Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Unintentional Inveiglement	By : onecelestialbeing Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Snape/Hermione Views: 130116 -:- Recommendations : 8 -:- Currently Reading : 30
Disclaimer: I own nothing of Harry Potter and it's characters and making no money from this story.

Chapter List
- 13
- 14
- 15
A/N: I hope everyone stateside had a Happy Thanksgiving! Mine had a lack of enough chocolate cake and NO mashed potatoes (the horror). Thank you for the reviews, as always! :D

By the end of the following week, Hermione was at a loss as to what she should do to keep from losing her mind. During their free time, if Ginny wasn't off with her friends, then she was attached to Harry's side. Lavender Brown, a giggly curly-haired blonde that was also in their House, literally and figuratively, sank what looked like a lurid shade of bright pink varnished nails into Ron's arm, and refused to let up.

Hermione laughed when she thought back to the way Lavender had smarmily eyed her one afternoon as they were on the way to class. Immediately knowing what the problem was, Hermione assured the blonde that she didn't fancy her boyfriend, and that she could keep her nasty looks to herself. After that, Lavender had been very amenable and always made sure to speak to Hermione when she saw her, although her best friend, Parvati Patil, still turned up her nose.

Hermione was happy for both her best friends; she just wished that she could stop walking in on either heavily-snogging couple. The first time it happened had been funny, at least; Hermione had just walked into the Gryffindor Common Room, where Ron and Lavender were tucked away into a corner that was somewhat hidden from everyone. She had been unable to see anything, and little muffled sounds made Hermione walk closer to investigate, upon which she had turned bright red at the sight of Lavender practically devouring Ron's face. Mortified beyond belief, Hermione had ducked down and hastily retreated, walking backwards and knocking right into Ginny.

Ginny's face was turned up into a smirk when she noticed the kissing couple and then Hermione's flaming cheeks. She had ducked back out of sight and made silent retching noises into her hand before turning to run up the steps to their dormitory, leaving Hermione snorting with laughter in the Common Room.

Two years prior, Fred and George had alluded to the fact that Ron was sweet on Hermione. Ron and Hermione were only fourteen at the time, and with a typical adolescent indignation, Ron told his brother that he did not like Hermione that way, and to shut their mouths. His face had nearly matched his hair but he immediately clammed up when his brothers kept ragging on him.

It was that summer when Ron tried to hold Hermione's hand. The why of it was forgotten, but Hermione distinctly remembered cringing and trying to pull away without causing a scene. Right then and there, she realized that she only had friendly feelings for Ron, and soon after, it came out that the sentiment was mutual.

They never talked about that awkward incident, and from that day on, their relationship was of a more platonic variety. Ron and Harry might both say that it was more of a 'mother hen and her two chicks', as Hermione was always nagging and bossing them around for one thing or another.

She didn't care; it was for their own good. Sometimes Hermione truly wondered about her best friends, as she was sure if their heads weren't attached to their bodies, that they would leave them back on a Quidditch pitch or elsewhere.

In any event, Hermione didn't know what she would have done with a boy her age. Not at that point, and especially not after being intimately acquainted with a highly complicated man that was nearly twenty years her senior. Hermione didn't see Snape as the sort of man to hide in a corner and kiss and grope her like some hormonally-ridden sixteen-year-old boy. Nor could she see herself in the same situation. She would have died of embarrassment had someone walked in on her in the midst of a heavy snogging session.

Another thing Hermione found was that teenage boys were often too free with their hands. She'd allowed Viktor Krum to kiss her, and ended up having to yank his hand down when it delved too close to the neckline of her dress. Snape, on the other hand... she practically had to throw herself against him and force his hand upon her body.

It had been somewhat of a shock for Hermione to realise that she couldn't see herself getting tangled with another wizard at that point. Which is why when Ron wolfishly pointed out that Cormac McClaggen, a burly young man also in Gryffindor who was a year older than them, had his eye on Hermione, she couldn't help but shriek in distaste.

Hermione had been unable to ignore the way McClaggen's eyes roved over her as they passed each other in the Common Room, as if he were trying to undress her. He was handsome, but early on, she learned that looks weren't everything.

Gilderoy Lockhart was prime example of that. He'd been exceedingly good looking, and it turned out that his head was filled with nothing but self-imposed lies and delusions of grandeur. The man told so many tales, it was as if he had really believed them all. Hermione felt like a heel whenever she remembered the way she fawned over Lockhart, believing the lies that dripped like honey from his lips. She now knew that people who often bragged and boasted to the point of annoyance to others, actually didn't know anything.

