Author's note: Final instalment! Thank you for everything, everyone who read and reviewed (: It all means so much. Banner(s) up soon on my profile page.

Nymphadora Tonks wasn't one to be pressured into anything.

Ever since birth she had been difficult and stubborn, and though sometimes it could rub people the wrong way – what with her 'colourful' personality to boot – it was helpful when it came to sticky situations.

Peer pressure wasn't an issue at Hogwarts – she'd never conformed before and she wasn't going to start back then – and any issues in the workplace were swiftly resolved with stunning results since she was an excellent prankster. Anyone who took her on also took on her mad skills for irritation and making others' lives hell.

So, in short, she would never be persuaded to do anything she didn't want to do – that included entering into a relationship with Remus Lupin.

Three weeks before, she had returned from her unplanned sojourn with Scabior and told Lupin – the man she had thought might've been The One – that it was never going to happen.

Since her attempts at bringing him to her had been so unsuccessful before he realised he loved her, she had thought that since she'd realised that she actually didn't return those feelings then he would give up or play it cool like she had.

But, no. He hadn't. He'd even stooped so low as to enlist Molly Weasley and Sirius 'Ladies Man' Black to help him in his efforts to 'woo' her.

So far, looking at her overflowing wastepaper basket from her cross-legged position on her bed, she had received plain flowers, enchanted flowers, singing cards, leaping paper dolls, and a collection of multicoloured chocolates which Remus must have considered whimsical since Tonks liked to change her hair colour so much.

Tonks wasn't amused.

She wondered, absently, whether she'd ever expected such…generic attempts off of someone so unordinary. She certainly wanted to stay good friends with Remus – his kindness and humour were something she'd loved, even before she'd considered a romantic side to her feelings – and she certainly didn't want to hurt him.

But, considering the man he was running against, he was definitely going to be disappointed when he found out that she'd take a few whispered words in Scabior's dark and fervent tone over Remus' dancing dolls and undying flowers any day.

She threw herself back on her bed, sinking into her fuzzy pyjamas and closing her eyes to dream of tight trousers and a single red lock of hair.

"You know, dear, though he doesn't have much gold, his personality more than makes up for it…"

Tonks sighed into her tea as she sat in the dimly lit kitchen of Grimmauld Place, wondering when she'd given Molly the impression that she was so shallow as to care about Remus' earnings. The woman was obviously running out of explanations as to why Tonks wouldn't accept Remus' many offers. At least she hadn't gone so low as to suggest that Tonks' reluctance was because of Remus' lycanthropy, though Tonks was sure it was on Molly's list.

As Molly went off on another line of enquiry – this time to do with Remus' career opportunities – Tonks asked herself if anyone really knew her.

Scabior seemed to, a nasty little voice said in the back of her mind.

She casted an imaginary Silencio over the traitor in her head, scowling at the white china teacup in her hands as she did so – she missed Scabior, but she couldn't afford to think about him.

A sharp voice cut through her thoughts.

"Mrs Weasley, I suggest you immediately desist your current activities and go see Albus in the library. He's asking for you."

Tonks knew who that voice belonged to without even looking up, but her eyes still sought his out nonetheless. Severus Snape's black gaze met hers and his lips twisted in a small gesture that resembled something like a…smile.

Tonks turned away and grinned into her china. "Severus."

Mrs Weasley bustled away, the kitchen door shutting loudly behind her.

Tonks summoned a teacup for Snape and the teapot that sat to one side of the kitchen under a constant warming charm. He took up a seat opposite her and nodded his head in thanks as the teapot poured him a cup.

"I thought you might have needed saving," he murmured.

Tonks looked up from the battered wood of Sirius' kitchen table. "From Molly?"

Snape nodded as he sipped his plain tea.

"So…Dumbledore's not really asking for her?"

He scoffed. "Of course he is. But he's not in the library. Her boys, however, are, and they're making a fine mess. She'll be too distracted with them to bother you again tonight."

She stared at him with an expression she was sure she would classify as 'stupid' if she could have seen it on someone else's face at that moment.

The corner of Snape's mouth hitched up in a wry half-smile. "Shocked, Nymphadora?"

She ignored his use of her first name. "Of course! You're never bloody helpful with trivial things like Molly bothering me."

His smile didn't slip like she had thought it might at her bluntness – it grew a little. "Your honesty is refreshing – as is your respect for me."

Tonks eyed him. "What d'you mean?"

"Most people are honest with me, but for the wrong reasons – they are honest in their hate or dislike of me, being as I am one who used to serve the Dark Lord faithfully."

True, Tonks had never treated Snape badly, mainly for taking on the hard life of a spy as he did, but that didn't mean she liked what he had done when he was a true Death Eater.

He seemed to read her expression. "I'm not saying you approve of me and my actions, past or otherwise. I'm simply saying that you have given me a chance as a human being. I receive little in that way these days – not that I deserve it, of course."

