Summary: [HG/SS] Emotion has always been the bane of Snape's life. Emotion is what got him into trouble time and time again. Emotion made his mouth run. This time, emotion caused him to run off at the mouth to the one person who had always been able to forgive… until now. (A phoenix-centric story)

A/N: A little detour for Story Please who was feeling a little lonely.

Beta Love: The Dragon and the Rose, Dutchgirl01, and one non-Malfoy ferret under duress.

A Moment of Weakness

He knew the instant his fingers touched the softness of her cheek that he was doomed— doomed to feel when he didn't want to again, doomed to care. It was the last thing he wanted. It was the last thing he needed now that he knew he was going to die without ever having known what could have been. He'd spend so many years brooding over the could-have-beens. He'd spend them all thinking of Lily who had long since perished instead of the present.

For a moment of disbelieving happiness, he had brushed his fingers across her skin, feeling the soft lean of her towards his touch.

"Come with me, Severus," she had said. "I've had an offer to study in Australia with a shaman and learn aboriginal healing and magic. They said I can bring someone with me—"

Then, just like he'd mucked up with Lily, he proved that he was more the imbecile than any of his cauldron-blowing-up students by insulting Hermione when she was the most happy.

"What makes you think I'd want to go roughing it out in some Australian bush-lands, Granger?" He had hissed at her. "I'm not some irresponsible Dumbledore who just galivants off on some mission and leaves people behind to hold everything together."

Hermione looked at him with confusion. "Severus, I thought you'd be pleased. "It would give you a chance to live a little, get away from Hogwarts for a while."

"So I can return here? Back to the job I loathe, but I can never be free of?" Severus snarled. "So you can show me how great life can be and then cram me back into my little cell just like that old goat always did? No thank you. I do not need you, Miss Granger, to be a constant reminder of where I have fucked up my life," he had snapped at her, thinking that there would be no escape from his sins. No place would have him after his wretched reputation. He would be stuck teaching at Hogwarts until the day he died.

He stood there, glowering at her, as he watched the light of her eyes trickle away as the pain filled them.

Then, for the first time in a decade of their being colleagues— she as Poppy Pomfrey's apprentice in healing— Severus Snape saw Hermione Granger's eyes lose their warmth and the seemingly limitless power to forgive. He saw the darkness fill her eyes is it had his— the Occlumency— and chase her emotion away. He had taught her that in order to help her keep her thoughts from bleeding out when treating patients, but she had never once used it against him save the times he had been teaching her how to use it.

"I'm sorry, Severus," she said tonelessly. "I had thought— well it doesn't matter now what I thought. I was obviously mistaken. I will not inflict myself upon you again." She turned away from him and left with the hint of the red and orange of her wings flickering from the back of her robes— wings that could have flown her to freedom oh so long before this.

Why had he said that to her—she, who had been his most stalwart advocate for his redemption after the war? She who had saved his life by revealing the one secret she had kept from everyone until the moment before he had almost died: she was the daughter of a phoenix. She had cried over him as he lay dying, and it had saved his life.

There was only two ways to secure the services of a phoenix: gain their trust the hard way or enslave them. How do you enslave a magical creature that could just as easily spontaneously combust than be with you? Secret away their eggs. How do you hide something as obvious as phoenix egg? Transfigure it into a human baby and hide it in the most unsuspecting place possible: a family of barren dentists desperate for a child. Thank you, Albus Dumbledore and his grand plans.

Severus was the only one that knew the truth for a long time, seeing as she had revealed her true nature by crying over him. Minerva, of course, knew now, but the secret remained between them and them alone. The night Dumbledore had finally passed across the Veil thanks to Severus, the spell that had locked away Hermione's birthright had broken. Hermione met her real father for the first time as he arrived to witness her first Burning Day — her first, true birthday into the heritage that had been stolen from her. He, in the tradition of phoenixes, gifted his long-lost daughter with the memories of their lineage and magic, the burning joy of his love, and then left— finally free to seek out the rest of his stolen chicks. Fawkes then knew his chicks could very well be like Hermione, living their life unknowing of their heritage and their birthright and oblivious that they were so much more. He left, promising her that they would meet again, hopefully to reunite with the siblings she never knew she had.