Silence truly was golden, and still waters really did run deep.

Not once had Snape ever bragged or boasted about his abilities to do anything. He remained silent the entire time, right up until the duel between him and Lockhart. The glint in his black eyes should have warned the cheerily-grinning wizard, but hadn't. It wasn't until Lockhart found himself flat on his back, with a smirking Snape standing a few feet away, that his wide grin finally faltered.

Also, strictly going by appearances, it was safe to say that Severus Snape wasn't a pretty wizard.

He was rail thin, and whenever Hermione lie against him, she could feel his ribs and hip bones protruding through his pale skin and pressing into her softer body. His nose was hooked and his hair always lank and hanging around his gaunt face in dark curtains, but he was clean. Snape wasn't the 'greasy git' that everyone thought him to be. Unlike Lockhart, he wasn't groomed within an inch of his life, who made it no secret that he had his own nighttime primping regimen. Hermione nearly screamed with laughter at the thought of the choleric wizard going down to Diagon Alley, black robes billowing behind him as he sauntered up to Madam Primpernelle's shop to purchase eye cream.

Hermione giving up her status as a witch and handing her wand over to the Ministry would sooner happen.

And anyway, if Snape were to use some potion, surely he would make it himself, as he seemed to be the sort of wizard that would never buy something from over the counter. Still, she cherished the outlandish image of the snarling Potions master pointing one long finger to a shelf, asking the always gussied up shop owner, a svelte brunette witch that had a penchant for silken robes in bright colours, for wart remover or something equally ludicrous.

Thinking back to Cormac McClaggen, whose skin was equally smooth as Lockhart's, Hermione wondered if he had his own regimen as well. An extensive hair regimen was quite possible, as his fair curls were smoother than her own.

She knew that he came from what others would consider a successful family. Unfortunately, if anyone had doubts as to his background, McClaggen made every attempt to boast about himself and who he knew, or who his father knew, or who his uncle knew. While some of her classmates went for that sort of thing, it only made Hermione want to cast a 'Langlock' in his direction.

Why he wanted to go around with her? She had no idea, especially when she took into consideration the amount of girls in his own year that gushed incessantly over him. The witches mostly consisted of tall, glamourous creatures that seemed to find time in the morning to make their faces-subtly enough, that their Head of House wouldn't notice- and perfectly coif their hair.

Hermione was taking more than the usual amount of classes that year, and couldn't be bothered to do more than put her hair in a messy plait or bun in the mornings. The only thing that went on her face was moisturiser and a mint-flavoured, colourless lip balm, both of which protected her sensitive skin from the frigid Scotland air.

Now that she was thinking about it, Hermione didn't even know why Ron mentioned the fact that she was under McClaggen's radar. Ever since Quidditch trials, both boys had been at odds with one another, purely because McClaggen was an entitled brat that thought he knew everything. He even annoyed Harry, who was usually mild-mannered, to the point that he snapped at the older boy and told him to get out of his face.

Harry knew about the Confundus Charm that Hermione used during Quidditch trials, yet he never told on her. Ron didn't know, and they'd left it alone. Hermione hadn't meant to break the rules, and it killed her to use magic, but she hadn't been able to stand another minute of Mr I'm-Better-Than-All-You-Peasants and his constant berating of her best friend, and it had only taken her a second of deliberation before deciding to cast the charm. Harry never came outright and said that he knew what she did, yet the look on his face had been confirmation enough.

At least they didn't share classes with McClaggen. Hermione didn't think she could endure the feel of his eyes trying to unfasten the clasp on her robes while she was in the midst of following the lecture.

Classes, namely, Defence Against the Dark Arts, was another issue.

The first class started off as usual, according to Snape's habits. The classroom door had been slammed shut, the windows closed and curtains drawn, bathing them all in darkness. Never once did his eyes drift towards the desk that Hermione shared with Harry, which was surprising, as he usually always reserved one of his nastier glares for her messy-haired best friend.

In a hushed tone that counteracted with the sinister things that came from his mouth, Snape proceeded to go on about all of the horrible sounding curses that had been uses to torture witches and wizards alike into submission. To further emphasize his point, he had then shown slides of pictures of people being held captive by each curse. The class was completely silent, most likely scared stiff by the fact that they could possibly come face to face with Dark magic being used against them.

