warnings: sexual tension, nudity, cursing, dom!sev
word count: 4286

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Her dress slackened to a heap, the warm bubble bath air licking every pore of her bare body, only her most intimate clothes donned.

He scanned her frame above his Roman nose, mentally tracing a finger along her spine. She had moonmade skin maimed by numerous scars of different sizes spiraling from head to toe.
She was clearly athletic, solid, toned - her every wound tried to martoriate her muscular anatomy into a bundle of past reminders.

"Each one is for a kill, or a battle." she whispered, feeling somewhat worshipped under his dead glare.

He breathed in, as one does to prepare before a great struggle.

"You showed me your scars, it is only fair to show you mine."

Snape curled his fingers in his direction, slightly bowing his head when Cesira stood right under his nose.

"Undress me." he intoned as one of his orders, knowing she wasn't a woman to be bossed around.

Yet, she obeyed.

His soothing voice smoothed her tensed edges, beguiling her senses as much a mermaid lures sailors to death.

His deep chant could never go unnoticed.

Cesira fixed her eyes on his, even as his frock and shirt were set aside above her robes. He curled his lips.

"Take a look."

She lowered her gaze to his unnatural pale complexion, his broad chest and corded arms peppered with visible rivers of veins mapping his skin.
His abs, once softer, now popped under his flesh each time he breathed out, lats pouring into his center to underline upper and lower core muscles. He wasn't necessarily hairy, his torso was bare expection made for a happy black trail around his bellybutton plunging inside his slacks.

It was clear to her that he had been training outside her lessons.

His scars were equally white, almost invisible compared to his sallow skin, some were longer, some were deeper.

She looked up at him, unbuckling his belt - he never touched her.

Before she could kneel he got rid of his trousers via wandless magic, black boxers carefully hindering his proportions.

"No need to kneel, Cesira, it would be out of character." he stated unabashedly, pleased by her coy little smile.

As he turned his back to get into the huge tub she leered his back, her heart squeezed in unrequired sympathy and pity. She could recognize belt scars everywhere, Hazel had them too.

His upper back was sprayed with deep wounds, there were so many that she could not outline the shoulder blades, the back muscles stiffen with his movements: a large painting so ferociously disfigured as to restore it unrecognizable.

Those ones never fade, never heal.

"Leering is considered rude, Blyde."

She quickly masked her pity with innocence - aware he would loathe her sympathy as much as her - slowly immersing herself into the tepid waters conquered by mountains of foam.

He groaned in relief, leaning his nape against the marble border of the pool, accepting the soothing effect of magic bubble bath as distant ambience music echoed in the castle.

They stayed at each end, eyes closed, intimate clothes vanished thanks to foam guarding their now completely naked bodies.

"Eowyn." he drawled after blissful minutes, or hours, of peace and quiet.

Cesira heard his voice calling her second name from the realm of dreams, fluttering her eyes as she met his frame right two feather away from her.

Had it been another month, she would have jumped to her wand.

"Yes?"

Severus placed himself beside her, looking at the dormant mermaid and the way light trespassed stained glass windows, reflecting a plethora of colored prisms on the pool.

"I've never heard this kind of name before," he kept murmuring, never allowing his sonorous baritone to trigger such a dreamy atmosphere.

She chuckled, slowly moving water with her fingers.

"It's from a muggle trilogy called The Lord of The Rings, my parents were huge fans." she explained, voice sweet and memories distant pangs of faded pain.

"Sounds solemn." he commented.

"I can lend you the books if you'd like, they might keep you company when you will be through with me and Penny messing around." she quipped, noticing his wet raven hair dripping.

He groaned. "Merlin help me, devilish women."

She giggled, lightly splashing his chest. Soon after a much bigger splash swallowed her whole, wetting her perfectly dry hair.

She gaped. "You-"

His lips placidly stilled on hers, unmoving, barely reaching their long lost partner. His nose brushed against her face scar.

Cesira trembled, stumbling forward to run after the ghost of his chaste kiss, his slender fingers encased her jowls without tugging nor mandhandling her with the usual violence they had used to touch each other until now.

Why do I feel on fire if I'm surrounded by water?

They locked gazes, desperately wanting to ravish their bodies so that their skins slackened to a heap above their robes, dismantling their bones until there was nothing left to love but their souls.

"I would burn this instant if I don't have you against the marble board, Eowyn, but this is not the day."

She smiled sadly, closing her eyes and brushing her cheeks against his gentle fingers. He was right, they would regret this - furthermore if they were to spend weeks together hellbent on something more paramount.