Tonks rolled her eyes playfully and sat back in her chair. "How can I hold it against you when you risk life and limb for The Cause and you're so bloody contrite?"

"And that's why I helped you. A good turn deserves another, or so I've heard," he said, before pouring himself another cup of tea.

It was then that Tonks realised she'd found someone who would take her side in things, and though a part of her wondered at Snape being that someone, another part of her just didn't care.

Her fist was silently clenching and unclenching under the Grimmauld Place table as she stared a hole into its surface.

Molly's hand touched her elbow and Tonks resisted a flinch.

"Come on, dear. Tell me how he can show you he cares for you."

Tonks' nails dug into her palm and she knew she was going to draw blood.

Not only was Mrs Weasley seriously testing Tonks' patience, but she was acting as if Severus wasn't even at the table with them – though she was hardly surprised; Molly detested Snape, and so to her the rest of the table was simply empty.

She could feel Snape's eyes on her and, while a part of her wished he'd step in, she knew that she should deal with Mrs Weasley by herself.

But it seemed like Severus was unable to abide Tonks' silent thoughts, and he stepped in selflessly.

"Goodness. All this over a mongrel," he sneered.

Tonks wanted to roll her eyes back in relief and around in disbelief – Snape putting himself out there was one thing, but throwing himself under the Knight Bus for her was another.

Molly turned to him, spitting fire. "How dare you! Remus is more of–"

Though she hadn't said it, her silent words were clear – Remus is more of a man than you…

Snape controlled his burgeoning lip curl, but his eyes still narrowed. "Stop hounding the girl. If she wishes to remain free of his filthy paws then let it be. You're not her keeper."

Mrs Weasley huffed and stood, bustling loudly out of the kitchen and muttering furiously under her breath.

Snape muttered under his too, though Tonks could plainly hear his words.

"You realise that if you did poison her then there would be no one to cook for us here, and, quite frankly, my cousin is a god-awful chef."

Snape huffed an amused breath, just as said cousin came striding through the kitchen door. Sirius' eyes narrowed as soon as he spotted the black-clad professor.

"Slumming it, Snape?"

Tonks discreetly rolled her eyes as her cousin took up the chair next to hers and summoned some Firewhiskey.

Severus merely cocked is head. "Are you suggesting that Nymphadora's company is considerably less than others'? That seems to be what you're implying."

Sirius just closed his mouth at Snape and turned to Tonks. "You know that isn't what I meant…but it doesn't matter. I have other news."

The sudden sparkle in his eye told her exactly who it was about.

She held up her hand, halting his words, and said clearly, "I will never be with Remus Lupin, and if the next words to fall out of your mouth are 'why not?' or 'he's poor but nice' I will hex your bloody balls off."

Snape's amusement was evident. Sirius looked like the wind had been ripped from his sails.

"Oh."

Tonks sighed at her cousin. "Sirius, why don't you do him a favour and push someone towards him that wants to be pushed? What about Emmeline? She's always had a soft spot for him."

Sirius rolled his shoulder awkwardly. "He already slept with her a little while ago."

She merely raised an eyebrow back at his statement. "So, when I actually liked him he was off shagging other women in the Order?"

His silence was enough.

Tonks slumped back into her chair and levelled her gaze across the table at Severus. "Why the hell do all the men I like turn out to be arseholes, fuckwits, or De–"

She stopped herself, eyes wide. She had been going to say 'Death Eaters,' thinking of Scabior – he might not have been an actual Death Eater, but he was as good as one. But then…he'd given all that up to save her, hadn't he? There was no way for him to go back into his 'moonlighting,' as he called it, and she wondered once more where he was.

Snape suddenly seemed extremely interested in catching her wandering gaze.

Sirius shrugged off Tonks' unfinished statement. "Fine, then."

She turned to him in shock. "Huh?"

"I said 'fine.' If you don't want him then I won't push it anymore. You obviously don't fancy him like you did in the beginning. I suppose it's better that he finds out this way than in a few years from now when everything just falls apart."

Sirius drained his Firewhiskey and left, leaving Tonks and Snape looking after.

"What were you going to say?" The professor suddenly asked.

Tonks steeled herself, looking over at him. "Nothing. It doesn't matter. I can't even remember."

His eyes narrowed. "Well, even when the individual forgets, the mind retains the information for at least a short period. I'm a very skilled Legilimens – I could look. I'm very interested."

She scowled. "And I'm a very skilled Auror. I've been trained to be able to close off my mind."

Snape gave a grim smile. "Ministry-grade training isn't very efficient, Nymphadora. I imagine I wouldn't have much difficulty in finding–"

And, suddenly, she didn't want to hide Scabior anymore - at least, not from Snape – and it was time to let her secret breathe a little.