Or perhaps it was the way that Snape stalked up and down the aisle, his silky voice low enough to cause ripples of fear in each student. Hermione had even become so nerved that she had been unable to raise her hand.

Whatever it was that rattled the students, Snape's point had clearly been made, and when the lesson was finally over, everyone quickly scrambled to gather their belongings and bolt out of the room. There had been not a single complaint about the lengthy homework assignment given, eager everyone was to get out into the brightly lit corridors of Hogwarts.

Ron and Harry were the first to run out of the classroom. Even Draco looked happy for the lesson to be over with, and had followed in behind the two Gryffindors he hated most, forgetting to treat them to his usual brand of derision.

Hermione had purposely dawdled over packing her rucksack, hoping that she could catch a glimpse of the professor before going on to her next class. Uneven beams of light had filtered into the classroom, and it was just enough for her to make out his black-robed form, still standing behind his desk.

"I'm waiting for another class, Miss Granger," he began without looking up.

Ever since the last student had filed out of the room, Snape had been looking down at something on his desk, and never once had his eyes come in her direction. Hermione was shocked that he knew she was standing there, and fervently wished that he would at least look at her.

"Well? Either tell me what you want, or get out."

Hermione stood quiet for a moment, staring at the top of Snape's bowed head. His black hair hung more limply than ever, and was still parted in those same lacklustre curtains. He spoke to her in the exact tone used to deliver the lecture on Killing Curses, and it was informal and dry as a handshake and succinct greeting from a politician.

"Nothing...sir," she stammered once she finally found her voice.

Snape gave a curt nod, still refusing to look up, and Hermione took that as her cue to pick up her last book and leave the classroom.

Her mouth had gone dry, and she felt numb all over. She knew that he still had to maintain every sense of propriety, even in the classroom, but figured that Snape could at least look at her. What did he expect, that his eyes would fall upon her and make her immediately jump his bones? Because it wasn't as if he would jump hers; the closest they'd gotten to that point was the first night when Snape pushed her down on her bed and shoved his fingers into the most sensitive place on her body.

Hermione hadn't expected those advances, nor had she regretted them.

Embarrassed by the tears that sprang to her eyes, she hurriedly rushed out of the classroom to hide her face from the professor. The last thing she wanted to do was lose her composure in front of him. It took more than a few minutes of mental coaching for Hermione to convince herself to not cry in the middle of the corridor. Wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her school robes and resolving to finish her cry once she had some privacy, she went on to her next class.

When Hermione Granger walked into his first Defence class of the term, Snape immediately remembered that it was only a fortnight since he had the young witch beneath him, her strained-sounding moans at his ear as he plunged over and over into her trembling, sweat-covered body.

Being a master of disguise that he was, his thoughts hadn't been given away by a change in facial expression. It hadn't matter, however, as his next source of distress in form of a pale-blond wizard came shuffling into his classroom.

Draco hadn't given Snape any more smug looks; he calmly took his seat, morosely staring down at his closed notebook, quietly waiting for the lesson to begin.

Snape began the lesson, pulling out all the stops. In no way did he glaze over the details about each Dark curse that he went over in class, because to do so would have been idiotic, especially since he knew that a few of his students had already encountered Dark magic. To not give them the complete truth would have been to serve them all a great disservice.

And besides, he enjoyed the way his class squirmed uncomfortably as he described in great detail what would happen had they been under the influence of each curse. He didn't want them to be comfortable with his lesson. They surely wouldn't have been comfortable had they fallen into the clutches of a Death Eater. In fact, what Snape was teaching them had been tame.

He was surprised when the resident know-it-all never once thrust her hand into the air to ask about said curses. Of course, Snape knew about the D.A. meetings that Potter and his friends held the year before, and no doubt many of them had been apprised of a few curses. Still, it was strange to not have the bushy-haired witch interrupting him every five minutes to fire away, then going on to hastily scribble everything down onto a piece of parchment that was already overcrowded with her writing, to ensure that she missed nothing.

Snape had managed to keep his wits about him for the entire class, and was relieved once the lesson ended. Of course, in her own subtle-yet-not-so-subtle way, Hermione had lingered behind, under the pretence of packing her overstuffed school bag. Eager for the girl to take her leave, the professor had stared down at an unrolled parchment on his desk, which had been nothing more than a few notes for his next class, all of which had been already committed to memory.