"I know, this would only be the first boulder of a landslide we wouldn't be able to stop."

His index grazed her temple, craning her head daintily.

"I thought about planting fake scenarios of a most salacious nature inside this pretty, clever head of yours so as to satisfy you, and you would plant yours in mine -" she licked lips, the sudden realization of being naked at his mercy birthing havoc from the seams of her bones.

I thought about it too.

"Even though it would be cruel to beguile ourselves with what we can't have." he concluded, his grasp tightening a bit, her hands instantly gripping his forearm - not defending herself.

He licked his canine at her staccatos, her shaking frame sending electric jolts right to his crotch.

"How would you know what I find satisfying in a coitus, Severus?"

She predicted a pull on her temple and his presence marching inside her mind, ripping her thoughts etched on her skull - he didn't.

His taunting chuckle belonged to the Devil.

"You could easily disharm me this instant, though here you are: shaking under my hand, sodden." he prodded her cheeks, hollowing them. She could feel his nails digging her skin.

She whimpered, he tudded. "Such a dominant mistress on the outside, always trying to get under my skin, putting dunderheads in their place with her icy eyes: untamable, unbended, unbroken."

He towered over her, her neck on the verge of breaking at the painful angle he was holding her head.

"Yet so willing to empower me to make a wreck out of her."

She choked his forearm as his hand quickly strangled her neck, her sapphires watering with immense pleasure at his oozing dominance.

"Am I right, Cesira?"

She shook her head, hissing as he squeezed harder, her hand clasping his bigger one to pry it away.

"I intend to throttle you if you don't tell the truth witch, and you know I will."

Cesira swiftly freed herself to prove him wrong, wrapping her arms behind his neck to assault his lips.

He aimed south, tracing her spine until he fulfilled his months old desire to knead her bum, lightly lifting her off the poolbed.

She bit down his lower lip, dragging it forward before releasing it with a lecherous sound.

"Yes, yes, you're right you despicable man! I hate you, you disgust me." she spat, backing away before she could feel his boner on her stomach.

He displayed his Slytherin smirk.

"The contempt is only mutual."

Silence. Humors shifted again.

"Come," he guided her under the cradling jets seeping from the thousand taps, turning her around to brush her locks with his fingers.

"You should know that bathing right under the taps leaves a special scent on you, as if they know which one suits you best." he explained, focusing solely on combing her hair and not her visible chest.

She secretly yearned for a tender kiss on her head after he brusquely bruised her face and neck - he didn't.

"My, you're a regular guest here."

"Sometimes, yes, it's my guilty secret: not even the old fool is aware of it."

She turned around as he finished, carefully twirling his inky strand around her finger.

"My turn."

She raised her arms to brush his soft hair, massaging his scalp every now and then just to elicit delicious groans thrumming inside his chest.

Her eyes leveled with the pointy bone of his neck, his chewed back right under her nose. She thought about kissing his scars, but it would be instantly translated as sympathy.

"Your scent is fresh ink, parchments, yellowed pages and rain when it washes away snow on a misty evening." she murmured.

He hummed. "Yours is summer wind, a flourished meadow, olive tree and waves lifting the sea."

Silence settled once again, the lulling melody of gurgling water and mellow music soothing their sharp characters one more time, quenching their sexual appetite.

She couldn't restrain her limbs from hugging him from behind, resting her cheek on his back as they let colored water trickle down their bared souls.

They stayed like that until dawn, in sacred quiet.

Not a word on it, not a chance to alter their rivaling chemistry known to everyone outside that chamber.

What they shared there - along with what they haven't had - was meant to swim and drown inside that pool forever.

They vowed not to reveal the best of them to anyone, only to themselves.

. • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆. • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

"PEEVES! Get the fuck off the tree you useless troublemaker!" Cesira bellowed in the Great Hall, hands on hips as she threw imaginary daggers at the poltergeist trying to ruin the central Christmas tree she and Minnie had decorated with the best Hogwarts disposed of, worthy of Filius' traditional ornaments.

She was outraged, oblivious to the nine students who remained at the castle giggling at her prophanities.

The spirit threw chicken legs at her, singing all kinds of insults.

"Oh you'll be sorry for that," she whipped her wand, "Scacciaspettri!"

Black smoke taking form of a dragon erupted from her aspen, chasing down the poltergeist who yelped like a baby until it disappeared.

