Humans Are Creatures Of Habit
Jun. 5th, 2006 11:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
foudebassanRating: NC-17. This is not meant for anyone under 18. In other words, if you are under-aged, you are not to read this. Please go here for more suitable material.
Warnings: Explicit sex, non-con (= rape), BDSM, slavery, and, well, you get the picture. And no, this time it’s not a joke.
Pairing: HG/SS
4700 words
Humans Are Creatures Of Habit
1. Collared
Humans are creatures of habit.
Severus repeated the sentence to himself. Coherent sentences made for a coherent mind, and losing his mind was not something he could afford, not now, not in the present circumstances.
He glanced around at his cell-mates. They had obviously not followed the harsh mental discipline he subjected himself to: Rabastan was staring at the opposite wall with empty eyes, and, as for Lucius – well, Lucius was nothing more than a glistening puddle of human flesh and fluids. Azkhaban, escape and renewed imprisonment had not done him any good, much to the contrary. He did nothing but stutter broken sentences from time to time, his topsy-turvy phrases illustrating their present conditions to the perfection.
Voldemort had been vanquished some time before – Severus couldn’t recall when precisely. Night and day were alike in the hole they had been thrown in, and time had lost all significance long ago. Most Death Eaters had been killed in the final confrontation; himself and his two cellmates owed their life to some particular strike of luck – they had only been wounded, and not Avada’ed like most of their brothers-in-arms.
Being alive, however, did not mean that they were to be envied. On the contrary, Severus often wished he had met the wrong end of a curse that day – he would be free of this obscurity, free of this pervading filth and stench. Free from the shackles that bound his arms to the wall behind him. Free from this staunch survival instinct that forced him to live on and on; to ignore his own excrements piling under him in-between each negligent cleaning spell; to bow down to the plate wards brought them periodically; to force his mind to coherent thoughts, even in this hell.
But, as things went, this was not the case. He was alive, his body subdued, but his mind in working order. And so it should be, for the present – he lived in the instant only, afraid of projecting himself in an unknown and menacing future, unwilling to dwell on the past mistakes that had brought him to his present situation.
It didn’t prevent him from wondering whether other Death Eaters had survived. Maybe this cell was for Inner Circle members only? Did their guards even know about the Inner Cercle? How many other cells were there? Were there any other cells?
Another question he could not banish from his thoughts altogether was their immediate future. They had been here long, too long for a summary execution to be decreed. Were they awaiting trial? If so, why was it taking so long?
He shifted against the wall. The shackles were most uncomfortable – one could not recline against the wall, one’s hands were in the way, nor lie down completely, as the chains were too short.
Perhaps they had already been judged? Maybe this was their punishment for having followed the Dark Lord – sitting in their own shit for the rest of their lives.
There it was again, his thoughts had wandered towards the future again – a dangerous direction.
He should remain focused on the present moment. Think. Use his mind.
For instance… the different uses of Boomslang Skin. Yes, he would recite them exhaustively. And then, perhaps, allow himself some sleep, for a short time. After that – no, after that was in the future, and future was forbidden territory.
So – Boomslang Skin. First,…
*
* *
He was awoken before he had planned to, by unusual noises outside the cell.
Rabastan grunted. He too must have noticed that the guards were not in the habit to talk to each other like they did right now.
And they normally arrived by pairs. Whereas he could hear another voice – a female voice. A somewhat familiar female voice –
“Are you really sure about that, Miss?”
“That’s Undersecretary Granger to you, Sir. And yes, I am quite intent on carrying on the Minister’s direct orders.”
Miss Granger? Severus’ breath hitched. What could this possibly mean? She could not be the executioner, only Purebloods were allowed in that profession. And orders from the Minister? Was Scrimgeour still Minister?
The cell door opened, and, as usual, both he and Rabastan blinked at the light of the guards’ torches. Only Lucius did not move – he seldom moved any more, even to be fed, and seemed content with remaining prone on the floor all the time.
Before he had a chance to speak or think, the chain that attached his wrist shackles to the wall had been removed. The silent guard then heaved him to his feet and half-supported, half-dragged him to the cell door.
The pain in his legs came close to being unbearable. Just standing up was agony after having remained crouched on the floor for so long – walking was torture. The trip from the cell door to the prison’s closely warded apparation point seemed longer to him than any length of walking he had ever done before. Before long, each of the two guards had seized him under the arms and forcefully led him.
“We shall apparate directly back” Granger indicated to the first guard once they had reached the hall. “All I need is to have him properly shackled before we go.”
The guard muttered something in response before fetching what resembled a large metal loop.
“Wait a minute – he needs to be cleaned” she added.
Severus shivered as a strong cleaning charm swelled over him, soon followed by a disinfecting charm. The ward then came closer, and the steel collar’s cold embrace wrapped itself around his neck with a sinister click.
He swallowed – his Adam’s apple brushed against the collar. The feeling was alien, and uncomfortable; yet a dark premonition warned him that he would be getting used to it soon.
Humans are after all creatures of habit.
2. Chained
His room was not small. Comfortable – no; but it was large. The space did not make him feel any less caged, though – maybe because he shared it with various torture instruments.
It was right under the roof – the ceiling was vaulted on each side, and the main wooden beam went all the way from wall to wall.
His collar was currently tied up to that beam, and his hands in his back.
