alsoooo I have a friend who's getting into posting her art and trying to get commissions and here's her most recent one. I believe this is a dream Taigen had. no matter how much he denies it...wink wink. so please do go check her out, girls gotta EAT.
Trigger Warning: Enemies to Lovers, stabbing, curses, abusive parents, cuss words, inappropriate use of a wand, penetration, sexual intercourse, oral sex, fellatio, cunnilingus, raging bitches, they want to kill each other, got them together for the plot ngl, bookstagram ahh fic.
Authors Note: HELLLOOOOO EVERYONE THIS HAD BEEN IN MY REQUESTS FOR A LONG TIME AND I FINALLY FINISHED IT. i honestly wrote this and scrapped it 5 different times before I was somewhat satisfied with it. I suck ass at writing enemies to lover honestly but eh I TRIED MY BEST OKAY TT also the banner was designed by my friend so please go support her she is an AMAZING designer and does poster and everything go check her out
here is my MASTERLIST
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synopsis:
"A Gryffindor and a Slytherin—Kim Izuku and the girl he can’t stand—locked in a rivalry so bitter it could set the castle aflame. Every encounter is a battle of wit and venom, every glance a silent dare. But when hate burns this fiercely, it has a way of turning into something just as dangerous.
The mop squeaked against the stone floor, the bristles leaving behind streaks of water that refused to dry properly. Her shoulders burned with every push, stiff and useless beneath the curse that seemed to coil tighter the longer she worked. She kept her eyes locked on the floor, because if she looked up—if she saw the smug little looks the professors shot her way, the faint murmur of “at least she’s well-behaved for once”—she was going to snap.
She could hear them in her head, their clipped voices dripping with relief that the notorious viper had finally been reduced to scrubbing the dungeons like some common servant. As if she were a rabid dog, finally muzzled.
Her jaw ached from how hard she clenched her teeth. Well-behaved. The word curdled in her gut, acidic and humiliating. She wanted to laugh in their faces, rip their throats open with the sheer sharpness of her words, remind them she was no meek little thing to be praised for obedience. She wanted to set their heads on spikes and line the corridors with them, just to watch the fear replace their relief.
Instead, she kept scrubbing. Miserable. Reduced. Pathetic.
Her wand hand twitched at her side, useless and empty without the length of wood she’d snapped in that fight with Namjoon. Every muscle screamed for her to do something, to lash out, but her body betrayed her. The mop handle dragged against her palm, rough, splintering, like it knew she wasn’t meant for this kind of degradation.
And the worst part? The silence. She hated it. No insults flying, no banter, no gleeful cruelty. Just the scrape of a mop and the hollow echo of her own thoughts growing darker and darker with every pass.
Across the room, Namjoon worked too, his back straight, his movements methodical, every stroke of his rag looking irritatingly natural, as if this punishment barely fazed him. And though he hadn’t spoken a word yet, she could feel it coming—the snark, the jab, the little verbal dagger he always had ready.
She was already glaring at the floor so hard it blurred, fingers twitching like claws. If he so much as breathed wrong, she’d rip him apart, silence curse or not.
Namjoon wrung out the rag in the bucket, watching the water swirl dark before he slapped it back onto the flagstones. From the corner of his eye, he caught her.
Her back was rigid, too straight for comfort, her shoulders stiff as if the mop weighed more than a mountain. To anyone else, she might’ve looked—Merlin forbid—serene. Like she’d finally learned humility, like she was doing her penance with quiet acceptance.
But Namjoon knew better. He knew the way her fury lived in every muscle, the way her glare burned holes in the floor with each drag of the mop. She looked small. Not in the way she carried herself, no—she could still sneer down at anyone if she wanted—but in the way her body was betraying her, caught somewhere between exhaustion and rage.
It rubbed him the wrong way.
He hated it.
This wasn’t her. She was venom and fire and noise, always too much. The silence, the fragile stillness—it made his stomach twist in a way he didn’t like. He’d wanted her to shut up, sure, but this wasn’t victory. This was…something else. Something that felt like watching her unravel.
His grip tightened around the rag, guilt gnawing sharp at his gut. The silence curse. He hadn’t lifted it yet, had let it linger because he’d thought it would be funny, satisfying, a chance to breathe without her constant tirades. But now? Seeing her like this—rigid, burning, furious but trapped—he wasn’t sure if he’d gone too far.
Namjoon straightened, tossing the rag aside with a wet slap. He leaned his shoulder against the wall, eyes narrowing on her as she kept scrubbing, movements jerky and violent enough to make the mop squeal against the stone.
“You know,” he said finally, voice deliberately casual, “you look like you’re trying to murder the floor.”
She froze mid-swipe, head snapping toward him, and even without her voice he could feel the snarl radiating off her. Her eyes, usually sharp with mischief or smugness, were ablaze with a fury so raw it made his throat tighten.
For a second, he almost undid the spell. Almost.
But then her glare sharpened further, promising a thousand curses and insults the second she could speak again, and his lips curved into a crooked smirk.
“Not that I’d blame you,” he added, tilting his head. “Stone’s about the only thing left around here that hasn’t tried to hex me on your behalf.”