She had kept it all a secret in her quest to help Harry defeat Voldemort, all the way up when Snape lay bleeding out on the Shrieking Shack's floor. She had asked for nothing, never once calling him out for a life debt. She had even used him as her Master's project, healing him of his many, many scars gifted to him by the Dark Lord. She had shared her ultimate secret with him, the shunned and loathed man that he was, telling him that he was one of the only ones that could understand why some secrets had to be kept.

She had never said why she trusted him of all people, he who had been such a terror as her Professor over her supposed best friends. He had even become used to bickering with her over nuances of spellcrafting and the effects of potions over actual healing spells and whether the two could be combined for even more efficacy.

Yet, when Hermione Granger had asked him to come with her on sabbatical, something inside of him had reared up inside of him: jealousy. She could just pick up and travel like some bleeding Albus P. W. B. Dumbledore and then expect everything to be fine when she came back.

She'd leave him like everyone else always had.

Idiot. She asked you to come with her, and you threw it back in her face.

You might as well have called her a bloody Mudblood, Severus Snape. Have you learned nothing?

Severus winced. He deserved every agony imaginable for his sins, now more than ever.

A flash of fabric caught the edge of his vision. He looked up, desperately hopeful that he would have a chance to eat crow and fix what he had just done.

"Ah, there you are Severus," Minerva said as she walked by. "Have you seen Hermione? I did you both the favour of procuring two substitutes for next year. You'll both perfectly free to enjoy yourselves in Australia and get away from the teaching and healing for a while. Merlin knows how much you both deserve a little break. I think I'm a little jealous. Do send a nice postcard, will you?"

Minerva chuckled. "I have to go work some magic on the Board of Governors. Wish me luck." The feline Animagus winked and wandered off towards the Board meeting.

Severus flinched.

He really was a bloody idiot. This was not the world of Albus Dumbledore— where the Headmaster kept a tight leash on everyone. Minerva, as Headmistress, seemed to genuinely care for both student and staff health. Hell, there hadn't been a Gryffindor-Slytherin fight in years, save over Quidditch. Quidditch, well, it was Quidditch. Bosom buddies could get in first fight over Quidditch when no other differences ever came up.

Hermione had obviously brought up the idea to Minerva before asking him, probably so she could get approval before suggesting something like a joint sabbatical only to be turned down. Of course Minerva would have thought he'd jump on the idea to get away from it all. Who wouldn't have?

Just Severus Snape— the man with so many triggers to instinctive offence that he was a bloody minefield.

Go after her, idiot. Don't let what happened to Lily happen again.

He gathered himself and fled down the corridors towards her private chambers, fully intending to sit outside her portal portrait in a similar torturous state that he had been in as a teenager. He had a hundred or more different embarrassing, crow-eating apologies, and he was ready to spew them all out at once if it meant he could take back the cold words that had spewed from his idiotic mouth.

The corridors were empty since all of the children had left for summer holidays. Soon, all the remaining professors would also be off to their summer abodes, and all that would remain would be Argus and Mrs Norris. He had a feeling the crotchety old caretaker preferred summer to all other times. Rumour had it that Minerva came back mid-holiday to check on something and found the old caretaker jamming air-guitar in a pair of knickers and dancing with Mrs Norris (who was dressed up in pink bows and little white socks on her paws as if for some debutante ball). Rumour, perhaps, was the wrong word, unless one meant traumatised for life. On that note, Severus was seriously glad he hadn't been there for that Argus-related ephiphany. He was also glad that Minerva didn't force his head down into the Pensieve memory.

Minerva had admitted herself into Mungo's for a mental health check afterwards. No one blamed her for that. Some argued the wrong person had gone to Mungo's, but it wasn't like anyone was going to bring it up to Argus. Ever.

Hermione's personal quarters were located just off of an inner courtyard arbouretum. It had been a mastery project once upon a time, and it had also been a bit of a natural haven. All the trees and shrubs were fruiting, and depending on the season, there were berries and fruit on something throughout the year. There were about twenty different magical plants that were oblivious to weather mixed with Muggle ones that were not. The combination, however, had made for a calm retreat where students could escape to the forest without actually having to roam into the Dark Forest and get themselves maimed or eaten by giant man-eating spiders. Hermione had spent years gathering the perfect combination of plants and had worked with the local centaur to find the "perfect celestial resonance" that did not clash with the surrounding Dark Forest. The tentative and almost begrudging peace between centaur and human had finally given way to a true peaceful partnership. In the end, Hermione had not only healed Severus of his physical scars but had also healed something between the bond between human and centaur— something that had festered and never healed as it should have across the span of the great wars.