A niffler belonging to an Hufflepuff ran towards the shiny stars hanging from one of the trees, high jumping to take its gold, Cesira prepared to catch it bare hands when a quick spark shot it, engulfing it until it dangled by its scruff from Snape's hand.

"Five points from Hufflepuff for not controling your creature Miss Cazalet." he reprimanded the poor girl, still holding the niffler which clearly felt uneasy in his grasp.

"Oh Professor Snape please, it's Christmas Eve!"

"Ten points for your cheek, do you intend on pursuing your tantrum silly girl?"

He let go of the poor animal, brushing his hand on his cloak in disgust.

"Snape stop being a spoilsport and leave the kids alone for one day of your life!" Cesira interfered, shooing the bat away not to let him ruin their Christmas at Hogwarts, knowing it to be the best yet the loneliest feeling ever.

"And I return all the points taken Miss Cazalet, we don't take points during the holidays."

He scoffed, swatting her hands that were pushing him away. "Speak for yourself, as for the students from my house," he dangerously eyed some greens sitting together with the shrapnels of the student body, "I strongly advise you to keep your behavior pristine, unlike Professor Blyde here I am not a 'mama bear'."

He meant to be intimidating, instead a soft laughter erupted at his words. Cesira dried a tear.

"Mama bear? Sweet Merlin Professor, how do you even know these words?"
She exclaimed.

He rolled his eyes, storming off with a swish of his cloak. Dramatic bitch.

She ran after him to ease his brooding spirit so as to prevent any outburst on innocent victims, but he was gone.

Then again, she was just trying to keep herself busy with literally anything to prevent thinking about what day it was.

The day they died.

Cesira unconsciously strolled outside, pacing the snowy grounds away from any glare. She entered the empty quidditch stadium, mounted on a training broom and started playing solitaire with a quaffle, hurling it inside the circles and chasing it soon after.

She dusted off her old strategies that never missed, unwillingly wallowing in memories where they were very much alive.

"Give them hell Rira!"

She halted, looking at the stands where a boy and a girl were cheering for her, swinging a Ravenclaw scarf high above their heads.

She slowly approached them, afraid they would fade away. Francis and Hazel kept shouting her name even when she was two feet from them, heart shattered, soul ripped.

"Francis, Hazel..." she whispered, snow watering her eyes as silent tears fell down.

They couldn't see her, a frozen memory etched on those stands forever.

She finally released the lump in her throat, crying histerically while hunching on the broom, letting snowflakes knit a cold blanket on her sobbing frame.

It felt ugly, holding all that grief inside her eyes. Letting her body emotionally react was harrowing her, yes, but it was also heaving up a pending weigh from her shoulders.

She kept crying whilst the images of her friends cheered, a grotesque show.

She knew that after the tears they would still be gone, she knew none of this could ever give them back to her.

But right when teardrops drowned her that was when she could finally breathe, displaying her sorrows around her and vacant her body of every piercing pain.

A soft, human hand rubbed her back, taking off the snow.

It wasn't Snape, he would never comfort her and betray his demeanor.

"My dear, dear girl." Minerva cooed, scooping her up from her broom with surprising strength, wrapping her in her plaid cloak as she expertedly flew towards a tower of the castle, carefully hiding from stranger eyes.

She opened a window, landing in a cozy room Cesira had never seen.

The Gryffindor common room was a circular room full of squashy armchairs, tables, and a bulletin board where school notices, ads, lost posters hung.

No student was around, Minerva lit the embers, conjuring shortbreads and floral tea.

"All my students are away for Christmas, no one can reach us here my dear."

Cesira hugged her knees still wrapped in her cloak, sobbing the last tears as her throat itched with spiking pangs of white-hot pain.

"I would have loved spending my school years inside this room," she stated hoarsely, "but that crusty hat decided to condemn me to seven years of constant reminders I was in the wrong place, I was wrong."

Minerva sighed, deciding not to reach out to her until she said so.

"I admit, you yield all the qualities Godric Gryffindor himself valued in an individual: unselfish bravery, outstanding sense of honor, and a certain drive for recklessness."

She paused.

"Yet, the Sorting Hat is never wrong. Besides, it takes a lot more than courage to be who you are today."

Cesira scoffed. "An hopeless wreck?"

"A great witch." she countered sternly.

"You don't know what I've done after I left your cottage Minnie, how I procured myself this scar."

The older witch lowered her cup, crossing her hands on her lap.

"Why don't you tell me? Crying is a sign of growth, not a weakness."

