BAD DREAMS: A Snape/Draco Romance

Severus groaned and put his hands on his head. There is an acupressure point just above the nose – right there, where the bridge of one's glasses would be if they didn't keep slipping down one's nose – and a hard steady pressure on that point will somewhat reduce the pain of a headache.Then both hands, gently, use their fingertips to smooth out the cramped muscles of the forehead, while one forces oneself to breathe in a relaxed manner.

It helped enough that he felt up to staggering out of bed without his head falling off.

Clutching the left side of his head with his hand (one wouldn't want to strew bloody bits of skull and brain on the floor if one turned out to be wrong about migraines not causing heads to explode), he swung his feet over the edge of the bed and stood up.

He knew better than to open his eyes: any light hitting them would be perceived as the blinding glare of a burning sun, accompanied by the shout of many war trumpets, and the feeling of several tenpenny nails being hammered into his head.But he knew his way around his own bedroom and didn't need eyesight to walk to his writing table, and sit in its spindly chair, and reach out to familiar bottles among the many potion bottles on the table.

First the Pain Numbing Potion, poured into his cupped left hand and then splattered over his left forehead and scalp, and cheek, and shoulder, and the floor.Then the Eye Ease Potion, intended to be used as an eye bath, but he poked the fingers of his right hand into it and used them to smear potion on his eyelids and all around his eye sockets until he felt his eyes were healed enough that he dared to open them.Severus was well aware that he was doing exactly what he tried to beat into his students' heads not to do: "Potions are powerful magic.Don't think you can treat them like candy or children's toys.Always look what you are doing.Always use potions as directed.Don't make messes."

But it reduced the agony in his head to mere misery, enough to notice his unhappy stomach. Severus always hated to admit that there was anything that a potion couldn't do better, but a Stomach Settle Charm worked best for migraine nausea; he tapped his solar plexus with his wand while uttering the charm's incantation.Then he slathered some Coldness Potion on the left side of his head.

* * *

Now he felt well enough to wash and dress for the day ahead, while lost in distracted thoughts that might be influenced by migraine's small hallucinations.He had to teach today.He suspected that he wasn't in any condition to keep the little monsters under control.Today he had sixth-years.Which was worse, the Ravenclaw-Hufflepuff class or the Slytherin-Gryffindor class?The Ravenclaw-Hufflepuff class, he decided: those stupid Hufflepuffs and argumentative Ravenclaws.The Hufflepuffs at least were careful to follow instructions when doing their lab work, and worked hard at rote memorization of recipes, but there was no hope of them ever understanding even a little bit of Theory.The Ravenclaws always tried to show off by asking absurd questions, because they preferred to speculate instead of learning what had already been discovered.They were so sloppy and careless in the lab that, halfway through his first year of teaching, Severus had made an iron-clad rule that every Ravenclaw must partner with a Hufflepuff; never will two Ravenclaws be allowed to partner together.That had made the Ravenclaws sulk but greatly reduced the number of accidents that required Madam Pomfrey's services.

And the Slytherin-Gryffindor class, despite the presence of the appalling Neville Longbottom, clumsier than any Ravenclaw, did contain a few talented students.Draco Malfoy, of course, good enough that he not only aced his own work, but dragged his brutish friends to passing grades.The Zabini boy and little Regina Nott showed promise.And, in the privacy of his own mind, Severus had to admit that the irritating Hermione Granger was a good student, despite her disrespectful attitude. The way she spoke to him, the way she looked at him, made his hand itch for his wand.He wanted to curse her thoroughly, teach her who's in charge here.But dueling with her would be a bad idea; she'd think he was treating her like an equal.Better to treat her like the child she was and put her over his knee for a spanking.That was an enjoyable thought.It even cheered him up a little.

So, of course, he pushed it out of his mind.Severus believed that it is both immature and inefficient to waste time on daydreams and adolescent wish-fulfillment fantasies.He believed that life, at least in this day and age, is a constant battle against the forces of darkness, death, decay, and decadence."Darkness, death, decay, and decadence."He always loved the oratorical way it rolled off his tongue.And in a world so full of irresponsible fools and careless dunderheads, there was no one to fill in for him if he ever took even a momentary break from battle.

* * *

He didn't feel like eating breakfast, but fortunately today's lesson required some advance preparation.Last week the class had made a concentrate of cow's eyes, to the accompaniment of nervous laughter and sick jokes from squeamish students, but today's potion required the concentrate to be fresh, not a week old, so Severus had to prepare enough for all the students.