While Snape managed to keep the less than appropriate thoughts concerning the off-limits witch out of his head, it still hadn't meant that the temptation was gone. He was irritated to find that she stayed behind after class, and vowed to not look at her, lest he be tempted to charm the classroom door shut, drag her over to his desk, and have her right there. Treating Hermione with abrasive indifference had been easier, although it had been hard to ignore the way her voice cracked with apprehension when she spoke to him.

Snape could have sworn that he heard Hermione sniffling just outside of his classroom door once she fled, yet stay put at his desk, still unfocusedly staring down at his lecture notes scribbled in his signature slanted handwriting.

There was no doubt about it; he had to get Hermione Granger out of his head. Everything that transpired between them at Grimmauld Place needed to be put in an ironclad box and locked, key thrown away, and the box tossed out to sea. Because there was no way in the seven circle of Hades that he would make it through the school year without being tempted to shove those ugly school robes above her thighs and have his sordid way with the too young witch.

Keeping her promise to herself, Hermione refused to cry for the rest of the day. Even when she went to bed that night, she refused to let herself get upset, yet still drifted off into an uneasy sleep. When Monday rolled around, she didn't feel like attending her early morning Potions class with the sycophantic Slughorn, as the classroom alone with its glass bottle-lined shelves reminded her of Severus.

Fortunately, Slughorn had a different approach when it came to his classroom, as nearly every curtain had been drawn, every window opened, and the atmosphere was bracing in the brightly lit classroom.

That made things a bit easier on Hermione, even if she was still distracted. Slughorn had assigned his class the task of making Elixir to Induce Euphoria. Hermione wasn't in a euphoric mood in the least bit, and had to stop herself from sneering when Harry's potion turned the perfect shade of yellow, earning him an obscene amount of praise from their rotund Potions professor.

Hermione couldn't lie to herself-she was aggravated. Aggravated because Harry, all of a sudden, was upstaging her in Potions, and two, because she knew that he was using a questionable Potions text with old scribbles that he'd found in the classroom cupboard.

She had been working on her potion for an hour, only gaining a splitting headache when the mixture wouldn't solidify or change colour as needed. The noxious fumes wafting upwards had stung her nostrils and she was positive that the fine hairs inside had been burnt off. To top it off, copious amounts of steam from her cauldron had transformed her hair into a tangled, stinking cloud of fuzz.

Damn right, she was mad at Harry.

Ron didn't seem to care that Harry had managed to finish his potion with perfect results; he was too busy frowning and trying to figure out where he had gone wrong to notice much of anything else.

When class was over, Hermione couldn't help it when she threw Harry a scathing glance, attempting to smooth back her frizzy hair before gathering up her books and stomping out of the classroom. She knew that he only turned in stellar work because of his defaced book, but was too much of a friend to tell on him. Harry quickly tried to wipe the smug look off his face, and Ron, as usual, stood by looking befuddled. Lucky for them, Hermione didn't hear the chuckling under their breath as she stomped away.

Anyway, she had troubles of her own to worry about.

At lunchtime, she had been too wound up to eat more than an apple, and merely nibbled a few shallow dents into the soft, sweet flesh. Defence was their last class, and Hermione's stomach rolled with trepidation at the idea of seeing Professor Snape again.

She saw him every night in the Great Hall at dinner, yet he still refused to acknowledge her presence. Hermione knew it would have been hard to do so, especially with him sitting on the staff dais and surrounded by colleagues, but even during class, he still hadn't looked her way. He kept looking at Draco, though, she curiously noticed.

At first, she chalked it up to Slytherin favouritism, until she realised that the rest of his snakes hadn't received the same shrewd yet subtle attention. Fact remained-Draco didn't look well at all. He barely spoke in class, not even to make one of his customary sarcastic remarks.

The only thing that managed to garner attention from the professor was Hermione staring across at Draco. She hadn't meant to be obvious, yet Snape barked at her to pay attention, and Hermione nearly jumped out of her seat in fright. Draco hadn't noticed a thing, and went right on with staring a hole into the wall that was on his left.

Of course. He only notices me to chastise me, Hermione told herself, resuming the process of taking notes on Snape's lecture.

