Changing Destiny

Seventeen: Having The Talk

Sebastian laid nestled in my arms, playing with my hair, tired from all of the guests I received today. The few Rosiers that took notice of me arrived, welcomed me to the family after hearing of me in The Daily Prophet. Half of Slytherin and Ravenclaw House paid their respects, and my room was full of gifts for the baby.

I tickled my son's ticklish feet, and he giggled, trying to communicate with me through his own brand of simple legilimency by touching me. I booped his nose, and Eskimo kissed him. "You laugh more than your daddy ever did, I swear. Are you sure you're a Prince, honey?"

He gave a mental shrug, and yawned as he curled up in my arms, and slept. I began reading over The Quibbler for fun, because Luna left it for me when she visited with Mini Me, and Harry. Harry seemed happy for the new baby, but he must have felt odd about the situation, knowing who his father was. Mini Me was overjoyed, and cast sparkles with her wand, and Sebastian kept trying to eat them with his tiny hands.

It was just before the dinner service that Severus arrived, and he had one of those big gold Godiva boxes you find in department stores. "Wow, no chocolate frogs or exploding bon bons, I'm impressed," I teased.

He set it on the table where the mountain of magical sweets already sat, and I did not like his grave expression at all. The smile froze on my face. "What's wrong, Severus?"

"Can I...Can I hold Bastian first?"

"Of course. But be careful, he just dozed off."

He gathered our son in his arms, and rocked him, delicately stroking his cheeks as if he were made of precious porcelain. A tear rolled down his cheek, and he wiped at it bitterly. "I...I kind of fucked up, Hermione. I knew it was stupid, and I may have been seething over your tryst with Lucius, but I...I wanted to see if what we have is real. So I tested myself, and I went to The Dragon Pit to try to buy a witch for the night."

Dread filled the pit of my belly at his words. Okay, granted, we never committed to being a couple officially, but we made a child together! Surely, that meant something even to a Slytherin, right?? I swallowed the bile that rose in my throat, and forced myself to say, "G-Go on. You want to break up with me, don't you?"

He looked truly sad as he shook his head. "No. I bought the witch, and we got as far as the room, and oral sex, but...but I just couldn't. I realized that it was more than my becoming disgusted with myself for falling back into my old pattern of dominating a witch for my own carnal release, I realized that...that she wasn't you, and that you mean more to me than words can express."

Apology chocolates. Gods, it was a nice gesture, and I did forgive him, but what was to stop him from having another 'crisis of conscience,' and going back to Knockturn Alley for a meaningless fuck? The answer was not a damn thing. I wanted to believe that he wouldn't hurt me again, but history was being repeated in my marriage with Ronald Weasley. The two wizards were nothing alike, of course, but that ginger idiot really broke my trust in men in general.

"What is to stop you from seeking a convenient fuck every time you experience another one of these 'crises of conscience'?" I asked, making quotation marks with my fingers, "Or, if we quarrel? Am I to be expecting repeated performances of contrition? Apology sweets or flowers? How am I to trust that you have our family's best interests at heart, Severus? You said it yourself: this baby has changed everything between us."

He scowled, "You dare speak to me of trust when you fucked my cousin. You already carried our child. How was I to know then it wasn't his?"

That stung. Wow, he could give as good as he dealt out, I would give him that. "First of all, I didn't know I was pregnant at the time. Second of all, you and I were a one night stand thing. Lastly, you let that random witch touch your cock the day I gave birth to a child we made. How am I to think of that?" I cried, my tone angry.

"You can think whatever you damn well like, witch," He drawled. "The point is is that it went no further than that."

"How convenient for you that your conscience saved you from outright cheating," I spat back. The baby began crying, and he handed off the baby to me.

Severus paced about the room angrily. "Godsdamnit, witch, what do you want me to say?? That I'm sorry? There, I said it. Don't you understand that this...this family...committment...all this is hard for me??"

I cast a silencing charm around Sebastian after soothing him back to sleep. I laid him down in his crib, and stood to face him. His eyes widened in shock, and he moved to escort me back to bed, but I slapped his hands out of the way. "Don't touch me! Don't you think this is hard for me too?? I am in a time period I shouldn't be in, from a time where you were mur--murdered in cold blood. You bled out in my arms! I lost my parents to the war, Harry, my entire social group practically, even though it hasn't happened yet. Then we make this baby, and all because I have been in love with you for years! Was it stupid for me to have slept with Lucius Malfoy? Yes, and I apologized for that over and over until I was blue in the face. I don't love him. I love you! I love our son! And I want you to just once tell me you love me when I know you do."

We stared each other down, and tears filled our eyes. He moved towards me, and swallowed past the lump in his throat, "I love you. Truly love you, Hermione. Whatever you need of me, I will give you and our son. Please just say I have not lost you."

I kissed his cheek, but when he moved to kiss me, I shook my head. "If you are going to be with me. Then, be with me, Severus. Don't just commit because we have a child that needs both his parents in his life. I want you to go back to Hogwarts. I want you to think, really think of life with your family, and without, and I want you to decide if that is what you want in your life."

"Are you sure that is what you want?"

"Yes. I am ready for this. But I won't be with a wizard who will treat me as anything less than his number one priority," I asserted. "I am ready because I have waited decades for you, my love. Life is too short to be without the one you love; and, if you do not want me, I want you to make that decision with a clear head. I will be awaiting your owl. Now, please leave."

He knew better than to press me further, because he simply helped me back into bed, gave a soft kiss to the baby, and left the room. I succumbed to my tears once I knew he was gone, and the visiting hours were over anyway. I soon went to sleep, and dreamed of the dark dreams where I was always too late to save Severus from Voldemort, and he died over and over in my arms...

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Severus

He did as Hermione bid and went back to Hogwarts, and from that night on, he truly began to examine just where his loyalties lay, and just as the petrifications of students began to pile up two months later, that was when he realized that he needed to make Hermione his fiancee, officially....