Severus winced.

She had always been a healer. Even before she knew what she was— even before Fawkes bequeathed her the memories of her birthright. She had healed the hearts of two barren Muggle dentists that had been desperate for the love of a child. She had saved her friends countless times, often from themselves. She'd filled the hole of Minerva McGonagall's heart at the loss of her husband and first love by being the daughter the witch had never had. She'd helped Harry Potter embrace life enough to stand up for what he wanted in a career and life after the war, and she had pushed Ron towards what he had really wanted in life: a family with the witch who had never stopped loving him. Ronald had sat at the bedside of Lavender Brown until she recovered from her almost fatal mauling at the hands of Fenrir Greyback.

Thanks to an anonymous donation of phoenix tears, Lavender's extensive wounds healed in combination with St Mungo's healers' extensive treatments. She would crave rare steak forever more, but she would be alive and human.

Severus, however, had paid Hermione back by letting his instinctive backlash and disdain for the previous Headmaster to cloud his judgement the one time she had asked him to leave the life he had no great love for because deep down, Severus Snape was afraid. He was afraid of change. He was afraid of feeling anything, because emotion had gotten him into trouble every time.

Hate for his father had set him on the Dark path.

Hate for the Marauders had caused him to lash out in pained, clouded words.

Lily had repudiated him, driving him into the depths of self-loathing and a need for revenge.

Pain had driven him into the arms of the Dark Lord.

Despair had driven him to seek help from Dumbledore.

Desperation had given Dumbledore the keys to enslave him.

Hate for Harry's father had kept him from being truly understanding of Harry's plight, which had driven him into the arms of one smug Albus Dumbledore.

Jealousy had caused him to run at the mouth to Hermione only moments after he had felt such tenderness towards her.

Emotion had been the bane of his life.

Yet he could still feel the gentle lean of Hermione's cheek against his fingers— voluntary affection he had never once believed possible could come to one such as him, and then he had ruined it. Again.

Minerva was going to kill him, and he would probably let her do it.

Severus forced his feet to walk forward. He looked up to where the hanging gardens extended. A terraformed waterfall spilt down from above, providing water to the arboretum and filling the area with a pleasantly cool mist.

A startled snort caught his attention, and a little centaur filly stared at him with wide eyes. It was Firenze's little foal. He had introduced her to Hogwarts early— the first foal to be born after the war and the first true ambassador to the centaur people. Applebriar, who ironically had the colouration of what humans called the "medicine hat" horse, spent most of her time here while her father was busy teaching when her dam was off attending to herd matters outside their normal territory. In the evening, Firenze and his filly would return back to the Dark Forest to rejoin the herd. During the day, however, she was Hogwart's little Darling, charming the pants off everyone that had a flicker of emotion left in their soul.

Applebriar being here while the students were not meant Firenze was attending to some business somewhere in Hogwarts, probably speaking with Minerva about some unauthorised release of something "'armless" on Hagrid's part. The half-giant never could stop himself from his ill-advised rescue projects. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if he hadn't tried to mix rescue with husbandry. Minerva was at her wit's end with Hagrid, but was unable to fire him due to an iron-clad contract Dumbledore had put in place after Umbridge's shenanigans. It was only a miracle no one had died to his "harmless" little friends.

Hermione had speculated that Hagrid was compensating for some love lost in his childhood by adopting animals. Unfortunately, it was not something that Hermione was specialised in when it came to the healing arts. Psychology, she said, was not always as simple as mending a bone, healing a physical scar, or putting someone's finger back on after a particularly bad Quidditch match. The mind, she had said, was fickle and unpredictable.

Severus closed his eyes. His mind, perhaps, worst of all.

Waving his hands in apology to the startled filly, Severus climbed the floating platforms up into the uppermost tiers of the garden towards the waterfall's source. The little filly pinned her ears back and then shook her head at him, almost as if she knew he wasn't here to enjoy the garden.

Think of it as one hundred stairs of penance.

