I'll Stand Alone

-Your strength is my weakness, your weakness my hate-

It was well past midnight and the Dark Arts professor was still not in her bed.

The Grey Lady sank down on the bed's pale blue coverlet and bit down on her transparent lip, debating with herself about doing another sweep of the castle. Miss Jardin was simply no place to be found and had been for several hours now-in fact, the Grey Lady had not seen Miss Jardin since early that morning; Miss Jardin had been dressing, tugging a stocking angrily over her knee and muttering to herself, her eyes limmed with grey shadows. The Dark Arts professor had then raced through breakfast and slipped out of sight shortly after...twelve hours hence. She had apparently not left the grounds and had not been seen by any of the castle's residents.

The Grey Lady pulled a wrinkle out of her skirts and stood up, ready and resigned to another search. She could not leave matters as they stood at present. The Dark Arts professor was a denizen of Ravenclaw Tower, and Ravenclaw Tower was always and ever her sole responsibility.

It was perfectly normal and quite reasonable to worry. If Miss Jardin had been wandering sleepless through the castle's halls or getting a midnight snack from the House Elves then all her worries would be for naught. But since the young lady in question had been seen by neither student nor ghost nor beast nor portrait for half a day, worry pressed forth. It was natural and commendable. Inevitable.

Painful.

The Grey Lady walked across the carpet, her feet brushing it lightly and slipped through the wall on the far side, pressing her way through the rock.

The hallways were silent and even the portraits had drifted off to rest. Occasionally she would pass a fellow ghost passing in the other direction and they would nod or bow to each other depending on the era in which they had lived. She glided through the hallways, calling softly as she went, but she did not expect a response. Kitchen, gardens, classrooms, grounds-all full of people breathing quietly and all she met were where they should be.

She entered the Great Hall, paused to look at the dark wood of the tables and chairs gleaming in the light from the full moon in the ceiling and pressed a hand to where her heart had been.

The Grey Lady dropped to hover over a bench in the Great Hall and think hard, turning over each bit she could remember a hundred times over, fretting everything into pieces. A queer, nasty little suspicion was forming in her mind; it grew stronger and more definite each time her mind returned to Miss Jardin's muttering over her stockings that morning. Bits and pieces all jumbled together, but there had been recognisable words mixed within; "nightmares" and "tell him". To the Grey Lady, there was only one "him" who could be muttered about in that tone of voice. She sat quite still. No, she had not looked in every place in the castle after all; she had not checked the dungeons except for a cursory glance about the stairs. To venture deeper meant meeting the Bloody Baron.

The dungeons belonged to the Bloody Baron, who stalked them every night after curfew, insuring that no interloper would dare broach his domain. The other ghosts were not exempt from this decree and the Baron had made it quite clear several times over that no one was allowed in his dungeons without his express permission. Possessive as only a true Slytherin could be. She snorted softly between her teeth. Well, the Baron would have to content himself with letting her bend the rules a bit tonight-after all, he did not see the way Professor Snape looked at Miss Jardin. The Grey Lady shuddered, hands gripping her elbows. He was always staring at her with a cold, lurking hunger peering through the sneer in his eyes, and the worst thing of all was that the Grey Lady was not entirely sure Professor Snape even knew it was there.

Well. Time to stop sitting and rescue her Dark Arts Professor. Placing an air of determined command on her face, the Grey Lady passed through the doorway that led to the Slytherin dormitories and hurried down the damp stone steps. The corridor reeked from the Potions classes held only a short way away and she resisted the temptation to hold a nose she did not have anymore.

She placed a thin hand on the wall. Perhaps it would temper the Baron's wrath if she didn't actually enter the Slytherin chambers. The Slytherins slept here and their Head of House slept further down, over here...

"Lady Anna," a voice rumbled quietly from behind, emphasis on each word, and her back stiffened in response. "Why are you here?"

The Bloody Baron was the only one who called her by name. She turned her head enough to see him looming behind her, gaunt and pale, his silver colouring dimmer then any of the other ghosts at Hogwarts.

"Baron," she said politely, and made a slight curtsey as she tried to gauge exactly how upset he was. "I believe your Head of House has made off with a resident of my Tower."

The Baron looked at her in silence for a long moment and it took a tremendous effort of will to keep her face blank and innocent. His silence was not unusual; the Baron preferred to simply stare at his victims until they ran away screaming. This tactic had limited success on other ghosts however, and for those cases the Baron would step close to the offender and glare at them until they went away. You simply couldn't argue with perfect silence.

"I know," he said simply, and offered her his arm. Her jaw dropped.

"You KNOW?" she blurted, her voice jumping madly over each syllable before she could regain control of it.

"I know," he said again, and offered his arm once more, with a pointed little shake that told her she was to take it.

After a minute, she did.

Taking her back to Ravenclaw had been out of the question from the start. The closest secret passage was the one he had used the night he had checked her skinny arm for a Dark Mark that wasn't there, a passage that was completely unsuitable in the present situation because it opened out into the Ravenclaw common room. That left taking her back with him into Slytherin, another highly unappealing prospect but sadly the only reasonable solution. He growled.

Getting her back to the Slytherin dormitories would be difficult. The corridors swarmed with students packed end to end in each direction and he doubted very much that his Slytherins would understand if he suddenly appeared in their midst with an unconscious girl in his arms. He would be forced to creep and cringe against the walls like a mouse, an activity that set his teeth even more on edge as he thought about it.

He had been forced to wait until nightfall, when everyone was at dinner and Hogwarts empty save for the dining room. In the meantime he wandered about his office, making a half-hearted attempt at reorganisation and the work he had meant to complete, pausing every so often to glare viciously at the small slumped figure inhabiting his chair. Every now and then she would shiver and draw her arms and legs in closer to her small body. Poor, poor little princess. She could shiver and whimper all she liked. It was a most fitting punishment for her trouble. However, when her lips had begun to show blue around the edges, he had been forced to cover her with a spare cloak to spare her frostbite, sneering all the while.

It wasn't that cold.

"Weakling," he snapped, studying the sleeping girl. Her body barely made a dent under the scratchy woolen folds of the cloak. Such a tiny, little helpless thing, a endless bit of trouble he couldn't even deal with until after she was awake. He bent close and whispered to her prone body. "Serves you right for putting yourself in this situation, oblivious, unconscious and helpless. You are very lucky, Miss Woodville, that I am a man of honour."

Snape busied himself with cleaning the glassware while he waited out the hours until nightfall.

At last the footsteps and voices had both died away and he was free to act. Rubbing a kink out of his neck with equally stiff fingers, he went to Miss Woodville and unceremoniously lifted her from the chair by her forearms, gathering her into a position where he could comfortably carry her. Her skin was dry and chilled but she was light, and as he pulled her against him she muttered incoherently and snuggled up against his chest.