Granger had been kind to him this morning – she had left him facing the window. Looking all the way down, he could see a patch of green grass, outside. Not that he was ever led outside – but having a chance to peer at it was better than nothing. The window faced eastwards, and he had had sun earlier. Great rays of warming sun – when you standing up naked in a cool room, sun was very enjoyable indeed.
She was seldom nice to him, and always had an ulterior motive. This time, maybe she had hoped that the receding sun would leave him colder than he would be had he not felt its warmth in the first place. Or maybe she held something truly dreadful in store for him this evening.
All things considered, the latter was probably true – but that was the future, and future was forbidden territory. The rules had not changed with the prison swap. Nothing had changed with the prison swap, except that the guards hoped he would die over there, if the food they had been given was any indication, whereas Granger made sure he would not succumb to this treatment.
For instance, he knew that if he tried to hang himself by bending his knees, the spell she had placed on him before she left would prevent him from doing so. And give him a good measure of pain to boot, just to enforce the point. No, the current torture was merely to stay upright and immobile all day. What his fate would be this evening he didn’t know yet.
He looked around the room for the sake of thinking of something else, of anything else.
On the right, the narrow bed he was sometimes allowed to sleep in. With shackles on each end. Just to make sure that he made no dreams of freedom.
On the left, the torture rack. She had made sure that he could see it from wherever he stood in the room – his room, as he just as well might call it, since it had become very clear that he would never be allowed out of it. She didn’t even need to use that instrument often – she knew very well that his imagination replayed every scene from the past, and invented new ones all the time, despites his best efforts to discipline his mind to avoid just that.
Behind him, the door to the narrow bathroom, and the wall she hung most of her instruments on. She did own a great many – funny that, when he came to think of it. She must have started this collection quite early in life to have gathered so many different whips and chains by now. Who would have thought that the Gryffindor Head Girl… ah, well, it was always those you suspected the least.
Any hope he might have entertained regarding the possible mercy Granger might have for him had been crushed early on, and crushed with disarming intensity.
Hope is overrated anyway – it only makes disappointment stronger when deceived.
Why was she so focused on tormenting him, of all people? Surely she could find other men ready to partake in the kind of games she enjoyed. Maybe he would learn it someday – she sometimes let something slip by during orgasm. It would dreadfully predictable, something to do with his having killed Dumbledore, no doubt. Or maybe with that business with Potter a few years after his departure from Hogwarts. Gryffindors could be perverts, but they were nonetheless disgustingly easy to read through.
She did treat him humanely – as far as making sure he would not die on her went. He was well fed, given enough time to sleep, led to the bathroom when he needed it, and even the temperature was bearable for his ever naked body.
Other than that, she made sure he was painfully aware of his state. Pain could be mental or physical, but she seemed to derive endless pleasure of applying both at the same time. Hitting him, and telling him he deserved it. Whipping him, and making him tell her that he deserved it. And they both knew well that he did deserve the harshest of punishments, on more levels than one – he had after all perpetrated more than one abomination himself.
He was almost tempted to bend his knees sharply, in one big kick. Maybe he could break his spine is one swift go? But no, the spell was sure to prevent even that. And it would ensure he had hell to pay after any attempt.
No, he was there to wait. To wait until every single muscle of his body ached – to wait until the chill penetrated his naked body to the bone – to wait until he couldn’t dispel the images of what would happen to him afterwards from his head.
He had never been patient before. It was amazing how one could get used to a new context, though. But humans are creatures of habit.
*
* *
He heard her come back long before she showed herself. The stairs creaked, the door moaned as it was pushed open – no locks were needed, as he was always shackled to some piece of the furniture, or to the wall, or to the ceiling, as was presently the case.
Then, she stood behind him. He could hear her breaths, long, even breaths, that only made the pain in his stiff muscles sharper – the last part of the waiting were always the hardest. She knew that, and she enjoyed every minute of it. Which is what made is last so long – which is why he hated it so much.
Granger finally walked around to face him. She was not wearing the Ministry robes she had in the morning – she must have taken her time to change to this loose kimono.
He felt like a pet – she fed him in the morning, then tied him up until she saw fit to come back to him. When she finally did come back, she toyed with him, allowed him to relieve himself at last, before playing with him – and tying him up for the night.
Except that pets weren’t made to talk to they jailers.
“Did you have a nice day?” she asked.
He didn’t have any choice of an answer. The script had been written long before he had even entered this room, and he had been made to learn it – painfully, of course.
“Yes, Mistress. Thank you for letting me face the window.”
“Facing the window was kind of me… Do you think I was justified in doing so?”
“No, Mistress. I do not deserve it.”
She grinned. He could swear her grins made her look even more like a madwoman.
“What should I do with you, then?”
That was the tricky part. The script there was blank, for him to fill it in with something different each time. It had to respect the spirit of the general play, of course – he would not dare suggest anything other than more abuse. The few times he had tried, it had been forcefully beaten out of him. No, the fine line here was between asking for too lenient a punishment – which would earn him extra attention – and suggesting more than what she had initially intended for him. And she had something in mind indeed – she always had.
She was after all the kind of student who always came in class well-prepared, textbook learned by heart, homework done. Meticulousness was so easy to transpose outside from the classroom.
“I might deserve a whipping, Mistress.”
