Snape wants to be disappointed in Draco. For his inability to be silent, to control his reactions, his emotions, the pain he feels. To take it like a man, as a muggle-born or mudblood might be used to hearing. But there was more to it than that, more than muggle notions of masculinity. It was about control, about having control over your own body even if you have control of nothing else in the world. Not what happens to it, surely, what it feels, but how it reacts, whether the show it puts on satisfies or remains indifferent.

The truth is, if he's honest, if he looks deep enough, he wants Draco like this. Out of control and needing him. Needing this. Needing a hard touch, guidance, discipline.

"I said quiet," he lingers heavily on that last word, mouthing it slowly into the air between them as Draco is even still now reacting. Back arching, hands coming up beneath his face, head coming up, still defiant.

"The count won't begin until you manage to control yourself," he says softly, not letting on what that number is. "Again," he announces, and this time the blow comes sooner, but he waits until buttocks relax again from that involuntary clench, and this blow is just as hard, to the as yet untouched cheek. He's satisfied to see pink spreading over his pale skin, roughly in the shape of his own hand.