A drop of sweat touched his forehead for just a brief moment. Merely because of the warmth, that was the only reason, he told himself sternly over and over as he swiftly ducked through the corridors with his awkward burden. She had shivered in his office; he was a source of warmth and that was the only reason she had leaned up against him. The only reason. The words looped through his brain, running endlessly over each other all the way back to his chambers.

Once they were safely inside his bedroom he dropped her on the bed and went to wash his hands. When he returned he was a bit dismayed to see that the impact from landing on his bed hadn't awakened her; she slept on, oblivious to everything except what swirled in her dreams.

He frowned suddenly. Someone had told him something about her dreams but the memory was faded and ragged around the edges and he couldn't grab hold of the threads long enough to tell. His nose ached dully with the thought and he put up a hand to rub it.

Well. If she was going to be spending the night he could put her on the floor in a blanket, over near the fire. It should be perfectly comfortable for her. Snape bent to lift her once more, but as he did she shivered violently and clutched his pillow tightly in her small hands.

"Get OFF!" He pulled sharply and nearly succeeded in tumbling her off the bed, but her hands were clenched on the pillow as if they had been nailed there. "Fine, fine. I refuse to humiliate myself by playing tug-a-war with a girl who's not even awake. Keep the bed, brat, and may you have horrid dreams all night long."

A soft snore was his only response.

Miss Woodville was in his bed and he now lacked a place to sleep. He certainly was not going to sleep in front of the fire like a dog, which left his very uncomfortable chair as the only place to lay. So be it. He would add the events of tonight to her running list of favours she owned...all of which he now wanted repaid with interest. Doubled interest.

The infuriating, vexing, abdominable, wretched little girl still shivered on his covers. She would need to lay under his covers to keep warm and from the look of it, might need several more beside.

"Which means your shoes have to come off," he muttered, lifting her slightly and pulling his sheets back and to the side. He laid her in the center of the folds, taking care to let her legs dangle off the bed's sides, then undid one buckle and slid the strap back. The shoe fell to the floor with a muffled thump and he pulled off the other just as easily. With a push, her legs came back up onto the bed and he draped the covers around her, then stepped back and studied her. Something was off.

The glasses. He pulled them off and folded the stems, placing them on the nightstand. Simple, yet not quite right. There was more.

Those pins in her hair. It was falling loose anyway so he might as well take it down and spare himself the complaints he would get in the morning if he left the pins in and they gave her a headache. Snape placed a hand between the sharp wings of her shoulder blades and lifted her into a sitting position, fumbling around with the other hand in the crow black mess pulled tightly around her head. He drew out each of the slender silver pins buried within her hair-there must have been ninety of them-dropped them beside the glasses and her hair spilled out over his hands.

No wonder she needed so many pins. The hair fell to her waist and a little beyond and it was much thicker and softer then he had imagined. Strands wove themselves around his fingers, the flat, slightly reflective black of spilled ink and as fine as spider silk and he was enjoying this far too much. Far too much pleasure. Pleasure did not belong to this one, pleasure was frightening with this one, pleasure belonged to someone else long since dust and try as he might he could not unsnarl his fingers from her hair.

For just one moment, he thought about ignoring his chair and sleeping beside her, with an ample amount of space between their bodies of course. It had crossed his mind more then once that perhaps, just maybe, his night terrors would fade if there was the warmth of another body sleeping beside his, that maybe the sound of someone breathing quietly into the silence would hold all his fears at bay. Yet even as the thought passed through his mind he knew perfectly well he could do no such thing with her; they might start out at opposite ends of the bed but at some point he would awaken to find himself curled around her, face buried in her hair.

And when she woke up and saw him in bed with her, she would castrate him.

"Enough," he said curtly, and with only a little tugging he was able to free himself from her hair. Hair, glasses-that left the scarf around her neck; it could easily twist itself around her throat if she was a restless sleeper. He carefully tucked the thin material between the tips of two fingers and pulled it away from her neckline, exposing an ample amount of white skin. Sweat ran down his back with the movement. Those low necklines she wore were simply indecent, even if there was nothing there to be seen; it was the thought, the suggestion that counted.

She was now suitable for sleeping and once the blankets had been piled around her she shivered not at all. Of course you could hardly tell there was a girl there with all those blankets on top; he pulled the pile away from her face so she would be able to breathe and watched her for a bit. Her lips were slightly parted, her face full and soft in pleasant sleep and he felt rage gather in him once more.

"What luck you have," he snarled, staring down at the small white face. "You always come out on top, don't you?" His eyes watched her lips part with each breath.

Bastard. She thinks you're a bastard. a voice whispered behind his ear. She'll never change her mind, she's stubborn, I know her. You never change your mind either, do you? But it's too late, isn't it? She remains unchanged while you had to..

"I have not," he snapped, unable to take his eyes off her face. "She's nothing to me. A spoiled rotten, breakable, helpless little object that I've been forced to protect."

I thought she was a child at first, and then she turned and I saw that she was a woman...Then they told me this child, this woman, this delicate little creature with the bright blue eyes was going to teach the most important, most vital subject of this year, Defence Against the Dark Arts..

And you hated. And your hatred spun a twin thread of longing that grew and pushed roots deeply even as you tried to strangle every last bit. Don't you want her still Severus? A soft voice caressing his ear, bringing unbidden visions of soft white hands stroking him and he trembled. Don't you want her to lay back and open herself to you, let you pry out all her secrets...?

"Shut up," he chanted through clenched teeth. "Shut up shut up shut up. I don't want that, don't feel like that. Her favours will be repaid in a different coin."

When someone gives me something, I have to give them something in return.

"And so you do," he whispered. His finger slid along the edge of the blanket, just above the sharp rise of her collarbone. "So many things...the first is..."

A kiss. That's what started this sorry mess off. She gave me a kiss I have an obligation to return.

He bent halfway before he realised this was going to be a poor substitute for the one she was owned; she needed to be awake, helpless and wide-eyed in anger and indignation, just as he had been. But, he told himself fiercely, this will prove there is nothing between this girl and myself. Nothing. Frustration builds over time and it's been a VERY long time and it's all because she merely happens to be the only female around anywhere near my age and I will remain untouched.

His breath stirred the hair on her cheek.

Completely untouched.

His mouth touched hers and lightning went off in his brain.

The Grey Lady would have sprang through the wall, aiming herself straight at the professor's throat had the Bloody Baron's hands not suddenly clenched hard on her arms.

"Let me go," she whispered hoarsely, her voice thick and slow with unaccustomed rage as she strained against her bonds. "Let me go."

"Hold yourself," the Bloody Baron said quietly, his hands firm. "He's moving away from her-watch his face. I believe your lady is safe."

Snape was backing away from the bed where he had just stolen a kiss from a helpless girl, shaking his head with a look of bright panic in his eyes. He touched his lips, took his hand away and stared at Miss Jardin, touched his lips with trembling fingers once more. "No no no no," he whispered fervently, rubbing his mouth as if it had been scalded. He stumbled away from the bed towards the fire, his face gone white and sweat shining dimly in the hollows of his cheeks. "No no no no."