Wrong answer. He could see it on her face. Gryffindors could never hide their glee.
“And a caning.” He added rashly.
Wrong move again. He knew it before he had even finished the sentence. Damn her! Why couldn’t she tell him outright what she wanted to do to him?
“A whipping – and a caning – you shall most certainly get, my dear. But that is not quite sufficient.”
She walked around him again, and whispered just above his shoulder –
“And you know that, don’t you?”
The fine hair of his neck stood up, and a shiver went all the way down to his feet. It must be the chill of the evening...
He guessed more than he felt the swish of air in his back – and fell onto his face. His collar had been release from the ceiling chain, he fell forwards, and his bound hands were of no help to him.
She grabbed the collar and pulled up. He chocked, kicked, and somehow managed it to his knees.
“Do you have a request?”
The script again. Fine.
“I would need the bathroom, Mistress.”
His bladder had been aching since noon.
“Would you indeed. Well, you shall have it – you need to clean up your arse as well.”
He flinched. Sodomy was not unusual, but not frequent either.
And, needless to say, he hated it.
This did not prevent him from following her to the bathroom without the slightest resistance – not that resistance was allowed, anyway. Relieving one’s bladder was nice. Getting one’s arse “cleaned up”, and Granger so neatly put it, was not.
But crouching back to the room on one’s knees was still less.
“The large whip.”
The script, again. She loved to make him fetch the implements that would be used of him during the evening. Well, she was right, in a way – his knees ached, and the dark anticipation twisted awkwardly in his stomach. The tension had built up during the day, but it was a lot more intense when he was made to face it directly.
“The short cane.”
Another trip, on his knees, to the wall where everything was kept.
“And the box with butt plugs.”
He hated her even more for her knowledge of what frightened him most.
“ Stand up and bend over.”
The table was hard under his bare chest and face. She insisted on that contact, though – it made his arse stand up higher.
He closed his eyes – at this stage, it was permitted, or at least tolerated, and he needed the isolation.
She caressed his buttocks with an owner’s touch, almost tenderly – and, without transition, the first stroke landed. He bit down a yelp, and instinctively clenched his muscles. Which made the second stroke more painful.
He forced himself to relax, but the pain increased with each renewed contact between the old cane and his naked bottom. Soon he had to concentrate not to moan out; she felt his inner tension, and somehow swung her favourite implement with even more vigour.
As usual, she did not stop until he did moan out.
Then, the caress came back. Each cheek was pressed and softly kneaded; a hand crept up to his chest, lifted him slightly up, and circled around his left nipple, teasing ever so gently. The other hand remained on his buttocks, and then returned with lubricant, only to plunge into his now very clean arse, with no warning. She must find it amusing to see how he squirmed at the unwelcome contact and penetration.
She never let him see the butt plugs; she sensed how the unseen frightened him, how the potential of a blind stretching and filling was superior to the sight of the actual instrument.
“Now tell me what I should do.”
Why did she insist on asking the question – the answer she wanted was bleeding obvious. But then, it always hurt him again to say it, so she must derive renewed pleasure from extracting a response from him.
“Please whip me. Mistress.”
“And why should I do that?”
“Because I deserve it. This, and much more.”
She seemed content with that – the first blow fell on his still sore, bare bottom. This time, he couldn’t stop from crying out. She went on and on, in what seemed like forever – the cracking of the whip brought down, the sound of its hitting flesh, and then the sharp pain that flared and invaded his whole body, until he was no more than a throbbing mass of hurt and fire. Each blow made him clench painfully around the plug, and the whip occasionally fell on the plug itself, pushing it further still inside his unwilling body.
It took him a while to notice it had stopped, and then the cool sensation of her hand on his buttock dampened the pain. She kneaded and caressed, and the fire turned to glowing warmth as the pain receded.
The hand came back with salve – he could smell the Ashwinder. She wasn’t that imaginative, was she, that particular salve she used almost every night.
The fingers crept around his hip, seizing the flaccid penis and stroking, again and again.
Long enough for the aphrodisiac to take effect. She never stopped before he was fully erect, ready to pleasure her.
Before he could grow to enjoy the relief from pain, the hand on his genitals, the soothing effect of the balm on his bottom, she yanked up him, and towards the bed. He was then chained again, the arms above his head, legs slightly apart, the butt plug trapped between his body and the mattress.
He couldn’t help but watch as she disrobed. The gown was unbuttoned, thrown back her shoulders, revealing a large expanse of white flesh. The previous exertion had coated her face and chest in sweat, and she was breathing heavily, her breasts straining upwards with every intake of air.
She would be very beautiful indeed if she wasn’t a sadistic pervert, and a Gryffindor one to boot.
Their eyes locked in a silent contest as she straddled him in one swift move. She clutched his chest and started to shift her hips up and down, staring at him with a dark, intense concentration.
He closed his eyes – he always lost that game.
Her cunt pressed around him as she quickened her moves. He couldn’t help but feel the growing arousal within himself as well – it was like being trapped in a tunnel, a long black tunnel that engulfed him and brought him to some unknown, feared destination. Life before the tunnel lost all signification as his penis seemed to concentrate all the blood of his body; life after the tunnel was something he subconsciously refused to face. Nothing mattered but the soft thighs clutching his, the hands shoving against his chest, and, above all, the warm spiralling gulf above him.