Severus squared his shoulders and climbed. Hermione's quarters had balcony that opened out over the top of the arboretum. One portal led off from the Hospital wing and one led to her balcony. It was a long climb up.

Damn, I'm getting too old for this.

Well, stop saying stupid shit when you get overly emotional like a bloody tortured teenager, and maybe you wouldn't have to.

Severus didn't need Hermione to yell at him. All he had to see, really, was that closed-off Occluded coldness in her eyes after the pain had flickered there— the pain he had lashed out and put there. Then, he would torture himself for the next two decades, watch her marry some git who could never truly appreciated her, and then one day finding himself having to teach her child how not to blow themselves up in his potions class. Knowing his luck Hogwarts wouldn't let him die, either, because no one wanted to be the Potion Master of Hogwarts after Severus Snape.

Stop it. Hermione is not Lily, and if you'd stop letting your mouth run ahead of your brain and getting you in trouble, you could be the one that appreciated her.

Severus paled. What the hell was he thinking?

He arrived at the beginning of the waterfall, a glorious pool with multi-coloured koi in emerald green healing water. The water was perfectly oxygenated for the fish and plant life, and the water that spilled down from the floating islands was filtered through the roots of cleansing plants, creating water that was pure enough to use in potions. It was no small feat.

He stared over to Hermione's balcony. The shutters were open, which usually meant she was home, but he could tell that there was no one inside. Hermione wasn't home. He imagined she was out flying over the Dark Forest setting the skies ablaze to keep from setting him on fire. He resolved to wait.

Then Severus froze. Tonight they were supposed to have dinner together, as they always did on Friday evenings. There was a really good chance that she'd blow him off, but, if he didn't even bother showing up?

Torn between standing vigil over her chambers and waiting in his quarters for their standing Friday plans, Severus was a total mess of confusion and indecision. He could manage to hold his tongue in front of two bloody insane masters for decades, and yet he couldn't stop himself from proving himself the complete and utter arsemare everyone thought he was.

Everyone but her— until now.

Severus dug his fingernails into his palms and descended the stairs. He would go back to his chambers, wallow in his self-flagellation and misery when she didn't come to their appointed meeting, and then sit vigil at her door until he died of starvation or she at least told him where to go.

She is not Lily.

This time, I deserve her scorn.

There hadn't been torturing Marauders there to spurn his mouth this time. There hadn't been some true manipulation on her part. No, this time, Severus Snape had dug his own grave, and he would have to lie in it.

He retreated to his chambers like a dog with its tail between its legs.

As he passed into his chamber door and threw his outer robe over the nearby sofa, he threw himself into the nearby armchair, and let out a low groan.

"Severus Snape, you are the world's most insufferable bastard," he scolded himself. "You'd bloody deserve it if she hexed your shriveled balls off and left you with even less than you apparently already have."

Something stirred under his cast-aside robes.

Hermione pulled his robe down from her head as she closed the book she had been reading and pushed it onto the nearby coffee table. She snuggled under the robes like a blanket, staring at him with half-lidded, weary eyes.

"That wasn't a nice thing to say, Severus," she said, cuddling his old and abused couch pillow in her arms. "If you didn't want to go, it's okay to just say you don't want to go."

Severus gaped like a fish out of water, doing his best impression of a Ronald Weasley caught in headlights. He'd forgotten he'd given her a pass into his wards many years ago. Until now, she'd never used it because he'd always been there to let her in.

Hermione gave a sleepy yawn, her eyes no longer the dark Occluded and cold mirrors that they had been after his outburst. While they were not as exuberantly warm as they usually were, they were not hateful either.

"I—" Severus blurted. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it."

Hermione sniffed, inhaling some scent on his robes. "I know you didn't, Severus, but they were hurtful words. I had thought we had left those behind."

"I fear some things have never quite left me," Severus said painfully, his gaze drifting to the stone floor. "All I could think of was Albus bloody Dumbledore and how he would leave for days, months even, without a word. For a while, it was better. While he was gone, I was almost free, and then he would return. My chains were as tight as ever. My servitude was extended. I'd loathe when he left because I knew he would return."