Miss Jardin slept on, breathing evenly, unaware of the assault the Potions Master had just perpetrated on her being. In fact, she almost seemed to smile underneath her cocoon of bedding.

"He won't hurt her," the Bloody Baron repeated, holding her steady. "Calm and wait for morning. A kiss here, a kiss there..it never hurt anyone."

Professor Snape had collapsed to his knees by the fire, breathing in heavy, ragged sighs.

Lilika woke slowly, through a haze of wool, to the sound of someone moving around the room and not being terribly quiet about it either. She opened her mouth to tell off the Grey Lady for waking her so early, then shut it as her eyes opened. "Right."

Snape stalked into view on her left, his mouth twisted into a fierce crescent by anger or annoyance. Glassware rattled as he set it down outside the field of her vision. Things were flung by the sound of it. "Well, well, my little princess is finally awake. I trust you slept well?"

"I don't like feather pillows, so no," she answered, hoping that would please him enough, and pushed back the covers so she could stretch, pulling her elbows behind her head and wiggling her toes. There seemed to be a bit more of a draft then usual, the air cold on her neck and shoulders. Funny.

Snape glanced at her and then whipped around and darted through the door to his sitting room, his face a strange greyish colour. She snorted after he went, shifting her shoulders to loosen the kinks and felt her hair move against her back with the quick movement. Startled, she gently ran her fingers down the mass. Her hair band was gone and so were the pins that held her ridiculous tumble of hair in place.

She managed to locate her glasses on the nightstand and reset them on her nose, pushing them back into place with a finger. "Why'd you take down my hair?" she asked, raising her voice so she could be heard over the commotion from the next room. Her hair things were also on the nightstand, so she gathered up all of the slippery silver pins and shoved them into her pocket, winding the band around her wrist so she wouldn't forget it.

Goosebumps were dimpling her arms and she was hugging herself to stay warm when Snape reappeared, his face hard and his mouth sour. He shut the door behind him with a sharp click.

"Why are you still here? Get out. I'm tired of looking at you. You've already made me lose a whole day with that little stunt you pulled," he snapped off, not looking at her. He was moving swiftly around the room, yanking drawers open and taking small objects out, which he then put in a canvas sack that was hanging loosely from his wrist.

"Why'd you take down my hair?" she asked again, half out of curiosity and half for the fun of watching his face turn a ruddy purple with rage. "You did do it; you took out all the pins..."

Snape skidded to a stop in front of her, his thin hands a twitch with the veins standing out. "Because," he spat-oddly, he seemed to be addressing the floor and not her-"I did not want to hear any complaints that your tender head was hurt from sleeping on that legion of hairpins you employ to keep that crow-coloured mess under control."

"A thoughtful gesture? From Snape? My goodness, hell hath frozen over, though you certainly wouldn't be able to tell from in here."

"Not up to your usual standard," he muttered.

Lilika shrugged demurely. "I'm still half asleep, begging your pardon. Even so..." She began to let loose with a certain sly and pointed insult she had been waiting for ages to use but just as she started her voice trailed off into a shriek and then died entirely.

Her dress had shifted on her shoulders and as she put a hand up to the material of her bodice to readjust it, Lilika discovered that she was handling mostly breast and very little bodice. "My scarf! YOU TOOK MY SCARF?"

No wonder he wouldn't look at her directly. Lilika glanced down hurriedly, cheeks flaming with blood, and saw most of the pale skin of her bosom was now exposed and not only exposed, but as pocked with goosepimples as her arms. The total effect very much resembled the skin of a raw chicken. She tried hard to form words, mouth shaping desperately, but all that came out was another thin little shriek.

Snape pulled her scarf off the bed post with a smirk and handed it to her, or rather wrapped it around her limp hand. "My lady," he purred, shaking his head in a slow parody of sorrowful neglect, "you look positively wretched. But look on the bright side. It's not as if there is much there to see anyway and I still fail to see how this covers anything...Come, Miss Woodville, it's really nothing to get so worked up about."

Her face was burning so hotly it should have set her body totally aflame and spared her the indignity of watching Snape's eyes fill with gleeful malice as he smiled at her, savouring the undignified situation she had ended up in.

"You..you pervert," she croaked, praying desperately for the ground to open or to burst into flames or something, anything better then having to see Snape smirk at her. The ground remained firm and unbroken.

"Miss Woodville, you're the one showing the skin," he said smoothly, one eyebrow raised. "Perhaps you shouldn't bandy the word 'pervert' about so freely..."

Gasping between rage and humiliation and unable to find anything to save this situation, she whirled around, smacked the door open, and ran out of Snape's chambers, past the stares of a few surprised Slytherins. Her feet pounded the stones as she sprinted towards Ravenclaw, trying to put as much space between herself and those damned Slytherins in as little time as possible.

Dear God, it wasn't that much skin. She risked another glance down at herself.

There was still a good inch and a half of fabric between herself and total exposure. That filthy, venomous snake.

She ran on.

The look on her face had almost been worth it, he thought, equipment bag swaying against his back as he strode towards the Great Hall and the meeting place he had designated for the students wishing to work for a little credit in Potions. Almost worth the painful, slow-burning arousal that had come with watching her stretch and lounge about on his bed, her soft white breasts mostly exposed, taunting him with what he couldn't have. (If she was going to lounge about on his bed, a small new voice he had already began to hate whispered, she was going to do it wearing as little clothing as possible). Almost worth the vinegar taste of the realisation that like it or not...very much not...that he was attracted to her. Attracted to her- the girl, the vexation, the crow, the thorn.

"Hormones," he muttered. "Mind over body, spirit over flesh."

A tiny group waited for him at the largest pillar in the hall and he was not terribly surprised to see they were all Slytherins. A fourth year boy, a sixth year girl, Mr Malfoy and his loyal stooges. His charges for the day. He eyed the group as he walked up; all looked to be fighting varying degrees of sleepiness and Crabbe's small piggy eyes nearly vanished into his face they were so close to shutting. Snape stamped his foot sharply and they all jerked awake at once as if they'd been set to do it.

"Well," he said. "This is everyone? Pitiful. The five students out of how many hundreds who aren't afraid of a little hard work for their grades. Let's be off then; we have a ways to walk." The group shuffled to their feet and he walked off towards the doors, his students trailing obediently behind. There was quite a lot to do today, he mused. It would take a good half hour just to walk to the spot in the Forbidden Forest and then to get everyone set up and instructed...

"Wait sir," Mr Malfoy said suddenly from a few steps behind everyone else and Snape stopped, craning his head so he could look over his shoulder. "I nearly forgot to wake her back up."