Above him, she was moving quicker, harder – each time she pressed back down against him, the plug inside him grazed at a tender spot – and then she shuddered, and the tunnel abruptly crashed, as the warmth was removed from him and left him alone and bereft, surrounded only by the pregnant smell of sex, by her body odours.
“You don’t get to come today. Perhaps tomorrow, if you’re a good boy.”
Her expression was guarded as she took one last glace at him, before she secured his bindings with a flick of her wand and bended to pick up her discarded robe – and then she was gone.
The chains felt heavy against his wrists and ankles. His erection was uncomfortable, but there was no shifting position. He was stuck there until morning, until she arrived to torment him again.
His anus clenched uncomfortably around the implement.
*
* *
He couldn’t tell when exactly hope had abandoned him. It didn’t matter either way – he was not allowed to die, was not allowed to enjoy life. Hope would only have represented a passing lure, a momentary elevation of spirits, all that was needed to be even more disappointed when life went on as it always did.
He didn’t need hope.
He didn’t even want to hope for a quicker death.
Hope is vastly overrated.
3. Freed
Humans are creatures of habit.
Severus repeated the sentence to himself. Coherent sentences made for a coherent mind, and a coherent mind was a gateway to a wide world of imagination – a world untainted by the chains that bound his earthly body. Imagination might be the household’s madwoman, but madness just might be the only escape route left to people like him.
Having his wand taken away from him had been like having a part of himself severed off.
Wearing a collar around his neck, having no saying on what happened to his own body – good or bad, torture or orgasm, or both – was like being separated from his own body. Even his speech didn’t belong to him any more.
But his mind was his. Several barriers of Occlumency shielded him from the outside world, and no one, no one would ever be able to enter. Not even the Dark Lord, and no one alive could even compare with his Legilimency abilities.
He tried devising new potions in his head. The principle was simple enough – the properties of each and every ingredient were well documented, he had read them all in his time as a Potions Master, and reciting them came as a second nature to him. All he needed was an imaginary cauldron in his head, and he could add ingredients to his will, pondering on how they would react to each other.
Reality was more complicated. Ingredients had very different reactions when paired to other ingredients, depending on the other elements, how the interacted with each other and with the first element. All these interactions became a lot to ponder, especially when there were more than, say, twenty of thirty of them, and when some were volatile.
He enjoyed devising imaginary potions with volatile ingredients. All the interesting potions had volatile ingredients in them, after all.
And being whipped raw did not matter much any more when you were trying to counteract the effect of dragon’s blood on an ameliorated Draft of the Living Dead – a draft that would act more quickly, of course.
People should be allowed to die sooner rather later.
All this thinking didn’t please his Mistress. She often grew quite infuriated with him, and whipped harder. It only ended when he lost consciousness – then she would heal him and let him come back to his senses on his own bed.
Severus didn’t like losing consciousness in the middle of a whipping. Upon waking again, he found it most difficult to pick up his imaginary experiment at the exact point where he had left it. It was most inconvenient – the plotted variations to the Elixir of Venoms suffered no less than four such interruptions, and the final result still was most disappointing to him.
He had shelved the potion in one of his mental storage rooms – he would come back to it later.
For he had time, all the time in the world. Days were long, long enough for at least forty ingredients – he kept a meticulous count.
Nights were less structured. He always dreamt, always dreamt of potions during the night. He went on mixing and adding in his imaginary laboratory, with less method, less organisation, and less conclusive results.
It didn’t matter – most strokes of genius occurred in disorganisation, so working on in his dreams was definitely not a problem.
*
* *
Hermione must have noticed what he was up to by now. He knew she knew it, and it would only be a matter of time before she gave him paper and pencil and demand that he jot all his ideas down.
He wouldn’t comply, of course. She could make him cry and scream, ejaculate and beg forgiveness for his past crimes, but his mind was his own.
A coherent mind – and it was barred to her, barred forever. He chuckled.
In another world, in another time, before his captivity, he would have noticed the demented tones his chuckle had adopted.
But now, he did not notice anything – he had by then grown used to his own madness, and to the increasing signs of lunacy that pervaded his thoughts and gestures.
Humans, he knew all too well, are creatures of habit.
A/N.
“La folle du logis” (the household madwoman) is a phrase by Saint Theresa of Avila, and refers to imagination.
Turning mad from elaborating complex patterns in one’s head during captivity is a theme explored by Stefan Zweig in the “Chess Novella” (Schachnovelle).
Captivity seen as a means to free the mind, to enlighten the soul, is a major theme of Camus’ “The Stranger” (L’Etranger).
Severus and Hermione, needless to say, belong to JK Rowling, who would most certainly not caution this story. Fanfiction also means the re-telling of the same plot over and over again, but I feel compelled to mention the story “Wrapped Around Her Little Finger”, by JadeOrchid, which has provided me with enough inspiration to border on plagiarism – even though I do hope I have not crossed that peculiar line.
All language mistakes are mine and mine alone.
If, on the other hand, you have objections to the plot – I know it’s all wrong, no need to flame me. But please consider that a) this is fanfiction, ie, not reality, not even proper fiction, and therefore twice as remote from anything resembling reality and b) try to picture Severus as the abuser and Hermione as the victim… doesn’t that remind you of something? Of a nice big portion of Ashwinder, perhaps? The only difference, apart from reactions to gender roles, is that here, Hermione has the “excuse” of being on the right side…
Warnings: Explicit sex, non-con (= rape), BDSM, slavery, and, well, you get the picture. And no, this time it’s not a joke.