He was happy to enter the small workroom attached to the Potions classroom.Even though it was spotless, he dusted a little, just for pleasure, before he set to work.The countertops, the cauldrons and glass vessels stacked on their shelves in their cabinet, the tools hanging from assigned hooks on the wall, could be dusted by pointing his wand at them with a grand swooping gesture and an incantation, but he didn’t use a wand for the stoppered bottles and jars on the shelf over the counters: he wiped them with a cloth from one of the drawers.He had an excuse, about not mixing the magic of the ingredients with the magic of the Dusting Charm, and did not think of himself as fondling the ingredient bottles.

With skill gained by long experience, Severus efficiently sliced the cow's eyes correctly.Even so, the task took enough of his attention that all other thoughts were shut out of his head.That, in addition to the pleasure of doing a thing right, was why he loved brewing potions.With familiarity from his many years of potion making, he viewed the cow's eyes simply as ingredients.He was slightly aware of their magical potential, as if it were whispering in the background, but (unlike the students) he did not notice at all whether the eyes looked like human eyes or were looking at him.

* * *

The Slytherin-Gryffindor students had come to class and been threatened with loss of points if they didn't stop shouting and banging things around.They'd been directed to copy down the instructions on the board and then follow them.Now they were working.They were making a potion to recall unpleasant memories, not that anyone would ever want to use such a potion, but it had quite a number of ingredients that had to be dripped into the cauldron, requiring no less than four different types of dripping, and was therefore good practice.

Severus strolled among them to observe their work.Draco Malfoy, of course, was dripping the squid ink correctly, and with the appearance of casual ease, as if he also had done it a thousand times.Draco had his partner, the Parkinson girl, and his friends, Crabbe and Goyle, under control. The Zabini boy, partnered as usual with that Gryffindor girl who looked more like a rugby player than a female, and little Regina Nott, partnered with Millicent Bulstrode, were doing okay.The other Slytherin pairs needed some correction.

Now the Gryffindors.Hermione Granger was working with Neville Longbottom.Severus tried to tell himself that that was good because it would reduce the likelihood of explosions, but still he was disgusted that Granger would try to further build up her ego by showing that she was better than Longbottom. Now, if she compared herself to young Malfoy, that would be a challenge.Potter (let's grit teeth and not look at him today) and Weasley had to be reminded that the thistle root was supposed to be cut into tetrahedral pyramids, not cubes.Thomas and Finnegan had to be reminded that the sign of a professional is that his work area is always kept clean; making messes is the mark of a dilettante.Patil and Brown were working correctly, except: "Could you young ladies possibly hold the noise level down to a dull roar? It hurts my head."That silenced them for a moment, but they were giggling again as soon as he left their lab bench.

Watching the class from his desk at the front of the room, Severus found himself watching Malfoy's hands.Severus knew that there is no truth in the common belief that long, graceful fingers are skillful, agile fingers, but Malfoy's were both.The boy doesn't know how lucky he is, Severus thought, to have inherited physical grace from both sides of his family.Not just the hands — Draco at 16 had grown tall without ever going through a gangly phase; he'd grown his white-gold hair long and smoothly tied it back in a ponytail that followed his movements as though it were choreographed.Somehow, there was not even one pimple on that even-featured face.The white-gold hair and fair skin seemed to glow like the first light of morning turning stygian darkness into misty silver dawn, so that his face, marked by neither the wear and tear of adult life nor the blemishes of adolescence, seemed impossibly beautiful and fragile.

Severus mentally slapped himself ("Fool!"), which made his headache worse ("Double fool!"), so he went quickly into his workroom to slather on some more Pain Numbing Potion and Coldness Potion before coming out to see what horrors the students had committed while he was distracted.Fortunately, there were no horrors, only relatively minor mistakes that required correction.Severus always resented the way that students from the other three Houses responded to his useful corrections and helpful advice; they acted as if his words were a cruel punishment, a scolding, or an insult."They must have very swollen heads if they expect to do everything right the first time.They’re so oversensitive, feeling insulted just because someone mentions that they've made a common mistake," Severus thought yet again.

But his eyes drifted to Malfoy again.Draco was looking more like Lucius all the time.Not Lucius as he was now, having added bulk (somehow without getting fat) and frown-lines, so that he radiated power and prestige rather than potential and beauty, but Lucius as he was when Severus had first met him.Already a grown man accustomed to exercising power, but quite a young one, only a few years older than Severus, nowhere near 30 yet.And he had smiled at Severus, and asked him to tell him about his dissertation research....

Severus groaned: that was something he didn't want to remember, even if he hadn't needed to keep his attention on the class.Those damned girls were looking at him: had they heard him groan?"Miss Brown, Miss Patil, if you failed to write down the instructions when you were directed to do so, they are written on the board, not on my face."