Snape stared at him as Malfoy walked quickly back towards the pillar. "What do you mean? Wake up who?" But Mr Malfoy had already disappeared 'round the pillar and was talking in whispers to someone hidden behind it. Now that he looked, the edge of a black skirt was just barely visible against the shadows. Snape swallowed hard and his liver slowly tied itself into a knot.

A few minutes later, Miss Woodville came out from behind the pillar, tousled and sleepy-eyed but awake and with Mr Malfoy tagging her steps, yawning behind a pale hand. Her bright red cloak matched the fire. "Nice to see you again, Professor," she said sweetly, her lips slightly curved and her eyes bright with innocence. "Shall we be off?"

"What are you doing here? How did you find out?" Snape hissed in her ear as they lead the silent students towards the Forbidden Forest. She had to step very quickly to keep up with his longer legs, since he seemed to be very determined to leave her behind."I thought I was going to get a break from you for once, damnit!"

Lilika smiled calmly at him, enjoying the ruddy anger in his face. "Well, you did put up notices around the school that you wanted volunteers and I simply couldn't pass up the opportunity to discharge some of my debt. Besides, you can't watch me if you're off in the Forbidden Forest gathering potion things, can you?" she asked, kicking away leaves with the toe of her boot. She accidently kicked some at Snape's ankles and he growled, then began to walk even faster, forcing her to run to keep up. "Besides, this is my way of fulfilling our bargain. You do remember our bargain, don't you Snape?"

He was staring straight ahead. "This is going to take considerably more then an hour, Miss Woodville," he said finally and threw a glance back at the Slytherins trotting along behind them. "And keep your voice down."

"Too late for that; I've already been spotted running out of your chambers, Snape," she said, looking up at his face, which darkened to a nasty yellowish-grey at her words. "Maybe if you hadn't been such an ass..."

Snape stopped so abruptly she overshot him, staggering as she tried to bring herself to a quick stop, but he reached out and clamped both hands down on her shoulders, dragging her back to him. Her face was no more then an inch away from his. "Behave yourself," he whispered, his uneven teeth clenched and a horrible anger twisting his face. "Behave before I murder you in front of witnesses!"

Lilika looked away, blood rushing into her face. Blushing? I should not blush. I do not blush. I am an idiot sometimes.

She found herself suddenly not wanting to look into those black eyes. "Only if you behave as well. I'm not going to conform to your standards unless you are willing to reciprocate in turn," she said firmly, despite her unease. After a moment Snape released her and stepped back, his face wiped clean of emotion once more.

"Of course," he said.

"That's not an answer," she pointed out.

"Can't you ever stop?" he hissed. "Fine. I promise that if you behave, I shall behave."

She smiled. "It's so nice to see that we understand each other."

They walked further into the Forbidden Forest and it seemed to Lilika that with each step they took the light grew dimmer and more grey, the tree branches crowding them in more thickly on each side, forcing the little group to become a straight line. The birds cawed, chuckled and cackled to themselves, but few sang.

She tried several times to ask Snape exactly where they were going and what they would be gathering but he cut off each word with a grunt and she soon gave up trying to speak to him. The Slytherins were completely silent behind them except for the crunch of their feet on the leaves, making the atmosphere even more unsettling. They flanked Snape like an honour guard, pushing her off to the side and into the reach of several nasty grasping branches and they refused to budge, even when she nudged them back. Lilika was glad when they finally stopped in a clearing bright from the sun and Snape announced that this was where they'd be working.

She busied herself looking around as Snape lectured the students, studying the stunted trees, bushes and rocks with curiosity. All wore the same shade of grey-brown and the trees looked rather tired, branches sagging and their leaves half gone. The Forbidden Forest really didn't look all that nasty and there was no sign of the vicious creatures that supposedly roamed around the trees.

Snape stepped up behind her and put a trowel into her hand. She blinked up at him in confusion. 'What..?"

"Weren't you listening?" he snapped. "You dig with this, Miss Equipment Impaired, and when you reach the caelus root- it's blue and thick, you can't miss it-you take it out with your hand. Do not use the trowel. They are easily damaged." His lip curled into a sneer. "Do you understand, or shall I draw you a diagram?"

"That won't be necessary," Lilika said with as much haughtiness as she could muster through her embarrassment. She stalked over to a log a few paces away as Snape set the Slytherins out in a wide circle but close enough so he could keep an eye on them. Wishing heartily that she had kicked him, she perched on the log and made a few stabs at the dirt before footsteps warned her that Snape was coming back her way and she began to dig in earnest.

She was sweating through her dress by the time she reached the first root and a small mountain of dirt lay at her side. She wiped her forehead with a grimy hand and stared at the reward for her hard work. Ick.

Lilika reached slowly out to take hold of the root, not entirely wanting to touch it. It was indeed blue and thick but it was also shining with some sort of greasy film and as she watched it, the root moved. Her mouth twisted. Disgusting.

A shadow darkened the ground in front of her.

"Not to your liking my dear?" Snape purred from far above her, a smooth roll to his voice that told her he was very pleased with himself. She could feel him looming like a thundercloud against her back, apparently enjoying his superior vantage point.

For two minutes she thought about grabbing a handful of dirt and flinging it at his head but thought better of it-they were quite far from witnesses after all and the Slytherins certainly weren't going to tell on their beloved Head of House. She reached for the root.

Tugging gently, she tried to ease it to the surface but just as she was halfway up the root squirmed violently in her hand. She yelped and let go, watching as the root fell all the way back to the bottom of the hole. "Damnit!"

"Helpless," Snape pronounced. He hitched up his robes and knelt at her side, but he seemed more smug then angry. Small wonder that. She refused to look at him. Why should she look when she could feel the smugness just radiating from his body? "Absolutely helpless." He did like that word. "Here, girl-like this-"

Snape reached over and wrapped his right hand around hers, his skin hot and dry, not greasy like his hair. Her fingers twitched in surprise but she forced herself to remain outwardly calm. What's he doing? He had slung an arm around her shoulder and leaned into her, his weight mostly against her back as they reached down into the hole. His warmth was bleeding slowly into her skin.

"Look here." He folded their hands around the disgusting thing, showing her how to place her fingers on it. It was hard to concentrate with him breathing near her face and shifting his weight like that; she was growing much too warm and restless and for the first time she became conscious of how much smaller she was compared to Snape.

Little puffs of air escaped from her lips. She couldn't breathe properly with him leaning on her and she couldn't pull her hand away as their fingers were too firmly entwined. Warmth slipped from her arm down into her belly and slowly pooled there.

Together they managed to guide the damned thing out of the hole and place it on the ground. "There." Snape pulled his hand away from hers and gave it a little shake to get the dirt off. He rose, brushing his robes off, his face calm, utterly unchanged. "You can manage now, I hope? I need to supervise the others and can't spend time catering to your inexperience." He turned and left for where Malfoy and his cronies were sitting and arguing over something before she could frame a reply.