Pairing: HG/SS
4700 words
1. Collared
Humans are creatures of habit.
Severus repeated the sentence to himself. Coherent sentences made for a coherent mind, and losing his mind was not something he could afford, not now, not in the present circumstances.
He glanced around at his cell-mates. They had obviously not followed the harsh mental discipline he subjected himself to: Rabastan was staring at the opposite wall with empty eyes, and, as for Lucius – well, Lucius was nothing more than a glistening puddle of human flesh and fluids. Azkhaban, escape and renewed imprisonment had not done him any good, much to the contrary. He did nothing but stutter broken sentences from time to time, his topsy-turvy phrases illustrating their present conditions to the perfection.
Voldemort had been vanquished some time before – Severus couldn’t recall when precisely. Night and day were alike in the hole they had been thrown in, and time had lost all significance long ago. Most Death Eaters had been killed in the final confrontation; himself and his two cellmates owed their life to some particular strike of luck – they had only been wounded, and not Avada’ed like most of their brothers-in-arms.
Being alive, however, did not mean that they were to be envied. On the contrary, Severus often wished he had met the wrong end of a curse that day – he would be free of this obscurity, free of this pervading filth and stench. Free from the shackles that bound his arms to the wall behind him. Free from this staunch survival instinct that forced him to live on and on; to ignore his own excrements piling under him in-between each negligent cleaning spell; to bow down to the plate wards brought them periodically; to force his mind to coherent thoughts, even in this hell.
But, as things went, this was not the case. He was alive, his body subdued, but his mind in working order. And so it should be, for the present – he lived in the instant only, afraid of projecting himself in an unknown and menacing future, unwilling to dwell on the past mistakes that had brought him to his present situation.
It didn’t prevent him from wondering whether other Death Eaters had survived. Maybe this cell was for Inner Circle members only? Did their guards even know about the Inner Cercle? How many other cells were there? Were there any other cells?
Another question he could not banish from his thoughts altogether was their immediate future. They had been here long, too long for a summary execution to be decreed. Were they awaiting trial? If so, why was it taking so long?
He shifted against the wall. The shackles were most uncomfortable – one could not recline against the wall, one’s hands were in the way, nor lie down completely, as the chains were too short.
Perhaps they had already been judged? Maybe this was their punishment for having followed the Dark Lord – sitting in their own shit for the rest of their lives.
There it was again, his thoughts had wandered towards the future again – a dangerous direction.
He should remain focused on the present moment. Think. Use his mind.
For instance… the different uses of Boomslang Skin. Yes, he would recite them exhaustively. And then, perhaps, allow himself some sleep, for a short time. After that – no, after that was in the future, and future was forbidden territory.
So – Boomslang Skin. First,…
* *
He was awoken before he had planned to, by unusual noises outside the cell.
Rabastan grunted. He too must have noticed that the guards were not in the habit to talk to each other like they did right now.
And they normally arrived by pairs. Whereas he could hear another voice – a female voice. A somewhat familiar female voice –
“Are you really sure about that, Miss?”
“That’s Undersecretary Granger to you, Sir. And yes, I am quite intent on carrying on the Minister’s direct orders.”
Miss Granger? Severus’ breath hitched. What could this possibly mean? She could not be the executioner, only Purebloods were allowed in that profession. And orders from the Minister? Was Scrimgeour still Minister?
The cell door opened, and, as usual, both he and Rabastan blinked at the light of the guards’ torches. Only Lucius did not move – he seldom moved any more, even to be fed, and seemed content with remaining prone on the floor all the time.
Before he had a chance to speak or think, the chain that attached his wrist shackles to the wall had been removed. The silent guard then heaved him to his feet and half-supported, half-dragged him to the cell door.
The pain in his legs came close to being unbearable. Just standing up was agony after having remained crouched on the floor for so long – walking was torture. The trip from the cell door to the prison’s closely warded apparation point seemed longer to him than any length of walking he had ever done before. Before long, each of the two guards had seized him under the arms and forcefully led him.
“We shall apparate directly back” Granger indicated to the first guard once they had reached the hall. “All I need is to have him properly shackled before we go.”
The guard muttered something in response before fetching what resembled a large metal loop.
“Wait a minute – he needs to be cleaned” she added.
Severus shivered as a strong cleaning charm swelled over him, soon followed by a disinfecting charm. The ward then came closer, and the steel collar’s cold embrace wrapped itself around his neck with a sinister click.
He swallowed – his Adam’s apple brushed against the collar. The feeling was alien, and uncomfortable; yet a dark premonition warned him that he would be getting used to it soon.
Humans are after all creatures of habit.
2. Chained
His room was not small. Comfortable – no; but it was large. The space did not make him feel any less caged, though – maybe because he shared it with various torture instruments.
It was right under the roof – the ceiling was vaulted on each side, and the main wooden beam went all the way from wall to wall.
His collar was currently tied up to that beam, and his hands in his back.
