Occasional Table

By Predatrix and Fuchsia, from an (extremely) original idea by Gloria Lancaster. Thanks to Cybele (I think) for coming up with the title for a gay porn magazine “Swish and Flick”. Thanks also to the denizens of various Snape slash lists for continuity help, and to Lexin and Mari for visiting my party and offering ideas.

“I’ve got an occasional table/That’s it, over there/It’s just an occasional table/Usually it’s a chair.” - Les Barker, An Infinite Number of Occasional Tables

There was a certain amount of semi-serious rivalry between teachers of different subjects. While Flitwick’s sunny personality seemed to ensure that he had no need to evangelise Charms at the expense of other subjects, and the Headmaster was notionally above that sort of thing, the other teachers did do their best to show their own subjects to advantage.

McGonagall’s rivalry with Snape was particularly nasty. Snape was willing to admit she thought he favoured his own House too much (although this was totally unreasonable considering how much she favoured hers), but then there was the question of subjects. She shared the common, strong prejudice against Potions.

One particular Wednesday made him see redder than usual. “For this lesson,” he overheard as he skulked quietly past on the way somewhere else, “we will need Photograph Potions for the animating principle in the transformation. Would anyone like to go and ask Professor Snape for some? No?” Audible, conspiratorial smile. “Maybe we’ll do our own, then. It’s only nasty, smelly mixtures, not real magic. Transformations, for example, take power, intelligence and control.”

Snape started tinkering about with Animagus transformations, with the typical power, intelligence and control McGonagall would like to deny him. He didn’t like the thought that McGonagall could do something he couldn’t. He really didn’t like the thought that Sirius Black could do something he couldn’t. Transformations weren’t natural to him, but he certainly wasn’t going to ask McGonagall for any hints and tips. Grimly, he worked his way through the books, taking the precaution of doing the work outside in case he became something really big. The Quidditch field, he decided. Late at night so no-one would see him, and even if he became something rather imposing it would be big enough. He also took the precaution of wearing nothing under his warmest robe. Clothes could make things more complicated, and this was going to be difficult enough anyway.

Eventually, he felt the dizziness of a new shape taking hold.

What would he be? A cat (black)? A serpent (black, with a dull green lozenge pattern)? A nice glossy raven (black)? A fire-breathing dragon (black)? He liked black. It went with everything and didn’t show the dirt. Passionately, he wished that he didn’t have to turn into anything colourful.

He opened his eyes, except he didn’t seem to have any. It was more of a focusing of attention. Having focused, he realised he was an ebony bookcase full of books (black).

Well, this was unexpected, but surely nothing he couldn’t handle. He felt a flash of pride: he’d bet no other Animagus was an Inanimagus. If only it wasn’t illegal magic, he’d write up a monograph. Well, it probably wasn't actually illegal. If nobody knew it was possible, it wouldn't be illegal yet.

Struggling to view his own contents (which felt rather like trying to look over his shoulder), he noticed: Potions Accidents Through The Ages (oh yes, that was the one with the green dripping skin conditions), Moste Potente Potions, One Is Fun (which seemed to be some godawful Muggle cookery book), History of Quidditch (and pray what is that doing in my shelves? he thought, looking at all twenty volumes), Swish and Flick (and what on earth is a pornographic magazine doing stuck between my volumes? he thought), most of the other Potions references he’d ever heard of (including The Joy of Potions) and 101 Uses for Slime (which he approved of, it being practical and repulsive at the same time).

He wondered whether to delete Swish and Flick from his shelf-space. He was nearly sure he could, but he didn’t quite like to, in case it stood for any part of his anatomy that he might not use often but didn’t want to lose anyway. Or it could be his libido itself. Well, he’d probably work more efficiently without it, but he felt a strange impulse not to delete it entirely.

Besides, it was mostly under control already.

Under control... he thought, and tried to think himself back, panicking violently as he realised he couldn’t. The damn thing is stuck! It must be will and control, because Black can’t hold a wand in his paw, and there’s nothing about wands in the books. Oh my god, how can I teach if I’m a bookshelf! I couldn’t even mix a Potion! What would my life be if I can’t do Potions? He didn’t really want to find out.

It was a long cold night to stand on the Quidditch pitch full of books. He had time to think about exactly how he’d gone wrong: just concentrating on being “something black” had been too unfocused, and he should have been more clear about the reverse transformation before he tried. He really should have known better, especially since he knew Transformation was his weak spot, and he damn well ought to have given the spell no excuse to go wrong.

After sorting that out in his mind, he found the silence and the small noises of nocturnal things fairly restful, especially since there wasn’t anything he could do about it right now, and calm might help.

Towards the morning, just as he was about to fall asleep, a blackbird perched on him and began singing its little throat out.

Oh my god, what if it nests in me? Snape wasn’t entirely sure why the thought was so upsetting, but it was. He didn’t want little avian claws scratching at his finish, or beaks pecking at his pages.

Luckily, the blackbird flew away quite uneventfully, but then it was time for dawn practice. Hooch led the team onto the field.

“What’s this?” said Hooch curiously. “Why would anyone leave a bookcase in the middle of the Quidditch pitch?” She inspected him. “Probably one of the Professors...”

You have no idea, thought Snape, as she picked out Evil Skin Conditions Caused By Failed Potions.

It was a strangely odd sensation feeling a hand dip into his shelving. Hooch’s hand was strong and warm, yet indefinably female, if not feminine. Like feeling a female hand stroke across his ribcage and down his belly; a sensation he had hoped he would never have to feel since he’d told Narcissa he wasn’t interested in her That Way (Lucius had been very grateful).

It was extremely intimate: partly because he wasn’t quite sure whether the books symbolised different parts of his body or his mind. Was she, for example, making free of his skin (a certain tickling sensation: various pictures of noxious red weeping conditions) or his mind (the Potions-obsessed, tough-minded, unsqueamish side of his character)? He was, as it happened, highly proud of his own absence of sentiment and presence of mind, but that didn’t mean he’d ever wanted to talk to Hooch about it.

“...Snape, probably,” she said, inspecting her find. “It’s got a lot of Potions books, and everyone else hates Potions.”

Ron picked out the book with the green dripping skin conditions. “Oh, ew! That is so revolting!”

That is part of my mind or body, Weasley. Put it back immediately, thought Snape, feeling fairly revolted himself at the thought of Weasley running his fingers through (what might be green and dripping? Bile duct, maybe?).... He did rather wonder why so many books appeared to be devoted to skin conditions.

Harry said, “Hey, there’s a Quidditch book in there. Can’t be Snape’s. He doesn’t know how to have fun.”

This hand was definitely not a woman’s. Harry’s firm, confident, Quidditch-player’s hand made free of his shelving. He itched, having that hand in him. Swish and Flick swelled and bulged breathlessly between two repressive volumes, and he was beginning to fear some sort of embarrassing accident by the time Harry’s fingers pinched shut on the Quidditch book, allowing him to master his feelings.

Harry began to leaf through what Snape was interested to note was a list of rules and accidents.

“Not the fun sort of Quidditch book,” Harry decided gloomily.

“Get on with the practice,” said Hooch. “Whoever’s it is, it can wait.” She cast a quick Cushioning Charm over the bookcase so that nobody might fall out of the sky and break anything.

Snape was mildly pleased. This was bad enough without having injured children falling on his head. This was the last pleasant thought he had over the course of the game: he kept wanting to flinch every time someone whooshed past him, and realising he hadn’t got anything to flinch with. He’d never been quite sure Potter was safe in charge of that Firebolt, or more to the point that anyone else was safe as it whistled past their ears.

After an interminable Quidditch game, the team and Hooch wandered off, discussing the game (in which Snape had no possible interest) and how the hell a bookcase had ended up on the Quidditch pitch.