Left alone, Lilika stared at her filthy hand. A funny tingle ran up from her hand, making it shake a little as if she was chilled but she was very warm. Hot even. Her back still felt his weight leaning upon her, the way his arm had moved against her...Her forehead was hot. Burning. Thinking like that made her burn. She put her other hand to her forehead. Could she be sick again? Better thinking about that then thinking about the funny little throbbing tingle that made her flush and itch. It happened to be centered somewhere down in her lower belly.

Snape touched her and now she felt funny. She let out a small laugh, sharp as a thorn. Was she going mad?

A truly horrible, awful, terrible thought came to her all unwanted, piercing in its clarity the way unwelcome thoughts often are.

Snape had touched her and she liked it.

"My God, are you somehow punishing me by giving me this weird chemistry with that man? Of all the things I've had to put up with, this tops it all!"

She pulled her eyes from the heavens and glared fiercely down at her body. Her traitorous, deceitful body. "So what if I haven't had any in years. What did I ever do to you?" she snapped in a whisper, hating the flush, the tingle and most of all the itch. "Am I so desperate that you'd act like this for Severus Snape?"

"How much longer are we going to be doing this?" Lilika asked Snape as they ate lunch sitting on her log, Snape on one end and herself at the far other. She licked the crumbs of her sandwich off her lips as he glared at her around his own sandwich. She wrinkled her nose back at him, not really in the mood for any of his antics right now. Snape had been very cranky as he gave her some of the food he had brought, grumbling that he hadn't been expecting an extra person, much less one that was capable of eating her entire body weight in one sitting. Since she had no clue how to get back out of the forest on her own, she let that pass.

She was keeping as much distance between his body and hers as possible, very determined that there be no further physical contact between them until she figured out just what the hell had happened before. Snape seemed oblivious and she was quite confused.

How come nothing like this happened when I kissed him before? she puzzled, taking another bite of her sandwich. I kissed him and it was plain and simple and I wasn't flushing and blushing and burning all over the place. Then he touches my hand and I fall all apart. Perhaps I'm hormonally imbalanced. This is right around the time of the month...

Feeling more cheerful, Lilika finished her sandwich in two large bites and reached for another. These were wonderful sandwiches, better then any of the food she'd tasted so far at Hogwarts, full of lovely flavours and salty, creamy cheese. Her hand touched the platter and found it empty.

Lilika slowly raised her eyes and discovered the last sandwich was with Snape and apparently uneaten. He was just holding it, eyes focused on something in the distance. She let out a whimper. If there was anything she hated, it was perfectly good food sitting around untasted.

He blinked twice and gave himself a little shake, then his eyes fell on her. "What?" he snarled.

"Are you going to eat that?" she asked, unable to keep all the eagerness out of her words. His snarl cut even more deeply into his face in response. "Come, Snape, it wouldn't hurt you to be generous once in a while..." To her surprise, his snarl faded to a resigned sigh.

"Here then," he said, holding out the sandwich on the very edge of his fingers. "Is there no limit to your appetites?"

Now she was left with a quandary-take the sandwich from his hand and touch him in turn or refuse and make him angrier. "Can't you just put it down on the log?"

He stared at her. "And have it get all filthy? Are you mad woman? I thought you wanted this-take it then."

Still she hesitated and a smile spread quietly across his face. "Well," he said with a tiny shrug, raising the sandwich to his lips, "if that's the way you're going to play it..."

Lilika lunged for the sandwich and ended up draped over his lap, her arms tangled in his and a very good view of the smirk on his face. She popped back up immediately and sat down fuming on her end of the log, eating her prize while Snape watched her, a thoughtful quirk to his mouth and his black eyes glittering.

She finished, subtly licked some cheese off her fingers and sighed in pleasure, closing her eyes. The sunlight turned the inside of her eyelids a brilliant rosy red. "Lovely sandwich. The house elves outdid themselves that time."

Snape had turned away to rummage in his rucksack. "The house elves didn't make the sandwiches," he said, his voice slightly muffled by the sounds of his search. "I did."

Her eyebrows went up of their own accord and she opened one eye to look at him, still bent over his equipment. "You made these sandwiches?"

"Do I hear an echo? Yes. Those sandwiches were to be for me alone, not a small interloper."

"Better to be small and neat then tall and over-stretched," she sang quietly.

Snape's back stiffened and he whipped around, face twisted in anger. He went off so easily; that hadn't even been a particularly strong insult. "Miss Woodville," he began in a taunt voice, but his words choked off into a gasp and he put a hand to his throat, chest heaving.

"Snape?" His face quickly turned a sour white, like bad milk and he crumpled in on himself, shoulders shaking. "Snape!"

Lilika jumped up, heart bouncing against her ribs and ran to him, putting a hand on his quivering shoulder. The cloth was plastered to his skinny frame, damp and sticky from sweat. "Snape? What's the matter? Snape?" He was clutching his knees, the thin ridges of his knucklebones white and stiff against his skin and his yellow teeth were bared, sunk into his lower lip. One arm seemed spastic.

Bright panic rushed through her. Dark magic. She turned to look at the students but all of them were a good distance away, though still in sight and they appeared not to notice anything out of the ordinary. Even Malfoy was still arguing with his toadies. "Snape! Please answer me!" Cold fear bit at her heart and her legs were trembling, sweat pooling in the backs of her knees and the top of her thighs. She knelt at his side so she wouldn't fall, shifting her arm so she could give him something to lean on. His greasy hair was hanging lankly in his eyes, hiding most of his face.

He managed to open his mouth enough to speak and she was horrified to see dark blood welling on his lower lip. "My arm..burns.." he whispered, and from the way his face was contorted she knew he was trying his best not to scream.

"It's your left arm, isn't it?" she said, frantically digging into her pockets for a handkerchief. Why couldn't she keep anything neat? Her fingers snagged it and she put it to his mouth, urging it against his lips."Snape, bite down on this instead." He shook his head, unwilling or unable. "Snape, I will not let you bit your lip off. You'd be even more hideous then usual and I already have trouble looking at you, so bite down."

"Please," he whispered, his voice slow and thin with pain, "just go and let me handle this..."

"Let you handle this!?" she spat. "Are you fucking insane? Do you want the students to find out? You handle this while you squirm and twitch as if you were dying? Oh Snape." A new fear pricked her and she gently pulled the hair away from his face. "Voldemort can't kill you through the Dark Mark, can he?"

A sound short and hollow that might have been a laugh pressed from him. "Wouldn't do that. Would torture me, want to see my face. This is his way of punishing me for refusing to come."

Lilika stroked his hair back, sliding her arm further around him in an effort to better support his weight. He was using her handkerchief now but the little smothered noises he was making were just as horrible to her ears as any shriek of pain. She reached over and started to roll his left sleeve up.