At last the class period ended.As the students grabbed up their book bags to prance out of the room, Severus assigned Dean and Seamus to clean up the classroom, so that they could learn the value of cleaning your work area as you go.He had to follow them closely and continually point out spots that they'd missed, as they seemed to believe that 'cleaning' meant a lick and a promise, and that complaining about being late to lunch was their most important task.Severus rather hated them for being there, preventing him from having his classroom to himself.At last they finally finished and he sent them away.Severus cherished his empty classroom, his own little kingdom, and took comfort from running his gaze over the neat racks of equipment and the cabinets of potion ingredients; everything in its place and a place for everything.All too soon, the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws bustled in, chattering with their loud voices, and were also threatened with loss of points if their noisiness continued.

* * *

Severus survived the Hufflepuff-Ravenclaw class better than he'd survived the morning class: there were no Malfoys to remind him of things he'd rather forget.Still, he suspected that the pain in his head had put him into a mood in which he might have over-reacted to the students' usual lack of effort, lack of interest, and lack of respect.He was overjoyed when the class period ended, and he went straight to his room, took a dose of Sleeping Potion, and went to bed.

He awoke in the dark of night and noticed that a lit candle on his writing table was illuminating a plate of tuna fish sandwiches and carrot sticks, a glass of milk, and a pitcher of ice water.And a note, he noticed when he was closer.It said: "Fasting is not a cure for migraine.Neither is dehydration.–AD"

Severus smiled involuntarily.Dumbledore was right, as usual: forgetting to eat always made his problems worse.Dear God, what must it be like to be right all the time like Dumbledore?To be like Dumbledore, never tempted to do bad things?Feeling vaguely comforted that his father figure still cared about him, Severus ate his meal, used some more Pain Numbing Potion, went back to bed in somewhat better health, and went back to sleep.

* * *

Lying in his bed, Severus didn’t know whether he was asleep and dreaming, or awake and indulging in a rare moment of idle reminiscence.Either way, he was lost in memories from five years ago, when the roster of entering students included the names ‘Potter’ and ‘Malfoy’.Everybody knew all about the famous Harry Potter; it wasn’t just a coincidence of names.

The name ‘Malfoy’ wasn’t a coincidence, either.For years, Lucius Malfoy had spoken graciously to Snape every time he came to Hogwarts, once or twice a year for Board of Governors meetings, and also for the Annual Fete, and besides asking about Severus’s research and checking whether he needed a good word said for him to the Department of Magical Research’s Grant Committee, he also reported proudly on his son Draco’s good marks in primary school, his excellence at dancing lessons and fencing lessons, and his accomplishments at Junior Quidditch.At this summer’s Fete, he had mentioned that Draco would be starting at Hogwarts this September.

A review of the roster confirmed that the names ‘Crabbe"; ‘Goyle’, "Lestrange", and "Nott" were also there.Snape felt as if his long-buried past were rising up to tower over him and crash down upon him, a frightened and angry feeling.He knew that things come in cycles, but this wasn’t the Saturn return of his first run-in with James Potter, nor the Jupiter return of the first time he met Lucius Malfoy.Maybe it had something to do with the spiky peaks of the current sunspot maximum.He told himself, stay calm, there’s no reason to expect children to be like their parents, Harry might be a great deal less unpleasant than James, there’s no use to think about it until they’re actually here.

* * *

But he couldn’t keep that resolution when the rest of the staff kept talking about Harry Potter, Harry Potter, Harry Potter.That flibberty-gibbit flighty fool Flitwick was bouncing around, chortling: "Isn’t it wonderful that Harry Potter is coming here!Aren’t you looking forward to meeting him, Severus?"

"No." said Snape.He added: "I do not become excited about fame, only about those rare occasions when a student shows signs of intelligence or diligence."

Even scaring off the other professors with his scowl and sour tongue did not save him from hearing about that Potter.When he simply needed Hagrid to do an errand for him, a visit to the Forbidden Forest, Mister Strong-Back-Weak-Mind wasn’t available: Dumbledore had sent him to take Harry Potter to Diagon Alley to buy Harry’s school things.

"More special treatment!All other students are responsible for buying their own school supplies, but a member of the school staff is sent to take Harry Potter shopping!Really, Albus, the way everyone fawns on that boy, he must already have quite an exaggerated idea of his own importance.The sooner he receives the same treatment as any other student, the sooner he will learn to pull his own weight and take care of himself, and yet you give him special privileges!"

"Yes, indeed, Severus, Harry is receiving the same treatment as any other student who has no parents or relatives to prepare him for school.We will be concerned for his welfare as we are for that of all students, while requiring of him the same responsibilities as we do of all students."

