On Marriage

Chapter Seventeen - Staying Out of Trouble

Disclaimers: I own none of it. Everything you recognize is owned by JK Rowling, her publishers or someone else, but not me. I'm just playing with the characters for a little bit. Please don't sue me; I have nothing. (And for anything I inadvertently lifted from someone else's fan fic, I profusely apologize. I've read so many and worked this idea over so many times I'm sure that I've added things without meaning to.)

A/N: Again, thank you to those of you who are still with me. I had no idea that the ride would be this long and I adore you for hanging on to see how it ends. For your patience, I reward you with a much-longer-than-normal chapter and... (finally!) lemons! Those of you reading on the appropriately rated sites will get the whole story; those of you reading on the PG sites will get the brief version. All errors are mine. Given the length of time between postings, I was entirely too impatient to take anyone up on beta offers.

***

Hermione was able to locate the first floor library with relative ease, and spent the better part of her first full day as a Snape there. She poked about the house some, in blatant disregard of the portraits she seemed to disturb, but wasn't able to locate Severus' laboratory. She imagined that he had placed a fairly strong ward on the entrance to keep her from finding it, though. The house and grounds were large, but not so expansive that they would be able to entirely hide from one another otherwise.

When the weather was good, Hermione expanded her browsing to out of doors. There was a nicely groomed garden, with cobbled paths cleared of snow, though all but the evergreen plants had withered to skeletal remains for the winter. Hermione imagined that the area might be described as 'lush' in the spring, but would have to wait and see. When she asked Severus about it over dinner, he had merely offered a noncommittal noise and agreed that the gardens were 'nice'.

As the second week of her honeymoon drew to a close, Hermione began to get terribly restless. Severus was the only person she had seen or spoken to since the wedding. He disappeared as often as possible, and recently seemed reluctant to hold up his end of a conversation during meals or other times the pair found themselves together in the sitting room. With all mail-carrying owls being redirected for the duration of their stay, Hermione was growing desperate for some sort of interaction. Christmas was only a few days away, and she was sorely beginning to feel the lack of friends and family and genial interaction with other human beings.

Severus seemed to note her mood at dinner that evening.

"You've grown tired of the estate already?" he asked without looking up from his plate. There was little sense of query to the question.

Hermione looked up from her own meal, hoping to at least catch his eye, but was denied even that much interaction. She sighed quietly.

"Not at all," she said, dropping her eyes back to her plate and stabbing a bite of vegetables a bit more viciously than was really necessary. "The house is lovely, the grounds arranged beautifully and I'm sure the gardens will be quite charming come spring." If only the house held someone who was willing to hold a decent conversation! Or, at minimum, someone who didn't seem to want to flee the room the moment that she entered it. While they had yet to achieve a true sense of comfort with one another, Hermione had thought, back at Hogwarts, that they would be able to get through a few weeks without things feeling this terribly awkward. Not for the first time, she longed for the cumbersome politeness that their pre-marriage classroom and tea-time interactions had held. She couldn't imagine why empty vows and a wedding band should be such a set-back.

"And do you intend to be this surly until then?" Severus asked, finally meeting her gaze pointedly. "I rather suggest that you learn how to be an adult and cope without your playthings."

Hermione blinked in utter surprise. She was being surly? And had he just referred to her friends as 'playthings'? She opened her mouth to sputter a reply, but was interrupted by the most unexpected event - an owl fluttering to a stop on the windowsill and tapping the glass in a request for entry.

Gauging by how quickly Severus turned his head to the sound, he had not been expecting an owl, either. They had been assured that only mail of the highest priority would interrupt their time spent away from Hogwarts. The scowl on Severus' face when he retrieved the letter suggested that he knew what it was before he had broken the seal and read the brief sheet of parchment.

"Well, Mrs. Snape," he said dryly, returning to the table and letting the parchment fall beside Hermione's plate. "It appears as though you will have something new to occupy your time this evening."