"I've fallen in love…with a dark wizard." She refrained from saying 'Death Eater'. "He's why I won't have Remus, and…"

She could say no more, a lump catching in her throat.

Severus' gaze was cool and calculating. "Dark, you say? A Death Eater, perhaps?"

Tonks just shook her head. "No. He works–worked for them."

"Not necessarily dark then," he said, and Tonks' wide eyes snapped to his.

"Are you kidding me?"

His expression indicated he wasn't, as he folded his hands and looked her in the eye. "Obviously, you cannot know the ways in which Death Eaters run their business – only Death Eaters do – but more often than not they will 'convert' someone. This doesn't mean that they turn them into a follower, but more that they force them to render any services the individual may have solely for Death Eaters to use."

Tonks wondered whether or not she should say what was tumbling from her mouth, but she decided to just let the words roll.

"He makes potions. He's a bit of a backstreet dealer."

Snape smirked slightly. "Really? Well, I would imagine that if his business was run in Knockturn Alley, say, then he would have been one of the first that the Death Eaters called on."

Tonks listened to Severus' words before replaying them again and again. She was trying to see if Scabior fit with what Snape was saying and…he did. It wasn't truly Scabior's fault that he had to do what he did.

"But, on a different note…" Snape cut through her musings. "Was this wizard the one who sold Fletcher that Lust Potion all that time ago?"

Seeing as she had already spilt most of her guts, Tonks decided that she might as well just spill the rest of them.

"Yes."

Snape nodded. "I thought so. I knew you were lying when you said you hadn't had any of that soup – I could smell it on your breath. It's a very potent mixture."

Tonks resisted a blush, remembering how she had looked as she hobbled through the front door from that thoroughly fantastic shag.

"Not to mention you looked quite…mussed," Severus murmured, and Tonks chuckled a little at herself.

Snape sat forwards, resting his forearms on the table between them. "But, Nymphadora, I hope you realise that the potion would have only uninhibited you. Due to it being boiled down, you must have been attracted to the man for it to have any effect on you. The potion only made you give in to your desires."

Resigning herself to the fact that she was going to talk to Severus Snape about her love life, she let him in on everything. She told him she was very attracted to the wizard she met, with or without potion, and when Remus and she went on their mission it was that wizard who she bumped into and who saved her from being captured. She also told him how he took her in and cared for her, and then how she paid him back by leaving him for The Cause. She told him how she regretted it every day.

Snape only had one question about the entire ordeal. "Why?"

"Excuse me?"

"Why did you leave him?"

Tonks struggled for a moment, before repeating herself. "Because I have a jobto do, Severus – not just as an Auror, but as a member of the Order."

Snape waved his hand as if it was inconsequential. "Yes, yes. I'm asking you why you felt it necessary to leave him entirely. Perhaps, as you have said, your sense of duty wouldn't allow you to run away with him and hide, but you could have kept in touch. You could even have brought him here and pleaded sanctuary for him, if he crossed the Dark Lord and saved you from danger as he did. You could be together now – he could even have lived here."

It was like a light flickered to life inside her mind.

"But…he wouldn't have wanted that. He–"

Snape cut in. "Excuse my bluntness, but did you actually ask him? Of course, you know him better than me, but did you ever actually talk to him about what you would do? He very obviously gave up everything he had, every piece of tentative safety he possessed, and his entire way of life…to save you."

Tonks was speechless.

Severus' gaze was piercing. "Crossing the Death Eaters is one of the stupidest things anyone could ever do, and if he is as you say then I would hazard a guess as to that he knows it and he still chose you over his own skin. Love doesn't come often, Nymphadora, and love like that is even rarer."

Snape didn't leave like she had absently thought he might, making his words far more dramatic – he simply sat and watched her closely. She felt so…

"Stupid," she groaned, throwing her head into her hands.

"Perhaps," Snape said coolly, making her look up at him through her fingers and dark purple fringe. "But at least you have the chance to rectify it."

"How?"

He rolled his eyes at her. "Really, Nymphadora, you're a very skilled witch – surely you can think of some kind of appropriate guiding spell?"

Tonks just smiled, throwing back her chair and bolting from the kitchen as she called back, "Thank you!"

It turned out that it wasn't as simple as using a guiding spell, or a finding spell, or a mapping spell… In fact, it was damn near impossible. Scabior was invisible.

At first, Tonks worried that he could have been caught and captured, maybe even killed, but as Severus pointed out, after she had invited him to her room to help her in a tearful fit, it would have still given her the location of his body. It was far more likely that he had taken extreme measures to protect himself.

Severus had been impressed with Tonks' wizard's skills and had subsequently deemed him worthy enough to make him his own personal project since the Death Eater meetings and Dumbledore's missions were few and far between.

It was a week after he had begun to help though that there was a breakthrough.

Tonks was sitting at the Grimmauld Place kitchen table, looking through filched files from the Ministry to brush up for her next mission, when Snape came flying into the room all black billowing robes and slammed down a rather large and dusty tome on the table.