Snape, with feelings too deep for words, waited. He was very, very tired. Eventually, despite the cold, he fell asleep.

When he woke up, he was wet and cold and miserable on the Quidditch pitch, realising why the books had advocated the use of Animagus transformations for people with more friends than he had (starting at 1). While he wouldn’t admit to wanting a cuddle, or a rub-down with a warm towel...

He sighed, and walked back. A hot bath, at least. Luckily, he used Wednesday mornings for private study, so nobody would be expecting him until after lunch.

Two weeks later, he felt an itchy, twitchy, restless feeling that was somehow familiar. In fact, it reminded him of the feeling he’d had just before he became a bookcase. After double Potions with the third year, he triple-checked his timetable: good, he could spare a couple of hours, so he went into a deserted classroom, leaned against the wall, shut his eyes, and prepared to become a bookcase.

Instead, to his amazement, he became an ebony-framed wall mirror.

He cursed, reflectively and silently, and decided Animagus transformations were not an ideal field of study for a wizard whose natural bent was not towards Transfiguration and who had no particular interest in nature.

On the other hand, maybe it was the ideal gift for somebody with his own predilection for spying. He could, after all, more-or-less see and hear. If he could only learn to control it a bit better.

He opened his eyes. Having expected to become a bookcase, he’d chosen a deserted classroom, and was leaning against the wall.

Harry Potter came in.

“Hmm. New mirror. I wonder,” he said to himself, “if this is one of those magic mirrors like the Mirror of Erised that shows you what you want to see? Might be fun,” he said cheerfully.

Idiot, Snape thought. I’m just a mirror. No trace of magic. The unwelcome thought struck him that since he was normally a wizard it wasn’t that stupid a conclusion to draw.

“I’d never realised how goofy I look when I’m smiling,” said Potter sadly, looking into Snape.

Idiot. You’re not that bad-looking. I’m just not the flattering sort.

Potter rubbed some ink off his chin. “Do I always look this grubby?”

Brat in need of a good bath? Definitely. Snape admired Potter’s tumbled hair and bright green eyes. Doesn’t look bad on you now you’ve grown up a bit, he thought grudgingly. If I were half my age and not a teacher, or a mirror, I’d bathe you myself. Thoroughly. Repeatedly.

“I was wondering who to ask to the dance this year, but I’m not sure if I fancy turning up. Don’t much fancy being Britain’s Most Famous Wizarding Wallflower, and I don’t much fancy getting dances because of the scar, either. Just want to be me. Is that too much to ask?”

Idiot. Speaking as one of the more aesthetically displeasing Slytherins (at least I seem to have grown into my nose since I was your age: maybe I should tell Bulstrode things may get marginally better with maturity), being ugly isn’t particularly helpful.

“Looks as if I’m glaring at myself now,” Potter muttered morosely. “One of those You Stupid Idiot things Snape tends to do.”

Snape glinted a grin at him.

“That’s better, actually. Not much, but a bit.”

Idiot. Stop wasting time admiring your beauty.

“Must have been a trick of the light,” Potter said, sighing.

Ronald Weasley and Miss Granger came in. “What’ve you been up to?” he demanded curiously. “Oh, is that one of those magic mirrors again, brilliant!” he exclaimed.

Weasley. Go away and never darken my glaze again.

“Damn, I’m growing out of my clothes again,” muttered Weasley. “Well, is it magic?” he demanded of Granger.

Granger sighed heavily. “I thought I’d fixed the teeth,” she said, sadly. “No, it’s not magic.”

I always thought your claim to intelligence was overrated, Granger.

“You know, there’s a sort of mirror where you always look good, as if you’re just on your way to a party, all dressed-up and happy, and everything shines,” she went on. “This is the other sort of mirror.”

Maybe a little natural wit and observation, Snape decided grudgingly.

“What, like a Dark Arts mirror? Can it conjure evil spirits?” demanded Ron excitedly.

Oh-for-god’s-sake! I think red hair leeches the brain.

“No?” she said rather doubtfully, “but we might as well ask the teachers to check it in case we’re wrong.”

“It’s a very handsome mirror,” said Potter thoughtfully. “Pity it has the reverse effect on people.”

“Handsome? I think it looks gloomy.”

“Dark, gleaming, rather imposing, strangely fascinating,” said Potter.

Snape forgot to glare in sheer shock.

“In a horrible sort of way,” said Weasley grudgingly.

“Let’s ask McGonagall what she thinks, just in case it’s magic,” asked Granger. “I don’t trust it.”

“Give me a minute,” said Potter absently, “I’ll be along soon.”

The door shut behind two annoying brats.

Potter stayed gazing into Snape’s depths as if he wanted to learn him by heart. A certain tingling made itself felt in Snape’s silvery backing.

“Who are you, really?” Potter whispered. “Or maybe I should be asking myself ‛who am I, when there’s nobody else there?’.”

The tingling felt stronger. Snape shifted in his frame.

“It’s as if there’s someone looking back, even if it’s just me.”

A green glance pierced him.

“Hullo, me,” Potter whispered, smiling crookedly, and reached out to brush Snape’s surface with a fingertip.

Dear me. I find myself for once without words.

“Well, if you’re a magical object, I should think the teachers will know what to do with you.”

Even considering Albus frequently picks employees who would not be able to find their way out of a wet paper bag, let alone through the maze that is Hogwarts.

“I hope. Bye!” said Potter, and left.

McGonagall was quite prepared to check. “Now, who are you?” she asked, glaring into Snape.

Severus Snape. Designed, polished and prepared for looking on the black side.

She sighed. “There’s something odd about this. It’s not a normal mirror, but it doesn’t have the right sort of feel for any transformative magic I’ve seen.”

One in the eye for you, Minerva, I think.

“Caution may be advised, children,” she went on. “We’ll keep it in the staff room until we can make sure it’s safe.”

Snape stared at her crossly. He spent as little time as possible in the staff room as it was. Irritably unable to prevent it, he permitted himself to be lifted and carried (‛Mobilispeculum!’) to the staff room.

“What d’you think of the mirror?” McGonagall asked of the assembled staff, such as they were, once Snape had been installed.

“I think it makes me look mildly insane,” Dumbledore remarked conversationally. “The colour of the tie I’m wearing doesn’t really help.”

No, it doesn’t, Snape agreed, and try ‛wildly’ rather than ‛mildly’, Albus.

Flitwick stepped up next. “Good lord!” he said, chuckling. “I can only see the top of my hair in this, and even that looks a trifle odd.”

Get yourself a ladder, Snape snarled.

Sprout said, “I think something’s seeded in around my collar.”

Not surprising. You could grow potatoes in that neck.

Hagrid said, “Reckon I’ll give up on the Screwts one day. Everythin’ above me eyes is one big singe.”

Baldness might conceivably improve the effect. But I doubt it.

Trelawney said, “There are several divinatory methods involving mirrors I might try.”

Sybil, you have difficulty seeing into the present, let alone the past or future. On the other hand, it might shut you up for a bit.

The current Dark-Arts moron said, “Needs dusting.”

I am so glad you are upholding the Hogwarts tradition of Dark-Arts education. Mainly because that only leaves you a couple of weeks to go. Of course, I’ll actually learn your name if you last. He glinted wickedly. Not much danger of that, is there?

He waited for everyone to leave the room, then concentrated on falling asleep. The last time suggested that he couldn’t manage the reverse transformation consciously, but could perfectly well manage it in his sleep. This time, because he wasn’t really tired, it took a while, but he managed it in the end.

Again, a few weeks later, he recognised a familiar feeling creeping over him. All the books on Animagus transformations suggested they could become somewhat addictive. Well, they were fascinating, and...he wanted to see what he was going to turn into next.

The fascination, though, was contingent on being somewhere private to explore himself.

