023

There's a battle going on in my head, and it's driving me insane.

There's the one side of me that is terrified for Hermione's safety. I want to lock her away and lose the key. I want to potion her with a dreamless drought and send her as far away from me as possible. I want to obliviate myself from her mind and be damned of the pain it causes me. Would the bonds still affect her if she no longer knows who I am? I could close them, I'm sure. If I tried hard enough. I feel her, like a fire burning in my chest. Bubbling in the back of my mind. Every moment I let this go on, it gets stronger. She gets stronger within me. I should lock my sense of her in that little box in my head and bury it until she's lost to me forever.

I could. If I tried hard enough.

I lean against the doorframe of the Grimmauld Place library. Hermione is set up at a table with a half dozen books open and spread out around her. She has another half dozen color coded spiral notebooks, with markers and highlighters and Muggle instruments of studying that the magical folk in this house have never seen before. 

She changed into different clothes when we got back from her parent's house and is wearing a baggy t-shirt and a pair of shorts. I don't think I've seen the shirt before. She has a spot of pink on her nose, probably from the highlighter currently behind her ear and I know I'll never be able to do it. I'll never be able to send her away from me. I can't imagine a time in my life where I don't go searching for her in a library somewhere.

And that's the other side. The bastard side. That side wants to crawl inside Hermione and never see daylight again. That side is winning and terrifies me to pieces. 

It isn't simply winning. It's already won.

Is it possible to make a home from a person? I've always thought of a home as a structure with a roof and a foundation. Hogwarts was my first home. The Burrow, with its tilted walls and sneaky gnomes, has always been my second. But Hermione feels like my only home now.

Everything with her parents just made it all so real. I'm choosing to keep her with me. I could send her away if I really wanted to. I could have sent her and Ron away last time. 

I didn't. I chose to keep them with me. I kept her at my side, even after Ron left.

The price for that choice was her death. What price will she pay for my choices this time?

Even now, with all the protections we've put in place, I could be signing her death warrant. 

But still…

"It's almost midnight," I say quietly, not wanting to disturb her work but unwilling to let her push herself past the point of exhaustion. I walk further into the room, coming to rest behind her. 

I cup her face in my hand and tilt her head backwards to look at me. I wasn't lying when I said that I can't stop touching her. It's almost painful to be too far away from her for too long. Hermione will blame it on those blasted bonds. I choose to blame it on the fact that she's beautiful, and mine.

"Are you coming to bed any time soon?"

Most everyone has already gone to sleep, though I left Remus and Sirius talking in the study. Buckbeak was sent to Hogwarts while we were out, and they'll spend the weekend transforming the attic into a space for training. 

She smiles at me, tired and soft, and I can't resist leaning over and kissing her. I don't care that it's awkward and I'm upside down. We're alone, for once. The fear of being interrupted is minimal this late at night. I take her lips between my own and run my tongue across them until she's sighing into my touch.

I only pull away when I feel her neck getting sore. I slide out the chair next to her instead.

The Goblin text is in a spot of honor, resting next to one of the tomes she took from Ollivander. There's a book on magical bonds, and what looks like a children's book of fairy tales too. 

"Find any of the information you were looking for?" I ask, and her eyes light up in excitement.

"Well," she starts. "The Twins for sure share a soul bond. If nothing else, I've confirmed that."

That startles me, and I take the notebook already brimming with her neat precise scribbling and read the section she directs me to.

"The differences between soul bonds and soulmates are profound." She's dropped into what I've long thought of as her teaching voice, seemingly forgetting that she's talking about her and me. "With soulmates, it's strictly a love match. They are literally made for each other. One half compliments the other half. But it's more than that. It's said that you won't reach your true potential without your soulmate by your side. They don't make you a better person, but you're a better person because of them, if that makes sense." 

I nod because she's obviously nowhere near done talking. But it makes perfect sense to me. Hermione has always made me better. In every shape and form. Even when I was trying to date other people, she had to tell me how to do it.

The thought, somehow, makes me smile. I think I owe Cho an apology.

"When soulmates fight, it can be extreme. Brutal even. Something about hurting those we love the most the worst. Anne Boleyn and Henry the VIII were soulmates, and he had her beheaded!"