* * *

When the new first-years were led into the Great Hall for Sorting, Severus watched them with even more interest than did the other professors.Every year, all the staff was eager to see the new students, hoping to get an idea of their characters, what kind of students the teachers would be stuck with for the next seven years, and the Heads of each House hoping to be assigned children who would be a credit to their House and not a disgrace.This year, they were all especially eager to get a glimpse of Harry Potter.

All the staff at the Head Table and all the returning students at their House tables stared at the ragged line of first-years as McGonagall led them into the Great Hall.Many were trying to recognize which boy was Harry Potter without waiting for his name to be called.Severus had six names to match to faces, and five of them were easy: all four boys very much resembled their fathers, and Amanita Lestrange took after her mother.Severus would have preferred if she hadn’t.

When he saw the exact image of the James Potter he remembered from childhood, his mind was flooded with memories of all the slights and damage he’d endured from James.He forced himself to pull his glance away from Harry, in hope of pulling his mind to more pleasant thoughts.Young Malfoy was a good-looking child, and, with all the talents his father boasted of, he’d be an asset to any House.Severus tried to suppress an entirely irrational fear that the boy might be Sorted into some other House.Lucius would be horrified and Severus deeply humiliated if some other House took the House Cup away from Slytherin with points earned by Lucius’s son.

"Crabbe, Vincent" and "Goyle, Gregory" were, unsurprisingly, Sorted into Slytherin.Severus thought that they looked cute, in the way that very young puppies of very large breeds always look adorable, with their feet and skin much too big for them, and the rounded babyishness of muzzles that would be viciously pointed in adulthood.If they resembled their fathers mentally as much as physically, they wouldn’t be earning Slytherin any points for brainpower, but they would be useful as muscle, with the virtue of loyalty, but a tendency to thuggishness that would have to be channeled into activities that would not result in loss of points from Slytherin.

"Malfoy, Draco" was Sorted into Slytherin so rapidly as to prove that Severus’ fear had been irrational."Nott, Regina" didn’t look all that much like either of her parents; Severus hoped she had inherited her father’s brain and her mother’s heart rather than her mother’s brain and her father’s heart.Who said anything about hearts?They just lead you into trouble; trick you into making foolish decisions.Much better not to have a heart at all.It’s the brain that’s important, not only for understanding the science of magic, but for understanding that good and evil are not just some sentimental fairy tale, but actually are a way of distinguishing between intelligent, productive behavior and stupid, counterproductive behavior.

"Potter, Harry" went into Gryffindor.Well, that just went to show that his character resembled his annoying father as much as his looks did.Always seeking his own glory, regardless of the cost to others. It would have been …interesting… if Potter had been Sorted into Slytherin, required to learn that Slytherins stick together, stick up for each other.Snape’s mouth twisted as he involuntarily reflected that that’s what’s wrong with having hearts: it led Slytherins to stick together all the way into Voldemort’s circle, and the brain has to decide whom to betray: one’s friends or the human species.He hated remembering that he had been the traitor against his friends.He hated noticing the parallel between his own situation, betraying his friends for the sake of the Light Side, and James Potter’s situation, betrayed by his own friend to the Dark Side, being killed despite all Severus’s efforts to save him.He hated himself for having been a traitor, and unsuccessful.

He forced his eyes to the Slytherin table, where Crabbe, Goyle, Malfoy, and Nott had found seats among their peers, and reminded himself of all the friends who had considered themselves rescued rather than betrayed.Lucius Malfoy, for example, bewitched by Voldemort, controlled like a marionette, compelled to do dreadful things, not limited to luring his associates into the same trap, and very glad to have been freed from the enchantment.The trial court had believed his innocence and allowed him to resume his life of public service that had been interrupted by Voldemort, and to brighten Severus’s life with his charm whenever they met.

* * *

Severus awoke in the morning without a migraine.Unfortunately, he still had a head full of Malfoys, which was almost as painful.The younger Lucius, handsome and elegant, was prowling across Severus's memories.The younger Lucius was self-confident and charming, wealthy and socially prominent, and quite an intelligent wizard — and he asked Severus knowledgeable questions about his research, and listened to Severus's explanations with interest.The younger Severus felt tremendously flattered to have attention and approval from such a man – he resolved to make a good impression on Lucius, and gain his friendship.When Lucius eventually offered Severus free run of the Malfoy library, Severus was as delighted by this sign of Lucius's trust and affection as by access to such a magnificent collection of rare and valuable books.