She looked at her former student as she battled with herself whether to welcome her proposal or refuse it, closing her fists on her mantle.

"I wouldn't know where to start... thus I'll show you."

Cesira took out her aspen, pointing it at the thriving hearth.

Her hand trembled, until it stilled.

"Mostramemoria." she muttered under her breath, and the flames danced high, morphing into figures.

The haunting tale of the Lion-Eagle Dame started playing.

° .• °:. *₊ °

"Let me go!" cried Cesira, ripping herself from Minerva's spell, sauntering up to the Death Eaters flying away.

Blood escaped her mouth, her robes were scarred, ribs broken.

She pointed her wand against a jet black tall man preparing to flee as other members of the Order had arrived.

"Crucio!" she yelled, heart beating wild as the man impossibly deflected the curse to the ground.

She tried every dark spell she knew - he repelled them all.

"Fight back! You coward fight back!" she cried, unbridled thirst for revenge dried her tongue and deserted her brain.

"Sectumsempra!"

Thousand cuts opened her skin, blood flowing gracefully. She fell face on concrete, staining the road.

It felt as if Death were taking her sweet time to suck life out of her cuts.

Cesira clenched her teeth and painfully crawled to her aspen a few feet from her, the open flesh brushing against harsh surface, she stretched our her hand in an animalistic groan instantly superseded by an ear-shredding cry as a boot stomped on her wrist, crushing it on the ground.

"You dare call me coward?" a melliflous, aloof baritone drawled above her.

Cesira shook her head, mingling tears with rivers of crimson liquid. They died, they died right in front of her eyes and she couldn't save them!

"Kill me," she pleaded, "KILL ME!"

Another harrowing cry fended the somber air as the man pushed his boot down, breaking her wrist in an horrendous crack.

Her head was yanked backwards, his gloved hand taking a handful of her chestnut hair, making her face two lifeless charcoals shining behind a mask.

"Letting you live would be much worse, to stay here while they're gone." he mused, she started coughing blood as his curse reached her heart.

"I will spare you. I do not wish to fight a dying witch."

He let go of her head, repelling a wave of fire.

"Incarcerous!" she heard Minnie yell, but the Death Eater had already appareted elsewhere.

The flames roared, changing setting.

Minerva's cottage perched in the Highlands was a quaint little home, filled with memories and seven cats.

"You can stay here until the war is over my dear, no one can hurt you now."

She had tried to get a word out of her student, but in two weeks of recovering she didn't utter a word, nor an emotion.

The young girl was numb, paralyzed by anger and grief.

Minerva cursed Albus and his foolish decision.

"Promise me you won't leave when I'm back."

Cesira didn't answer her, keeping her eyes fixed on the window.

Flames soared high.

Images of multiple shelters burned faster and faster, until they morphed into one on one fights, daring chasings and multiple killings.

The flames cared to focus on Bellatrix Lestrange laughing above Cesira, carving her dagger on her face as she screamed until she used wandless magic to knock her back, her scarred face glowing in the fire.

"I didn't kill your filfthy mudblood friends, it was all your fault!" Bella intoned, dancing around.

"Liar!" Cesira bellowed, a hand on her bloody eye.

"You killed your best friends, you killed your best friends!" the witch kept on singing.

And then dogfights, duels, tortures too graphic to describe danced in the welcoming hearth.

The flames stopped on a Daily Prophet moving picture of 1989 Slytherin graduates, a long dagger pierced through the heart of Severus Snape.

° .• °:. *₊ °

E

mbers glowed.

Cesira looked at Minnie, ready to encounter contempt or to be fired on the spot.

"I... applied here for him, I wanted to get my revenge for sparing my life and impeding me to kill myself as a punishment for surviving the war when they didn't."

Silence.

"He knows, I guess I was never good at hiding it."

Minerva gently cupped her face, swiping away newborn tears.

"Do you still wish to kill Severus?"

Cesira breathed in, breathed through, breathed out.

"No, I do not."

Minerva scanned her face in search of any trace of dishonesty, pulling her into a motherly hug. Cesira desperately clawed at her shoulders as if she was going to disappear.

She couldn't stop the new wave of ugly crying.

"You have ripped your soul so deep my dear lassie, I cannot condone your murders but I understand. I understand the pain, the anger, the grief."

She rocked her back and forth.

"Never, never use dark magic again Cesira. Who you are is not etched with darkness, but warmed with light."

Her voice was stern yet sweet, half reprimanding her actions, half soothing her sorrows.