Severus squared his jaw. "And he never failed to remind me of my place. I'm sorry. I never—"

Hermione let out her breath slowly through her nose. "Next time, if you don't want to 'rough it' out in the outback with me, Severus, just say so. I'm a big girl. I can take rejection. Merlin only knows I've had enough of that to go around. I'm starting to think I'm not human enough to understand what people need beyond the basics of food, shelter, water, and having their bodies remain healthy and intact."

"No!" Severus exclaimed, then winced, looking extremely awkward.

Hermione blinked at him.

"I would gladly suffer through any backwater condition if it meant seeing you happy," he blurted, and then, realising exactly what he had just said, he turned away painfully.

Hermione sat up on the couch. "Severus—"

"No, please, before I lose my nerve," Severus begged, his face twisting in the absolute agony of trying to put words to describe what he was feeling without letting his penchant for defensive snark and rancor get in the way. Some Slytherin you are, Severus.

"I care for you," he whispered. "I want to see you happy. I was just jealous that you could be so free. In that moment, I let my hatred for the old goat cloud my true opinion of you. A part of me believes that if I go, I will get to watch you fall for some oblivious cretin who somehow has all the looks and charm but absolutely no brain to go along with the rest of the package. I fear I would be condemned to be your colleague or friend forever— with you never knowing that I—" He trailed off, flinching.

Severus paused as Hermione was making choking sounds. He looked with with concern, thinking she was dying or some sort of freakish disbelief was killing her. Then, anger filled him as he realised she was laughing. He flushed, feeling the indignation and instinctive anger rushing through him, pushing him to do what he did best.

"Severus," Hermione said, her face flushed from laughter yet strangely serious at the same time. "What makes you think I'd have eyes for anyone else but you?"

Blink.

All of his anger went fleeing into the night, yelping like a scalded dog.

"What?" He replied, dumbfounded.

"Did you think I would invite just anyone with me to share a year in probably quite intimate conditions out in the bush?" She stared him in the eyes, her whisky brown irises flickering with inner fire.

"I—" he blinked and stumbled over himself, finding he had no idea what he could possibly say to that. Slytherin finesse? Apparently not.

"We've been colleagues now for over ten years, Severus," Hermione chided. "The last eight we have met every Friday night for dinner and conversation. Must I be more plain?"

Severus stared at her, clearly not understanding what she was trying to say.

Hermione huffed. "I will never find a young, oblivious cretin I fancy because the oblivious cretin I want is right here in front of me, you bloody stubborn sod. Would you like me to tattoo that on your forehead backwards in Aramaic?"

Severus felt a stabbing pain in the center of his chest. Was this it? Was his heart finally giving up at last?

Hermione stood up, letting Severus' heavy outer robe fall to the floor as she crossed the floor towards him. Her fingers touched the side of his face as her eyes stared deeply into his. For a moment, he saw the flash of wings— brilliant red and orange cast against the dark of the room. "You doubt me. Even now, you doubt me."

Severus flinched. "I am not the kind of man that people love."

Hermione snorted. "Well, then it is good that I am not a person then, hrm?" Vibrant wings unfolded from her back, spanning the length of the room with their splendor. They folded around her body as she shifted into her true form. Her body compacted into the shape of her avian body. A long, fiery tail extended from her as a long, ornate crest rose from her head.

She sang.

It was molten happiness. It was joy. It was love, and it was as pure as a perfect cloudless sky. It filled him up and bubbled forth, escaping the vice-like tightness of his chest. Soon, he felt tears streaming down his face as the intense and genuine emotion wrapped him tightly in the warmth of its embrace. He let out a sob of mixed wonder and pain.

Suddenly, she was human again, folding in on herself to resume the form she had assumed so many times before. First, it had been for Harry. Then, it had been for Minerva, but now, he knew she did it for him— to be with him. She wanted to be there for him.

She slowly lowered her mouth to his, pressing her lips to his in a gentle, questioning kiss.

Severus groaned, his arms folded around her body and pulling her down into the armchair with him, his hands weaving into her curly hair to press her head closer to his. He ran his fingers through her hair, feeling how close to feathers they were. He felt the velvet softness of her skin and the hint of down, the rush of heat from her fiery core, and the blazing suddenly obvious need to be so close to her that they were one the same.

Questioning no longer, Hermione let out a soft sound of desire, and Severus felt his body sing in response. He wanted, no, needed her and the soft, insistent press of her body against his.