He jerked away from her hands. "Stop it. You act like I've never seen a Dark Mark before," she said, pulling the fabric away from his skin, doing her best to be gentle and steady. "I find it hard to believe you could have forgotten what I come from." Snape shook his head and shuddered heavily as air touched his Mark, his arm now gone quite stiff.

"How ugly," she said quietly. The Mark was not its usual black, but a shuddering greenish-red that was almost giving off light, so brightly did it glow. The skin around it was bright red ebbing away to dead white and apparently sore, which she discovered when she touched it lightly and Snape yelped.

"Hush." Lilika pulled out her wand, found another handkerchief and reached for the flask of water they had been drinking from. Ice would help the burn and numb his skin enough to help the pain. I think. "I don't want to use my wand directly on that Mark-for all I know, he might be able to sense magic performed on it." She laid her wand across her lap and poured the water onto her handkerchief, soaking it transparent. "I hope this helps." A Freezing Charm later and her handkerchief was now a flat sheet of ice. Gritting her teeth against the cold, she pressed it against his skin.

He screamed and she was nearly flung away by his thrashing, but she clutched at his robes with her free hand and managed to avoid being tossed. "Is it not working? Should I stop?"

Snape shook his head and panted: "No...keep trying...nothing better at hand." The skin of his arm was a flat grey but his face seemed a little more relaxed so she placed the handkerchief back against his skin and watched, biting her lip, as he moaned in pain.

He had gone still, so it was easy for her hand to keep the compress firmly against his skin and after a few minutes he took the handkerchief out of his mouth, his breathing heavy but not raspy. A few minutes later his shoulders slumped and his hands were no longer gripping his knees. That was good, but his Mark was burning so hotly the ice was melting, water dripping down Snape's arm in little rivers. She took it away and re-froze it again.

After fifteen minutes of this, Snape went completely limp and Lilika took the handkerchief away to look at his skin. The Dark Mark was cooling to black, only slightly green at the edges and his skin had lost the grey shade, fading back to his normal sallow colouring. His breathing was hoarse but even and he managed to lift a hand and wipe his forehead. She had been stroking his back in a clumsy attempt to take his mind off the pain, but she dropped her hand back to her lap as he straightened up.

Snape turned his head to look at her, his face shimmering with sweat and his black eyes bright with pain. He swallowed hard.

"You...Thank you."

She seemed subdued and a little frightened, blue eyes wide, but she acknowledged his gratitude, afterwards turning away to stare at a point somewhere in front of her. He rubbed his left arm absently as he studied her tense profile. Miss Woodville's lips were pulled tight and her eyebrows drawn close, some of her black hair escaping its stern bun to leave shadowy wisps around her face and white neck. He decided that it was probably a good idea not to mention that he'd tried to distract himself from the pain by mentally undressing her.

"Voldemort," she said slowly, looking straight ahead. "You didn't go back to him."

"No." He wondered how far she would dare to go.

Miss Woodville drew a line in the dirt with the toe of her boot. "Why not? I mean," she amended hastily as she caught sight of the look on his face, "You would be in the perfect position as a double agent. The Headmaster could only benefit from that knowledge."

He glared at her fiercely until she turned a ripe shade of pink and bit her lip. Snape had to grudgingly admit that she looked quite charming doing i-I'm already so far gone-but there were more important matters at hand to be dealt with.

"Oh, I suppose then that you would also be a good candidate for a double agent? A young girl rebelling against her family, who finally sees the light and comes to kneel, devoted, at the feet of her Lord and Master?" Her face turned a bloody crimson with rage.

"I would never!" she shouted, unmindful of the students not a hundred feet away. Her small hands clenched into claws. "Do you honestly think that I'd take up with that ass after all those years of running away? Of hiding and being hunted and seeing...seeing...I don't want to talk about this. But you're a fool for even thinking it."

"And you think that I, after turning against him at 'great personal risk' would return? Some of us can claw their way out of that pit."

"Why did you dig the pit in the first place? Or choose to fall. Whichever."

Well, wasn't his little miss growing bold? He leaned close to her and put his mouth near her ear as she flinched and pulled a little away. "None_of_your_business," he whispered, making each word drop like a threat. "Let's just call it 'personal matters'. In regard to why I left-well, you're certainly not ever going to find that out." He could smell her lavender perfume quite clearly and had to fight away the urge to lay his nose against her neck and inhale until he was dizzy.

"To continue, even though this is also not any of your business," he said, continuing to rub his aching arm, "I never had any plans to go back to the Dark Lord. Ever. As for that double agent idea, it would be the height of foolishness. He knows I am no longer his."

"How does he? I suppose you mean that you are Headmaster Dumbledore's then?" she asked, with another sideways glance. Her lashes slowly lowered, hiding her eyes from his view.

Snape snorted. "I'm not about to tell you of our plans, but You-Know-Who knows very well that I have left him forever. To go back to him, pretending loyalty would be not only suicidal, but stupid, and I am certainly not going to do anything stupid."

Miss Woodville straightened up and turned to look him directly in the eye. "How does he know?"

A terrier with a particularly delicious bone to knaw. He sighed. "Remember when I had told you that one of the previous Defence Against the Dark Arts professors had carried Voldemort within him?" Her lips went in and she nodded slowly, anger creasing her eyes. He could tell she was mentally replaying their tense hallway meeting. "Well, on the back of his head to be exact. Quirrell-that was his name-tried to hex Potter off his broom during a Quidditch match. I saved the boy-of course there wasn't a word of gratitude from him-and confronted Quirrell about it later, not realising that I was revealing to his other part that I had saved Potter's life deliberately. A true Death Eater..." He closed his eyes, remembering the cold shock that had gone through him at the match as he had realised what was happening and the pale blur of Potter's face as he desperately tried to hang on to his broom. It could have been over so quickly. "A true Death Eater would have let the boy fall."

She wasn't even looking at him. "I suppose..."

Anger burst inside him. "You suppose what?" he barked, turning fully to face her. But the log was empty.

His eyebrows shot up. "Miss Woodville?" A quick look around their clearing revealed nothing out of the ordinary; some trees, a few birds sitting dumpily in a tree to his right, and a large lizard was sunning itself on a rock. No Miss Woodville. Snape twisted around to look behind him and discovered the large bramble bush to his left had grown eyes.

Little incoherent mumbles were emitting from the bush, and the blue eyes were stuck wide with fear. "Oh no oh no, keep away no no no, ack ack ack..."

Snape folded his arms and gave her his best withering look. "Miss Woodville, what in the name of Merlin are you doing?"

More mumbling and something that might have been 'lizard'.

He glanced from the bush to the lizard, who was stretched complacency out on its rock, the tip of its tail waving every now and then. "The lizard is behaving perfectly normally for something of its kind. It's merely sunning itself. Now, what excuse do you have?"

"I kinda have a...problem...with lizards," she said in a whispered rush.