I bite my tongue at the way the prospect of quarrelling so extreme it ends in the other's death seems to excite her. 

 "There's a physical aspect to being soulmates too. Obviously. In the days of arranged marriages, finding your soulmate after the wedding would nullify the vows because you were almost certain to stray from your spouse."

I raise my hand, bringing her rambling to a stop.

"Are you trying to tell me there's a compulsion to have sex?" I ask, horrified at the prospect.

Her face goes blank, then morphs into an expression appropriate for the twisting in my gut.

"What?" She shakes her head. "No. NO!" She tries to assure me, waving her hands in denial by her face. "That's not what I meant at all. I just meant, well…" her cheeks flush a lovely shade of rose, and she bites at her bottom lip. Mi reaches forward and grabs my wrist, running her open palm up my arm. "I only meant that the book said close physical contact with your soulmate can bring you comfort."

That much I'd figured out on my own. Every time I touch her, I breathe easier.

"Ah, okay." 

Relief crashes through me like a wave. I had never thought about Hermione like that, before our first kiss. I made a very conscious, very painful decision to never think about Hermione like that. I spent countless hours thinking about not thinking about Mi in that way. Even after the soulmate bond was sealed, the thought didn't occur to me until she rose dripping wet and naked in front of me.

Of course, I haven't thought about anything else since. But I figure I'm allowed now, so it's okay. Even with us sharing a bed these past weeks, I've tried my damndest to be respectful.

The thought of some compulsion pulling me to her that way makes me sick. 

I roughly clear my throat and try to get back on subject.

"Is that where the whole," I wiggle a finger between her and I, "able to read each other's thoughts come from?"

"Nope!" she says, grinning ear to ear. "I haven't come across one mention of soulmates being able to read the other's mind. Have a close link? Absolutely. But there are no psychic connections between soulmates. It's all emotional and physical."

I take the book she's jabbing with a finger and pull it over so I can glance at it. There's a list of famous soulmates on the page, and I flip through it with interest.

"That's a soul-bond thing then?" I ask, looking up at her from the pages. 

She slowly shakes her head no.

"No again," she smirks. "Though, soul-bonds are fascinating. Most of the famous sets of soul-bonds in history are siblings. Three are sets of twins. But! It doesn't always happen like that. There was even a recorded trinity bond between three female best friends. The only of its kind! Some, like the goblins, think that souls are reincarnated, and that two people are born sharing the same soul. Others think that something profound happens to the pair, and that in turn links their souls. Or maybe they imprint on the other person." She makes a whatever gesture with her hands. "Either way, it's a deep mental bond. They can, in a sense, share thoughts. But I've found no record of them reading the other's mind. Of one half of a pair pulling memories from the others."

I open my mouth, but Hermione powers over me.

"That's how I'm convinced the Twins have a bond. I'm going to ask them about it tomorrow. Their father works at the ministry. I'm sure they have their orb. It's the only explanation for that freaky twin talk thing they do."

Well, she's got me there.

"Then how can we—"

Hermione cuts me off, a sheen of magic seeming to make her glow.

"We're not just Soul Bound. Or Soulmates. We're Bonded Mates!"

She reaches for the book in my hand, flipping pages till the very back then shoving it back in my grip.

"Read!" She instructs me with energy.

I read.

"On Bonded Mates, very little knowledge is still in existence. They are considered obsolete in the modern era. A magic that has been lost to us over the passage of time. What is known, however, is that to have a Bonded Mate, was to be as one in two bodies. If soul bonds are formed when a single soul is split in two and forced to live its current life searching for its other half, then the bonded mate is the pinnacle of joining. Two spirits, whose connection is so profound, they  unite into one being. On their next cycle into life, they will reincarnate as man and woman, and share every bond there is known to have; familial, friends, equals, lovers. Like the yin and yang, their souls are interconnected and interdependent. They are the duality. The light and the dark. The chaos and the calm. For one cannot exist without the other."

I flip the page, but it's empty. Blank. One paragraph is all there is about a connection that's changed our lives as we know it. 

"This tells us nothing."

I toss it back onto the table, and Hermione gives me a reproachful glare.

It's useless. It's worse than useless. But Hermione is practically bouncing in her seat.

"When was it written?" I ask, thinking about it referencing the 'modern era.'