Granger had been kind to him this morning – she had left him facing the window. Looking all the way down, he could see a patch of green grass, outside. Not that he was ever led outside – but having a chance to peer at it was better than nothing. The window faced eastwards, and he had had sun earlier. Great rays of warming sun – when you standing up naked in a cool room, sun was very enjoyable indeed.
She was seldom nice to him, and always had an ulterior motive. This time, maybe she had hoped that the receding sun would leave him colder than he would be had he not felt its warmth in the first place. Or maybe she held something truly dreadful in store for him this evening.
All things considered, the latter was probably true – but that was the future, and future was forbidden territory. The rules had not changed with the prison swap. Nothing had changed with the prison swap, except that the guards hoped he would die over there, if the food they had been given was any indication, whereas Granger made sure he would not succumb to this treatment.
For instance, he knew that if he tried to hang himself by bending his knees, the spell she had placed on him before she left would prevent him from doing so. And give him a good measure of pain to boot, just to enforce the point. No, the current torture was merely to stay upright and immobile all day. What his fate would be this evening he didn’t know yet.
He looked around the room for the sake of thinking of something else, of anything else.
On the right, the narrow bed he was sometimes allowed to sleep in. With shackles on each end. Just to make sure that he made no dreams of freedom.
On the left, the torture rack. She had made sure that he could see it from wherever he stood in the room – his room, as he just as well might call it, since it had become very clear that he would never be allowed out of it. She didn’t even need to use that instrument often – she knew very well that his imagination replayed every scene from the past, and invented new ones all the time, despites his best efforts to discipline his mind to avoid just that.
Behind him, the door to the narrow bathroom, and the wall she hung most of her instruments on. She did own a great many – funny that, when he came to think of it. She must have started this collection quite early in life to have gathered so many different whips and chains by now. Who would have thought that the Gryffindor Head Girl… ah, well, it was always those you suspected the least.
Any hope he might have entertained regarding the possible mercy Granger might have for him had been crushed early on, and crushed with disarming intensity.
Hope is overrated anyway – it only makes disappointment stronger when deceived.
Why was she so focused on tormenting him, of all people? Surely she could find other men ready to partake in the kind of games she enjoyed. Maybe he would learn it someday – she sometimes let something slip by during orgasm. It would dreadfully predictable, something to do with his having killed Dumbledore, no doubt. Or maybe with that business with Potter a few years after his departure from Hogwarts. Gryffindors could be perverts, but they were nonetheless disgustingly easy to read through.
She did treat him humanely – as far as making sure he would not die on her went. He was well fed, given enough time to sleep, led to the bathroom when he needed it, and even the temperature was bearable for his ever naked body.
Other than that, she made sure he was painfully aware of his state. Pain could be mental or physical, but she seemed to derive endless pleasure of applying both at the same time. Hitting him, and telling him he deserved it. Whipping him, and making him tell her that he deserved it. And they both knew well that he did deserve the harshest of punishments, on more levels than one – he had after all perpetrated more than one abomination himself.
He was almost tempted to bend his knees sharply, in one big kick. Maybe he could break his spine is one swift go? But no, the spell was sure to prevent even that. And it would ensure he had hell to pay after any attempt.
No, he was there to wait. To wait until every single muscle of his body ached – to wait until the chill penetrated his naked body to the bone – to wait until he couldn’t dispel the images of what would happen to him afterwards from his head.
He had never been patient before. It was amazing how one could get used to a new context, though. But humans are creatures of habit.
* *
He heard her come back long before she showed herself. The stairs creaked, the door moaned as it was pushed open – no locks were needed, as he was always shackled to some piece of the furniture, or to the wall, or to the ceiling, as was presently the case.
Then, she stood behind him. He could hear her breaths, long, even breaths, that only made the pain in his stiff muscles sharper – the last part of the waiting were always the hardest. She knew that, and she enjoyed every minute of it. Which is what made is last so long – which is why he hated it so much.
Granger finally walked around to face him. She was not wearing the Ministry robes she had in the morning – she must have taken her time to change to this loose kimono.
He felt like a pet – she fed him in the morning, then tied him up until she saw fit to come back to him. When she finally did come back, she toyed with him, allowed him to relieve himself at last, before playing with him – and tying him up for the night.
Except that pets weren’t made to talk to they jailers.
“Did you have a nice day?” she asked.
He didn’t have any choice of an answer. The script had been written long before he had even entered this room, and he had been made to learn it – painfully, of course.
“Yes, Mistress. Thank you for letting me face the window.”
“Facing the window was kind of me… Do you think I was justified in doing so?”
“No, Mistress. I do not deserve it.”
She grinned. He could swear her grins made her look even more like a madwoman.
“What should I do with you, then?”
That was the tricky part. The script there was blank, for him to fill it in with something different each time. It had to respect the spirit of the general play, of course – he would not dare suggest anything other than more abuse. The few times he had tried, it had been forcefully beaten out of him. No, the fine line here was between asking for too lenient a punishment – which would earn him extra attention – and suggesting more than what she had initially intended for him. And she had something in mind indeed – she always had.
She was after all the kind of student who always came in class well-prepared, textbook learned by heart, homework done. Meticulousness was so easy to transpose outside from the classroom.
“I might deserve a whipping, Mistress.”
Wrong answer. He could see it on her face. Gryffindors could never hide their glee.
“And a caning.” He added rashly.