Tonks coughed, waving her hand in front of her face to dispel the displaced dust. "What's this?"

"The answer," Severus replied, his voice intense. "I was in the Hogwarts library, running through possible wards that your wizard could have used to hidden himself, when I came across a Potions book. This is that book."

Tonks flipped back the hard leather cover and read the preface. "But this is about creating visual distortions through brewing and consuming various potions. Our spells would still be able to detect him even if he did somehow manage to feed this potion to every passerby – individual perceptions wouldn't be able to change reality."

Snape looked practically wild. "No! Don't you see? I thought the same, until I followed my instincts. I looked through the list of ingredients and realised that if one were clever enough one could add one simple ingredient and completely transform every single potion in this book into something…unimaginably brilliant."

Tonks stared. "That ingredient being?"

"Blood," Severus breathed, sitting beside her and flicking through the pages of the book to show her different relevant passages. "A little blood from your wizard in each potion would create a substance that when, say, marked out a certain area he resided in, or when kept upon his person, would render him invisible . And not just visually, Nymphadora – these potions would distort reality. He doesn't exist within the outline he has set himself."

"Impossible," she breathed.

Snape simply shook his head and corrected her. "Remarkable. Your wizard is… Well, he's clever."

Tonks never thought she'd see the day when Snape was speechless over someone, but that day had come.

Relief and joy suddenly washed through her body. "So now we know what he's done, we can find him somehow, right?"

"Ah." Severus' face darkened. "There is the problem. If we are right – and we must assume we are considering this is the only explanation that seems remotely likely – then the only way I can see of breaking through his wards are by being inside of them. Though the potions pose a distorted reality to any outside viewer, theoretically a viewer on the inside would be able to see the true reality."

Tonks screwed up her face in confusion. "But then…if he's got the potion on him…"

"There's no way to be inside the wards. Exactly," Snape finished for her with a nod. "But all of this is academic if we have no way of breaking through the wards in the first place. The only way I can think of achieving our goal is to already have you inside the wards."

Tonks gave Snape a stern look. "I hate to break it to you but I'm sitting at this table with you. I'm not currently with him."

Severus rolled his eyes. "Yes, I'm not blind. I'm talking about your DNA."

"He must have washed by now, Severus," she sighed. "There'll be nothing left of me on him."

The thought made Tonks' eyes sting with the threat of tears. This was all her fault.

"Nothing? You can't think of anything?" Snape asked. "What about you? Do you have something of him? We could try that."

Tonks gaped at him before swiftly Apparating to her room and then back downstairs. She presented Snape with a neatly folded tissue, her face cracking with a wide grin.

"A week or so ago, I found this on one of my t-shirts. It's one of his."

Snape peeled back the tissue to find one long curling strand of red hair. His eyes questioned her how she could be sure it was his.

Tonks beamed. "My hairs don't fall out. Metamorphmagus thing."

Severus nodded. "Bring me the pot on the stove and fill it halfway with water. Hopefully, this will go well. Though your DNA on him would be, theoretically, more likely to make this happen. I remind you that this may not work at all since he 'technically' doesn't exist."

Tonks nodded in affirmation and followed his orders as Snape conjured ingredients and locked the kitchen door from prying eyes. It took the Potions professor a full hour and a half to build his mixture to a good consistency that would absorb the hair instead of destroying it.

He'd just finished adding frog bones when he pronounced it to be ready.

"Do you have a coin?" He asked.

Tonks rooted around in the pockets of her tight black jeans before pulling a Galleon out of a back one. She blew off the dust and handed the large gold coin to Snape.

He immediately dropped the coin into the thick and pale broth.

"Give it a few moments…" Snape said, as Tonks stood by anxiously.

She watched as the solution visibly decreased in volume, leaving a faintly glowing gold Galleon in the bottom of the pot. She recognised its shimmer.

"A portkey?"

Snape nodded. "It's not common practice to use a potion to create a portkey, but then when you charm an object to become one you usually know where you're going. This should take you directly to him – I doubt it would have charmed correctly otherwise." He gave her a shrewd look. "Are you sure you can't remember obviously leaving anything of yourself there?"

Tonks sighed, running through her time with Scabior again. "I don't think my blood got on him." She skimmed over their lovemaking, and then– "Oh, Merlin! His ring! I kissed it!"

Snape slowly smiled, charming the Galleon to levitate itself from the pot and hover above Tonks' hand. He muttered a few words, charming the golden metal to a time of departure, and then let it drop into her grip.

"You have two minutes."

Tonks immediately Apparated to her room, finding her Auror-issue canvas duffel bag and stuffing it with anything she might need. Shoes, socks, underwear, jeans, t-shirts, jumpers, and robes… By the end she found herself pushing in sugar quills and chocolate, and it was at that point that she conceded she was wasting her last minute at Grimmauld Place.