Hermione picked up the letter without hesitation, and felt the blood drain from her face as she read. It was a missive from the Ministry, stating in rather blunt terms that she and Severus had reached the end of their grace period and were required to consummate their marriage immediately, or else find the union declared null and void.

With a controlled hand, Hermione placed the letter back on the table. She was very aware that Severus was watching her, but found it difficult to meet his gaze. She stared at her dinner plate instead, knowing full well that she would be unable to eat another thing.

After a moment's silence, Hermione heard the rustle of Severus' robes as he moved away from the table.

"I'll see you this evening," he said flatly, and disappeared into the hallway. Agreeing with the need to run away but not being inclined to follow through the same doorway, Hermione pushed away from the table and retreated to her bedroom.

***

Hermione lost some time sitting on her bed, staring sullenly at the wall. She shouldn't have been surprised by the contents of the letter. She had known that, at some point, the need would arise to actually consummate the marriage. But there was something decidedly off-putting about being told, via an impassive and impersonal note from some faceless Ministry employee, that that moment had come. She had hoped to be a bit more emotionally prepared, and wondered if his own preparations had led to Severus' recent distance. It would make sense, she supposed. He didn't seem any more eager than she to engage in the required actions.

With a sigh, Hermione roused herself. She supposed she should go about some sort of preparation, though she really had very little idea of what that should entail.

She bathed, that action making the most sense. She made sure that her legs were smooth and that no unwanted hair made an appearance anywhere else. She combed her hair and scented it very, very lightly. She filed her nails. She put on lip gloss. While Severus had to know that she wasn't exactly a willing partner, Hermione saw no reason to make the event any more difficult for him than it was already going to be.

Clean and back in her room, Hermione looked critically at the space. It had occurred to her that she had no idea if she would be entertaining him in her bed, or if it was to be the other way around. That was a decidedly uncomfortable thought, either way, and Hermione shook her head to get rid of it. She'd know soon enough. In the meantime, straightening up the little bit of clutter that she had accumulated would give her something to do.

Entirely too quickly for her own liking, her clothes were folded and put away, her school things stashed back in her bag, and her books neatly arranged on the shelves. She sighed again, feeling her stomach twist and tighten. How late was it getting to be? Would Severus let her know when it was time? Had he even come back to their suite?

A quick glance at the clock on her nightstand told Hermione that it was getting to be quite late. She knew that she had wasted as much time as possible in the bath, and that was in addition to the time she had spent lost in thought and cleaning her room. If Severus hadn't even made it back into their rooms yet, it was going to be an obnoxiously long night.

Screwing up her courage and ignoring what felt like her heart beating in her throat, Hermione tied her dressing gown over her pajamas and opened the door to the sitting room. It was dim, as it usually was at this time of night, lit only by the fireplace and a few candles that had been placed on the sideboard. Severus was nowhere to be seen, so Hermione crept further into the room. Perhaps he'd left a note...

There was nothing on the table, the sideboard or near the sofa. She scowled. Where in the world had he gone and when exactly was he planning to come back? As nervous as she had become, part of Hermione was ready to just get the whole thing over with so she could get some sleep.

Throwing a baleful glance towards Severus' bedroom, Hermione was surprised to find the door standing partially open. In the two weeks that they had occupied these rooms, Hermione had never seen his door open. From where she stood, she tried to see if he was inside, but the room beyond the doorframe was darker than the sitting room and she couldn't see inside. She crept forward a few steps, craning her neck, but still couldn't make any definite sense out of the shadowed shapes that she could make out.

Before she knew how she had covered the distance, Hermione found herself within arm's reach of Severus' door. Swallowing hard, she reached out a hand and knocked tentatively on the wooden frame.

"Severus?" she asked, her voice so quiet that it barely registered in her own ears.

She was greeted by a silence so thick that she was convinced that the room was empty. Perhaps she should just go back to her room and wait. Severus could send for her when he returned.

Just as Hermione turned to make the return trek across the sitting room, there was the sound of someone stirring from deep inside the shadows.

"Come in," Severus said.