She runs her teeth over her top lip this time. Has she always done that? It's horribly distracting.

"In the late 1800s," she says, shrugging off my concern.

I lean my elbow on the table, supporting my head with my palm.

"Which of us is the chaos and which of us is the calm?" I ask sarcastically, but Hermione lights up with enthusiasm.

"Don't you get it, Harry?! It doesn't matter. Think back for the last seven years. Every altercation we've ever had. Every confrontation with something scary or evil. Name one situation where we freaked out at the same time."

What?

I shake my head not understanding.

"I—"

Hermione cuts me off.

"You can't! Because we didn't." 

She jumps up from her chair, her excitement too pronounced for her to sit still. She throws her arms out in wide sweeping arcs, gesturing wildly between her and me.

"I still don't understand."

"When you thought Sirius had been taken, I was thinking clearly. When the dementors were killing us, I fell unconscious, but you got us through it. At Malfoy Manor…"

A shiver runs down my spine.

"You lied through your bloody teeth," I breathe, "while I stood in that dungeon and screamed my head off."

"Youngest Quidditch player in a century," she says pointing at me. Then she points at herself.

"You can't ride a broom," I finish. 

Hermione beams at me. Positively glows. 

I feel sick to my stomach. 

"I thought you didn't believe in prophecy?" I ask.

"I didn't!" she exclaims. "I don't! But—it's riveting, Harry. Amazing. No one knows anything about Bonded Mates for certainty because it's so rare. One pair a lifetime. Maybe even the same pair, reborn over and over again."

She almost looks manic; eyes wide and hands twisting. She's tugging on her fingers again. She's glowing, magic softly seeping from her pores. I feel her consciousness rub against me, almost the same way my Patronus rubbed his antlers against her. She's pulsing in her excitement, pacing the small length of the table, and paying me no mind at all.

I feel like the earth has tilted underneath me. My throat is as dry as a desert.

"They're talking about souls, Harry! Not bodies or magical bonds or spells that tie you to another person, like the House Elf vow. They're talking about your very being! Souls that are entwined for all eternity! What if there are no records of their gifts and limitations because there are no limitations? Imagine what would happen if we just... dropped the walls between us? No guards. No boundaries. Two souls, joined in every way possible. Twin flames, born over and over, living separate lives before rejoining to reach ascension."

I stand up, facing her head on. She doesn't pay me any mind, continuing to burst with the perceived possibilities. 

"The very idea is horrifying and breathtaking all at the same time," she rambles. "The ability to share your consciousness with another person is… But you aren't really a different person, are you? You're me, in reverse. My equal. My—"

"Stop!" I say, my voice cold. She freezes mid step, her head whipping up to look at me. 

I run my hands through my hair and pull, wanting to scream but not able to get it out.

 "I don't—I don't want to hear anything else." I yank my glasses from my face and dig into my eyes with my forefinger and thumb, rubbing at the headache building there. "Research the fucking bonds until your heart is content. But I don't want to hear a single word about it."

She gapes at me, eyes wide and mouth open.

"What? WHY? Why don't you—"

"It's bullshit, Hermione!" I yell. "It's total and complete bullocks! Fate can kiss my ass, okay! How many times have I died? Have you died? Fate means nothing! Destiny can go fuck itself as far as I'm concerned. If you're content to believe that some supernatural bond made this happen, then more power to you. But I won't listen to it. I can't!"

I slam my fist onto the table.

"It's just one more person, one more THING, telling me I have no control over my life. A higher power dictating what happens to me and forcing the decisions I have no choice in making."

Her hands droop loosely to her sides, and she takes a step closer to me, but I take another back, keeping our separation equal.

"Don't you get it? I can close my eyes and see it, Hermione." 

I feel wounded. I do close my eyes and rub at my chest, willing the ache to ease. 

"The war over, you, married to Ron. Me, married to Ginny. Half a dozen children between us. All of us would be working for the ministry in some shape and fashion. You and I, we'd still be best friends. Our spouses would secretly hate us for it but come to rely on it too. Ginny would have to call you when I locked myself in the office to brood and Ron would spend half his life bitching to me about how you work too hard, and he needs more attention. We'd be best friends. But we'd have separate lives. Sleep in separate beds. If we hadn't died together this time, that's exactly what would have happened."

She opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. Her bottom lip is trembling. She knows I'm right. I can see it in her eyes. Feel it in the hopelessness currently coursing through her veins.

"I chose this!" I insist, my hands balled into fists. I smack myself in the chest. "I did. I. Kissed. You! Not because someone told me to do it. Not because fate demanded it. But because I wanted to. Because something horrible happened to us, and the only thing I could think of was to get as close to you as possible. I followed you into that bathroom when I was eleven, because even as a stupid kid, the thought of something bad happening to you made me sick to my stomach. So yeah, I don't want to hear another fucking word about magic or fate or anything deciding that I had no choice over who I fell in love with!"

My voice cracks, and I take another step back, needing space to breathe. Space to rage about the fucking unfairness of it all. Finally, something good happens to me, and she tells me I didn't even have a say in it.

"Oh, Harry," she sighs, and this time when she closes the distance between us, I let her. She takes my face in her hands and her fingers are shaking. She clings to me, engulfing me in her tiny frame, and I sag into her embrace, my forehead resting against hers.

"I'm so sorry, Harry. That's not what I meant! That's not what I meant at all!" She rubs her hands over my face, making shushing noises like you would use to quiet a crying baby. "You heard you had no choice. I heard you chose me, over and over and over again. In every life you've ever lived, you've chosen me."

Choice. What did I tell Dumbledore? It was the distinction between being dragged into an arena to do battle or walking into the arena with your head held high. The end result is the same, but the path to the destination makes all the difference. 

"Where does your choice come into this?" I whisper against her face. "You have to choose too."

"Harry," she sighs. She rubs her nose against mine, the softness of her lips brushing against the prickles on my face. "I chose you years ago. How many different ways do I have to prove that to you?"

I'm almost crying, and I have no idea why and no clue how to pull it back. 

"I know you've been using occlumency," she says softly, catching me off guard. I try to jerk away, but she holds me tight. "How?" she asks.

I close my eyes and clear my throat, rubbing my cheek against her face like a cat. Her hair is tucked up at the base of her head, and I roughly yank out the band wrestling the masses into compliance. I drop it to the floor, and dig my fingers into the strands, pulling at the curls until they straighten long and tight before springing from my grip. 

What did she want again?

Oh yeah.

"Um. Mortimer taught me," I say. "Kind of. Or maybe a combination of him, and Snape, and finally being free of Riddle's influence. Everything I don't want people to know, I lock it into a trunk in my mind, then bury it in a closet and throw away the key."

"Good to know," she sasses gently. "I need you to let it go, Harry. Everything you've been trying to keep from me these last few weeks. Every thought and every feeling you've been hiding inside, afraid that you'd scare me away. Let it go."

Her hands creep inside my shirt, her palms warm against my back. I dropped the sword off in the bedroom hours ago. If I need basilisk venom in our Order and Ministry warded house at midnight, then all hope is lost already. My wand is on my hip.

I tighten a hand in her hair, arching her back and lengthening her neck. My other hand slips down her back until it's resting low on her hip. I take a step closer still, until my legs are spread and she's practically standing between them. 

She wants me to show her what I'm thinking right now? She's out of her bloody mind.

I want to grab her ass. I know from experience how well it fits in my palm. 

"No." 

I'm not even sure if she heard me. My lips are pressed under her ear, and I run my tongue against the sensitive flesh there. I open my eyes to watch the goosebumps appear over the expanse of her throat.

"Yes," she demands with a sigh. Her head is thrown back. Her eyes are closed. How she's still having cohesive thoughts is beyond me. It must be a girl thing, because I don't have enough blood in my head to think properly. "I thought I was in charge?" she asks.

I shake my head no, then nod, then shrug. All while keeping a bite of her skin between my teeth. My eyes are twitched up to watch her reactions as I lick and suck my way across her neck.

"I'm in charge of theory," she persists, and I really ruddy hate her brain sometimes. "You're in charge of killing things." 

I laugh at that, my head falling onto her shoulder with amusement. 

"Why are you so bloody bossy?" I ask her, and her smile could light up the room.

"I could ask you the same thing," she replies. "Lower your barriers, Harry."