She Apparated back into the kitchen in a flurry and was glad to find Snape sitting alone still.

He smiled at her as he poured himself a fresh cup of tea. "Good luck. Tell Scabior I said 'hello'."

Tonks gaped. She'd never told Snape Scabior's name.

He gave her a self-satisfied smirk. "I was your Potions master at Hogwarts in my third year there – what made you think I couldn't be anyone else's? Scabior was in my first year. He was always my best student. Owl soon. I'll tell the others."

With that the coin in her hand glowed a bright blue, the Grimmauld Place kitchen and Snape falling away into a blinding whirl of light and nothingness.

The next thing Tonks knew she was knee-deep in snow and looking up at the very tip of a wand pointed squarely between her eyes. Her gaze shifted enough to allow her to see two circles of bright blue.

"Never thought I'd see your lovely mug again."

When he'd woken up after that night all those weeks ago, he'd flung his arm out to catch Nymph's sleep-warm and deliciously naked body and his sleepy smile had instantly vanished when his hand had found nothing but cold air.

Once more, she had left him, and she hadn't even bothered to say goodbye. She'd just gone.

So, on looking down at her kneeling in the snow then, Scabior wondered how long it would be until she shagged him senseless and then fucked off from whence she came once more.

His words were met with silence…but, Merlin, she was pretty.

Her little nose was pink from the cold and her eyes were large and grey in the dim moonlight made brighter by the snow. She was beautiful, and Scabior instantly cursed his rotten fucking luck that he had to fall in love with a bloody angel instead of a hag. She was going to walk all over him and, most likely, he'd let her.

But there was one thing that needed clearing up. "How'd you get 'ere?"

He didn't believe for one minute she'd been out for a walk just outside of Criccieth in Wales and had been able to stumble through his wards by sheer accident.

A piece of gold was held up to him in the middle of her pale palm.

He raised an eyebrow. "You paid your way 'ere?"

Slowly, she rose from her knees. "No."

Merlin, her voice was soft and beautiful to his ears. He felt all the rage and all the pain from her absence just melting away bit by bit…

"I had help. We made a portkey out of this…with a strand of your hair…" She rolled her lovely eyes. "Look, it's all very bloody complicated, and my knickers feel damp from the snow."

Scabior couldn't help the smile that lit his face – this was the woman he saw in her, not the one that kept running away but the one who made him crack a smile when he felt so frozen.

He turned away and let her follow. "Come on then."

A grey brick cottage came into view beneath snow-covered limbs of bare trees that hung over the little building Scabior had commandeered. Outside of his wards the place was a wreck, but inside he had been able to fix up the entire cottage without alerting a soul. Not that there was anyone to alert really – the cottage was out of sight of the nearest road and away from any forest trails.

It was so peaceful, so serene, so…boring without her here. But, now, she was.

He opened the wooden door with a tap of his wand, the locks and the charms he had wrapped the place in when he'd left coming undone under his magical signature.

He held it open as Nymph pulled herself and a lumpy canvas bag in with her.

His eyes widened. "What's that?"

He hadn't noticed it before.

She smiled, slowly. "Just some stuff I might need. Clothes and the like."

Clothes… Things she might need… She'd brought stuff so she could…stay?

With a flick of his wand Scabior lit the candles dotted about the house and shuttered the windows. He rounded on her quickly, kicking the front door shut behind him and tearing her bag out of her grasp.

"What do you want?"

Nymph stood still for a moment, her back to him, as her hair ever so slowly turned a burnt orange. When she turned around to face him, her dark grey eyes practically black, Scabior knew he should have just bloody left her out in the snow. He was done for.

Her hips twitched mesmerizingly as she came forward, one of her slender hands coming up to trace the vertical line buttons of his ragged blue waistcoat.

Scabior noticed how small she looked in front of him, thin like she hadn't been eating and shorter than before like she'd shrunk in the shade.

Without his permission, his right hand rose and slipped into the near-red bangs of her hair.

He sighed. She smiled, hair darkening to cerise.

"What do I want?" Nymph asked, slowly rising up on her tiptoes with her lips obviously fighting a smile. "I want you. I want to give us a proper chance. I want this to work. I want to apologise for being such a…"

Scabior grinned, slowly. "Little tart?"

She narrowed her eyes slightly. "Yes. I was a little tart, and I'm sorry."

The weight that had been constricting his chest for all those weeks lessened, and he found himself leaning in to press his face to hers. He nosed away a couple of her, sudden, curls, and breathed in her mind-boggling scent.

"Bloody 'ell, love," Scabior growled. "You can always be a right little tart if you smell this good."

A sudden, fresher, scent invaded his nostrils, and he felt his pupils dilate rapidly as he breathed it in. It was her arousal. She liked him growling.

He did it again, rumbling sounding deep in his chest. He was rewarded with a breathy, fluttering moan.