Snape grumbled. The woman who had so coolly handled his pain was now quaking over a lizard. Each time there seemed to be hope for her she instead slid back once again. He sighed, then did the only thing that seemed reasonable under the circumstances; he reached into the bush, thankful for the heavy cloth of his robes, grasped Miss Woodville by the rapier points of her elbows and yanked her out. "Hey! No no no no you can't do this! Stop!"

"Don't worry, I'll chase away your scaly friend," he taunted. She was squirming fiercely in his grip, wriggling and trying to dig her way through his chest in an effort to escape. He was rather enjoying it.

She finally gave up when she realised he was not to be moved and huddled against him, muttering softly. This was quite nice indeed. "So," he said, casting a glance at the top of her black head, "What traumatic event in your childhood caused this ridiculous phobia?" Miss Woodville looked at his chest, then at her feet, giving him an excellent view of the bun in her hair.

"Oh, you know everything, don't you?" She would not meet his eyes. He waited patiently, not once relaxing his grip on her body.

Miss Woodville capitulated. "Charles..when I was four he put a lizard in my room-a little teeny regular lizard except he cast an Enlargement Charm on it and made it into King Lizard. It was bigger then my bed. I came into the room and saw it sitting there." She went quiet for a moment then added "It bit me on the side before I could get away from it."

"And left a scar, I suppose. Your family does seem to be known for its odd fears," he said, subtly shifting his arm so it encircled her narrow waist. "As I recall, your dear brother had a deathly fear of snakes. Most unfortunate for one who followed a man whose symbol was a serpent." His distraction worked; she lifted her head and smiled, just a little. "I used to get him on that. If he bothered me, sooner or later I'd get a little garden snake and put it in his chair or by his slippers. He never quite knew when I'd strike."

A soft rustle as the branches scraped together in the breeze and a few birds called from behind. Her face was slowly tilting upward and he wanted to see her look at him but she seemed to be taking care not to look at him directly, instead focusing on the trees above, the rocks to the side-anything but his face. He grimaced. Playing shy, was she? How frustrating. She was still looking away when he felt her body suddenly tense. "What's that?"

"What's what?" he snapped. She was standing right on top of him and yet she wouldn't pay him any attention. Miss Woodville was instead craning her neck sharply, squinting at the trees above them. What was so damn interesting? "I saw something that looked like a broom. Someone on a broom spying on us."

He bit back the sharp retort that jumped to his mouth. Was she just trying to change the subject? "Ridiculous. We're miles out in the Forbidden Forest and I did not advertise our route or destination. The only was someone could find us is if they had followed us from the start. Did you see anyone follow us Miss Woodville?"

"Nooo...but I still think I saw someone spying from a broom."

"Potter is the only one who darts around spying on people from brooms, and yet I sincerely doubt he's up there, more's the pity," he muttered and looked up at the crossing branches above them and the pale pieces of sky between them. "I see nothing. Perhaps your fear has addled your brain-not that you had far to go to begin with."

Miss Woodville's mouth made an O in outrage and she started to say something, but shut her mouth without a word, grimacing. He arched a brow at her. "Fine. You believe what you want," she murmured sullenly. For some odd reason she was looking at her hands, running a pale finger over one palm.
She suddenly seemed to realise how close they were and pulled away, much to his displeasure. First, she peered around him to see what the lizard was doing, then cautiously edged out, wand held between stiff fingers. It must have gone. Amusement and annoyance mingled within him and Snape stifled a laugh as he turned to gather his things. "It's time for us to be heading back," he told her, shouldering his pack. "So get your things. The sun is growing low." She darted another look at the trees at his words.

"Would you stop that?"

This time the students walked in front instead of behind, chattering quietly among themselves. Snape walked at her side, face set in his usual snarl. Lilika carried the knotty basketful of roots-and the damned things were heavy for their size-along with the left-over bags. Her feet crunched nicely into the leaves; she was pretending each one to be Snape's head.

Snape, with the air of a very great king pronouncing a judgement on a very small person, had declared her the official baggage handler because she had dug the least roots out of the whole group, never mind that she'd been distracted with such small niceties as enormous lizards and cosseting Snape while his arm tried to burn off. When she had tried to protest, he'd pulled a sneer and told her to hold her tongue and she was damned lucky he didn't leave her behind in the Forbidden Forest for the werewolves to play with.

She kept one eye on the group and one eye on the sky, still convinced that what she had seen before was someone floating high above them on a broom, watching. Lilika uncurled her palm and looked at the faint pink line running parallel across the length of it; a souvenir of her wandless magic trick that had saved her life the last time someone on a broom had come for her. She pressed her lips together, making a mental note to check some books and do some tinkering with that spell as soon as she was able. The shielding spell would be ever so much more effective if it didn't severely burn her hands when she held the spell for more then a few minutes.

Snape's Mark burns...and then someone else comes a'calling. Sure, no one followed us from the castle but who's to say Voldemort couldn't track Snape through the Mark? Still, they were here awfully quickly after the Mark burned. But wouldn't a follower of Voldemort have tried to kill us while we were away from the castle? The Killing Curse works just as well fired off from some trees as it does when the person is two feet away from you. Puzzling. I don't like this.

Snape was now walking a little ahead of her, black hood pulled over his head. He was just a shapeless blot in the growing darkness, walking steadily towards the castle.

He won't tell me what the Headmaster has planned...still doesn't trust me, I see. Not a spy, so what are you doing, Snape? You're the one with the connection here.

The trees thinned out and the lights of Hogwarts could be seen, gleaming dimly ahead of them. Snape slipped ahead of her and told the students to hurry, that dinner was nearly served. They needed no urging to break into a run, Crabbe and Goyle moving surprisingly fast for their size. They quickly vanished into the darkness across the lawn and she and Snape were left alone.

"Pick it up, will you?" he said irritably, brushing some leaves off his cloak. "I want to eat, especially since someone else ate most of my food."

"You didn't have to give it to me," she snarled, trying her best to pass him, but he was always just a little faster then her. "I merely asked, you didn't have to do it. In fact, I was more surprised that you did give it to me-OW!"

A large tree, twisted and bent, stood right at the break between the Forbidden Forest and the Hogwarts grounds, waving its branches creakily in the wind. As she passed it, the branches suddenly swung down with a great deal of force and struck her in the face.

"Are you hurt? Let me see." Snape's warm hands cupped her face, fingers searching, and she shivered involuntarily. Oh bloody hell, not this again...Behave! Behave damn you, behave!

Her cheek was scratched-she could feel where the skin had parted-and blood was oozing down her forehead, which meant another cut somewhere on her head. She grumbled a sigh. The trees here didn't seem to like her very much; on her arrival at Hogwarts a tree had taken exception to her flying in and batted her down, forcing her into a crash landing that ended up with her snagged between several trees. It had not been fun.

Snape produced a rag and dampened it with water. "Tilt your head so I can clean the wounds-no, more up. Thank you."