Wrong move again. He knew it before he had even finished the sentence. Damn her! Why couldn’t she tell him outright what she wanted to do to him?
“A whipping – and a caning – you shall most certainly get, my dear. But that is not quite sufficient.”
She walked around him again, and whispered just above his shoulder –
“And you know that, don’t you?”
The fine hair of his neck stood up, and a shiver went all the way down to his feet. It must be the chill of the evening...
He guessed more than he felt the swish of air in his back – and fell onto his face. His collar had been release from the ceiling chain, he fell forwards, and his bound hands were of no help to him.
She grabbed the collar and pulled up. He chocked, kicked, and somehow managed it to his knees.
“Do you have a request?”
The script again. Fine.
“I would need the bathroom, Mistress.”
His bladder had been aching since noon.
“Would you indeed. Well, you shall have it – you need to clean up your arse as well.”
He flinched. Sodomy was not unusual, but not frequent either.
And, needless to say, he hated it.
This did not prevent him from following her to the bathroom without the slightest resistance – not that resistance was allowed, anyway. Relieving one’s bladder was nice. Getting one’s arse “cleaned up”, and Granger so neatly put it, was not.
But crouching back to the room on one’s knees was still less.
“The large whip.”
The script, again. She loved to make him fetch the implements that would be used of him during the evening. Well, she was right, in a way – his knees ached, and the dark anticipation twisted awkwardly in his stomach. The tension had built up during the day, but it was a lot more intense when he was made to face it directly.
“The short cane.”
Another trip, on his knees, to the wall where everything was kept.
“And the box with butt plugs.”
He hated her even more for her knowledge of what frightened him most.
“ Stand up and bend over.”
The table was hard under his bare chest and face. She insisted on that contact, though – it made his arse stand up higher.
He closed his eyes – at this stage, it was permitted, or at least tolerated, and he needed the isolation.
She caressed his buttocks with an owner’s touch, almost tenderly – and, without transition, the first stroke landed. He bit down a yelp, and instinctively clenched his muscles. Which made the second stroke more painful.
He forced himself to relax, but the pain increased with each renewed contact between the old cane and his naked bottom. Soon he had to concentrate not to moan out; she felt his inner tension, and somehow swung her favourite implement with even more vigour.
As usual, she did not stop until he did moan out.
Then, the caress came back. Each cheek was pressed and softly kneaded; a hand crept up to his chest, lifted him slightly up, and circled around his left nipple, teasing ever so gently. The other hand remained on his buttocks, and then returned with lubricant, only to plunge into his now very clean arse, with no warning. She must find it amusing to see how he squirmed at the unwelcome contact and penetration.
She never let him see the butt plugs; she sensed how the unseen frightened him, how the potential of a blind stretching and filling was superior to the sight of the actual instrument.
“Now tell me what I should do.”
Why did she insist on asking the question – the answer she wanted was bleeding obvious. But then, it always hurt him again to say it, so she must derive renewed pleasure from extracting a response from him.
“Please whip me. Mistress.”
“And why should I do that?”
“Because I deserve it. This, and much more.”
She seemed content with that – the first blow fell on his still sore, bare bottom. This time, he couldn’t stop from crying out. She went on and on, in what seemed like forever – the cracking of the whip brought down, the sound of its hitting flesh, and then the sharp pain that flared and invaded his whole body, until he was no more than a throbbing mass of hurt and fire. Each blow made him clench painfully around the plug, and the whip occasionally fell on the plug itself, pushing it further still inside his unwilling body.
It took him a while to notice it had stopped, and then the cool sensation of her hand on his buttock dampened the pain. She kneaded and caressed, and the fire turned to glowing warmth as the pain receded.
The hand came back with salve – he could smell the Ashwinder. She wasn’t that imaginative, was she, that particular salve she used almost every night.
The fingers crept around his hip, seizing the flaccid penis and stroking, again and again.
Long enough for the aphrodisiac to take effect. She never stopped before he was fully erect, ready to pleasure her.
Before he could grow to enjoy the relief from pain, the hand on his genitals, the soothing effect of the balm on his bottom, she yanked up him, and towards the bed. He was then chained again, the arms above his head, legs slightly apart, the butt plug trapped between his body and the mattress.
He couldn’t help but watch as she disrobed. The gown was unbuttoned, thrown back her shoulders, revealing a large expanse of white flesh. The previous exertion had coated her face and chest in sweat, and she was breathing heavily, her breasts straining upwards with every intake of air.
She would be very beautiful indeed if she wasn’t a sadistic pervert, and a Gryffindor one to boot.
Their eyes locked in a silent contest as she straddled him in one swift move. She clutched his chest and started to shift her hips up and down, staring at him with a dark, intense concentration.
He closed his eyes – he always lost that game.
Her cunt pressed around him as she quickened her moves. He couldn’t help but feel the growing arousal within himself as well – it was like being trapped in a tunnel, a long black tunnel that engulfed him and brought him to some unknown, feared destination. Life before the tunnel lost all signification as his penis seemed to concentrate all the blood of his body; life after the tunnel was something he subconsciously refused to face. Nothing mattered but the soft thighs clutching his, the hands shoving against his chest, and, above all, the warm spiralling gulf above him.