The older Severus's mouth twisted into something a little bit different than his usual sneer.He was sneering at himself for having been such a fool.Such a damned, obtuse, gullible, swollen-headed, egotistical, idiotic fool.Words were not enough to express it."Just give me a little flattery and I'll follow you anywhere," Severus berated himself."Thought I was so smart and never noticed that Malfoy was playing me for a sucker all along.When the vanity gets up, the brain shuts down, or else I would have seen that he was leading me around by the nose, getting me to hex his enemies under the impression that I was just trying out spells I'd learned from old texts.A fool being seduced by intellectual curiosity, that's an irony or a subject for vulgar slapstick."

Much as he despised himself for his past bad judgment, this scolding was not enough to drown out the voice of his conscience, telling him that his nose wasn't the only thing Lucius had led him around by, and that intellectual curiosity wasn't the only thing he'd been seduced by....When the younger Lucius said good-night to the younger Severus, sometimes he had clasped his hand a little too long, looked into his eyes a little too deeply, and smiled a little too meaningfully.Then the younger Severus would go home and dream.Dreams that were very pleasurable, while they lasted.There was no shame or guilt in the dreams, only kisses and caresses and warmth and pleasure.And then he'd awake, with both recollection and physical evidence of what kind of dream he'd been having, and the shame and guilt would flood in.

As long as he couldn't stop remembering it, he could wonder whether Lucius had known about this aspect of the younger Severus's feelings.Sometimes he thought he'd kept it secret well enough that even Lucius Malfoy, the master manipulator who had gotten him to do everything he wanted, even murder, still hadn't known.Other times he thought Malfoy must have put some kind of spell on him to make him have those cravings.It never occurred to him that his feelings were perfectly natural, perfectly obvious, and Lucius hadn't needed any magic to take advantage of them.

Severus reminded himself of another misjudgment to blame himself for.For years, after the trials had found Severus rehabilitated and Lucius innocent, he had believed that Lucius had been acting under an enchantment.He had been free to appreciate Lucius's charm and intelligence and patronage without blaming him for the bad things he'd done — they were done only because of the enchantment.Then, little more than a year ago, he'd learned that Lucius had been and still was, not only voluntarily but enthusiastically, a loyal Death Eater.Since then, Severus had divided his attention between sneering at himself for being fooled again, and worrying about the children in his care, especially Draco: were their dreadful fathers leading them to the Dark Side?Now another unhappy thought was again claiming its share of his attention; he resumed chastising himself for the first time he'd been fooled by Lucius Malfoy.

* * *

This went on for weeks.Severus often forgot to eat, and he couldn't sleep well when he had nightmares, so his health visibly suffered.His eyes seemed even more sunken and his skin had paled to a rather greenish blotchy color that made the dark circles under his eyes even more obvious by contrast.He taught his classes by rote habit mixed with unusually savage (even for him) outbursts of temper, and remembered Lucius every time he saw Draco.

Severus never had nightmares about what was really his first murder, as it was something of an abstract concept to him.One day, in the course of a discussion of potions that control the human will, Lucius had presented the younger Severus with a wonderfully complex problem in Potion Theory: invent a potion that will cause the drinker to commit suicide.Lucius not only provided a lab and funding, but several Muggles to test it on.In those days, testing it on Muggles hadn’t seemed very different from testing it on mice or rabbits.With the resources that Lucius had provided, Severus had not only invented the potion, but figured out how it had to be personalized for each recipient, whether Muggle or wizard.Lucius even selected a wizard to test that hypothesis on: some enemy of his, who worked at the Ministry and was so surrounded by protective barriers that no charm nor curse could touch him, and anyone who attacked him by Muggle means wouldn't be able to Apparate away afterwards.A potion, disguised as his daily glass of red wine, was the only loophole.Severus brewed the potion and disguised it, while thinking eagerly of verifying his method of personalization.It always was a delight to see real effects happen the way that theory and calculation had predicted they would.Someone else placed the potion in the recipient's cabinet.Lucius reported back that the potion had been entirely successful.All Severus's friends, who had introduced him to Lucius in the first place, applauded him.

And it had never occurred to young Severus that Department of Magical Law Enforcement would investigate a suicide to find if it were natural.And it had certainly never occurred to Severus that there would be potion left over for the investigators to find.And it had absolutely never occurred to Severus that they would try to identify the potion maker by testing the potion.Until he read it in the Daily Prophet and realised for the first time that he'd been very foolish.He did not want to go to Azkaban – he'd seen a Dementor once and he would rather die than go to Azkaban."Oh, well, death before dishonor," he told his friends. "A short life but a merry one, eh?"