My head is loose on my shoulders, and I rotate it this way and that, working out the kinks that have tightened my neck. I do what she asks and loosen the hold I've had on my mind since we were dropped into this timeline. 

A full body shiver runs down her spine and her chin droops forward, as the little bundle I associate with Hermione bursts with light. She hisses through clenched teeth like it burns.

"Merlin," she gasps, and that's probably an understatement. She sways in my arms, her knees buckling, and I dip to catch her with an arm around her waist and under her ass. Without thinking I lift her up, and her legs wrap around me.

"You have a serious attitude problem," she mumbles between clenched teeth, and I fight out a laugh. She's limp against my chest, her forehead resting on my shoulder and her arms loose around my throat. "And a very dirty imagination."

The image of that book rises in my mind, and I picture my face pinned between Hermione's thighs. Then a hundred, a thousand, different images flash through my head after it.

"Merlin," she says again. "It's making me dizzy."

I'm feeling a smidgen lightheaded myself. Her mind is like a library, everything organized and in its place. It's a little nauseating, and a tiny bit claustrophobic. 

Except I'm dizzy with lust, and she's trying to make sense of the scattered wasteland that is my brain. I walk the two feet to the library table and plop her down on top of it. She's breathing heavily, sweat breaking out over her skin.

I slide my hands up and under her t-shirt, her skin smooth under my touch. She gasps when my hands skate up her back. I give into the temptation of flesh and let my lips wander where they will over her throat.

"I've always been fascinated with the way your mind works," she says, tipping her head back. "You can jump from A to C skipping B entirely."

She's panting, and her face is screwed up like she's in pain. But she's not in pain. She's not in pain at all. That link between us. The one that gets tighter with every breath I take until I can't tell where I start, and she begins…it's lighting up like a Christmas tree. Hermione is almost incandescent with how not in pain she is. 

"Hermione," I whine. I'm not even embarrassed that I am, in fact, whining.

"I'm assuming this isn't what it felt like when Voldemort scoured your mind?"

I huff out a laugh at that. It would be like comparing heaven to hell. The only similarity is they've both brought me to my knees, but for entirely different reasons. I can actually feel her riffling around in there like she would a messy closet. Attempting to stack books and filing shit away. Her thirst for knowledge is insatiable, but I'm done being her subject for the day.

I capture her lips in a kiss.

It, the bond, surges between us. I feel like I do when I'm diving for the snitch.  My adrenaline is bursting in my veins, my heartbeat is pounding out of my chest. Hermione's eyes snap open, and her pupils are blown dark and wide. Wild magic flows from our skin, and her hair floats around her head. 

The deeper I kiss her, the more the bond seems to stabilize between us. Equalize, until we are, as she tried to explain earlier, two halves of a whole. I hear her in my head like a bird on a foggy morning, her voice singing pure and clear. I feel her like an extension of myself. 

Separate, but interconnected. Linked for all eternity I think she said. I could get used to that.

I pull away just enough to speak, though my lips are still touching hers.

"What were those bonds that book mentioned again?"

She nods her head, attempting to come up with the answer.

"Familiar," she says.

Absolutely.

"Always been my family."

I suck a mark into her throat. 

"Friends," she squeaks.

"The best," I reply, tugging her closer until she's barely on the table anymore.

"Equals," she sighs when I try to suck her breasts into my mouth, despite the layers of clothing separating us.

"There was one more," I prompt.

"Lovers," she pants out between little gasps.

"That's the one I'm looking for," I announce. With a tug of my hands and a stretch of my arms, her shirt is off her head and thrown somewhere behind me. I run my palms up her sides, taking in the drastic differences in our skin. She's so pale and perfect, covered head to toe in freckles, and even now my hands are tan and rough.

I wonder what the differences will be in ten, twenty, fifty years?

Goose pebbles bloom all over her, and it's bloody addicting to watch her tremble under my touch.

"Harry," she sighs, and I can't tell if it's out loud or in my head. "Let's go upstairs," she suggests. "I don't want to do this in the middle of the library."

Liar, liar pants on fire.

She so wants to do this in the middle of the library.

I run my teeth over her collarbone, loving the way I can feel it on my own skin. Like a filtered reflection of the lightning coursing through her nervous system. Her head falls back on her neck, and her hands dig against my scalp.

