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Happy Traditions, everyone!
Title: Unlikely Bedfellows, Part 1
Author: cmwinters
Gift For: all fest participants! [original recipient] wanted hurt/comfort, D/s with spanking and femmedom, threesome, Eastern Europan Summer Solstice/Festival of St. John the Baptist, Saturnalia/Yule, Lammas/First Fruits, anything Jewish and/or anything Christian. Er, I tried.
Pairing(s): Lucius/Hermione/Severus, Lucius/Severus
Summary: Hermione finds herself in a strange alliance with the Malfoy family when it's discovered that Snape is alive and in desperate need of immediate medical attention
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: BDSM, hurt/comfort, slightly dominant female, threesome, some homosexual themes although I wouldn't strictly call it "slash"
Author's notes: I hope the beginning isn't too entirely boring. I tried to set it up for something plausible. The muse went on the warpath here. *stabs her with a rusty titanium spork*

Read it here or at Livejournal, and don't forget to leave feedback for all of our lovely participants!


Harry, Ron, and Hermione trudged down the bloodstained and damaged stairs leading out of the Headmaster's office and staggered wearily up to Gryffindor Tower. Unsurprisingly, Harry was exhausted and wanted only to sleep; Ron said he'd stay with him. Judging by the heartfelt "good night's" they gave her, they both clearly expected Hermione to collapse into her own bed in her own dorm, and in fact, she did head that way. One look at the bunk, however, convinced her she was in for hours of fruitless tossing and turning, and she made her way slowly back to the Great Hall.

Augusta Longbottom and her heavily bandaged grandson were just leaving, headed for home by the looks of things. Hermione really liked Neville; he was a quiet, unassuming young man with a terrible past and a strength of character few possessed. Although, in retrospect, she was filled with gratitude and admiration that Neville had eliminated Voldemort's snake as a threat while his head was on fire, even at the time, she hadn't been surprised.

"All right, Hermione?" Neville asked with genuine concern, and from some depths she hadn't known she possessed, Hermione managed a tired smile at him. "Been better," she admitted. Neville cast a critical gaze at her, clearly wishing to ensure she had no immediate needs before nodding.

"Could be worse," he said so quietly it was almost inaudible. Hermione nodded too.

"Headed home then?" she asked, and all three of them winced at the false brightness in her voice.

"Yes — well, no," Neville hedged. "I want to stop by the hospital first. I wanted, um, to see my parents. Tell them it's over." His brow tightened and Hermione could nearly hear him thinking not that it will do any good. She clasped him on the shoulder and he looked at her in slight surprise.

"I think that's a FANTASTIC idea, Neville," she declared firmly, looking him straight in the eye. "Give your parents my best."

"I will," he promised with a wry half-smile. "Thank you."

"Thank you!" she insisted, her eyes wide for emphasis.

They pulled each other into a heartfelt hug and separated with no few tears on either side. With watery parting smiles they went their separate ways — the Longbottoms out the immense oak front doors to Hogwarts castle, and Hermione through the entry to the Great Hall.

She paused to swipe a hand across her grime and tear-stained face, and reflected at how so much hand changed in such a short time. Determined to memorise and memorialise the faces and names of all the casualties, feeling as if she owed the dead that much respect, Hermione made her way to the long line of bodies laid out in quiet repose. Something in the back of her mind noted absently that the Malfoys were no longer huddling at the end of what had once been the Slytherin House table, although she paid it no heed.

The difficult task was made even more difficult by her not knowing all of the casualties. Some, she knew, were students that started the year after her. Some were Order members she hadn't met. Some had injuries that made them completely unrecognisable. She winced when she saw Arben Dervishi, an owner of a Hogsmeade shop, clearly dead by Sectumsempra. And at the far end lay her erstwhile professor, Remus Lupin, alongside his new wife, her features bland and her hair colour reverted to mousy brown in her death. Not even married a year, their infant son orphaned much like Harry had been.

It was Remus who Hermione stared at the longest; it was he that she probably knew best of all the new martyrs to this war. Colin had been a year behind her and Fred and George were always planning something together, so she hadn't spent nearly as much time talking to either of them as she had to Remus. She felt relieved in a sad kind of way. Freed finally from the curse of lycanthropy that Fenrir Greyback had foisted upon him, he'd no longer have to endure the sickening dosages of Wolfsbane or hide in the Shri . . .