Snape realised, with horror, that he was approaching what he thought of, in inverted commas, as ‛one of those funny turns’ as he walked down the corridor. Like a sort of wizardly epilepsy, it was embarrassing, possibly dangerous, and completely useless.

Especially here, in front of the Fat Lady’s portrait. Luckily she’d nipped out for a minute to talk to someone, and there was nobody else there.

Snape shrank, dwindled, fell down, twisting a little in the slight breeze.

Nothing happened for a while that he needed to take note of, although he was a little worried that he had a lesson this morning. Eventually, a house-elf came along and inspected him, paying careful attention to the label on his inside neck. Talking in the random scribble such creatures did, it assured him that he was going back to his owner and lugged him by main force into the Gryffindor common-room and then into one of the dormitories.

He was a robe. A well-cut, graceful, black, flowing robe. He squinted round, with extreme difficulty, and just-about-managed to see the label on his inside neck. H POTTER, it said.

He twitched a laugh. An unwholesome fascination with green eyes and dark hair and long legs? No. A piece of black humour on the universe’s part. Must be.

And here came the punchline. Oh joy.

Potter walked in, talking to Weasley. “Can you lend me a clean robe? All my Quidditch ones are caked in mud, and I think the house-elves are washing my others.”

“Well, I had a couple of detentions in my spares.”

“What did you get on them?”

“Slime on one, cobwebs on the other. I’ll wear the slimy one, I think.”

“I’ll pass, thanks,” said Potter with relief, spying Snape. “Looks as if the house-elves brought my clean one back.”

“I’d never have believed any Potions lesson could be worse than one of Snape’s,” said Weasley.

“Mm,” said, Potter, skinning out of a soaking-wet robe. “At least he never let Neville flood the dungeon that badly.”

“He makes sure Neville’s disasters only happen to Neville, when he can,” agreed Weasley, who seemed unaccountably immune to the view, or perhaps busy changing his own robe for the slimy one.

Snape wasn’t quite old enough to have outgrown hormones. On the other hand, he didn’t get out much and lacked Ron’s blasé attitude. Worst of both worlds, really, he thought, gibbering at Potter with every silent fibre of his being. Which, considering he was now entirely fibrous, was quite a lot.

“My god, silk!” said Potter in amazement, caressing Snape’s chest. “Where did this come from?”

My unconscious, apparently, thought Snape, shivering a little. There was no rational reason for him to have become pure, raw, heavy silk, and he hadn’t actually noticed that until Potter did.

Neither of the boys was sufficiently paranoid to think about how it might be booby-trapped. It wasn’t, but it might be. Potter had evidently learned nothing from the Firebolt episode (well, that hadn’t been booby-trapped, but it might well have been). For all Potter knew, he might be a Lethifold. If Potter had heard of Lethifolds.

He concentrated, trying to develop a pin in the lining just to show Potter, but without any luck.

“Come on, Harry. Are you going to spend all afternoon stroking that robe?”

“Mm,” said Potter abstractedly, tracing a circle around Snape’s notional nipple. “I bet this feels nice on.”

Snape felt an unfamiliar warm weight inside him, pressing on every sensitive thread. He’d never considered how good it would feel to have Harry Potter slipping into him before. Well, not this way, anyway. Not in the daytime.

He moved restlessly, trying to grab Potter’s bottom without having hands.

Potter squeaked and twitched. “Damn thing grabs each passing breeze and sends it up my arse. Fabric feels lovely, though,” he murmured, closing his eyes.

Weasley sighed. “It’s all true about us teenagers being a mass of seething hormones, isn’t it?”

Of course. Though if your brothers didn’t give you a clue about that it’s hard to imagine what would.

Potter was still lost in his own private little world. Fingers glided across Snape’s tight stiff fabric, and of course across the boy’s hot, sensitive nipples inside. It was like being the boy, and himself, experiencing the sensations doubled and echoing.

“I’ll wait outside for a bit,” said Weasley.

“Mm,” said Potter. “Oh, right, thanks.”

The door shut behind Weasley.

Potter groaned shamelessly and fell back on the bed, still rubbing. Snape felt as if his nipples had suddenly become hollow, and Potter’s nipples were stiffening inside them. There weren’t words for this particular erotic experience, he thought. Nobody else had ever...

Then Potter got one hand on the crotch area, and Snape discovered another little refinement. He was lined with velvet. Not everywhere, but where it counted. Every little thread of his pile was soft and erect at the same time, bulging restlessly against an equally hard, velvety cock. His outer fabric creaked a moan, while the inner stuff seemed to throb against Potter’s groin.

He was going mad for this, and the feeling had nowhere to go, in this form.

My god, he thought hysterically, I’m... I’m unravelling!

Every nerve or thread in his body thrummed with heat, his brain melted, a couple of buttons popped, and a silent shout ripped through him like tearing silk as Harry Potter convulsed within him.

He rippled gently, not wanting it to end, sucking Potter’s juices down.

Too shattered to move, he lay there, tenderly embracing Potter, and vaguely surprised that he hadn’t been torn thread from thread by the experience.

He could hear Granger murmuring something downstairs, probably asking where Potter had got to.

“Harry? I think he’s polishing his broom!” Weasley boomed loudly.

Potter giggled helplessly. “Need to wash this out, I should think,” he murmured, and appeared greatly surprised when he touched Snape.

“You’re dry!” he exclaimed.

Aren’t I always, thought Snape, in much more of a purr than his mental voice usually managed. Obviously his brain had indeed melted, or he wouldn’t have been feeling almost tender about Potter.

He heard Weasley’s loud footsteps on the stairs.

“Want me to get you a spare robe?” said Weasley.

“This one’s dry. Haven’t got a clue why it doesn’t stain.”

“That’s quite an easy spell,” said Weasley. “My Mum has it in the I Hate To Spell book or something. Resists spillages.”

“Oh, that’s clever,” said Potter, losing interest and stroking Snape’s sleeve absently.

Oh yes. You never did pay any attention to cleaning up after yourself. You left that to lesser wizards. Or, more likely, just left it without even thinking that somebody had to do it.

It was strange having Potter inside him. Now that the need for sex had passed, it was like having someone in his arms. Had he ever fantasised about that? Probably not.

Well, there had been several times he’d woken up with an armful of bedclothes, as if some quietly-ignored part of his personality wanted something to hold. He wasn’t even going to think about that. Just some sort of primitive nesting instinct, of course. Nothing emotional.

However, he was sexually-satisfied, warm and tired.

He yawned. Potter complained about the sudden draught whistling down his neck.

Shut up, boy, he thought, wriggling until Potter was wrapped up warmly. He couldn’t be doing with complaints about the cold when he felt so sleepy and comfortable.

He was dozily aware of Potter going about his normal daily business inside him, without troubling to pay much attention.

Eventually, Potter threw him casually across the back of a chair and went to bed. He realised dimly that this was his chance to get a proper rest, and fell into a deep, uninterrupted sleep, waking up at two o’clock in the morning with his hands trailing on the floor, his bottom in the air and a general sense that he’d fallen asleep in a really stupid position.

A hot bath would be a really good idea at this point, if he felt capable of running one. It was enough effort to use a couple of spells to get out of Potter’s dormitory without being noticed.

He staggered wearily home to his dungeon and fell into bed.

The next morning, he waited for Potter to turn up to breakfast naked. This was an enjoyable mixture of schadenfreude and lust, but he was never particularly worried by his own low motives.

“Severus?” asked McGonagall, “Why didn’t you take your classes yesterday morning?”

“Is that any of your business?”

“You haven’t missed a Potions lesson for the last thirty years, learning or teaching,” Albus put in. “Even when you had flu.”

“I had a minor allergic reaction to some ingredients. It may recur in future,” said Snape. “You have no reason to concern yourself, Albus.” He glared at the Headmaster, who visibly decided that if Snape was well enough to glare normally, there couldn’t be much wrong with him.