"You're telling me you've never had a fantasy about snogging surrounded by books?" I ask. 

A vision rises to the surface of Hermione pinned to the bookcases in the restricted section of the Hogwarts Library. A man with black hair with his face hidden underneath her skirt completes the picture.

My hands spasm around her ribcage, my fingers digging into her flesh. 

"Bloody hell, witch. You're trying to kill me."

She playfully shoves me away.

"I changed my mind. Make it stop. Get out of my head."

Hell no. I couldn't even if I wanted to. We've long since passed the point of no return. She wanted no barriers between us. Now she gets to live with the consequences.

"I like it," I tell her and it's true, and pointless, because I'm sure she can tell it for herself. Just like I can tell how much it turns her on to feel how hard I am through my jeans.

"Upstairs. Please," she begs. 

How can I say no when she asks so prettily? I kiss her again, and again. Until all I taste, or smell, or feel is Hermione. Until she surrounds me and fills every corner of my being. Then I link her arms around my shoulders and twist her legs around my hips and lift her from the table.

She takes her own weight with the whisper of a spell, then proceeds to nibble on my jaw. I flick my wrist, and her discarded shirt flies into my open palm. Thirty seconds later I kick open the door to our room.

I kick it closed as soon as I've passed the threshold. 

We fall onto the couch. The effort to make it the bed is just too much. It's too great a distance when there's a soft surface between me and it. I'm going to have to send Winky a thank you card, since I'm positive the additional furniture was her doing. The elf is a bloody genius.

Hermione's knees hit the cushion at the same time my ass does, and she grinds herself against me on impact. I'd groan from the pain if it didn't feel so bleeding fabulous at the same time.

"Har-ry," Hermione whines, and her voice is broken and hoarse. She keeps tugging my lips back to hers, despite the fact that I keep pulling them away to explore the rest of her body.

I have no idea how to unclasp a bra, and so simply tug the lacy material out of my way before capturing her nipple with my lips. She's so sensitive that every time I run my tongue over and around the peaked mounds, she twitches and spasms under my touch. I kiss them like I do her lips. One at a time. I draw as much of her breast into my mouth as I can and suck until I feel my teeth imprint and she writhes and whimpers on top of me.

Her nipples are dark compared to the pink of her flesh, and I'm in love with the varied colors of her skin. I think it's fascinating that the skin puckers as her breasts tighten with need.

I can't imagine ever getting tired of this.

"Teach me how to touch you," I tell her.

She shudders in my arms, then ducks her chin to hide her face.

"What?" she asks, and her voice is trembling. Barely discernible.

I like having to look up at her from this angle.

"Show me how you touch yourself," I demand. "I know you do it. Make yourself come. I heard you, once or twice in the tent. When you thought I was asleep or keeping guard outside. I'd pull the silencing charms down, afraid that you'd need me, and I wouldn't hear you. Instead, I listened to you moaning out your pleasure."

"You bastard," she hisses, color blooming on her cheeks in the most fetching manner. I run my thumb under her mouth and pull at her bottom lip.

"Where's that Gryffindor courage?" I taunt, and her eyes flash in challenge.

"You know, I really don't like this cocky confidence thing you've got going on here," she says. "It's not a good look on you, at all." 

Why is she lying to me when I can taste it on my tongue? 

I laugh at that; at the way she smiles up at me.

"Cocky?" I ask. "Try terrified. Every minute of every day I'm terrified of what's going to happen next. I'm petrified I'm going to screw this up. That's why I need you to show me."

She snorts through her nose, an adorable little sound that makes me smile even wider.

"Could have fooled me," she says.

"Good. It's working then."

Silence falls between us as Hermione nibbles her bottom lip. She's going to tear it to shreds, and I take my thumb and free it from its torment, before leaning in and kissing the abused flesh.

"Show me," I say again, whispering against her mouth.

Mi nods her head against me, before stepping out of my arms and off my lap. She slips her shorts from her hips, letting them pool on the ground at her feet. She reaches her arms behind her back and suddenly the bra that's been encasing her breasts slides down her arms, adding to the pile of her clothing.

