Disclaimer: Except for some OCs, the characters here and the world they inhabit are the creation and property of JK Rowling. This chapter takes place within the time line of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Emily arrived home from a long shift and sat down on the sitting room couch to unwind for a few minutes. She took out the letter she had received the morning before from an unknown but well fed owl and re-read it for the fifth or sixth time, committing the phrases and the look of his handwriting to her memory. Suddenly a blond-haired head appeared in the fireplace. Emily cursed in the back of her mind. If she had never seen Narcissa Malfoy again, she would have counted her life well-lived.

“I suppose you want me for something?” said Emily without preamble.

“You need to come to another dinner party tonight. Your husband arrived yesterday evening and they have been meeting ever since, planning something. In about a week they are going to make a major attack and everything may be over after that. I will meet you at the same dressmaker's door in ten minutes.”

“Hold on a minute. I've been working all night and any plan you have needs to include several hours in a bed, preferably with my husband.”

“You would bargain when your husband's life is already at stake?” Even looking through green flames, Narcissa looked perfectly made up, down to the elegantly raised eyebrow.

Utterly defeated, Emily whispered, “No.”

“I'll see you in ten minutes.”

Once again Emily stood in her underwear in the shop as Narcissa looked and chose. “You really have an amazing figure,” said the blond. “All we need to do this time is demonstrate that it's as beautiful as ever and that's not going to be difficult at all.”

“Why have you participated in this pandering?” asked Emily.

Narcissa shrugged. “Before, it was about obtaining power for my son and ensuring the power of my husband. Now it's just a matter of keeping us all alive. You will do what he wants you to do, Emily, if I have to kill your husband and children myself to ensure it.”

The woman looked a little mad, Emily thought. There were other worries as well. “Is he really capable of... you know?”

“If he's still looking for an heir, he will surely know how to bring it about. I'm really not so worried about the mechanics of it, myself. That's your problem.”

Narcissa settled this time upon a midnight blue strapless gown that was cut so low that it allowed a generous view of cleavage. The bodice held itself up by use of a stiff underlining. Emily would be forced to hold her back completely straight the entire evening.

This time she was brought to the library before dinner.

“Ah, Mrs. Snape! You are as lovely as ever! Narcissa has dressed you magnificently yet again.” Emily was grateful for the elbow-length gloves that matched the dress when the person speaking to her lifted her hand to kiss it. She forced herself to look at her companion as he spoke to her and breathed deeply to control her emotions.

“Good evening, Lord.”

“I was so sorry that we missed our tryst after the Potters died, but I was not myself. You wouldn't play along with poor Quirrell, either. I suspect you would have been more than he was capable of dealing with; perhaps that was just as well. Didn't you know it was me?”

“I've never had quite the same reaction to anyone else.”

He chuckled and her skin crawled. “How very gratifying! I think we shall have a quite felicitous union. I'm sure it will be fruitful, as well.”

“I've been unable to conceive for the past two years.”

“So you are not pregnant at this time. That is fortunate. You are soon going to enter into a period of great fecundity, Emily. You will give me an heir and then you and my faithful servant will give me more faithful servants to rule the Wizarding world with me. You owe me Death Eaters.”

“Now, Lord?” Emily was struggling to breathe deeply enough to hold herself together without being obvious or causing her dress to burst.

He walked around her as he had done on their previous meeting. He traced a long white fingertip along her skin just above the edge of her dress as he walked. She had the same sense of arousal and self-hatred that had come upon her at their first meeting. He stopped in front of her, his finger deep within her cleavage, and looked into her eyes.

“Ah, my Ravenclaw eagle, your talons are out tonight but you will soon be a dove, cooing for me. You see a monster before you.” He waved his other hand in front of his face and Emily saw a handsome young man with red eyes. “However, I am still a man and after Harry Potter has been killed, I can perform the last spell that will enable me to become more like my former self. It won't be very long, Emily. Just until the end of the week. We will take him and kill him and then you and I will have our time together.”