Clothes disappeared, perhaps by hand or by magic, neither of them really waited to question it, and he worshipped her body and soul until she cried out his name in manner that sent his mind retreated for more primal concerns of claiming her as his.

Somehow, they had moved to his bed, but he didn't remember how it happened. As they merged together, her hands clawed down his back, leaving trails of magical fire.

"Hermione," he breathed.

"Don't stop," she answered him.

He shuddered, letting himself go to pure instinct, drowning in the sounds of her pleasured gasps. He felt himself reach the shining bright point as he arrived at the edge of the Abyss and cast himself in it, breathing her name out into her ear as he did.

They lay together, entwined, minutes to hours after. Unknown to him, dark red and orange trails of colour were forming down his back, forming realistic phoenix wings just under the skin— the mark of one phoenix's love to her chosen mate in all its glory.

"Does this mean you'll come with me to Australia?" Hermione whispered into his ear.

Severus pulled her tightly against his chest. "Try and stop me."

Hermione's eyes drifted close slowly. "Mmm, I have you right where I want you at last. I think I will be your enabler instead."

As the soft touch her lips moved against his neck, Severus growled and set about enabling Hermione right back.

For some reason, she wasn't protesting.

He was fine with that.

In the distant future…

The dark-haired wizard put his hand under the sleepy red and orange phoenix and exposed two sleepy chicks. The pair stared blearily at him, pecking at his fingers as he cupped them in his hands. One was the blackish blue of the midnight sky, and the other was a flaming red and orange of his mother.

The female chick yawned beakily, her black head crest lifting curiously from her head feathers. Her red and orange brother tugged on her head crest with his beak feistily.

"Psh," Severus scolded, using his fingers to separate the siblings from going for each other's eyes as he carried them off with him so he could attend to getting the chores done and relieve Hermione of their incessant neediness for a time.

Fawkes arrived soon after in the kitchen window, warbling a greeting as he flew in with two of Hermione's long-lost siblings. They had visited almost every day to help with the grand-chicks and Severus with the adjustment of being assimilated into the phoenix family now that Fawkes had successfully found all of his transfigured egg-napped progeny.

Unlike Hermione, who still kept her human shape for Severus' sake, her siblings had renounced humanity's shape in preference for their phoenix heritage thanks to having been betrayed at birth by one infamous meddling wizard. It didn't stop them from wanting to get to know Severus, however, and all three adult phoenixes would sit and stare at him attentively, asking for permission to delve into his mind to get to know him better.

At first, he thought it would be like when the Dark Lord or Albus used Legilimency on him, but the magical birds were far more gentle, curious to the extreme, but genuinely happy for him. In exchange for humouring them, he would get pieces of the phoenixs' history as well, and he got the feeling they were prepping him to help teach his progeny their heritage as best he could before they were old enough to handle mind-to-mind teaching.

Hermione, however, preferred to get to know Severus the human way:questions. She had always been insufferably curious, and now that he know how bloody curious her family was, he began to recall how much she had always been a phoenix under her forced entrapment of a human body. He didn't mind though. As time passed from their first and most important union, he wanted her to know everything. He didn't want there to be secrets anymore. And with each coupling, the scars of his mind had begun to heal as completely as her magic had healed his physical scars. He finally felt— free.

The miracle of Hermione's being laden with egg, however, had been a turning point. Hermione had sang with such joyous welcome when her damp chicks tore free from the heavy shells of their protective eggs. As the two sets of loving, adoring eyes focused on him, Severus knew he would do anything, be anything, become anything to protect both them and Hermione.

Perhaps, some Elder god had been listening to his soulfelt wish in that moment of epiphany and judged his self-torture and loathing at an end. Severus didn't know, but he did know that was the first day his core had been filled with fire.

Now, ever so slowly as the weeks and months passed as he took care of his chicks, he was noticing changes that would come upon him and fade, as if it was preparing him little by little for an inevitable end: a strange feeling of pressure from his back as though the magically marked wings on his back were real and going to burst from his shoulders at any moment, the rise of strangely distinctive black crest of feathers from his head when he looked upon his children or his mate, the growing hunger for all things fruit, and a growing desire to sing.