But Lucius had offered him a spell to protect him from DMLE, and Severus gratefully accepted.When the time arrived (midnight at dark of the moon), it turned out to be an elaborate ritual by bonfire light: literally a bone-fire, one of many dramatic touches, like swirling smoke and flowing blood, black robes in darkness and gold gleaming in fire light, deep-voiced chants in an unknown language.Severus was very impressed by the theatrics, and how well his friends knew their parts (some of them he wouldn't have thought able to memorize even one chant), and his brain felt fuzzy, as if from excess of alcohol or cannabis, and then a hideous, tall, red-eyed, snake-man arose from the fire and stepped out of it.Clearly the god these people worshipped, as they variously bowed and genuflected while hailing him with greetings that Severus's ears couldn't quite make out.Severus automatically fell to his knees like the others.The rest of that ritual was vague in his mind, scattered images of the snake-man holding him with hands that burned like fire and ice, while Lucius led him to repeat words whose meaning he didn't catch at the time, but later realised was a loyalty oath.And the snake-man touched his wand to Severus's arm, which was the worst physical pain that Severus had ever experienced, and apparently had caused him to pass out.Later on, he had become more familiar with the ritual, and it did appear in his nightmares.

But that time, the younger Severus awoke in bed in a guestroom at Malfoy Manor and in rather more pain than usual.When he looked at his arm, he saw the skull and snake mark that he'd been branded with, and realised that yet again he'd gotten himself into a situation without having thought it through.

But his friends clustered around him, cheerfully congratulating him on having joined their fellowship, and Lucius Malfoy told him: "A wizard of your talent will be an invaluable asset to the Dark Lord," while the others praised the advantages of the Dark Side.It's a great career move, said Cassius Avery, and it can get you laid, said Evan Rozier, and agents in the Ministry will cause DMLE to lose all evidence against you, said Danoto Wilkes, and of course it is logical that the people with the most wizarding power should rule, said Casper Lestrange, while those with no magic at all must be kept under control, especially since they had a long history of enviously trying to kill wizards. "And immortality!"Damiana Lestrange exclaimed: "The conquest of death!"

And Damiana explained that their master was named Vol-de-mort because he meant to steal life from death.A very great wizard, he had invented the most powerful spells for becoming immortal, and was directing skilled followers to refine the spells to be used upon lesser wizards without killing them."And then he will reward his loyal disciples with immortality!We're called Death Eaters because we eat death and spit it out!"

As Wilkes, who had always been a vulgar type, cheerfully mocked Damiana for having said P when she meant H, Severus reflected that this wouldn't be so bad after all.What a research project!

* * *

But many parts were so bad after all.Lucius now coldly gave him orders, no longer smiling at him.And the Dark Lord punished any failure by a follower not only severely but publicly.At the Death Eater meeting, the Dark Lord would call the offender to approach him, grovel, be tortured with the Cruciatus Curse, and then thank Lord Voldemort for having corrected his error and taught him to do better.Then sometimes Voldemort would kill the offender at that point.Severus thought that was immature and inefficient."If you intend to kill the man, just kill him.Don't waste everyone's time humiliating him first, as if it were some kind of game," he wanted to say.Severus soon started having recurrent nightmares in which Lucius tortured him with the Cruciatus Curse.That was even worse than the other kind of dream about Lucius had been.

The worst thing of all, about which he regularly had nightmares even in the peaceful years before that Potter got Voldemort stirred up again, was what Severus privately called "my first murder".His friends Wilkes and Rozier had appeared at his door one night with broomsticks and demanded that he come along with them for a little fun.The "fun" was waiting at a sweet cottage in the countryside where a woman and three young children were sleeping. As Rozier set the house ablaze with magic fire from his wand, Wilkes used his wand to magically seal all exits so the frightened victims could not escape.Laughing at how helpless and agitated the victims were, Wilkes levitated the baby out of her mother's arms and smashed him down, while Rozier set magic fire, which cannot be put out, on the biggest child's nightgown.Worst, worst, worst, was the simple Avada Kedavra curse that silenced the mother's screams — Severus was altogether horrified, never having seen before how unobtrusively life can leave a human body, between one eye blink and the next.And then it's gone.Forever, as far as Severus knew.They waited until the house was burned completely before they raised the Dark Mark over its ashes.The nightmares started that same night.