The dinner gong sounded and the Dark Lord's usual appearance returned. He brought her into the dining room, leaving her several seats down from his own. From there Emily could feel the red eyes looking her over several times during the meal. As before, Bellatrix Lestrange glared at Emily. Others sitting at the table glanced at her curiously. Severus never took his eyes off of her except when directly addressed by his neighbors. Emily warmed under his gaze and smiled back.

After dinner, the guest of honor came and whispered into her ear. “Just a few more days and we will consummate our partnership, Emily. If by chance I should be unable to come to you, I will send your husband back and you can work on your other debts to me. I intend to collect in every way possible, with interest.” He raised his voice. “Severus, come see your wife off and then join me in the library for a nightcap.”

Severus held Emily's cloak and fastened her into it. He kissed her ardently and then whispered, “You look wonderful but he means to keep us separate until this next plan is completed.”

Emily whispered back, “On that day he means for me to—Severus, suddenly I'm not sure if I can.”

His hands were on either side of her face. “I should kill you myself rather than let him touch you again. But I can't, Emily, too much lies at stake. So much depends on us all playing our part. Will you be all right tonight?”

“Yes. I understand it so much better than the other time. And if you can do what you were forced to do, I can do my part as well. I will be fine except that I will be away from you. I love you.”

“I love you, too, Emily. We both must go.” He kissed her again and saw her out the door.

---

Severus had the nightcap that would keep him away from his wife and listened to the Dark Lord's plans. He understood that they would be kept apart until it was clear whether this next attack would yield the results his master wanted. He didn't need to follow the train of conversation too closely, but it would not do to dwell upon thoughts of his wife, either. Letting the Dark Lord see his resentment would not be a good thing to do.

After a rather long and completely one-sided conversation, Severus was dismissed to his bedroom. He allowed himself to dwell upon the appearance of his wife and the way the satin had clung to her body. He wondered if she had thought of him as she had taken it off that night and whether she was thinking of him now. Perhaps she was writing in her current diary about this evening. He turned to the one she had given him and opened to the next entry, groaning as he did so to find that he had arrived at a date that was firmly fixed in his memory.

21 July, 1979

...I think I literally heard his heart break when I told him Lily would be married in the morning. I held his wand hand for dear life and watched as he very carefully composed himself. He told me there was something he had to do and that's when I took out my wand and told him that I would put him under the Imperius Curse if he tried to leave my side.

He acted so lost and helpless that I held out my arms to him. I finally convinced him to let me hold him and I think it made him feel better. It was as though he were made to fit in my arms, the way he just clung to me and I could reach right around to stroke his hair and rub his back. He looked up at me suspiciously after a while and asked if I were trying to seduce him. I told him it was up to him and that's when he kissed me. Oh, his kisses! I have no idea where I was or what I was doing there, other than having his lips pressed to mine...

...It never occurred to me that it could be like it was. My medical books describe coitus in great detail but only from a clinical standpoint. They describe the problems that can occur instead of what happens when things go so very perfectly. I didn't know, when we started, what exactly I wanted. I just knew I wanted him.

His hands as they undressed me were everything I had thought they would be and more. He caressed me and then his lips followed...

...I looked into his face, then, and saw the young man who had always been my champion, confidante, tutor, and best friend. He would never hurt me. I smiled and he smiled, as ever a bit shyly, back.

...His name slipped from my lips as I sighed with desire. He groaned and I looked into his eyes again. He wanted me. Whoever he may or may not love, I was his deepest desire at that moment. His greatest fear was of hurting me, so he wanted me to decide whether to continue. Arrangements and boyfriends and virtue swirled around my head. Nothing compared to the fact that I wanted this with him right there and then. I nodded my head...

...I didn't know what to make of his actions. He seems as inexperienced as I, and we've never discussed his ever having been with a woman in this way. I can't swear he would have told me, but I don't think he would have hidden it very well. I am sure, from what he said in the park, that he's never kissed anyone before. At the same time there was no fumbling between us like you hear about. It's as if something within us always knew how to make love to each other...

...suddenly my world dissolved into the most intense pleasure I had ever felt. I was moaning and sighing with the surprise and joy of it as he clutched me to himself, kissing my face and murmuring his own delight...

...He held me close and let me touch him. I ran my fingers through his hair and touched the face that in the past hour had become so beautiful to me. I don't know exactly when, but I fell asleep in the arms of my lover.