Hermione's head snapped up, and she scanned the line of bodies intently. "SHIT!" she hissed, and darted off to the antechamber where she'd seen Shacklebolt and Dawlish moving the bodies of the Death Eaters, horror and apprehension causing her stomach to roil.

In the antechamber lay five bodies: Voldemort's, Bellatrix Lestrange's, Dolohov — whom she recognised from the battle at the Department of Mysteries two years previously — a bizarre wolfish body Hermione knew belonged to Fenrir Greyback, and a badly charred, thickset one that she knew had to be Vincent Crabbe. "Oh God, no!" she moaned after counting them again to make sure, furious with herself, furious with Ron and even furious with Harry. Her hands darted to her head, as if it were in imminent danger of bursting, and she ran out of the antechamber and dashed out of the castle as fast as she could.

It had been hours. At least four, maybe five. She knew her sense of time was skewed by the inherent trauma of the last several months coming to a head, but Voldemort had definitely said, "three hours" right before he died, and that had been at least an hour ago. She was disgusted with herself for not having insisted that someone take care of this earlier.

How could she do this? she berated herself. How could she possibly have done this? Left Severus Snape's body to rot in the Shrieking Shack of all places, the place where he'd nearly been killed as a child (younger now that she herself was supplied a completely unhelpful voice in her mind); the same place where four years previously he'd gotten a head injury, and Hermione and her friends had fumbled the way to escape for the man who had betrayed Harry's parents.

Knowing she'd have time for self-flagellation later, and knowing that if she continued in this line of thought she'd work herself into nausea before she even arrived, Hermione firmly pushed the thoughts of their betrayal of Snape out of her mind and on to more practical matters. She'd have to Levitate him, she knew; although she completely agreed with Oliver and Neville's doing the dead the honour of moving of their bodies by hand, Hermione knew she was not capable of carrying an adult male all the way across the grounds and into the castle. Even had she been able, the close confines of the underground passageway from the Whomping Willow made such a thing impossible.

She raced across the grounds, refusing to consider the myriad horrors that could befall a human body in the wilderness over a several hour period, but she whipped out her wand just in case. With it thus exposed, she flung a rock expertly at the knot she knew would stop the tree from crushing her, and ran straight at the tree. An onlooker would have thought she'd confused the Willow with the platform on King's Cross, but at the last second she shot her feet out in front of her, dropped to the grass and slid through the entrance in a move that would have made a rounder's base runner proud.

Underground, the dank heaviness of the dirt tunnel assaulted her. Breathing heavily from her dash across the grounds, her lungs took in great heaving gasps of humid air ripe with the smell of peat. It was harder to breathe in here, and she was forced to slow down, not only to catch her breath but also to navigate the treacherous tunnel which had partially collapsed, leaving roots shooting at odd angles that were invariably exactly the right height to either hit her in the eye or trip her.

She was beginning to wonder if it wouldn't have been better to leave the grounds and Apparate to the Shack — she certainly wasn't going to be able to navigate a body through this mess — when she made her way past a final mound of dirt and to the battered door. A moment's caution had her peering through the slats but what she saw on the other side caused her to push the door inwards in outrage.

"EXPELLIARMUS!" she screeched, aiming her wand at the cloaked figure leaning over the body of the professor. The figure in the cloak spun about and a hex was on her lips before she even knew which one it was, and it was only his visible hands held up in the universal message of surrender that kept it on her lips and not flying across the room at him.

"I am unarmed, Miss Granger," came the brittle voice of Lucius Malfoy.

She stared at him a moment, not believing him for a second. "Where's your wand?" she demanded finally.

"The Dark Lord confiscated it from me nearly a year ago. I've been told it was destroyed when he tried to kill your friend," he replied quietly. Hermione thought that Malfoy seemed rather indifferent to what Ollivander had made out to be a symbolic emasculation, but her musing was brought to an abrupt halt when he continued. "I do not wish to appear as if I am threatening you or even have my presence registered by you, truth be told, but my friend's body is lying on the floor of this filthy hovel, and I wish to take him home."

