Kristmas Wish Fulfilled for: purplefluffycat
From: inamac

Title: In The Bleak Mid-Winter
Characters/Pairings: Severus/Minerva
Rating: NC17
Kinks/Themes Included: bondage, leather, sensation play
Other Warnings/Content: biscuit dunking
Word Count: 2,200
Summary/Description: Minerva had always kept her pleasures to herself. Until Severus knocked on her door that Christmas Eve...
Author's Notes: Thanks to my prompter for asking for a fic with 'fondness between the characters' and this giving me a chance to explore asexuality in the Potterverse. And to the mods for infinite patience and extended deadlines.



It always snows at Christmas at Hogwarts. Sometimes I consider enlisting the help of my fellow teachers to break the Founders Charm on the weather simply to relieve the monotony. The older students would probably welcome the opportunity to get out of the Castle and away from the enforced jollity.

So I wasn't entirely surprised that Christmas Eve when, at eighteen years of age and in the middle of his final year at Hogwarts Severus came to me for instruction. The fact that he was neither a member of my House, nor one of my NEWT level Transfiguration students was a measure of his desperation.

The fact that I agreed to his request was a measure of mine.

And really, who else could he turn to? Albus had known passion in his youth, but betrayal and rejection had long since turned his energies from romance to politics. Horace Slughorn's values were all too material, and Poppy is too committed a Healer to understand that suffering can bring its own relief.

So he came to me.

I cannot say that it was unexpected. I know my students. I knew what Black and Potter had put the boy through; sniping at his parentage, his studiousness, his curiosity and his friendships. And I knew how he had reacted. His hurt and bitterness. And a further retreat into study, beyond what was required for his exams. Knew it because it was how I had behaved myself – before I understood my own nature, and thus how to recognise it in others.

So on Christmas Eve, with the snow falling fast from a white sky, swirling past my arched window and coating the black lead of the lattice with white spiderwebs, I had half expected the diffident knock on my door.

There were very few people it could have been, and only one student had remained for the holiday. I set aside my book, pulled my heavy woollen robe around me, slipped on my slippers and went to open the door myself.

He was wearing his school robes. Of course he was; he had no others; though they were clean and bore the heavy glamour of oft-repeated warming charms. He carried his satchel over one shoulder (something I do not permit to my students – it ruins the posture), and held a loosely rolled parchment in his other hand.

"Come in," I said. "You shouldn't still be studying on Christmas Eve."

He shrugged, and I did not need Legilimency to understand the unspoken I don't have anything else to do. What he did say, as he obeyed my instruction and crossed to stand where the fire made a pool of warmth, was not quite what I had expected.

"I've been looking up love potions, and I wondered... well, you know those talks you gave in second year?"

I nodded. I have no idea why Albus decided that I was the best person to provide the students with their instruction in sexual matters, although as Transfiguration teacher I had more than my share of pupils asking whether there are charms to enlarge certain parts of their anatomy (below the waist for the boys, above for the girls), and it was better to deal with the whole subject of sex between wizards and witches before the Infirmary had to deal with any more underage experiments.

"Love potions?" I repeated, wondering where this was leading. Potter and Evans had, rather spectacularly, announced their engagement at the end of term – on the station platform where Black had made some rather crude allusions to the operation of the pistons driving the engine of the Hogwarts Express. I had noticed Snape's expression, disgust and disappointment, but thought that he had accepted the ending of his long obsession with the Muggleborn witch. Plainly he had not. If he was researching love potions did he think that Potter and his cronies had somehow slipped amortentia to Evans? If he did, even the most superficial research should have disabused him of the idea. "That is really Professor Slughorn's field. And he is your Housemaster."

The boy dismissed my comment with a snort of derision. Then he froze, perhaps realising, belatedly, that a student should not be openly contemptuous of his teacher before another member of staff. But it was the season of goodwill, and I rather shared the boy's opinion.

I gestured to him to take my own place on the sofa and gathered my gown around me to sit in the upright leather chair – not so close as to be intimidating, but intimate enough to reassure. I conjoured a pot of hot chocolate and a plate of custard creams, poured for both of us, and pushed the plate to him. "Have a biscuit and start at the beginning," I invited.

"I..." He obeyed, nibbling a corner. You can tell a good deal about someone by how they deal with a custard cream. "What does love feel like?"

Damn. It couldn't be anything simple, could it? I split my own biscuit and dunked the naked half into my cocoa. "That depends on the person. What does amortentia smell like to you?"

He shrugged. "A potion. Damiana root, powdered Ashwinder egg, Betony, Essence of Antimony, White Caharis feather..."

"I see." And I did. The boy was a prodigy when it came to identifying the contents of a potion. "But how does it make you feel?"

Again he shrugged. "I don't know. I mean, it doesn't make me want to have sex or anything. That would be..."

Gross, I thought, wondering whether I was dealing with something as simple as repression. His Muggle father might have made him see sexual feelings as dirty or decadent. But he surprised me.

"Inappropriate," he said. "I mean, if you – love – someone you wouldn't want to – violate – them."

"Even if they wanted to be violated?" I asked.