“I take it I have a temporary replacement?” he asked McGonagall.

She indicated the Dark-Arts moron.

“No,” said Snape. “Somebody marginally competent, please.”

“There’s no need,” said McGonagall. “I admit,” she said grudgingly, “that high-level Potions work is a matter of skill and power, but any fool can keep some children out of trouble for an hour or so.”

Snape winced. He was an excellent disciplinarian himself, but even he had difficulty keeping Longbottom from doing something drastic. He was about to point this out when he was suddenly distracted by a touch on his hand.

He glanced down, but saw nothing. After a moment or two he interpreted the sensation as a fingertip touching his hand when (as usual) there was nobody near him.

The little swine’s turned up in his Cloak. The little swine’s naked under his cloak! he realised, torn between rage, lust and amusement. Of course, a risk-taker like Potter might well enjoy flirting with danger, and the idea of being naked in front of Snape when Snape had no means of seeing him (or realising he’d turned up naked) might well appeal to him.

He was very glad Potter didn’t know he’d been having sex with Snape. In that case, Potter might have chosen to go a lot further. A lapful of naked, squirming Potter... damn, he shouldn’t be thinking about that at breakfast.

By the time he had brought his reactions under control, the conversation had moved on.

He definitely had to gain control of his transformations, though. If not, he might not have a dungeon to come home to, if anything more drastic than usual happened while the moron was in nominal control.

It took about two weeks for the ‛inanimagus’ feeling to build up again. He wondered if that was the same physical cycle as real Animagi had.

Over breakfast, there was a minor contretemps. Potter’s quill burst into flames in his pocket.

Potter made an unnecessary amount of fuss about this.

A Delayed Arson Potion. Not bad, Snape thought. He should have noticed that Malfoy had been collecting ingredients for that, but Malfoy had been fairly Slytherin about it, collecting all sorts of bits and pieces over the course of a few weeks.

“Ask Professor McGonagall for a replacement quill,” Granger suggested.

Snape twitched, and reached for his coffee.

Coffee could calm the craving somewhat, but it was just a matter of time. He admired the glaze on his severe black mug, which worried him. It wouldn’t take much to have two black mugs sitting on the breakfast table, which would be a difficult trick to miss.

He looked wistfully over the table at McGonagall. He couldn’t bear to ask her for advice, but she just might have some help, especially since her room, full of useful books, would be left empty while she was eating.

Pushing back his chair, he rose and left. Nobody ever said anything social like ‛hallo’ or ‛goodbye’ to Severus Snape, and they didn’t this time, either.

In McGonagall’s office, it was harder to resist the addictive feelings of transformation. Something was creeping over him. He squeezed his legs together to stop it, but felt himself shrinking. He knew his reaction must be prompt and decisive.

Oh shit, he thought, promptly and decisively.

The rush of dizzy excitement flowed over him. What was he going to become this time? This one was quite painful: his legs telescoped upwards into his body, and he became long and thin. When he opened his notional eyes to discover what he was this time, he saw that he was thin and black from nib to feather-tip.

Ah. A quill.

The door opened. It wasn’t McGonagall.

Potter stood there. “Professor McGonagall?”

As you should be able to see, she is not here.

Potter came in, rather doubtfully. “

“Well, she’s not here, but there is one on the desk.”

He picked Snape up, stroking every barb on his back deftly until Snape smoothed down and almost purred with satisfaction.

“Nice pen,” Potter said softly. “Balances as though it was made for me.”

Frightening thought.

“Let’s see how it flows,” Potter said, reaching for a scrap of parchment.

Snape’s nib touched the paper, and Potter began to write, ‛the quick brown fox’.

Snape drew a heavy black line through that.

“Clearly your last writing instrument died of boredom,” Snape wrote. He was interested to note that his normal spiky, heavily indented hand seemed to flow from him in this form.

Potter’s mouth opened in a shocked ‛O’, and he tried to back away slightly while still holding Snape to the parchment.

“I am not Tom Bloody Riddle and you should know he’s dead!” Snape scrawled, nib crackling with indignation.

“Maybe not, but he wasn’t exactly forthcoming about who he was. I’d be a bit dim to fall for the same trick twice. Ron’s dad says ‛never trust anything when you can’t see where it keeps its brains’.”

“Oh?” Snape wrote with deadly affability, “where do you keep yours?”

Potter snorted. “It really isn’t necessary to insult me like that.”

“Why not?” Snape wrote.

“I might be famous,” Potter said, “but like the Roman emperors had slaves to remind them they weren’t gods, I have teachers. They’re really quite good at reminding me I’m nothing special.”

Potter sighed gustily. “Anyway, who are you?”

“Your quill, idiot,” Snape wrote.

“Yes, I can see that. Quills aren’t normally that chatty.”

“This one is,” Snape replied.

“So I see.”

Snape was lifted. He felt the odd sensation of his hair being brushed by someone’s lips. A sigh tickled his barbs until they stood, prickling with a strange, erotic, restless feeling.

“S’pose I’d better move,” said Potter. Pocketing Snape, he headed for the door.

Snape did not like travelling in Harry Potter’s pocket. Impressive wizard or no, Potter had pockets as full of junk as any other seventeen-year-old boy’s. Sweet papers. Owl jesses. Broom polish. Wood shavings. A spare practice Snitch that fluttered unpleasantly against him.

He was quite ruffled by the time they reached the end of their journey. He had also stabbed his nib through a Muggle envelope.

Potter inspected him, and sighed. “Just like my hair,” he said. “Five minutes after it’s been tidy, look at it.”

Snape struggled free of the envelope, with Potter’s help, and began to write on it. “You could try,” he said in tiny letters, “getting me tidy and then wrapping me up.”

Potter combed Snape free of crumbs again so that all the little barbs gave a pleased sigh of relief, and tipped the contents out of a battered wooden pen-box. The box smelt pleasantly of sandalwood.

Snape relaxed, comfortably fitted into place.

He rested, not-quite-sleeping, over the course of that day. Potter would eventually come and bother him about homework, but until then he could just think quietly to himself.

The first essay Potter had to do was for Flitwick. “Compare and contrast the use of temperature magic in the Flame-Freezing Charm and the Freezing Charm.”

“Pretty much the same,” Potter wrote.

Snape drew an insertion marker, and corrected the sentence to, “While the Flame-Freezing Charm and the Freezing Charm may seem pretty much the same to a casual glance, the two are quite separate.”

“What were you in your previous life?” Potter asked, “a pain in the arse?”

No, that’s what I am in this life, idiot! Snape thought. He continued to write: “While the Flame-Freezing Charm is inherently safe for use by children and idiots, the Freezing Charm must be used under the supervision of a responsible adult. Misapplied, it may result in drastic side-effects.”

“Like what?”

Snape, feeling the ink flow faster, began to settle down to actually enlightening a student’s mental darkness. It was unexpectedly engaging. Granger was nearly as bright as she thought she was, and there was the faux-attentive passionate gaze from Malfoy’s direction, but he rarely had the experience of someone starting out radiating extreme boredom, eventually saying, “I think I see,” and then asking moderately interested questions.

The problem had never been Potter’s brain, which was adequate. It had always been his attention. Without personal antagonism, there was a lot more brain to go round.

After half-an-hour, they stopped writing a reasonably-creditable collaborative effort.

“Well,” said Potter, smiling, “how d’you think we did?”

Snape hopped over to a convenient scrap of paper and wrote: “C++”.

“Doubt it,” said Potter.

Snape was seriously worried to wake up, still a quill, and still in Potter’s pen-box. If deep sleep allowed him to transform, why hadn’t it worked? Was he stuck forever as Potter’s pen? What sort of life would he have?