Hermione was astonished at the cracking of the aristocratic voice and the brightness of his eyes. Either the man was genuinely upset, or he was a very, VERY good actor. She knew from personal experience about the latter, but the possibility that the former may be true as well danced around her mind.

"Why are you taking him home?" she asked, walking toward him and intent on insinuating herself between Malfoy and Snape's body. She was quite certain that if Malfoy wanted to use the body to make it into an Inferius, he'd need a wand, but she couldn't figure out why else he'd want it.

Malfoy winced so strongly she thought the question physically pained him. "He . . . I . . . we . . . " there was a long pause here as Malfoy struggled to control his breathing, eyes still clenched shut. A detached part of Hermione's brain found that was odd; unarmed and effectively blinded, he was an easy target. Slytherins weren't known for being too far gone emotionally to care, so she reasoned he must have not considered her a threat. A deep breath from Malfoy brought her back. "There is a family plot on my estate," he explained in clipped tones. "He saved the life of my son and only heir. Severus was . . . not terribly well-off financially, and I would like to lay him to rest with my family. Excuse me."

At that declaration, Malfoy spun around and stepped rapidly away from her, and away from Snape's body. She looked at him curiously as he retreated, leaning his forehead against the far wall. His fists were clenched at his sides, but it was the tremors and forced even breathing that gave her pause. If she didn't know better, she'd have thought he was being tortured, and couldn't entirely rule out that he was suffering the after-effects.

When he pulled a handkerchief out of a pocket of his robes and clearly dabbed at his eyes with it, she nearly fell down. Malfoy, the Death Eater, was CRYING? He sniffed delicately and turned around to face her again. "So, Miss Granger, if you don't mind," he said and gestured at the body on the floor behind her. He took two steps, but stopped short. "Wait, where were you going to take him?" Malfoy suddenly wanted to know.

"I was — well I was going to take him up to the castle. Lay him out with the rest of the Order," she explained, unsure of what the best course of action was. She really didn't care to surrender Snape's body to Malfoy, but in her heart of hearts, she knew that interment on a family plot was preferable to what he was likely to get otherwise. Too many people would want to hold Snape accountable for his myriad crimes. He'd be lucky to be buried at all if some had their way. She lowered her wand, but still held it ready.

"I am not in any position to fight you about this, Miss Granger," Malfoy acknowledged. "I only ask that you do what you think is best." His eyes clenched shut again and he bowed his head, apparently overcome with emotion. When he looked back up at her, he made no effort to conceal the moistness in his eyes or the tremor of his lip. "I would, however, ask that you give me a few moments to say my goodbyes."

Hermione stared at him. He has no wand she reasoned. I heard Voldemort say it was shattered. He came in by the other entrance and didn't know I was coming, and gave all appearance of being surprised. My disarming spell would have taken care of any wand he had even if it wasn't his own. There's not much he can do without a wand; he can't Disapparate or cast most spells, and although he could use a Portkey, he wouldn't have put such a protracted effort into distracting me if that was his intention in the first place. She was still slightly uneasy, but she stepped away. She could always use the blood on the floor to track the location of the body if it came to that. For that matter, there was a considerable amount of Snape's blood on her clothing and shoes.

Malfoy walked around to Snape's right side, delicately avoiding the pool of not-completely-dried blood. He knelt, gracefully and reverently, at Snape's head and leaned forward to speak. "Severus . . . I'm sorry . . . I'm so sorry . . ." she heard him whisper, and then the energy in the room shifted so dramatically Hermione brandished her wand, whirling about to face what she assumed was some new threat.

She saw nothing. Berating herself for having fallen for such an easy trick, she spun back around, sure she was going to find that Malfoy had Portkeyed off with Snape's body.

She was not expecting to see Malfoy sitting back on his heels, looking Snape up and down with eyes nearly bugging out of his head.

"What's wrong?" she demanded, darting over to them. Malfoy was gasping now, his hands in his hair in a bizarrely comic gesture that mocked her own from the antechamber. "What is it?!"

Malfoy looked her straight in the eyes, and with a shaking voice, explained.

"He's alive."


Part 2