"Fuck…" He spat, one hand clenching in her hair and the other gripping her perfect little waist.

His teeth found her neck.

"Scabior…"

Merlin, her voice made him hard – the desperation, that tinge of pain, and all that fucking lust…

Scabior found himself throwing her up against the wall and pinning her there while her arms flew around his neck.

He growled into the silky skin of her neck. "You might be a little tart sometimes, Nymph…but, Merlin knows, you're my little tart."

His leg automatically shifted as she wriggled, slipping his thigh between hers and bracing his foot against the skirting board of the wall behind her so he could grind his knee against her hidden pussy.

Nymph flung her head back, slamming it against the chipped green paint peeling from the wall. "Ugh!"

Scabior felt a filthy smirk crawl across his face as he turned it to growl directly into her ear, forcing his knee against her harder as he did so.

"You like that?"

She nodded, groaning breathily.

Scabior licked a path up Nymph's neck, feeling his cock pound against his restrictive clothes as her taste instantly hit his tongue.

"You like what I do to you?" Another nod. "You like what I make you feel?" Another nod, and he smiled. "You trust me?"

There wasn't even a fraction of a pause, she instantly murmured, "Yes."

He closed his eyes at the beautiful word, wondering how mad she'd be if he tied her to his bed so she couldn't run away again. As soon as the idea hit him he knew it was time to try it out.

With one quick turn, he'd Apparated both of them upstairs to the bedroom of the cottage. Just a fraction of a second more and he had her magically bound to the gilded metal railings of his old-fashioned bed.

She wriggled before him, hips lifting off of the rubbed down and careworn duvet, before she stopped struggling. Her eyes met his, but they weren't angry. They were…amused.

Nymph lifted a slender eyebrow. "You like a bit of rope play?" She asked, tugging lightly at the silver lengths that held her wrists.

Scabior smirked, crawling onto the bed and over her deliciously vulnerable body. "As much as the next man…maybe a little bit more."

She laughed huskily, tipping her head back as he went for her neck so he could get a better angle to kiss her throat.

"You should be shoutin' at me, screamin' the roof offa this place about havin' your own freedom," he murmured against her skin, hands skimming her shirt away from her stomach.

He felt her smile against his face. "I made my choice. I came here. I found you. Now, are you going to take our clothes off or not? I'm itching for that big, fat cock of yours."

Scabior froze, before pulling back to gape at her – did she really just-?

Nymph was gazing back at him levelly, a tiny grin curling one corner of her mouth. "What?"

He shook his head, dazed. So long with only Pam and her five lovely sisters for company had severely affected his memory of Nymph. Either that or she'd suddenly become so much…more.

Merlin, he loved it.

"Say it again," he growled.

Nymph smirked, pulling forward as much as she could tied up like she was. "I want that big, fat cock now."

He was sure he'd never moved so fast in his life. One moment he was knelt over her, gaping down at her crimson curls, and the next his wand was in his hand and both their clothes had disappeared.

He couldn't help but groan as he looked over her naked body, arching for his as she twisted to feel some bare skin against hers. Nymph's face was covered in naked need.

"Scabior, please… I need you…"

Perhaps he had wanted to punish her before, but right then…all he wanted to do was show her how much he cared, how much he thought of her, how many times he'd had sleepless nights wondering if she'd been chased or caught…or even killed… But not yet. He was feeling too much too soon, and he just needed…release.

Scabior crawled over her body, licking a line from her nipple to her earlobe.

"I'm goin' to fuck you," he muttered sharply. "I'm goin' to fuck you, hard an' fast an' rough. An' then, once we've got past the mandatory mindless shag, I'm goin' to untie you. You can decide what 'appens after that."

With that, he angled her hips and thrust his cock to the hilt inside her wet and clutching cunt.

She froze beneath him, her back arching and her mouth opening wide in a silent scream as she soundlessly came around his still cock.

He was breathless from the initial plunge inside her perfect body, but he couldn't help but smile smugly down at his little witch.

"An' I thought it was blokes who 'ad trouble with comin' too early."

She panted beneath him, her muscles loosening ever so slightly around his throbbing length. "I haven't…touched myself…in weeks. Couldn't…do you justice."

Scabior kissed the small hollow at the bottom of her throat. "Shame. I wanked off every night, love. Never good enough, but still…"

Suddenly, she clutched him. Internally.

He threw his head back with a roar at the sweet rush of heat that ran up his spine and down his legs straight from his cock. When he finally determined that he hadn't, in fact, shot his load embarrassingly early from her brilliantly tight pussy, he glared down at her.

She grinned right back up at him. "Too much talking. Fuck me."

"With pleasure."

She may have talked the talk, but Nymph certainly hadn't been prepared for Scabior to walk the walk.