He couldn’t, of course, have a deep, secret desire to be a writing instrument for Potter. He refused to believe that. Even though last night’s essay had been one of the few times he’d really felt he was being a teacher.

Not that he minded terrifying children. Sometimes he felt it was the only fun he got in life any more. But he’d very rarely had that sense that he and a pupil were looking for the truth in an interested and curious fashion. It was normally more that children were looking for The Answer, because it might make Snape like them (Malfoy) or might make Snape hate them less (everybody else). He was heartily sick of the search for The Answer. Children wanted The Answer to stop them thinking.

Not that they needed much help not thinking, normally.

“You know,” said Potter, smiling gently down into his box that morning, “you were right about the mark for that essay. I got—well, we got—a C++. You seem to be a good guesser about that. Who were you before?”

Go on, guess!

“Maybe...you were...a teacher’s pen?” concluded Potter with satisfaction.

Some way to go, then. Snape settled down, more happily than he liked to think about, to being Potter’s quill for the day.

It was restful, in a way. Potter left him alone in his box for some of the time, and Snape always did like to have time to think without having to deal with people. Potter also had the habit of taking the pen out and absently combing every little barb into perfect order, which was strangely satisfying to the pen.

Having his feather-end stroked across Potter’s lips felt disturbingly erotic, but it was nothing to the way it felt when Potter loosened his clothes for the night and began to stroke Snape’s feathery tip across his nipples.

Snape leaked dreadfully, and couldn’t get a wink of sleep all night.

His pen-box was old, and undecorated apart from a rather wonky Gryffindor lion executed, recognisably in Potter’s hand, in a combination of knife-scrapes and red ink.

While Potter slept, that night, Snape concentrated his own ink into a bright bottle-green, which took rather a long time. With some effort, he drew a green serpent. It was meant to be strangling the lion, but since he wasn’t any better at art than Potter, it looked rather as if it was embracing it.

Potter had to write an essay for Hagrid the next night. “The Lethifold is a much-maligned beast.”

“Justifiably,” Snape scrawled. He had little patience with monsters, and after all the sexual frustration he was in a bad mood.

Potter glared at him. “I can’t write that!”

“Have you even heard of a Lethifold, boy?” Snape wrote, on the scrap of parchment Potter had learned to provide beside the essay parchment for overflow parenthetical comments after the first few times Snape had ruined his essay.

“Heard the name. Can’t remember anything about it.”

“The Lethifold is a creature in the form of a large black cloak. It hunts, smothers and digests sleeping humans, neatly, in their beds, leaving no trace behind it,” Snape wrote. He was going to add, “And you certainly should have thought about it when a mysterious black robe appeared on your bed for no reason!” when he realised that, as Potter’s pen, he shouldn’t actually know about that.

Potter shuddered. “Can you say anything nice about it?”

“Only found in the tropics,” Snape wrote.

“Well, I’m relieved to hear that, at least.”

After a two-foot-long stretch of supporting arguments, Snape staggered from Potter’s hand for a breather.

“What d’you think I’ll get for that?” Potter asked.

“E minus”, Snape wrote.

“Don’t think it’s that bad,” Potter argued.

“Hagrid prefers,” Snape wrote, in tiny letters, “students who see the strange beauty in what he calls ‛interesting creatures’.”

“Well, we can give it a final polish tomorrow morning,” Potter said.

Despite some effort, neither of them managed to think of anything favourable to add about Lethifolds in the conclusion.

Potter left the essay as it was. After breakfast, he stood in the hallway looking confused, and sucking Snape’s head. There was an undeniable thrill at knowing Potter was essentially sucking the greasy hair of the repulsive Potions master. Not that he really wanted to hurt the brat’s feelings: Potter simply wasn’t that important, despite his view of himself as the centre of the world (ably promulgated by those around him).

Weasley said, “Stop that, Harry. You’re always sucking your quills. Did you do your homework?” he asked hopefully.

Potter sighed. “Thought we already had one of us to ask that.”

“That’s why. It’s nice to know if you haven’t done it either. For immoral support.”

Granger came out of the library. “Have you done your homework?” she asked.

“No,” said Weasley.

“No,” said Potter loyally, despite the fact that Snape’s neatly-completed essay was under his arm.

Gryffindors lie just as much as anyone else! Snape thought indignantly, then forgot to think entirely as Potter absently reversed him in his hand and began to suck his tip. A very odd sensation when he was this size, actually. As though his entire lower body was being sucked slowly, with the tip of Potter’s tongue paying thoughtful attention to the tip of Snape’s prick. Every barb on his back erected all at once.

It was bliss. It was years since anyone had done this to him. It was definitely more than flesh-and-ink could stand, he decided, spurting deep blue inside Potter’s mouth.

Potter coughed and spluttered into a handkerchief.

All right. I’ll forgive you for not swallowing. This time, Snape decided benevolently, for once.

“You’re always doing that, Harry. I don’t know why you’re surprised,” said Granger.

“Tastes terrible,” said Potter indistinctly.

No I don’t! thought Snape, before realising that in this form he probably did, actually.

“Ron chews his,” said Harry. “At least I don’t do that.”

Thank God! thought Snape, shuddering.

Worn-out with sexual exhaustion, he dozed for the rest of the day, only waking up to offer insults or information when they seemed to be needed.

The first Potions essay of the week rolled around next.

Snape fluffed himself up and settled down to write. And write. And write. It was an interesting subject, and of course he had to point out the three or four logical and factual errors implied in the wording of the question.

When they’d finished, Harry settled down, rubbing his wrist.

“I think I’ve got RSI,” complained Harry. “I never thought I’d get it from homework.”

“Ah,” wrote Snape on the piece of paper devoted to his thoughts rather than Harry’s essays. “Going for some sort of world record in masturbation, are we?”

Harry spluttered. “You’re a pen!”

“I know,” wrote Snape.

“You’re not supposed to understand adolescent dirty jokes,” Harry went on. “I wonder what you think of our Dark-Arts chap as a teacher. You seem to know a fair bit about Potions.”

Harry had to get an overflow scrap-of-paper for Snape’s thoughts on the moron’s inadequacies, starting with ‛cannot keep order’ and going on to ‛poor security with ingredients’, ‛disgraceful stirring technique’ and ‛lack of basic intelligence’.

“Yeah, and he’s boring compared to Snape. I mean, lots of disasters happen in the class, but he can’t keep anyone’s attention.”

“I’m sure your normal misanthropic Potions master will be back eventually,” Snape wrote, hoping so.

There was a companionable silence.

“Funny thing is,” Potter said, “I miss Snape.”

“What?!?!?” Snape wrote, underlining it with three startled stabs at the parchment.

“I know, I know. Always thought I hated him. But he’s bright, and he’s got a sense of humour, even if it’s a bit twisted.” Potter paused. “And he’s fanciable.”

“You have no business thinking such a thing about one of your teachers!” Snape wrote indignantly.

“I know. Doesn’t stop me.”

“Oh yes,” Snape wrote acidly. “Rules don’t apply to Potters.”

“All right, I’m only seventeen. But I’ve experienced quite a number of things that just aren’t meant to happen to people my age. Death threats. Duels. Evil Dark Wizards trying to kill me. Being kept in a cupboard until I was eleven. Widespread ostracism by a school-ful of people. Seeing people killed in front of me. If my age doesn’t protect me from that,” Potter said angrily, “I don’t see why it should protect me from things I might actually enjoy, like having a few fantasies and being prepared to put them into practice if he ever lets me know he fancies me.”

“He never will,” Snape stated.

“You’re probably right.” Potter sighed, running a hand through his hair. “Anyway, what d’you think we’ll get? You’re a better guesser than I am.”

Guesser? thought Snape indignantly.

“A minus,” he wrote.

Harry got a D, with a ‛See me’ at the bottom.

It emerged that the moron thought such a large and above all sudden improvement suspicious.