"Take off your jeans," she instructs me. I hasten to obey, almost falling off the couch in my hurry to join her standing. I don't even bother to remove my belt. I simply unfasten it then let it hang open as I yank my zipper down. My trousers join her shorts on the floor. 

Hermione slips her fingers into the cotton of her panties and drags her palms down her thighs, taking her panties with them. My eyes are immediately drawn to the curve of her hips and the downy curls between her legs. 

She doesn't tell me to take my trunks off, so I leave them on. I'm so hard I'm aching, and I fist my hands to stop from rubbing myself to seek out some relief. Without waiting for her instructions, I climb over the back of the couch and onto the bed to place my back to the headboard.

Hermione does the proper thing and walks to the side, but then shocks me when she crawls into my lap. She kisses me hotly, thrusting her tongue into my mouth and pulling at my hair. I groan at the roughness of it, and the way it makes me tingle. My toes are twisting into the mattress as she forces my body the way she wants it.

When she pulls away, we're panting, her entire body flushed with heat and nerves. She turns around in my arms, then scoots into my lap, her ass against my straining prick.

She bites at her bottom lip.

"I'm not simply going to let you watch Harry Potter! If you want to learn, then you need to learn." Then she takes each of my hands in hers, and places them on her body.

It sounds like a typical Hermione reprimand, and if I ever complain about her teacher-voice again may Merlin strike me down where I stand.

"My nipples are incredibly sensitive," she instructs, our joined hands gliding over her breasts. I'd already figured that out for myself, thanks. "I don't know whether that's common, but sometimes even the lace of my bra is too much."

Mi shouldn't have told me that. Now I'm going to spend all of my free time staring at her tits.

She takes my fingers and tugs on her nipples and bloody hell do I like that. Hermione hisses through her teeth and wiggles her ass against me.

"Do it again," she whispers, then releases my hands. I tug on them a second time, before cupping her breasts in my hands and squeezing them in my palms, plucking at her tits. 

"Sweet Morgana," she breathes, and I add that into the 'do it as often as I can pile' that's rapidly growing in my head.

My hands wrap with hers again as she glides them down her tiny form.

"My thighs are ticklish," she says, but I rub my open hands over her soft muscles anyway. There's downy hair covering her upper legs, and I bring my fingers right to the apex of her thighs before holding them there for her guidance.

She places her hands over mine but doesn't link out fingers. My heart is thudding out of my chest with how bad I want to touch her, and with fear over doing it wrong. When she runs my fingers through the curls between her legs, I almost sigh in relief. 

The hair is soft and almost as curly as the hair on her head. What's surprising though is where the mane on her head is natural and wild, the thatch between her legs is neat and trimmed.

Hermione releases my hands, and my fingers continue to explore.

Her outer lips are as smooth as the skin on her thighs, and a vision flickers behind my eyes of Hermione with her foot on a shower stool and her legs spread as she lathers shaving cream between her legs.

Merlin, Morgana, and Circe. The woman really is trying to kill me.

I dip my fingers between her folds, and Mi gasps at the contact.

"Is this okay?" I ask her.

It doesn't matter that I can feel it is. I can sense how much she wants me to touch her. Where she wants my fingers. How it's taking all of her considerable willpower not to take my hand and force my digits between her legs. 

I want to hear her say it.

"Yes," she agrees in a tight voice. "It's wonderful."

"You're so wet."

I didn't mean to say that out loud.

"I'm sorry," she says self consciously.

"Don't be. I like it."

Actually, I think I'm obsessed with it. Screw Voldemort. From this moment on I'm going to train morning, noon, and night, to see how slick I can make Hermione's thighs. I'm not a complete moron. I spent six years living in a dorm with other horny teenage boys. I heard stuff. Read the occasional magazine. 

But I never imagined it would feel like this. The moisture between her legs is almost sticky. I bring my fingers to my mouth and suck them clean. I run the length of them with my tongue. Hermione gasps in surprise, but I moan at the tangy taste of it. I dip my fingers between her legs again and taste it a second time. 

On my way for a third sampling, she grabs my hand at the wrist.

My fingers end up between her lower lips, at the tip of her sex.

"This is where I'm most sensitive," she says, then moves my hand lower an inch. "Here is where you can enter me." I don't even think before I'm sliding a finger into her entrance. It's tight and warm and I can feel the ridges from her muscles inside.

