FICLET: Black Ink (Minerva/Severus)

[crocky-wock.livejournal.com]

Title: Black Ink
Pairing: MM/SS
Rating: PG
Word Count: 837
Summary: Minerva keeps young Severus in detention
Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction set in the Harry Potter universe, all recognisable characters and settings are the property of J. K. Rowling and her associates. No money is made from this work.
Notes: Written for rarepair_shorts. BDSM references. Please don't read if you don't like the thought of teachers being attracted by their underage students.
Link to Prompt Table: here

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2. Black Ink - 4th Year

His fingers are longish and almost white, much like my own. When he looks up, his gaze always lingers on me for a mere fraction of a second before he returns to his work, hurriedly, to finish before ten o'clock, as instructed, before it is time to go to bed for one as young as he is.

I sit in silence, watching him like a hawk from above, perfectly still, fixating on his regular scribbling and his rapid breathing. He tames his emotions for the sake of dignity. He forces calm upon his racing heart to maintain control of his trembling fingers. But he wants to get away, I can smell it – and I shall not permit it.

“How far have you come?”

My voice cuts the silence like a silver knife. Not accidentally – never accidentally – but with the full intention of interrupting his flow, making him sway, stagger, stumble, fall...

“Approaching two-hundred, Professor.”

His voice is small, though steady, and does not betray him, although it is still in the process of changing. He is in full control of his body, if not of his life at present. I close my eyes, as though to consider his situation, giving him a trace of hope that I can crash the next second.

“Good. That's only another one hundred to go. You should be able to back to the dungeons in time for bed.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

He returns to his work and I pick up my Daily Prophet again, watching him over the edge, not taking in a word of Rita Skeeter's fanciful societal storytelling. His nose almost touches the parchment, just as it always has. He bites his lip in concentration, as though writing more than just the same few words over and over again, a steady rhythm of guilt and shame, of punishment and obedience. You are in my hands, young Snape. I can keep you here as long as I wish. For what you have done, you shall be mine in this hour. I will hold and bend – but never break you, like a willow twig, like a rattan cane, so useful when intact...

“It is ten o'clock, Professor...”

“How far have you come, then?”

There is a pause, in which he counts. The tension in the air creeps up my fingertips and sends a shiver down my spine.

“Two-hundred and seventy-eight.”

“Continue then. You have my permission to stay up a little longer for this.”

My permission. Don't you forget it. Thankfulness for that, which deserves no thanks. A slap in the face of him, who is as yet untouchable. Severus Snape, if you were a decade older, I would pounce on you as a real cat might on a mouse, devour you as the snake devours the rodent. I would make you mine, bend you to my will as I do now under the safety blanket of the school rules. Unbelievable that, until very recently, this safety blanket could be ripped apart. I could have engulfed you in endless nightly punishment sessions down in the dungeons, where Filch plays hide-and-seek with his cat these days. I would not have, but I could have. I would have been allowed to touch you in a way the Ministry would never allow a teacher to touch a student otherwise...

“Three hundred, Professor. May I go?”

“Let me see, Mr. Snape. Did you write on both sides of the parchment again? I believe I told you that this was unacceptable.”

I let a moment's icy silence wash over him like the dormitory shower he so shuns. “Go to bed now,” I say eventually, “let you find yourself even less attentive in tomorrow's lesson.”

He leaves the classroom in a hurry while I still peruse the parchment. In recent weeks, I have taken to tearing it up in his presence, to throwing it away there and then, to show him what a waste of his time this was. And for the tiny jolt of pleasure it gives me to see his face remain stoically unchanging, to see his eye flinch just for a fraction of a second. But not today. Today, I scan the black writing line for line, word for word. My glasses hinder more than they help and I take them off to take a closer look at his last few lines.

“Gryffindor house is not a 'waste dump for unambitious, witless, disloyal Hogwarts students'.  Gryffindor house is not a 'waste dump for unambitious, witless, disloyal Hogwarts students'. Gryffindor house is not...”

And suddenly it breaks off. Hardly visible at first, because his writing is miniscule and black and hardly legible in the first place.

“Gryffindor house is your waste dump,” the black ink says at the very bottom of the parchment, looking completely regular and inconspicuous, “and I wish one of your unambitious, witless, disloyal Hogwarts students... could be me.”