Had he still taught Potions, Hermione wondered if there was some way to force the professor to speak to her. She reasoned that if she had blown up a cauldron, or whispered to Neville in aims of helping him, if he would give her detention. She quickly shot down that idea, telling herself that the only thing he would do was take a ridiculous amount of points from Gryffindor before resuming the lesson. And had he given her detention, Snape would have probably fixed it so she would serve it with Filch or Hagrid.

Again, Hermione surreptitiously tried to gain the professor's attention. Once again, he ignored her, this time refusing to speak, even though she stood a few feet away from him, her brown eyes burning a hole into the side of his face. When it was apparent that Snape didn't have anything to say to her, Hermione numbly walked out of the classroom, hugging her rucksack to her chest.

Later that evening, Hermione was unable to bear the sight of the black teaching-robed professor, who appeared to be calmly putting away his dinner in the Great Hall. Ignoring the curious look from her best friends as she rushed to finish her own meal, Hermione offhandedly gave the excuse that she wanted to study in the dormitory before things got too noisy. The boys readily accepted her excuse, knowing their friend’s penchant for studiousness, and continued stuffing their faces without any more questions.

Making sure to keep her eyes averted from the staff dais, Hermione hurriedly rushed out of the Great Hall, nearly tripping on her robes during her canter up the middle aisle. She never noticed a pair of black eyes that had immediately honed in yet lingered briefly on her retreating form.

Hermione had been fibbing when she told Ron and Harry that she wanted to study. Of course, she would go over her books before turning in to bed, but right at that moment, she knew that giving undivided attention to studying would prove fruitless. Instead, Hermione took it upon herself to patrol the corridors. It wasn’t as if she expected to find anyone up to anything; most of the students were still at dinner, and the corridors were empty save for a few ghosts gliding overhead. The only noise present was a few muttering portraits as she made her way past the frames, only one of them stopping to politely greet her.

Sir Cadogan, the clumsy knight who usually remained in his frame in the upper and more remote corridors of the castle, made his way down to the main floor, and had been in the middle of looking around a cluster of shrubbery for his sword when he noticed Hermione. The knight jauntily announced that Hermione looked sad, and offered her his handkerchief as well as a sympathetic ear to listen to her plight. She couldn’t help but to chuckle when he referred to her as a ‘damsel in distress with the most liberated head of curls he had ever set eyes upon’ before gallantly asking if she needed him to 'slice the mangy cur from nape to chops' that had her looking so forlorn.

Hermione thanked Sir Cadogan for the offer, but told him that she was fine. Besides, the thought of the painted knight ruffling so much as one inky strand on top of Severus Snape’s head was laughable at best; the professor would summon a bottle of turpentine before Sir Cadogan could so much as lower the visor on his helmet.

She knew that she was being absurd for pouting like a child that couldn’t have their way, yet Hermione couldn’t help stop feeling the way she did. As many times as she told herself that she needed to stay away from Severus, that it was indecent the way she continued lusting after him, each thought was for naught, and failed to make her think otherwise.

What was she expecting to happen? Hermione had no idea. She couldn’t even remember what initially drew her to the enigmatic, reserved wizard. It was true, the man was erudite as could be, many times making Hermione feel ignorant, which was a hard feat as she was usually a few steps ahead of everyone else.

Whatever it was, there was no doubt about it; Hermione was fascinated by Severus Snape. Time and time again, he had warned her to stay away, vehemently stating that he was definitely not the sort of person she wanted to get tangled with. Yet, Hermione had never been one to turn away from something just because she had been told to do so. And it wasn’t as if she looked upon consorting with Snape to be some personal challenge to see if she could break that impenetrable shell of his; she didn’t enjoy driving herself crazy for the heck of it, as she had soon learned that dealing with his mercurial moods did just that.

No pun intended, Hermione was spellbound. And the fact that Severus continued to push her away only made her want to push back harder. It didn’t matter that her brain kept screaming at her to tread a level course, to leave all thoughts of her, and the wizard, and Grimmauld Place in the past. But Hermione knew that she had to keep a calm head, lest everything go pear-shaped. She and her friends, as well as countless others, had enough to contend with as it was. The last thing they needed was for some sort of scandal to break out, taking into account those that were working for the Order, as well as the one member who was also secretly working for the other side.