When he figured out that this was a very unpleasant way to live, possibly as bad as Azkaban, and also a very illogical way of pursuing immortality (defeating death by killing people for no reason except 'fun' or childish spite), the younger Severus decided to turn himself in to Dumbledore, a wizard vastly more worthy of respect than anyone at the Ministry.Subsequent service as a double agent had kept him participating in many more waking nightmares.The older Severus now wished he could persuade the stupid children who thought Evil was glamorous that Evil is really not fun at all.They wouldn't think it was glamorous if they'd ever seen Damiana Lestrange kill.She always preferred to use a knife rather than a wand.She liked to cut throats, because she got off on the gush of blood.She'd stand there with the horrible red sticky drippiness blotching her smooth skin and softly draped white silk gown, and then do a Stain Removal Charm so that her skin was again clean, her dress again as white as silk can be, and she looked virginally innocent — until one looked at the sluttishly satisfied expression on her face.It had occasionally occurred to him to wonder whose blood she rolled around in when she had sex with her husband.

* * *

Severus was in his office, trying to concentrate on grading a stack of essays … although really it was less unpleasant to think about what a rotten excuse for a human being he was than to be reminded of how dimwitted all these damn children were: how will they ever grow up able to fight the Dark Side?He had had a particularly vivid nightmare the night before, about the handsome young Lucius Malfoy of his memories.In the dream, a handshake had turned into kisses and embraces and an embarrassingly desperate state of sexual desire, which led to a fabulous bed with black satin sheets and exotic animal furs and two naked bodies intertwined, with the taste and scent and texture of the other man’s intoxicating skin, and then they were doing something that Severus would have blushed to remember dreaming about.Then the dream had changed completely, in the way that dreams do, and he was lying, cruciform, on the same bed, watching in even more astonishment than pain as blood fountained from his chest, where Lucius had just slashed him with an obsidian knife.His arms and legs were held down, surely by magic as there were no ropes, and Lucius stopped the blood flow with a gesture of his wand.More careful wand motions peeled the skin back from the slash along the mid-line, first on the left side of his chest and then on the right side.It was by far more agonizing than any pain that Severus had ever imagined, and he cried and screamed and writhed, and did all the humiliating things that heroes never do.The dream got worse.Muscles of the body wall peeled back.Ribs bent open.Internal organs sliced like sandwich meats while still in their places…. Very soon, Severus woke up screaming, and eager to push the nightmare out of his mind with caffeine, and other thoughts to concentrate on.Thus, detailed criticism of every word of those essays.

* * *

He heard a knock on his door, and looking through the wood (that was a useful little charm that all the professors had on their office doors), he saw who it was.Under these circumstances, a pleasant distraction from the essays."Come in, Draco."

Draco strolled in with something less than his usual swagger, but as usual did not wait for an invitation to grab the uncomfortable wooden visitors' chair, turn it around, and sit on it backwards.Severus realised that this must be about his job duties, not just an opportunity to stare at Draco."Is it a Potions question or a House question?"

"Neither.I'm worried about you," answered Draco."You've been looking sicker and sicker for quite a while now."Severus opened his mouth to speak without the slightest notion whether he was going to say "Stay out of my business" or "I'm perfectly fine", but Draco put up a hand to keep him silent.

"I know you're going to say that it's just your migraines," Draco told Severus, "But it gets worse whenever you look at me, and migraines don't do that."

Severus stared at Draco in complete astonishment.He had no idea what to say.He had thought that he had enough self-control that no sign of his thoughts showed on his face, and he hadn't known that Draco was watching him.And, it not being possible that Draco was concerned about him out of mere kindness, Draco must be following some plan that Severus couldn't even imagine.Just like dealing with Lucius.

"Draco, I shouldn't tell you this, but whenever I see you, I am reminded of your father."

"I quite agree that remembering my father is enough to make anyone sick," Draco said, with only a little of the usual sarcasm returning to his voice."Would it help if I dyed my hair red like a Weasley, or black like that Potter?"

Severus thought of what Draco would look like with his long, straight, smooth, hair black.That was a mistake: he looked even more delicious than in real life.Severus closed his eyes helplessly."Please don't dye your hair, Draco. Thank you for your concern, but I'm going to be fine."

Draco knew when he had been dismissed.Severus tried to return to grading the essays.At least the Christmas holiday was coming soon.He wished he could spend it on a beach in Brazil, but he had to stay at Hogwarts.At least he wouldn't have to teach, wouldn't have to see Draco, wouldn't have to see any of the students if he just skipped meals in the Great Hall, ate in his room instead.

* * *

Severus actually did have a relatively pleasant holiday.He spent it immersed in books and calculations, trying to solve one of the famous unsolved problems of Arithmancy.He didn't find the solution, but he did find that when he fell asleep, not intentionally, but over a book he was staying up to read, falling asleep in his chair as the book gently slipped from his fingers, he didn't dream.