The first thrust sent her head flying back into the pillows, the second had her tits jiggling beautifully, the third had her fingers tightening around the bedstead, the fourth had her screaming his name, and the fifth had her coming around his cock once more.

He groaned between his thrusts, mouth on one nipple as his hands held her to him by her arse. She was so tight around him, so obviously desperate for him to fuck her harder that it actually staved off his release for a little longer.

Pulling his head back from her jiggling breasts, he ran one hand around to rub his thumb over her pretty pink clit and the other down a little to spread her soft arse cheeks.

She gasped beneath him, eyes meeting his.

He grinned, biting at her bottom lip. "I know you like it… Remember the first time?"

He certainly hadn't forgotten how tight she'd been and how she'd reacted to a little backdoor action. Her name, Nymph, was certainly apt.

"Little Nympho likes it, doesn't she?" He asked on a growl, pinching her clit and circling her back entrance as he pounded into her pussy even harder. "My little tart loves somethin' up 'er arse."

She gasped and twisted, groaning in pleasure at his words, and a smirk lit his face at the thought of…

"Turn over."

He watched her eyes shoot up to her untied hands and then down to her untied feet.

"Turn over," he growled again.

She pulled herself off of his cock with a moan and flipped onto her stomach, lifting her hips up for him and wrapping her hands back around the gilded bedstead. The image of her beneath him, on all fours, willingly waiting for him to tie her back up had him back inside her soaking pussy within a second and muttering a gritted 'Incarcerous'.

Silver ropes snagged Nymph's wrists and ankles, pulling her limbs straight and forcing her down onto her stomach. Scabior followed her down, still deep inside her cunt and eyeing her pretty little arsehole with interest.

"You ever had anythin' bigger up 'ere, love?" He asked gruffly, circling her pink pucker with one fingertip.

She shook her head against the pillow, magenta curls spilling everywhere.

Scabior smirked, casting a quick lubrication spell and leaning down to kiss a trail between her shoulder blades as slipped his finger past the tensed ring of muscles.

"Tight," he breathed, near exploding anyway because of the way her pussy was clutching him at his invasion.

He stretched her gently, scissoring his fingers and smiling as she wiggled back against them after a few moments.

Slowly, he slipped from her warm body. His cock was slick with her transparent cum, and bobbing so eagerly it tapped against her sensitive button.

Nymph cried out as the head of his erection rubbed over her clit. "Oh, fuck! Please! Do it!"

Spreading her cheeks and grasping the base of his dick, he slowly slid into her tight hole.

"Holy shit…"

She was tight, so tight, so un-fucking-believably tight…and though her muscles were more relaxed than before they were dancing and fluttering around the head of his dick, squeezing him as he slid all the way home.

Nymph's knuckles turned white against the bedstead, and Scabior felt his jaw pop from the strain of clenching his teeth to ward off his orgasm.

It was coming, whether he wanted it to or not – and he most certainly did not.

Scabior pulled up Nymph's hips, held apart her delicious unblemished arse cheeks, and thrust…hard.

She screamed, clenching around him and damn near robbing him of his sight.

Scabior watched as her back bowed, angling her hips just so, and he slid in so deep he found his balls resting against the wet warmth of her cunt.

He was going to explode.

With one last feat of strength, he stubbornly decided that she would come one last time.

Growling in her ear, he picked up a fast pace and punished her tight little arse with his thick cock. "Don't leave…again. Not…without sayin'…goodbye. I…fuckin'…need…you! Ohh…you like that?"

His fingers were on her clit and her nipple and she was writhing and keening beneath him in a way that just drove him nuts.

Then he felt it. Nymph stilled, mid-scream, her muscles twitching around him like crazy, and came just before he gripped her arse cheeks in both hands and slammed himself inside her one last time, shooting deep.

His spine was on fire, sending his back into a messy frenzy of electrical impulses that had his toes curling and his fingertips twitching in Nymph's soft skin.

Scabior fell against her back with an exhausted growl, near-dreadlocks falling around his face and tracing the soft curves of the beautiful woman beneath him.

There was peaceful silence for a few moments, except the pounding of his heart, and it was only as he slowly slipped out of her that she spoke.

"Fuck."

"Fuck," he agreed.

Déjà vu…

But there was no running and screaming this time. There was only peace, and silence, and them.

He kissed her shoulder and rubbed a thumb over the nearest loop of silver rope binding her to the bed – all of it disappeared in a flash of dark vapour.

Scabior gently pulled her into his arms, turning her face to his so he could see her expression as he laid them both out across the bed. She was beaming like nobody's business.

He sighed. "Bloody beautiful you are."

"Thanks," she replied cheekily, taking his hand in hers and rubbing her thumb over the face of his silver stag ring. "Not half bad yourself."

Her dark grey eyes met his and he found his eyes closing slowly, sleep crawling up over him like a deadly blanket.

She's going to leave… She'll leave if I –

"I won't leave," he heard, just as the darkness closed over him.