My dick pulses in my trunks, and I close my eyes and breath through my nose to pull myself back under control. 

I trail my fingers all over her sex, feeling the curves and grooves. I wish I could see it better. Next time I won't be behind her. I'm going to be between her legs so I can see everything up close and personal.

She's so soft and delicate. And warm. Heat radiates from her core. I want to make her come. I want to see her face again when she comes from my fingers. But I want to continue to explore, too. 

I pull at the sensitive flesh until it's tight and taught from her body. I dip my fingers inside then circle them around her hole. I let the wet digits slide a tiny bit lower, and she twitches and bucks from my touch. 

It's a struggle not to thrust against her.

Even the sounds she's making are addicting. Little gasps and soft sighs and high-pitched whines that make my fingers twirl in tight little circles against her nub at the top of her clit.

I can hear how wet she is between her legs, and every few minutes I suck my fingers back into my mouth. I want to taste her in the morning. I want my spit to coat her sex.

Her hips start to rotate as her hands dig into my arms, and I try to find a rhythm she likes.

I bring my free hand from her breast and grip her thigh to pull her wider and she moans so loud I feel it in my dick. Then I slip my finger into her pussy again. 

"I used a spell," she says softly. So softly I almost don't catch it. "After the Yule Ball. I used a spell so that when I lose my virginity, it won't hurt. Most of the girls did. You can go harder. If you want. Finger me harder."

I fiercely ignore any reference to why she would be worried about her virginity around that time and instead take her at her word. She's right, as usual. I do want to go harder. 

I take the leg I'm holding and spread her even wider, so that her knee is propped up by mine. Next time I do this I'm going to put the vanity mirror in front of us so I can watch.

Hermione whines long and loud and I know she pulled the thought from my mind. Her head drops back onto my shoulder, and I twist her face backwards and up with my hand until her lips and entwined with mine. 

I give up the fight not to rut against her like a dog in heat. 

With two fingers in her quim and two against her clit, I make my wife come on my hand for the first time. 

She clings to me, one arm over her head clutching at my hair. The other digs her nails into my thigh, and the sting only spurs me on more. Her body arches and wriggles, until she's almost sideways in my grasp, my arm supporting her back as I plunge my fingers in and out of her core. 

Her sounds pick up in tandem with my fingers as she reaches a fever pitch. 

I feel the tightening of her muscles, and her pleasure invading my mind a heartbeat before she starts to come. Her entire body quivers as she shatters under my touch. I claim her lips in a kiss, but it's uncoordinated and sloppy. She pants against my face as I lick into her mouth.

Her climax is a thing to behold. 

It seems like it takes forever for her body to stop spasming. Her entire being twitches, her muscles jerk and convulse. If I didn't know any better, I'd be worried she's having a seizure. Except I doubt you can smile as softly as she is, and sigh so delicately if you were in the middle of a medical emergency.

Every time I try to touch her, she smacks my hand away. But eventually soft strokes on her thighs gain me entrance to the valley between her legs again. The mattress beneath us is soaked with her essence. I just want to stare at her, to burn the image into my memory, of how Hermione looks covered in sweat and her own come.

She's beautiful.

"Thank you," she sighs. Then she literally melts in my hands.

Her eyes drift closed as her body relaxes, and I center her in the middle of our bed, pulling the covers up over her shoulders. She doesn't even blink. Her hair is a disaster, so I bundle it up as best I can and twist it into a knot before tucking the ends under her head.

I place a kiss on her forehead, then her throat, and her breathing never hitches from the deep well of peace she's fallen into.

It takes less than thirty seconds in the bathroom before I come all over my own hand.

I'm exhausted, but there's no way I'll be able to sleep yet. So, I grab one of the books from the bedside table that Hermione picked out today and settle onto the bed to read. 

One of the naughty books.

I plan on making it my mission in life to witness Hermione coming undone like that as often as humanly possible.

~**~

It's almost four in the morning before I finally feel like I can sleep. Hermione is tucked in against me, her hair attempting to suffocate me in her sleep.

I drift into unconsciousness asking the same question I've been wondering for hours now.

If we share a soul and if we're destined to walk the earth together, what happens to the other when one of us dies?