But all too soon the holiday ended, the students returned, classes resumed, and Draco knocked on his office door again.Draco entered with his usual pale blond good looks, his usual swagger, and his usual "I know I can get away with anything" smile, and, as usual, didn't wait for an invitation to turn the visitor chair around and sit backwards on it.

"What do you want, Draco?"

Draco's smile got stronger and more wicked.He was obviously planning to say something outrageous and enjoy the shocked reaction."Do you want to have sex with me?"

The tone sounded more like an invitation than a request for information.Severus felt like the whole world had gone crazy around him, or perhaps he was a pawn in some subtle Malfoy scheme."You could not possibly have said what I thought I heard."

Draco's smile got bigger still.In fact, it became the big grin of a mischievous child, which was probably not the effect that he wanted to achieve — it didn't match the tone of his voice, confident that he was in control of the situation."Judging from your answer, I think you heard exactly what I said.But in case you didn't, I'll repeat it in simpler words."He affected a very ugly American accent: "Hey, dude, wanna fuck?"

Of course the sincere answer would have been Yes.But that was getting caught up in Malfoy plots, taking advantage of a child too young to know better, violating the responsibility of a teacher, yielding to desires he never wanted to admit he had.

"You are breaking quite a large number of rules simultaneously," Severus was trying to sound harsh and threatening."I really should give you a long detention, one that has something to do with scrubbing out the sewer drains."If the student had been anyone other than Draco, Severus would already have given him or her a detention for impertinence to a professor, and sent him or her away with a profoundly dismissive remark that had required no effort: "Miss Valentine, you would be wise to practice your flirting techniques with a mirror before you expose them to public humiliation.Mr. Sweet, I am not THAT sorry for you."

Draco was still smiling, confident, not at all intimidated. "Boomslang skin can have either of two entirely different effects when used as a potion ingredient.What are the factors that determine which of these effects it has in any given potion?"

Severus jerked like he was going to jump out of his chair.That was the subject of his dissertation, although not exactly one of the questions that Lucius had asked.Trying to control his voice, his face, and not reveal any more emotion, he said: "This is a case in which I approve of your abrupt change of subject."

"Not so abrupt," Draco replied.He had stopped smirking, in his effort to explain correctly."Over the holiday, I spoke with Mrs. Nott.I know she’s one of the people you used to know, back before you became a professor, and I know that she always knows everything about everyone.I told her that I was worried about you, because you seemed to be in declining health, but all you would say is that I look like my father.She told me quite a lot about you and my father, including his show of interest in your dissertation."Severus wanted to scream in rage against little Nelly Nott, too stupid to know the uses of boomslang skin even if someone strangled her with it, thinking she had the right to spread tales about his private life.For that matter, had he really been so obvious that even Nelly Nott knew about it?Self-control.Self-control.

"She asked me if I know that my father is sometimes quite a son of a bitch, except she didn’t want to blame it on his mother," Draco smiled at that recollection."I told her that my father is a right bastard, and so am I when I want to be.She said my father had been terribly cruel to you.She called you a poor, inept boy.She said he could have gotten what he wanted from you with the Imperius Curse, he didn't need to play cat and mouse and go after you with teasing and flirting and make you fall in love with him, and just generally be a total cocktease."Draco's eyes were half-closed, as if he was reciting from memory."I told her that you're probably lucky that he didn't put out, considering what he does to his girlfriends."

Draco opened his eyes, looked Severus in the face, and continued:"So I reckoned, if your goal in life is to play hide the sausage with a Malfoy, I can take care of that.Problem solved, everyone’s happy." He shrugged in a way that indicated his satisfaction at his solution.

Severus realised that he was either going to throw his whole life away on a very complete act of folly or going to treat Draco Malfoy the same as any other Slytherin student.He told himself that this is what happens when one shows favoritism to a student, no matter how justified the favoritism.Any young student in first-year Potions who came to his office hours asking intelligent questions about why putting porcupine quills in the potion to cure boils before taking it off the fire causes it to explode, while the porcupine quills are supposed to be added to Engorgement Potion while it is still on the fire would have would have gotten his same effort to explain accurately but understandably….Any fifth-year student who had asked if he could please write an extra credit essay on the newly famous nineteenth century Potion inventory Rosemary Foxglove (newly famous because, in her lifetime, all her discoveries had been credited to various wizards) could have borrowed relevant books from him….

"Mr. Malfoy, I’m afraid you have forced me to give you a detention.With Filch, I should think.It is impertinent to proposition a teacher.It is extremely rude to refuse to accept No for an answer.It is unbecomingly arrogant to believe that you are the answer to someone else’s prayers.And it was a stupidity that I did not expect from you, to refuse the opportunity I offered, to let you off with a warning instead of a detention."