He shivered. Not with disgust but like a horse troubled by flies. I knew now what I was dealing with, and my heart went out to him. "Most people confuse the physical act of sex with the emotion of love," I said. "Just as they confuse the senses of taste and smell. But love and lust aren't the same thing at all. What you feel - what you felt - for Lily is love." Damn. The Greeks understood all this, but it was no time for history or a language lesson. "Have you ever," I asked carefully, "felt sexual arousal?"

"Of course. Just not... with anyone else."

"But a nice feeling?"

He smiled reminiscently, and the expression lit his face and made him look – not handsome, but desirable. I reminded myself sternly that I was considerably his senior. And that he was my pupil. And he was of age. And had come to me for instruction. And it was Christmas Eve. I had planned to spend the evening indulging in my own fantasies, but perhaps I could help him explore his.

"Severus," I said, using his given name for the first time. "I don't know whether you can ever find someone who can respond to your sort of love without needing physical expression, but there are ways of gratifying those needs."

"I know," he said, not meeting my eyes.

I reached out a hand to cup his face and bring his eyes to mine. "So what is it?" I asked. "What turns you on? What excites you?"

Again there was that equine shiver, but he leaned into my touch. "Constriction," he said. "Binding."

My breath caught in my throat. Of all the confessions he might have made, that was the most unexpected. We were much more alike than I had thought. I had planned on spending a cosy night in with my toys and some inspirational erotica, but this was better. I dropped my hand from his face to my robe, untying the belt and pulling the garment open to reveal the harness beneath. Yes, I knew about constriction and binding, and the purely physical responses that they could engender.

His eyes widened, and he licked his lips, but I knew that it was not the sight of my naked flesh that aroused him. His hand reached for the buckle between my breasts, thumb smoothing over metal and leather.

"Can I?" he asked.

"No," I said. This was not about my gratification, but his. "Not until you're ready. You had better strip. You can use my bathroom, if you need."

The offer had been mere politeness. His hands flew to the clasp of his over-robe, and, having shed that, moved quickly and with hypnotic rhythm down to undo the buttons of his tunic, the buckle of his belt, and the fly of his trousers, without pause. As he worked I stood, threw off my own robe and stretched, revelling in the pull of leather over buttocks, breasts and thighs, before bending to open the chest beside the sofa and contemplate the contents. There was a second harness, studded and spiked, but it was not designed for a male, and in any case was, perhaps, too advanced for his first time. I selected a few more appropriate items and set them on the sofa before closing the lid and picking up my wand.

I was aware of his eyes following me, but with curiosity rather than arousal. He showed no embarrassment at being naked before me, and neither he should. At eighteen he had attained his full height and his body was well muscled and firm, better in fact than a good many of my less studious pupils – but hauling cauldrons and climbing trees and cliffs to get at the more obscure potions ingredients is not work for the unfit. "Stand still," I ordered, walking round him to work out where best to begin.

He obeyed me without question, though I caught the quickening of his breath as I moved out of his line of sight. Fear and anticipation, I surmised. Well, it would do neither of us any good to delay any longer.

"Tell me," I said, "if I do anything that hurts or distresses you. I am going to start with a simple Binding charm. Are you ready?"

He swallowed, and then jerked his chin up, exposing the vulnerable length of his neck. "Yes."

It had been an involuntary action, but I filed the response away for later exploration. In the meantime I conjoured thin serpentine ropes from my wand and directed them around him, encasing his torso in a spiderweb of lines that echoed my own harness, and tightened to bite at his nipples, constrict his waist, and separate his buttocks.

He was breathing very carefully, exploring the sensations of rope on his naked skin, and of being in my power. He was not aroused, not yet, though the sight of him subservient to my will fuelled my own imagination. I flexed the muscles that made my labia pulse against the leather that confined it. Then I stepped closer and laid a hand on his shoulder, passing it down his body to pull the rope tighter.

"Yes," he said, again. It was an acknowledgement and a demand for more. Perhaps I had underestimated him. I crossed to the sofa and picked up a soft leather posture-collar. It had been designed for me, with corset-steels running from chin to breastbone, and on either side from the point of my jaw to my collarbones, so I had to do a little Transfiguration to allow it to fit his broader masculine neck. He stood quiet as the charm took hold and swallowed against the leather as I fastened the three buckles at the back, careful not to catch his overlong hair.

"You won't be able to nod," I said, though he would have realised that as soon as I had set it in place. "Or to look down. But I'm sure you don't need to see to touch yourself."

His eyes slid sideways to meet mine with a question that I needed no Legilimency to understand. "No." I said. "I will teach you what you need to know, but you must explore your own limits."

Obediently he curled his fingers loosely around his cock and began to press and pull himself to hardness. I watched with interest. His touch and rhythm was very different from mine. I ran my own fingers down to my clit in response and pulsed again, growing wet now, as he grew hard.

"I need more," he said. He freed one hand and reached back to finger his anus. I had not set a rope there, though I knew how much physical pleasure a well-positioned knot could give. For a moment I considered using magic to provide what he needed, then remembered one sensation that I was uniquely able to give.

And it was Christmas.

I knelt carefully behind him, positioned my hands on his hips to keep him still, and performed a very controlled Transfiguration. The first he knew of it was the bite of unsheathed claws in his flesh. Then I opened my mouth and uncoiled my cat-rough tongue to lick firmly across his puckered entrance.

He threw his head back to the limit the collar allowed, screamed – and came.

As did I.

~End~