"Revenge only cuts a deeper wound my dear, then it grows addictive until you lose sight of yourself."

She gently hushed her sobs, stroking her hair.

"Shh, it's okay. I am sure Francis and Hazel are waiting for you to redeem yourself, to cherish them with good deeds. They know you are not a goner - your heart is beating, your soul can be mended again.
They know, I know."

She nodded on her chest, silencing herself once again to gather sense of it all. Bellatrix said something that stuck with her like explosion shrapnels.

They tortured them to death, I remember. I... remember.

"Did you know it was Severus the Death Eater you saved me from?"

Minnie shook her head, a single tear falling down.

"Albus trusts him, therefore I do too. He has an horrific past, I am well aware, but he no longer believes in their cause. He had put his faith in the wrong person. Albus doesn't give second chances to anyone, he must have seen something in him."

Cesira sighed. "Do you?"

Minerva smiled, kissing her forehead.

"I believe the boy is redeeming himself, there is good in him he doesn't want to show."

"Have you seen his good side?"

Minerva chuckled. "Oh yes, he's the sweetest when he's not trying to push you away with his snarky comments. Losing him would pain me deeply."

She looked at her watch, fetching floo powder and stepping inside the fireless hearth. "Oh Godric! I best be going, my family will be waiting for me! They cooked a huge turkey, would you like to join us dear? We can always make room for a friend."

Cesira smiled, shaking her head.

"No thank you Minnie, I'll keep the students company."

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The Great Hall was heart-wrenchingly empty at dinner, the nine lot was probably dining together in a common room, the remaining staff was away eating with their families before coming back after dinner time.

Cesira ate her meal at the Ravenclaw table, sitting where she used to sit.

Snape was most certainly eating in his quarters.

No illusions of her friends sitting beside her, no chattering, no distant steps.

Poor Cesira Eowyn Blyde, all alone.

Minerva didn't excuse her actions, but she believed in her second chance. A chance she would serve rescuing Albus Dumbledore and annihilating a dead master of evil.

Deep down she had already read her final chapter: there was no other way to mend her soul if not through sacrifice.

Severus' story was meant to continue, Penny was too young to die - it had to be her.

And then, as the ground swallowed her whole, she would see their faces again and run through Hogwarts meadows together.

When she was done eating she entered the heart of the blizzard, making snowflakes take funny shapes of pixies, owls, mooncalves, fairies.

Midnight was due.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" he emerged from the entrance door of the Clocktower Courtyard, opening his cloak to wrap its right wing around her shaking frame.

Cesira leaned her temple on his chest.

"Yes, yes it is." she whispered.

Severus caressed her arm as he hugged her tighter to his side, whipping his wand.

"Expecto Patronum," an agile doe jumped from his acacia, galloping around, trying to catch snowflakes with its tongue.

Cesira mirrored him, freeing her orca swimming in the blizzard, playfully chasing his doe in circles.

"What do you like to do on Christmas Eve?" she asked, staring at their patronusses as her orca splashed snow on his doe with its tail.

"A quiet Christmas Eve spent beside a cauldron fire with snow falling outside is all the gift I need. You?"

She nodded, wrapping her arms around his narrow waist.

"All I need is spending time with a..."

"A friend?" he inquired, looking down at her.

She craned her head, smirking.

"Or a nemesis."

He grinned, stroking her cheek with his knuckles.

"I guess a friend will do for tonight."

He walked her to the empty staffroom - since his chambers were under the lake - sitting on the black leather couch stacked right in front of a tall, broad window opening on the school grounds.

They sat in silence, watching a quiet snowfall.

He would absentmindedly graze her legs resting on his lap or twirl his finger around her locks as her head rested on the crook of his neck.

"I know where I first met you," he confessed all of a sudden, "and I'm sorry."

He gently kissed the very wrist he had crushed nine years ago, murmuring latin words she found incomprehensible.

"I do not forgive you Severus," she kissed his hollow cheek almost ironically, aware he had expected her refusal.

"You never will." he hummed, as if she said the complete opposite.

She smiled. "Yes, but for now this..." she lingered on his half clothed hand drawing circles on her knee. "is nice."

They sat in silence for a while more, a silence that tasted like thousand words, and she would stay there listening to his heart for hours, years, or just one second.

The clock striked midnight.

Tomorrow night they would be leaving Hogwarts to find Albus and defeat Expirivit, but for now, just for this night, they could enjoy the fall of snow and how it glistened as it fell.

"Merry Christmas Cesira."

"Merry Christmas Severus."