While Potter was at Quidditch practice, Snape crawled out of his box and wrote a blistering letter, in propria persona, to the moron, including a comment about Potter receiving extracurricular tuition from himself. He left it on the table, properly addressed, where a house-elf would pick it up, and went to bed—or to box, in this shape.

Late that night, when Snape was resting patiently in his box, Potter fished him out. “You wrote to the teacher who’s taken over from Snape,” said Potter, not sounding entirely happy.

“Yes,” wrote Snape plainly.

“Well, thanks, of course,” Potter said, “but I wish you hadn’t.”

“What?” wrote Snape.

“I mean, pretending you’re Snape might work, because you have a sort of similarity to his personality, but everyone knows he hasn’t been seen for weeks.”

Typical teenage exaggeration, Snape thought. It’s only been five days. He was worried about that, actually. None of the other transformations had lasted longer than a day or so, and this was giving him uncomfortable thoughts about what his mother had said when he made faces (“The wind’ll change, Severus, and you’ll go like it!”).

“I don’t want you taken to the Ministry and put in their Dodgy Artefacts drawer. I mean, I quite like you, in a weird way,” said Potter.

Snape would have rolled his eyes, if he’d had any. Gryffindors! he thought.

“For all I know, it was Snape that put the spell on you,” Potter went on, yawning.

Hasn’t anybody ever told you anything about the differences between something being enchanted and being a transformed wizard? Snape wailed mentally. Although, now he thought about it, there weren’t any other Inanimagi, so it wasn’t that stupid of Potter not to guess.

"Well, good night," said Potter, and went to bed, leaving him on the desk.

He'd never expected Potter to like him, or try to protect him, as either Professor Snape or a quill. Why did he feel that now he knew Potter did, and would, some sort of resolution had been reached? He felt the strangest impulse not to sleep in his box, and wasn't entirely surprised, though annoyed, to wake up draped over Potter's desk in the middle of the night. Wearily, he cast a spell to ensure the assembled Gryffindors didn't hear his exit, and left.

A couple of weeks later, he found the next Inanimagus transformation was creeping up on him.

Nothing, he told himself firmly, that can be misused in a perverted fashion. He visited the library. A book, he told himself, bound in black leather. With a silver snake on the spine.

To his absolute horror, he transformed into an elegantly-shaped black leather dildo, with a silver snake-shape coiled round it. No-one was going to believe this had just been left lying around, and the only reason it couldn’t be misused in a perverted fashion was that perversion was its intended use.

Harry Potter walked in. A look-what-I’ve-found expression crossed his face, and he stealthily pocketed Snape. “Piece of luck!” he muttered to himself cheerfully. “Definitely not the sort of thing it’s easy to mail-order from a school address.”

How do I get myself into these situations? wondered Snape, bizarrely groped as he was carried back to Potter’s dormitory.

“Anyone else late for dinner?” shouted Potter to the empty common-room. No reply was forthcoming, and he whistled happily to himself as he skipped upstairs, making Snape feel slightly ill.

He’s going to use me! thought Snape, unsure whether to be horrified or excited, and curious about what it would feel like to be an erection instead of having one.

He wondered desperately whether to transfigure in Potter’s pocket, but then he was in Potter’s hands, being smeared with a most inferior form of lubricant. He squirmed to get away from it, but only managed to slip onto the bed.

“It moves!” gasped Potter, looking down at Snape in admiration. “I’ve never found one this good before.”

Snape felt strangely flattered. Then, to his distress for several reasons, Potter began to undress. It was, of course, a beautiful view, but that didn’t help. He was less-than-entitled to admire it, and he was presumably headed where he wouldn’t be able to see it.

It’s dark in there, thought Snape, and I’m sure this isn’t Albus’s preferred method of extracurricular instruction. He visualised Albus’s wide, brilliant, demented smile. Nearly sure, anyway. And then I might have to tell Potter eventually, and he wouldn’t take it at all well.

He went cold as an even worse thought struck him. What happens if I turn back at the wrong moment? He was entirely happy with his Inanimagus forms being unpleasant to people in quietly bizarre ways, but he drew the line at causing the sort of death only Walden Macnair would enjoy watching.

His shudder of horror only seemed to encourage the boy.

“Whoa there. How do you change the settings on this thing?”

Snape fought back the only way he could. He went completely and utterly limp, despite his undeniable physical excitement.

“Bloody hell, it’s switched off,” said Potter disgustedly. “Maybe I can find a spell that would help.” He aimed his wand, and muttered, “‛Transformeo,’ no, that’s not...what the fuck!?”

Snape was uncomfortably aware that he’d managed to transfigure in such a way that he was directly beneath Potter, who was straddling him and clutching onto the bed curtains for dear life.

“What... what the hell?”

Potter had turned the pale kind of colour that usually meant treatment for shock would be necessary. Snape decided that anything he could say probably wouldn’t help. Potter blinked a couple of times, then slowly let go of the curtains.

“Well.”

“Yes.”

“Quite.”

“Hell of a surprise.”

“Mm.”

“Nearly totally unpleasant, too.”

“What do you mean, ‛nearly’, Potter?” I was nearly inserted bodily into a very tight place, with possibly catastrophic results.

“You’re probably a lot more fun as a sex-toy than you are as a Potions master, sir,” Potter said innocently.

“The two options aren’t mutually exclusive,” said Snape, who was tired of the remarks people tended to make about his chosen career. Sometimes I have an erection in my hand instead of a spoon. Occasionally, it’s even somebody else’s.

“Mm.” Potter gave him a lecherous look, spreading his fingers out over Snape’s chest and rubbing against him slightly.

“Potter?”

“Well, that was quite a shock, and I’m feeling a bit... bereft.”

“Could I get you a replacement?” Snape suggested, the corner of his mouth twitching.

“Oh, I should think your leg will do perfectly fine,” Potter said, closing his eyes and moaning.

“One of my thighs?” Snape asked doubtfully. “Which one?”

“Left? Right? Decisions, decisions. I suppose I could always go for the option in between,” said Potter agreeably, fondling it. Even now the hand didn’t envelop his entire body, it still felt wonderful.

Snape said something. It wasn’t a word.

“What was that, Professor?”

“Don’t call me ‛Professor’,” said Snape, glaring. His teaching career was an unhappy reality that had no place in this moment. His teaching career was probably over, now that he thought about it. Better not to think, perhaps.

“Okay, Sev.”

“And don’t call me ‛Sev’!” snapped Snape.

“Well I can’t really call you ‛darling’, now can I?” Potter said, pulling his hand away and sitting up.

“You can call me ‛Sev’. Under protest. As long as you put your hand back.”

“Yes, dear,” said Potter, fluttering his eyelashes.

Snape rolled his eyes. “How do I get into these things?”

“By letting me...” Potter started, inching his fingers over Snape’s clothing until they stumbled into a button, toying with it gently. “I’d have thought you knew how to undress. Unless you just prop yourself up beside your cauldron at night.”

“Oh, just get on with it, Potter!”

“Only if you call me ‛Harry’.” A third button gave way.

“Do we really need to be on a first name basis?”

Potter stopped undressing Snape. “‛Professor’ or ‛sir’ is right for the classroom, right?”

“Right,” agreed Snape gloomily.

“And we’re not in a classroom, right?”

“Right.”

Potter waited, circling one of the buttons with the tip of his finger.

“I see where this is going, Potter.” I wish it could go there faster.

“You don’t give an inch, Sev. I want you to give me several.” Potter smirked, and wiggled his eyebrows.

“Mm. I’ll call you Harry if you prove to be minimally acceptable.”

“Oh, I think I can be more than that, Sevvie.”

“You’re going the right way to see me heading out of the door at a very fast pace.” Even with my robe undone at the crotch, Snape thought, realising that the button-by-button striptease had got unexpectedly far.

