietly, her eyes filling with sadness, only a bleeding heart like herself could muster for someone like him.

"Yes, my mother was quite ashamed of the sperm donor that was my father and in a fit of soul sickness induced madness, she took the iron poker for the fireplace and tried to burn off the mark that tied me to him and his family. When that didn't entirely work, she shoved it through the tissue and muscle hoping that would.

"Tobias thankfully came home in the middle of it and saved me from further harm."

"You call your father by his first name?"

Rubbing at corners of his eyes, Severus sighed, "The Tobias Snape I'm named for was a kind man who lost his young family while fighting in the second muggle war. My mother was close to the age his daughter would have been when he found her pregnant and on the streets. He took her and got her set up with a job as a secretary in the mill town of Cokeworth where he had worked before and after the war until he retired. There is in fact no blood relation that connects us though that doesn't mean I did not care for, respect, and mourn him as one would their father when he passed. He was the only kindness I ever truly knew as a child and his death was... devastating. Even more so than my poor, sick mother's."

"And your…"

"Father? Sperm donor?" he supplied.

"Yeah… did you ever learn who he is?"

Giving her half a shrug as head dropped back over the chair, he blandly answered, "Since you'll learn soon enough when the Dark Lord requests your attendance at a gathering. I see no reason to not tell you.

"Yes, I know who supplied my paternity. My mother's big secret–the one that could have stripped me of the metaphorical Scarlet A that I was forced to wear as a child–the cause for her soul sickness that sent her spiraling so far into insanity that she ultimately killed herself, her fucking soulmate and the very reason I never wanted to get landed with you, is none other than her fellow schoolmate, the darkest wizard of our time, Tom Riddle," he said with mock excitement.

"Holy fucking Sword of Gryffindor... and I thought finding out I was adopted was an explosive secret..." she breathed out.

"Wait, you're adopted?" he half shouted, the mystery of how she could be a muggleborn witch and possess a soul marking solved.