All practical thoughts aside, it was the more carnal ones that were driving her crazy. Difficult was an understated word for Hermione to use to describe the way it felt for her to try and forget about the way Severus made her body explode with absurd ease. She wasn't hard up enough to masturbate at night, even though no one would be any wiser since she slept with the curtains fully drawn around her bed. Still, it was hard to ignore the fact that she was surrounded by house mates, at least one of their beds only a foot away from hers.

Hermione had been walking blinding and turned a corner, each torch lighting up with her progress, when she thought about the very first time she had Severus' face buried between her legs, and it was enough to make her knees buckle. Reaching out to steady herself against the wall, Hermione drew in a deep breath and tried to contain herself.

There was no way she was going to make it to the end of the month without some sort of reprieve. The memory alone of Severus' tongue made her core throb and ache, and the sensation was borderline painful. True, Severus was still her professor, but Hermione thought she had made it abundantly clear that she wouldn't give up their secret. There wasn't a single circumstance she could think of that would make her do so.

The professor's unapproachable actions were obviously meant to keep Hermione at bay, and even though he hadn't actually told her to do so, it was a loophole she found most fortuitous.

Deeming her forays of traipsing about Hogwarts having gone on for long enough, Hermione turned and began to walk in the direction of the Gryffindor dormitory. Distractedly shuffling along, she didn't realize that someone else was a two feet away from her until a blur of something caught the corner of her eye.

Her head whipped up, and Hermione found herself staring into the face of none other than the very person who had been ignoring her since the first day of school. Brown eyes drilled like augers into black ones, although the latter pair never moved lower than her stunned face.

"Professor..." Hermione greeted feebly, having difficulty finding her voice. She did, however, walk up on the professor until she was literally under his nose. Snape frowned down at her, looking slightly put out. Had it not been for the snugly tied cravat around his neck, she might have noticed the way he swallowed hard when she stepped into his personal space. While she also missed his fingers curling into his palms, as Snape was doing his best to restrain himself from reaching out and touching the witch, Hermione did notice the way his jaw clenched, ever so slightly.

Her feet didn't want to move, and she stood in place, staring at the black-robed wizard as if seeing him for the first time. Hermione's skin prickled from head to toe beneath the heavy wool of her bulky school robes, and despite the cool air of the drafty corridor swirling around her ankles, suddenly she felt overheated.

"Miss Granger," Snape coolly replied, immediately averting his eyes over the top of her curly head.

While it seemed like a long time had passed that the two were standing only a few inches apart, in reality, only less than a minute had passed since Severus halted at first sight of the witch. An air of eagerness to get away from her suddenly took hold. His desperation was sequestered, however, and went completely unnoticed by Hermione as he sidestepped smoothly to continue past her, the hem of his trailing teaching robes catching the edge of her school robes.

That had been the last straw for Hermione. Her face had been close enough to Snape's for her to catch a whiff of the raspberry torte he'd eaten for dessert at dinner, hell, her nose had practically touched the long row of buttons on his frock coat, and still she was treated with a casual indifference. Not once did Snape look back as he retreated, and the sight of his black teaching robes billowing behind him as he rounded the corner and disappeared was enough to leave Hermione floored.

Eyes watering in a mixture of hurt and anger, she also felt numb with disbelief. Unable to do more than slump against the flagstone wall, heedless of the rough, uneven material digging into her back, Hermione allowed tears that were coming faster than she manage fall down her cheeks.

The sound of approaching footsteps from around the corner was the only thing to make her push herself off the wall. Stalking away without bothering to wipe away the telltale moisture on her face, Hermione strove to put as much distance between her and the space in front of her the professor had briefly occupied.

Ginny had been one of the first ones to come up to the dormitory, and saw Hermione already in her nightgown and about to crawl into bed.

"Alright?" she called from across the room. "Harry said you'd left dinner early."

"Yes; I wanted to go over some assignments while it was still quiet," Hermione fibbed, arranging the pillows and flopping down onto one.

Her excuse seemed to pacify the redhead, because Ginny readily accepted it and bid her friend goodnight. Hermione then drew the curtains around her bed, shutting her eyes and trying to get rid of the image of Severus from behind her eyelids.

Inwardly she cursed her traitorous body for becoming worked up in more ways than one at mere sight of the professor. Flashbacks of their naked skin touching and rubbing against each other with wild abandon couldn't have come at a worse time. Softly crying out into her pillow, which had thankfully been muffled by the thick material, Hermione shuddered beneath the duvet.