Severus, however, wasn't afraid. He wanted to be there for his mate and chicks. He wanted to teach them the songs of his life, the history of the man who screwed everything up and yet found redemption. He wanted to fly with them, wing-tip-to-wing-tip under the cast of the sun and moon, to shelter them under his wings, and to curve his neck around Hermione's and sing of how much he loved her— body and soul.

After Severus assisted Fawkes and his two sons stuff food into the chick's gaping, every hungry beaks, his fluffy lint-ball son and daughter let out a soft warble of song, filling Severus with such pure love that tears came to his eyes. Fawkes and his sons harmonised with them, and Severus felt something resonate in his core, bursting from his chest as warmth unlike anything he had ever experienced radiated from his body.

Fire was spreading across his skin as feathers sprouted over his skin. He doubled over, body convulsing, twisting, changing as it struggled to remake itself. Yet, Severus felt no pain. All he could feel was the love of his chicks, the love his unexpected family, and the love of his mate.

He wanted it.

He needed it.

He surrendered to it.

Severus cried out, but it came out as a warble, his voice changing as the rest of him was. His robes fell as wings burst from his back in a cascade of midnight feathers and a tail of long plumes grew like a waterfall down his back and away. His arms had disappeared, but his legs had bent, twisted, and transformed into talons. Meanwhile, his cells were busy remembering exactly how they were being transformed so he, like Hermione, could shift back and forth and preserve their human identity in a world that wasn't ready to understand just yet.

He staggered around the floor, awkward, almost drunkenly, unused to wings where his arms would be and talons where his feet should be. He tripped over his own long train of a tail. Severus let out a disorientated chirp.

His two fluffy lintballs assaulted him immediately, hopping down to the floor to warble and snuggle up to his body. Fawkes and his sons landed next to him and began the long process of preening him from head to toe as they made sure all of him was in working order.

As time passed, Severus felt the drive to preen his chicks, and he pinned each of them down as he tended each one and then sat on top of them, brooding over them with his new body, creating a makeshift nest out of his cast aside robes.

Fawkes warbled his approval, and Severus felt the contentment radiate off his inlaws— joy that he embraced the magic that allowed him to truly provide for his mate and chicks, happiness that he would not pass away and leave his mate alone and pining for him when the span of the human lifespan would eventually dim and go out.

While part of Severus pondered if it was some Elder God's will in combination with a certain group of phoenixes wishing their in-law to truly be one of the family, the rest of him didn't even care what had allowed his body to embrace to change. His chicks were safe. His mate would not be alone. His heart was full of love for his family. It was all that mattered.

Fawkes hacked up a gooseberry and offered it to Severus, his black eyes shining with approval.

Severus tore into it, ripping off small pieces for his chicks before making the rest disappear. Fawkes and his sons began to sing, joined by his sleepy, fluffy chicks, and Severus, for the first time, added his voice to the song.

Hermione rubbed her eyes sleepily as she walked into the library of their shared cottage. She smiled as their two chicks lay sleeping on Severus' chest as he had passed out on the lounge chair.

She leaned over him and gently pressed a kiss to his lips. The Dark wizard had finally found his way into the life he didn't think he deserved, but Hermione was content in knowing that in the end, it had brought them together.

As she stared at the two fluffy progeny that had made a makeshift nest of black down and feathers on top of Severus' human chest, Hermione felt all the love she had fill her up.

Her's was a story of a stolen chick forced to be human who in the end chose to wear a human shape to be with the ones she loved.

His was a story of a failed human being who scraped his way back into light of compassion and love, and in the end, surrendered all of what he was to become something else due to the strength of his love for his family.

Together, they would face anything.

Hermione snuggled up to him on the armchair, wrapping her arms around her mate as he slept away obliviously, a soft warble of breath coming from his human vocal cords. She pressed her face into his mixture of hair and feathers, now so much like hers.

"I love you," she sang softly into his ear.

Severus' eyes opened sleepily and he pulled her close, cradling their chicks between the press of their bodies, forming a nest between them. His fluffy son and daughter yawned beakily and snuggled between them with a content mutual sigh.

"And I you" he replied, pressing his lips to hers before tucking her head under his chin. "Always."

-o-o-o-o-o- FIN -o-o-o-o-o-

A/N: I just needed something that ended fluffy! ARRRRGHHH!