Scabior woke to warmth and sweet laughter.

He cracked an eyelid to find a very naked Nymph petting the tiny, fluttering fuzz of feathers that he called his owl. The bloody thing hadn't grown since Hogwarts and it still looked like a baby. He'd had the shit torn out of him for it at school, especially since he was in Slytherin with all their bloody pretty snakes and expensive pedigree pets.

Still, though he was loathe to admit it even to himself, he loved little Thaddeus.

He gave a short click of his tongue and the bird flitted from the window and Nymph right to his face, hovering above the bed sheets at the very tip of his nose.

"Botherin' my lady, Thad?" He groused.

The bed dipped as Nymph climbed on, sitting cross-legged and cupping her hands beneath Thad so he could drop into her palms with an audible little 'oof!'

She smiled at him, cheeks pink and eyes sparkling silver. "Good morning."

Thad cooed in agreement.

Scabior cracked a reluctant smile. It was kind of…beautiful, her sitting there – her being there at all was good enough for him – so comfortably naked with his childhood friend in her hands. His heart, ever so slightly, clenched.

"Mornin'," he replied huskily, crooking a finger at Nymph for her to lean forward and catching her pink pout in kiss when she did so.

The kiss deepened instantly, Thad forgotten as Scabior clenched a hand in the soft dirty-blonde curls of her hair and held her face to his so his tongue could explore her mouth.

A sudden peck to his chest had him backing away immediately.

Scabior looked down as he sat up a little more to see Thad practically glowering at him.

He rolled his eyes. "This is my naked girl. Find your own."

Thad gave him one last annoyed peck and fluttered away, zipping out of the open bedroom window.

Nymph sighed, bringing him out of his thoughts. "This is nice."

He looked at her, from the dark curls covering the pale pink lips of her lovely pussy to the more golden locks spilling over her shoulders, and nodded. "Yeah. You're actually 'ere."

Instead of looking pissed, she simply smiled and leaned forwards to grip his lower lip between her teeth playfully. "Mmm, and I held you all night, too."

Was it unmanly of him to just fucking melt at that? Probably, but he didn't care.

"I wasn't expecting your familiar to be an owl," she said teasingly, running a finger down his sternum to his navel. "Maybe a toad."

He snorted. "I 'ate the bloody things. Thad just came to me – he was wild before he flew into my bedroom window an' knocked himself out stone cold. After that, I kept him an' he just stayed with me."

"S'nice," she sighed, obviously eyeing the twitching at his waist beneath the bedclothes.

He caught her trailing hand, the one that was exacerbating the problem of his morning erection. "You wanna start somethin'?"

"I think I already have," she shot back, pulling her hand away and sliding it beneath the thin duvet to grasp his thickening cock.

"Shit…"

"Mmm." She smirked, slipping a leg over his thighs to straddle him and pulling the duvet down to reveal her hand pumping him. "Would you like a little something?"

Scabior nodded silently, swallowing against the urge to pump his hips up and down to hurry her hand on his dick.

But he never expected her to slide down his body and suck him into her sweet little mouth. All it took was one quick flick and swallow, her throat tensing around the head of his dick, and he came like a whimpering schoolboy.

Nymph had never looked so wicked as she did when she was licking a pearl of his cum off her lips.

"What was all that troll dung about coming early?" She teased, sliding up his body so she could kiss his neck.

"Nothin'," he muttered, meeting her lips and not minding his taste on her one bit. "Absolutely fuck-all."

She looked down at him, her face above his and her hair hanging around both of them in a soft curtain. He found his thumbs tracing her cheekbones and the need to tell her something building up in his chest.

"Love you, Nympho," he breathed, holding her gaze.

She smiled back wickedly. "I love you. It's completely crazy, but true."

Her fingers took his and lifted a single one to her mouth. She brushed her lips against his stag ring, and by the twinkle in her eye he knew she'd just made him one hell of a silent promise.

She was absolutely serious this time – he could tell. No mistakes, no messing around, and no lies.

"Now," she said, twirling his red lock around her index finger. "I believe you said that once we'd shagged what came next was up to me. I want a little breakfast and then to show you how serious I am about this," she wagged a finger between them, "by taking you outside for an early morning snowball fight. And then maybe we can come back, magic some Firewhiskey and have a long slow lovemaking session in front of a fire. What do you think?"

He didn't know how she had gotten to him, he didn't really care, but he was sure she would explain it all to him later. He could only think of that Galleon she'd shown him and how he was sure that when he found it later, he'd never let it out of his sight again. It brought her back.

He rolled her over and laid on top of her, smiling widely. "I think you need to get dressed, love. I wanna pelt you with snow until your knickers are wet again."

Nymph raised one eyebrow in challenge, and he felt his smile widen.

"I'm quite wet now without the knickers."

Merlin…she's perfect…

Finis