What followed was a very complete and explicit description of the way they had spent the next day. He smiled as her commentary varied between a clinical view and girlish romance. The way she had written about him was as dear to him as the words themselves.

...we sat down to a very late lunch. We chatted about things and smiled at each other as we watched the afternoon disappear on the clock.

He made love to me one last time, in a way reminiscent of the first, caressing me tenderly. He brought me to the edge of ecstasy and then tipped me over it with him, holding me sweetly and protectively until we were both finished. Looking into his eyes, seeing the tenderness and affection he had for me, knowing how carefully and gently he had treated me since we first disrobed together the night before, I realized that I love him.

I think my tears frightened him. He begged me to tell him what was wrong and how he could fix it, but I could only shake my head and cry more. He's the voice of reason in my head. He's the person who made my most difficult classes make sense. He's the champion who protected me from his own House. Now he's the lover who makes my body respond. There will never be anyone else for me. It's clear that he doesn't want to continue this level of our relationship after this moment. I will never know this with him again, so I won't know it at all. This was my brief sojourn into womanhood and all too soon, this is also farewell...

He could not take any more and set the book down. Her words had reminded him of a day he would never forget. Unfortunately the thought of days, possibly months of separation from her lay between them. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, hoping to ease his desire. In this house, he could request just about anything he wanted for that purpose and it would be brought to him. The one thing he wanted was denied to him, however. He took out a pen and parchment.

My Sweet Emily,

I had forgotten that I ever called you that, and tonight I read about the day I did and how you clung to that appellation because it was the dearest thing I had ever called you. I dropped it because you so quickly became my dear one and later, my love. It does not make you any less sweet to me.

I have arrived at the point in your diary where we first shared passion. I must say that no one looking at the professional Healer Snape would ever guess at the way you have cataloged our intimacies. Few who had known the demure Miss Smith would have guessed you were capable of such intimacies.

You have brought back so many memories of that night and the day following. I should start with the night in our seventh year when you made the bold suggestion that ultimately resulted in our daughter. From that time on, whenever I imagined holding a woman in my arms, she was always you. I still loved Lily desperately at that time, but she was somehow separate from what the Emily in my dreams and I shared. My feelings for Lily were too pure for such earthy passions. I should have realized, then, that I had fixed my affections in the wrong place.

You remarked that it was as if we had always known how to make love to each other. Perhaps it was. I had made love to you in my dreams at least a hundred times. By the time we had ceased to be students I already knew exactly how I wanted to touch you if the moment ever arrived. I suspect that the demure Miss Emily Smith must have cherished similar dreams, since she was quite an able partner? Perhaps the magic we unwittingly invoked eased us over the lack of experience, as well.

I had thought, when I first entered your bedroom, to share the moment you offered and then leave. Having done that, I found that I wanted to stay within your arms for a time. Then I wanted to re-experience our passion and decided that staying the day would not be amiss. By the time I left, the next evening, I was completely involved and the only way to extract myself was to simply leave. I had thought to go back to my usual existence and forget what we had shared. You know how I failed at that.

I cannot get enough of you, Sweet Emily. If only I could have taken you home tonight, I would have brought you to our bedroom and explored you in that gown. Then I would have removed the gown and explored you again. Perhaps your lips would have teased me about my high collar and tie as your fingers teased them open. Would we have come together explosively or slowly? Perhaps over the course of the night we would have done both.

It's uncertain whether we will be together soon or whether it will be some time. Clearly, if all goes as planned on this end, we will be apart for a longer while. We will be back together again sometime and I will wait for it impatiently. I am back to holding you in my dreams, Emily. If it's any comfort or reassurance, know that it's always been you.

Your husband,
Severus

Emily received the letter two days later. They were gone from Malfoy Manor, then. It was not the sort of missive one should read before going to work, but there was no helping that. She went back up to her bedroom and opened a closet door. The blue satin dress had been wadded up and thrown in the back of it the other night. If Severus had liked it, however, it was more precious than that. She laid it out on her bed and summoned a house-elf, asking that it be cleaned and properly stored for a future event.