The rag brushed gently against her cheek, which suddenly filled with hot blood and she hoped that Snape could not feel her flushing. His long fingers gripped her chin, forcing her to keep her head in place. Smooth and hot. She wondered for a minute what those fingers would feel like with a slightly more tender touch, stroking across her jaw and she was very very glad it was dark out. The moon was rising off to her left, a pale round of stone shining through the darkness. Lilika shifted her eyes to watch the moon, not really wanting to look at Snape, bent so intently over his task-the rag trailed down near her lips-so she swallowed hard and peered at the silvery light making patches on the lawn.

"You're tilting your head back too far, the blood is running towards your eyes," Snape said curtly, pulling her head back up. His fingers curled into her hair, turning her face to his. Her stomach fluttered. Damn him, damn him, damn him. Am I under a spell? I was perfectly normal this morning.

"I was looking at the moon," she said, annoyance fully formed in every word.

"Don't look at the moon, look at me." The rag was too saturated; some water dripped down her throat, heading for her cleavage. "Oops, let me get that..." Snape murmured, first dabbing the rag down her throat, then down near her breasts. One of his long fingers brushed the swell at the top of her neckline.

Lilika jumped away and gave his hand a good smack, resisting the urge to either start shrieking at the top of her lungs or throw herself at his feet. "You're enjoying this far too much," she snapped, jerking the rag away from his hand. Snape's lip curled in response.

"My dear, you presume far too much."

She stared at him, eyes small and hard in anger. "You were touching and seeing far too much. My presumptions grow out of your behavior and don't you forget it. You have enough faults without adding pervert to that long, long list."

She wiped at her face with the rag. Snape had turned away, his shoulders squared. "Are you quite finished, vulgar brat?"

She threw the rag at him and stalked towards the castle, stomping as she went. "So now we've degenerated to name-calling to hide our frustration. Snape, did some bits of you ever age past twelve?"

"Pretensious wench," he hissed, his longer stride bringing him to her side much more rapidly then she would have liked. "Do you think everyone adores you? A filthy vulgar slattern like yourself?"A blood vessel nearly burst inside her from fury.

Lilika punched him in the stomach before he could react, driving him to the ground. He lay flat, stunned and she knelt atop him, keeping him down with both hands on his shoulders as she stared him in the eye. His eyes were mere slits in his face, so angry was he.

"Apologise," she commanded, using her knees to pin him to the grass. She wanted him uncomfortable. "Apologise and we'll forget this ever happened."

"Not a chance," he wheezed. Apparently she'd knocked the breath out of him. Excellent. He breathed heavily for several minutes while she watched.

"Off me," he said quietly once he'd gotten his air back. His eyes glittered with the moonlight. "Get off me before I do something we'll both regret."

She chewed the inside of her lip, thinking about curses and other nasty tricks Snape might have up his long black sleeve. Snape's most dangerous mood was when he got quiet like that, but she wasn't about to submit and let him get away with anything. Unfortunately, before she could make a decision about what to do, his body heaved beneath her and she tumbled to the ground, stunned.

Snape's smirky face came into view above her, his long black hair falling against his nose. He was using a hand to hold her down as she thrashed and struggled to rise. He had simply put a long hand on her ribcage-though not near her breasts-and was more or less effortlessly keeping her down with just that one hand while she had needed her whole body weight just to keep him pinned. Infuriating. "You made a brave show, little one," he purred as she tried to break his fingers. "Pity you couldn't follow through."

"Start sleeping with one eye open Snape!" she growled, twisting underneath his hand as he pushed her deeper into the dirt. "When you're not looking I'm going to flay you alive!"

"Really," he yawned, looking very unmoved. "I'll tell you what. You lay still and obediently accept your punishment and we'll call it even on all counts. I'll even forget you started this."

Who the hell did Snape think he was? Punishment? The very word made her blood steam. Never. Absolutely not. She strained once more against his hand. His smirk deepened and he pushed down just a little harder. Dirt was smashed into her neck.

"Say you're sorry," he demanded, holding her firm. "Say it."

"Only if you say it first!" she spat, clawing at his fingers. She managed to slice him and he yelped, using several very bad words as he did. Lilika smiled and moved to push him off her.

"Professor Snape? Professor Jardin? Why have you been out here for so long?" A small circle of light moved towards them from the castle's front doors.

"McGonagall," Snape breathed in horror, quickly removing his hand. "Get UP!"

It was too late; McGonagall's lantern had caught them straight in its beam. Her mouth dropped open and hung there for several seconds. Lilika cursed, very quietly; Snape was staring at his feet, mouth thin with embarrassment and fury.

"Just what have you two been doing?" McGonagall demanded as soon as she could get her mouth working again. Her stare was piercing.

"Fighting," Lilika answered quickly, springing up quickly; Snape did the same. "Just fighting. Nothing more, nothing less." McGonagall gave them a sour look, her mouth pursed and she had an expression that said quite plainly that she did not entirely believe them. Lilika tried to look perfectly innocent of anything other then fighting. Being as rumpled and dirty as she was, it wasn't hard. She could feel dirt slowly oozing down her back towards her waist and grimaced.

McGonagall watched them for several minutes in silence while her mouth took various shapes, trying to decide on an expression. "So. Fighting. Is that what they're calling it nowadays?" she finally murmured and turned away, but not before Lilika caught what looked like the beginning of a wide grin. Besides her, Snape was almost vibrating in rage.

"Both of you return to the castle immediately," the deputy Headmistress commanded over her shoulder, robes trailing as she headed back to the castle. Lilika and Snape followed her departing figure in resentful, sullen silence.

"You talk of perverts; there's a pervert for your collection if I ever saw one, Miss Woodville," Snape muttered near her ear as they walked. " 'Is that what they're calling it nowadays'...how disgusting to even insinuate you and I would be doing anything of that sort. On the lawn, in that stinking wet grass, rutting like animals for the world to see." One corner of his mouth quirked. "I always knew she had a twisted mind."

Lilika hastily choked down a laugh. "Of course," she said, nodding her head rapidly. "How could she? Disgusting. I would never put myself on display like that."

"Nor would I," he murmured. His face looked rather flushed.

"Never crossed my mind," she agreed. Her thighs ached.

"Impossible," they said together and shot each other a quick, confused glance. They reached the castle doors; Snape held them open for her and she dipped him a small curtsey in response.

Once they were inside, Snape cleared his throat. "Well..."

"We should go eat?" she replied in a rush.

"Yes," he said just as quickly. "Exactly. Time to eat now."

She and Snape separated, each taking a different route to the Great Hall and walking very fast. Once inside, they sat at opposite ends of the table and did not look at each other for the rest of the meal.

Lilika toyed with her chicken, not really tasting it.

Snape's been funny today..I wonder..

No, can't be. Must be me.

She finished her chicken and put the incident out of her mind for the rest of the night.