“All right, no ‛Sevvie’, sweetheart, but you’re calling me ‛Harry’.”

“I suppose that’s reasonable.” Snape relented, grudgingly, and wondering whether he should set up an entirely new system of rules and penances or whether House points would do. No ‛Professor’. No ‛sweetheart’. Definitely no ‛Sevvie’. Deduct points for slow undressing. His thoughts were interrupted by Potter—Harry—playing with something that certainly wasn’t a button. Snape whimpered.

“Not playing too rough, am I?” Harry asked.

“Nnnnn,” said Snape.

“Oh good,” said Harry, squeezing rhythmically.

“I like that. Stop doing it at once,” said Snape.

“Of course,” said Harry obediently. I wish I could have that effect on him in lessons, Snape thought, as Harry removed his hand. Now he felt a little...bereft, as well.

“Prepare yourself, Harry,” Snape commanded. “And I do hope you weren’t going to use that sex-toy without the proper preliminaries.”

“No, of course not, sir.”

“And while you’re at it, take off your clothes.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And stop calling me ‛sir’.”

“Yes... er... Sev.”

“Well, what are you waiting for?”

Harry took off his glasses, gently tossing them over onto the bedside table, then began to unbutton his robe.

“Can’t you just lift it off over your head?” Snape asked, becoming impatient.

“Well, yes, but that’s not nearly so much fun.”

Snape glared at him, sliding his hands up Harry’s legs and coaxing his robe upwards . “For you maybe.”

“Are you going to be this picky all the time we’re having it off?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

“Potter, you little... Do you always walk around dangling in the breeze beneath your robes?” Which was not only an erotic thought in its own right, but reminded him of being the robe on Harry’s naked body as Harry pleasured himself.

“Do you?” Harry asked, tilting his hips so that Snape’s hands brushed over more of his skin and catching his breath slightly.

“Not normally, no, but given the circumstances I’m certainly glad I did.”

“Now you mention it, what exactly led to these circumstances?”

“I was practicing my transformations. I thought it was common knowledge that transfiguration has never been my strong point?”

“Mm... au contraire...” argued the boy flirtily.

“I would like to point out that the form I took wasn’t entirely intentional.”

“I’ll assume you mean it was an accident. Still, effective.”

“Quite.”

“Wouldn’t it have been less embarrassing if you’d changed back afterwards? I mean, I could have tried you out, and...”

“Would you have preferred me to suffocate, or for me to have changed back accidentally while you were using me?”

“Now that you mention it, I see your point.” Harry looked worried. Although he’d have sworn he wanted Harry to take things just a little more seriously, to his own surprise Snape was disturbed by the sight.

“I wouldn’t have let you,” Snape muttered, “and in fact I didn’t.”

“No,” Harry agreed. “Don’t want your whole body in there. Just the appropriate bit.”

The appropriate bit perked up.

“It likes that idea,” said Harry unnecessarily.

“It has no taste,” Snape stated.

“Really? Let me try...” said Harry instantly, and slid down the bed.

“Y’ c’n’t ‛ve b’n doing ‛is righ’,” he continued indistinctly, with a mouthful of Snape.

“What?” said Snape, rather distracted.

Harry stopped. “I mean, tasted bloody wonderful to me. Try some,” he suggested, kissing his way up (navel, nipple, neck, mouth).

Snape moaned into the kiss. He could taste himself very slightly in Harry’s mouth: wet and salt. He’d always agreed with the rules about not corrupting boys. What were the rules about being corrupted? Were there any? Harry’s lips were plump and cushiony against the sour thinness of his own, and Harry’s tongue fucked his mouth open until he could barely think.

Since Harry’s robe was already loose, and had started riding up, he was comfortably on the way to having an orgasm against hot thigh and restlessly-rippling robe—when the devil-boy stopped, and moved away.

“Not that way.”

Snape’s brain started functioning again now it was no longer competing with something bigger. “How much experience do you have with actual sodomy?” he asked bluntly.

“Enough.”

“I suppose that could cover anything from ‛once, with difficulty’ to ‛once, with the entire Gryffindor Quidditch team’,” Snape said thoughtfully. “It would be useful to know which.”

“Twice properly,” said Harry, “or possibly three times.”

“You should know if anyone does.”

“A bit of fumbling about at first, which doesn’t really count,” explained Harry. “My first fuck was Hitchens. Not an affair. Sort of...post-match euphoria thing. He said, ‛You’re a nice lad, but I don’t really want anything serious’. Since that was pretty much what I was thinking, we left it at that. My second one was Fred. Or George. FredandGeorge, anyway.”

Harry stood up and let his robe fall to the floor.

“Not sure which?” enquired Snape. I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart, but then I’m not all that interested in either, or both.

“Sort of. They were both there, but we were all drunk. It’s a bit of a blur.” He paused. “It’s sad, now I think about it, I haven’t really had repeated experiences. I could have had serious affairs, but nobody’s ever offered unless they hero-worshipped me a little too much.”

“Not a problem I have.”

“No.” Potter paused. He didn’t look noticeably cast-down by the thought of how little Snape admired him. “So will you want to do this again?”

“I shouldn’t even be doing this once, Potter.” Snape glared.

“It’s ‛Harry’.” Harry looked obstinate, as usual. Flinging himself back dramatically on the bed, he began to apply the inferior lubricant to his person, apparently making a show of it.

Snape’s mouth dried. He couldn’t say a word.

“Am I doing this right, sir?” Harry asked.

Snape was beginning to gain a keen appreciation of the fact that there could be worse things than disobedience in a schoolboy, and that one of the worse things was the schoolboy being bright, respectful and obedient about things he shouldn’t even have been considering.

“I’m not sure if that’s deep enough,” said Harry. “What do you think, sir? Feel it, and see what you think?”

He was just a little shocked at how hard, how fast, those fingers did the job, Harry might be inexperienced with people, but he seemed to know how he liked to be stimulated, and he wasn’t shy about making noises. It was, of course, idiotically trusting of Harry to lay himself open this way to anyone, let alone Snape, but...

“Don’t call me sir,” he commanded, fingertip skidding on a wet, rapidly-moving knuckle.

“Course not, sir.”

Harry seemed to have the dilation well in hand, so Snape started applying the lubricant to himself, complaining all the time. “Where did you get this appalling substance, Harry? It’s below what I would consider acceptable for masturbation, let alone company.”

Harry gulped.

“Now what is it?” Snape snapped. He would put up with a change of mind at this point, but he didn’t have to like it.

“Just like the thought. Of you touching yourself. Just like normal people. I’d like to watch you come.”

Snape wrenched his hand away.

Harry sniggered. “Maybe some other time for that, then. For now...” He wriggled on top of Snape.

Snape shut his eyes.

“Don’t worry,” said Harry. “I think I can do this.” Snape was just beginning to get annoyed at the way Harry felt he could do anything when Harry began to move. Snape shut his eyes, and watched the hot darkness inside his own head, feeling his own rigid prick being moved into place. Harry’s inner flesh was maddeningly tight, and very warm.

“Does...that...hurt...?” Snape asked, listening to each word dropping off his tongue as if into a very deep well.

“Not too bad. Don’t move yet.”

“...can’t...”

“Good.”

In, fraction by fraction. Harry was doing the work, at a slow steady push, while Snape salved a conscience he wouldn’t admit to having by telling himself that the boy knew his own limits, despite the fact that this was patently untrue when he thought about everything else Harry Potter had ever done over the years.

In, fraction by fraction. What did I ever do to deserve this? Snape thought, meaning the sentence in at least two mutually-contradictory directions at once.

In, all the way.

“That’s it,” murmured Harry. After a little careful testing of boundaries, he said, “Your turn to move now, Sev.”

“...hurt?...” Snape asked again.