Above him, she was moving quicker, harder – each time she pressed back down against him, the plug inside him grazed at a tender spot – and then she shuddered, and the tunnel abruptly crashed, as the warmth was removed from him and left him alone and bereft, surrounded only by the pregnant smell of sex, by her body odours.
“You don’t get to come today. Perhaps tomorrow, if you’re a good boy.”
Her expression was guarded as she took one last glace at him, before she secured his bindings with a flick of her wand and bended to pick up her discarded robe – and then she was gone.
The chains felt heavy against his wrists and ankles. His erection was uncomfortable, but there was no shifting position. He was stuck there until morning, until she arrived to torment him again.
His anus clenched uncomfortably around the implement.
* *
He couldn’t tell when exactly hope had abandoned him. It didn’t matter either way – he was not allowed to die, was not allowed to enjoy life. Hope would only have represented a passing lure, a momentary elevation of spirits, all that was needed to be even more disappointed when life went on as it always did.
He didn’t need hope.
He didn’t even want to hope for a quicker death.
Hope is vastly overrated.
3. Freed
Humans are creatures of habit.
Severus repeated the sentence to himself. Coherent sentences made for a coherent mind, and a coherent mind was a gateway to a wide world of imagination – a world untainted by the chains that bound his earthly body. Imagination might be the household’s madwoman, but madness just might be the only escape route left to people like him.
Having his wand taken away from him had been like having a part of himself severed off.
Wearing a collar around his neck, having no saying on what happened to his own body – good or bad, torture or orgasm, or both – was like being separated from his own body. Even his speech didn’t belong to him any more.
But his mind was his. Several barriers of Occlumency shielded him from the outside world, and no one, no one would ever be able to enter. Not even the Dark Lord, and no one alive could even compare with his Legilimency abilities.
He tried devising new potions in his head. The principle was simple enough – the properties of each and every ingredient were well documented, he had read them all in his time as a Potions Master, and reciting them came as a second nature to him. All he needed was an imaginary cauldron in his head, and he could add ingredients to his will, pondering on how they would react to each other.
Reality was more complicated. Ingredients had very different reactions when paired to other ingredients, depending on the other elements, how the interacted with each other and with the first element. All these interactions became a lot to ponder, especially when there were more than, say, twenty of thirty of them, and when some were volatile.
He enjoyed devising imaginary potions with volatile ingredients. All the interesting potions had volatile ingredients in them, after all.
And being whipped raw did not matter much any more when you were trying to counteract the effect of dragon’s blood on an ameliorated Draft of the Living Dead – a draft that would act more quickly, of course.
People should be allowed to die sooner rather later.
All this thinking didn’t please his Mistress. She often grew quite infuriated with him, and whipped harder. It only ended when he lost consciousness – then she would heal him and let him come back to his senses on his own bed.
Severus didn’t like losing consciousness in the middle of a whipping. Upon waking again, he found it most difficult to pick up his imaginary experiment at the exact point where he had left it. It was most inconvenient – the plotted variations to the Elixir of Venoms suffered no less than four such interruptions, and the final result still was most disappointing to him.
He had shelved the potion in one of his mental storage rooms – he would come back to it later.
For he had time, all the time in the world. Days were long, long enough for at least forty ingredients – he kept a meticulous count.
Nights were less structured. He always dreamt, always dreamt of potions during the night. He went on mixing and adding in his imaginary laboratory, with less method, less organisation, and less conclusive results.
It didn’t matter – most strokes of genius occurred in disorganisation, so working on in his dreams was definitely not a problem.
* *
Hermione must have noticed what he was up to by now. He knew she knew it, and it would only be a matter of time before she gave him paper and pencil and demand that he jot all his ideas down.
He wouldn’t comply, of course. She could make him cry and scream, ejaculate and beg forgiveness for his past crimes, but his mind was his own.
A coherent mind – and it was barred to her, barred forever. He chuckled.
In another world, in another time, before his captivity, he would have noticed the demented tones his chuckle had adopted.
But now, he did not notice anything – he had by then grown used to his own madness, and to the increasing signs of lunacy that pervaded his thoughts and gestures.
Humans, he knew all too well, are creatures of habit.
A/N.
“La folle du logis” (the household madwoman) is a phrase by Saint Theresa of Avila, and refers to imagination.
Turning mad from elaborating complex patterns in one’s head during captivity is a theme explored by Stefan Zweig in the “Chess Novella” (Schachnovelle).
Captivity seen as a means to free the mind, to enlighten the soul, is a major theme of Camus’ “The Stranger” (L’Etranger).
Severus and Hermione, needless to say, belong to JK Rowling, who would most certainly not caution this story. Fanfiction also means the re-telling of the same plot over and over again, but I feel compelled to mention the story “Wrapped Around Her Little Finger”, by JadeOrchid, which has provided me with enough inspiration to border on plagiarism – even though I do hope I have not crossed that peculiar line.
All language mistakes are mine and mine alone.
If, on the other hand, you have objections to the plot – I know it’s all wrong, no need to flame me. But please consider that a) this is fanfiction, ie, not reality, not even proper fiction, and therefore twice as remote from anything resembling reality and b) try to picture Severus as the abuser and Hermione as the victim… doesn’t that remind you of something? Of a nice big portion of Ashwinder, perhaps? The only difference, apart from reactions to gender roles, is that here, Hermione has the “excuse” of being on the right side…