Rare was the occasion that she had an unkind word where it concerned the Potions master, but right at that moment, she definitely had a dictionary and thesaurus' worth of choice words.

Typically, Severus would have given a detention and taken points for any student wandering the corridors of Hogwarts. Prefect or Head Boy or Girl mattered not to him, nor did the reason. Simply put, sometimes the presence of a loitering student had been enough to irritate him, and that irritation took the form of punishment.

However, unexpectedly running into a certain Prefect from Gryffindor had been cause for a completely different type of aggravation.

Snape had been doing his best to give wide berth when it came to the young witch. Usually he would have known if Hermione was lurking nearby, as he was well acquainted with the sound of her soft, evenly spaced footsteps. However, that evening, the two happened upon one another so fast that he didn't have the chance to backtrack and go in the opposite direction.

Hermione had stood close enough that he'd been nearly able to feel her breasts through the thick material of her school robes. The top of her head rested inches away from his shoulder, and he'd wanted to grab a handful of bushy curls, tilt Hermione's head back until that tempting column of her neck was exposed, and run his tongue over the spot that, in the darkness of his bedroom at Grimmauld Place, he learned made her tremble.

Instead, he did just the opposite, clenching his hands into tight fists and leaving them buried beneath the folds of his robes. He was sure that Hermione hadn't realized the way she moved to lean into him, and instead of Snape moving into her touch the way he wanted, he stepped back and left her standing there in the empty, dimly lit corridor.

Snape's hard bottomed dragon hide boots ate up the length of the castle's stone floor as he made his way down to his private quarters. The wizard was in such a snit that he didn't utter a word to Peeves the Poltergeist, who had been lingering in another corridor and drawing what looked like a rude picture on a wall in bright green chalk.

Without uttering a word, Snape whipped out his wand and fired a hex at the wayward ghost. The blast of magic went right through his transparent body, yet was enough for Peeves to drop his chalk and cheerfully whoop at the sight of the crabby professor. Peeves gave one last joyful hoot before doing a loop-de-loop midair and disappearing through the ceiling.

It took all of a few minutes for Snape to make it to his rooms, where he lowered the wards with a flick of his hand and stalked inside. Divesting himself of his teaching robes, cravat, and frock coat, all items were abandoned to a nearby chair before he took the leather wingback near the hearth. Grinding the heel of both palms into his burning eyes, Snape exhaled deeply.

He had a headache, and it wasn't the sort that could be remedied by potion or pill. It was the kind of ache that stemmed from burning the candle at both ends, all of which led to unavoidable stress. Of course, he strove to maintain a facade of normalcy, keeping up the pretence more for everyone else's benefit than his own.

Yet between dashing back and forth with Dumbledore and Voldemort, Light and Dark, as well as following behind Draco to make sure that the young man wasn't doing anything foolish, not to mention his workload for every class, Snape was beyond the point of bone-weary. Despite being only thirty-six, he felt much older, and sometimes mused that it was a wonder he hadn't yet gone grey as the headmaster.

Everyone believes you to be black-hearted; it's only suitable that your hair matches as well, he thought wryly, running one hand through the slick, black strands.

Since the school term began, only once had Snape returned slightly battered to Hogwarts from a meeting with the Dark Lord. That evening had made him appreciate each time that Hermione helped him at Grimmauld Place. While he had been able to get around on his own, and still loathed the idea of someone helping him, especially a person he considered a child, Hermione's soft hands had been a balm to his aching body, and surprisingly, he'd been able to sleep with her nearby.

His blood had started racing when he came across Hermione in the corridors. It had been glaringly obvious that the little witch was incensed by the way he'd been ignoring her, yet Severus wasn't about to change his premeditated course of actions.

His headache was refusing to subside, and Snape slumped back in his armchair, resting his head against the supple leather. He could have summoned a pain reliever from the small stock of potions he kept on hand, but even the thought of lifting his hand to do so made him exhausted.

Therefore, it was two hours later that Snape found himself still before the hearth, tilted sideways in his armchair. He had worn himself out thinking about Dumbledore, Draco, the Unbreakable Vow, the meetings with the Dark Lord, as well as his miserable life in general. When he finally dragged himself to bed, the only thing that made his turbulent thoughts somewhat subside was the memory of annoying, yet nevertheless welcomed, unruly brown curls tickling the side of his face as he slept.
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Unintentional Inveiglement