“Doesn’t now,” said Harry, panting slightly.

Snape took a firm grip on Harry with both hands. His fingers itched to have more. He loosened the grip.

Harry sighed restlessly. “Hold me tight, Sev.”

Cautiously, he added a little pressure. It wasn’t enough.

“I said, hold me. In your arms.”

Snape gave up on self-control. He held Harry. In his arms. He’d been afraid he would be brutal, given the chance. He had a nasty feeling he was...passionate, instead. Warm, properly warm. He couldn’t get enough of it. Burying his cold face in Harry’s hot shoulder, he sucked and kissed and nibbled.

“Nice,” said Harry. “Keep doing it. And fuck me.”

And here I am, taking orders from the Saviour of the Wizarding World just like everybody else. Of course, I didn’t roll over in quite as servile a fashion as most, if that counts for anything...

“Now! Snap to it!”

Snape snapped to it, shoving frantically.

Harry gasped sharply. So did Snape. Then he just let himself fall, and pulled Harry closer on top so that his mouth rested against Harry’s shoulder again, luxuriating in the feeling. Panting with ecstatic, heated excess, he managed to get himself just a little deeper. There was a warm weight on top of him, and his prick was sinking greedily into the tightest, hottest place it had had the pleasure of visiting for years, and he could feel Harry’s hand jerking sharply against him.

He hadn’t had a sex-crazed adolescent wanking against his body even when he was a sex-crazed adolescent.

“Can I come yet, Sev?” said Harry breathlessly.

“You could,” Snape suggested judiciously.

“Good-oh!” said Harry, and did.

No finesse, thought Snape. Young, crude, stupid and...

(he yelled, bucked and gushed ferociously)

...a bloody good fuck, all things considered, he concluded more temperately, as the orgasmic euphoria receded slightly.

Harry brushed the hair out of his eyes, catching his breath. “So do you think you could learn to change into anything else?”

“What exactly were you thinking of?”

“Well, considering how you were when I found you,” said Harry, a mischievous glint in his eye.

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Well it’s not like it’d be that different to what we’ve just been doing.”

“I am not going to transfigure myself into numerous unspecified marital aids for your amusement, Potter.”

“Oooohh, why not?”

“That’s what my games room is for,” Snape told him, allowing himself a brief smirk.

“A games room? You’re not talking backgammon here, are you?”

“Not exactly. Well, if one’s living and working in a dungeon anyway, one may as well decorate it properly.”

“And everyone thinks you’re a boring, nasty, stuffy old...”

Snape’s glare cut him off.

“Instead of a strangely fascinating...” (kiss) “...darkly sexy...” (kiss) “seductive, kinky man who just happens to have a boring job.”

“Yes, well perhaps eventually you will come to see just how exciting potions can make things.”

“Really?”

“I think you’d be surprised.”

“You’re right, I probably would, and I fully expect you to show me. So, how did I perform?”

“Even better than before,” said Snape absently.

“What?” Harry looked confused. “What are you talking about? I mean, I’m fairly certain I’d remember if I’d ever had sex with you before.”

Snape gave him the evil little grin that he reserved for special occasions, and reached his hand up to brush his thumb over Harry’s lower lip, still stained with ink. “I told you I’m not particularly good at controlling my transformations. I was your quill for a week or so, for example. The black one, that balanced so nicely in your hand, when you were missing your Potions master and wondering where he’d got to.”

“Oh, that was you! But there’s some difference between having sex and a bit of absent-minded fiddling,” Harry argued.

“Oh,” said Snape, laughing low in his throat, “you think I’m referring to your hand all over my body?”

“What else?”

“Fellatio.”

Harry looked blank.

“I prefer it when my partner swallows, of course,” Snape went on, “but you certainly made the ink flow.”

Harry laughed uncertainly.

“You think I’m joking? It’s an unconventional way to attain orgasm,” Snape admitted, “but perfectly functional.”

“Really?” Harry enquired, diverted. “What’s it feel like, coming ink?”

Snape thought back to it. “Sort of...royal blue, I suppose.”

“But the nib would be either your head or your feet?”

Snape smirked, rather pleased at the evidence of Harry’s occasional access to the higher brain functions. “The legs seem to fold away in that particular transformation. Leaving the lower part of the body, coming to a point.”

“How did you discover you were a...were-pen, Sev?”

“I’m an Inanimagus. I can make up the word, since as far as I know there has never been one before.”

“Like, ‛inanimate’ and ‛animagus’?”

“Quite.”

“So how did it start?”

“I overheard Minerva talking about Potions. ‛We can all manage nasty, smelly messes, but Real Magic takes a bit more skill’.”

“You were angry?”

“I was incandescent, Harry. It gave me an extremely strong incentive to try a bit of quiet work at a subject I don’t take to naturally. And, after all, if that mangy werewolf’s mangy dog can do it, how bad can it be?”

“How bad was it, Sev?”

“It was more difficult than I had presumed. Perhaps my lack of natural talent in that form of magic led me to an unconventional form. I have less interest in nature than a lot of wizards.”

“S’pose it’s a good one for a spy. Pity you don’t need to be a spy any more.”

Snape sharpened his “What-An-Idiot” expression on Harry.

“Well, you don’t. Voldemort’s dead.”

“Nature abhors a vacuum. Human nature abhors a power vacuum. And surely you have not yet forgotten what happened the last few times we thought Voldemort was dead. I think there’s no immediate danger. This does not mean there is no possibility of danger.”

“All right, get down off your high horse, Sev. I’m sure it’d be very useful if you got the hang of it a bit more.”

Snape sighed. “I do my best, but because it’s an unusual form of magic—and would almost-certainly be disapproved-of by the Ministry—my experiments are few, and in private.” He sighed harder. “I’ve always wanted some decent academic challenge to rise to, and now I have one, and it’s illegal. Or will be illegal as soon as anybody official finds out it’s possible. A particularly nasty dramatic irony.”

“Good job you’ve got someone to help you experiment then,” said Harry, cuddling up to him. “Sirius says it’s much better not to have to work on one’s own. I assume you’re permitted to take an apprentice?”

“You?” asked Snape, startled.

“Can’t spend m’life playing Quidditch,” mumbled Harry, blushing.

Snape gaped. He’d always assumed the brat wanted to spend his lifetime playing Quidditch. He’d certainly acted like it.

“I like Quidditch,” said Harry, “but I’d get a bit bored if it was the only thing I did.”

“What makes you think you’ll be any use?”

“Can follow instructions, managed to pass Potions despite having no interest in the subject, can fetch and carry, might well be able to help you publish anything you come up with on Inanimagus transformations.”

“Because you’re a war hero?” sneered Snape.

“Because I’m one of the war heroes that didn’t have to get his hands dirty,” said Harry, with complete, serious dignity. “It might not be fair or right that they’d cut me more slack for that reason, but I’d prefer to do something useful.”

“Have you thought of what this would mean?” Snape asked, seriously.

“Yeah, you don’t want me about.” Harry grinned. “Subjecting you to incredible sex, holding your spoon for you on long Potions jobs, more sex, writing stuff with me and doing experiments, more sex, having a hot bath run for you when you’ve just stopped turning into a piece of furniture, helping turn you back if you get stuck, having the sort of long noisy shag that will really infuriate my godfather when he finds out...”

Harry moaned, as Snape kissed him, deep and hard.

“Was that a ‛yes’?”

“Shut up and let your master sleep, boy.”

“Hey, that silk thingy!” murmured Harry in the darkness some hours later.

“Took you long enough. Of course,” said Snape, stopping just short of appending ‛you idiot’.

“I was in you,” muttered Harry. “I came.”

“Shut up, boy,” Snape told him.

“Yes, master,” Harry replied, leering audibly.

Snape decided to ignore the tone of voice. For now.

“Go to sleep, boy.”

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