Namjoon expected her to lunge at him, or at least glare harder until her eyes burned holes through his skull. What he didn’t expect was for her to pause, slowly set the mop aside, and lift both hands.
Her fingers moved sharp, cutting through the air with deliberate precision.
Fuck yourself.
His brow furrowed.
Then her hands shifted again, quick and merciless.
And while you’re at it, hang off Merlin’s balls.
Namjoon blinked. Then blinked again. “What the—”
Her expression didn’t waver. She made the sign again, slower this time, like a teacher indulging a particularly dense student. Fuck. Yourself. Hang. Off. Merlin’s. Balls.
Namjoon actually choked, caught between outrage and disbelief. “You—you know sign language?”
She rolled her eyes as if he were the idiot here, then gave him a sugary little wave that could only mean congratulations, you caught up.
He dragged a hand down his face. “Unbelievable. Even silenced, you find new ways to be insufferable.”
Her smirk sharpened, eyes glittering. She mimed zipping her mouth, locking it, and tossing away the key—then jabbed her thumb toward him in the universal sign for loser.
Namjoon let out a short, incredulous laugh, then flicked his wand with a huff. The curse shattered, her voice snapping back into existence like a whipcrack.
“The hell even is your problem?” he demanded, glaring at her.
“My problem?” she shot back instantly, her voice ragged but venomous, delighted to finally let the words loose. “You put a bloody silence curse on me for what—fun? To stroke your oversized Gryffindor ego? You really are insufferable.”
He threw his hands up. “You stabbed me in the shoulder! Forgive me for not trusting your mouth—or your hands—for five damn minutes.”
Her lip curled. “I should’ve gone for the heart.”
“Yeah?” He leaned forward, eyes flashing. “Then maybe you wouldn’t be stuck here scrubbing floors like a house-elf!”
“Better a house-elf than a hypocritical saint who thinks his halo doesn’t smell like shit!” she snarled back.
Their voices ricocheted off the dungeon walls, insults flying like sparks, venom and fury pulling the silence apart piece by piece until the room felt like it might collapse around them.
Namjoon’s rag hit the bucket with a wet slap, water splattering onto his robes, but he didn’t care. His jaw was tight, his voice low but sharp enough to cut.
“You know what?” he said, shaking his head like he was trying to knock sense into himself. “I don’t get you. I really don’t. You’ve been on my case since the day we stepped foot on the damn train. Every breath I take, every time I so much as look in your direction—you’re there. With that smirk, that little laugh, those bloody digs. Why? What did I ever do to you?”
She froze with her mop half-raised, eyes flashing at him like a snake catching movement in the grass. Then her lips curled, slow and venomous.
“Oh, poor Saint Namjoon,” she purred, dragging the words out like poison dripping from her tongue. “The Gryffindor golden boy doesn’t understand why the big, bad Slytherin is mean to him. Boo-fucking-hoo.”
Namjoon’s nostrils flared. “That’s not an answer.”
Her smirk sharpened. “Maybe I just can’t stand your face. Ever think of that? The way you strut around, all high-and-mighty, like Hogwarts should fall to its knees just because you walked in the room? It’s pathetic.”
His temper snapped like a bowstring. He stalked closer, boots hitting the wet stone with sharp echoes. “You think I’m the one strutting? You’ve done nothing but look down on everyone since day one. You treat people like they’re stepping stones, like you’re untouchable.”
“Because I am untouchable,” she hissed, stepping up to him without flinching, the mop clattering forgotten to the floor. “Unlike you, Kim Namjoon, whose whole bloody identity is Hogwarts. You’re nothing outside of these walls. Nothing but a filthy muggle-born pretending to be a saint.”
Her voice cracked—not with weakness but with fury—and the words hit him harder than any spell. His hands curled into fists.
“And you’re just a spoiled brat playing villain because it’s easier than admitting no one loves you!” he shot back.
For a moment, the air went still. Her eyes widened, then narrowed into slits, and Namjoon knew he’d crossed a line—but he didn’t step back.
She shoved him, hard, chest heaving. “Say that again.”
He bared his teeth. “You heard me.”
Her whole body trembled, but her voice was steady as a blade when she spat, “I’ve hated you since the moment I met you. And I’ll hate you till the day I die.”
Namjoon’s breath hitched, his chest heaving as her words sliced through the damp dungeon air.
“You wanna go on and on about how I’ve been on your case?” she snarled, jabbing a finger into his chest. “But tell me this, Kim Namjoon—have you ever once, once, been nice to me? You preach all that Gryffindor, high-horse, bullshit about kindness and honesty, about being the golden boy, about standing up for what’s right—when in reality you’re a judgy little twat with a stick so far up your ass it’s poking out of your bloody mouth.”
Namjoon’s teeth ground together, heat sparking in his chest. “Of course I’ve been like that with you! What else was I supposed to do when all you’ve ever done is bitch and sneer at me—?”
Her laugh was jagged, violent. “Bitch at you? You pompous, self-righteous fuck, you think eleven-year-old me—scared out of her mind about being shipped off to this hobo, witchy-woo castle—was bitching when I sat down next to you? When I asked you one stupid little question because you looked reliable?”
Namjoon blinked, caught off guard by the sudden crack of honesty beneath the venom. “What—”
Her eyes blazed, cutting off his thought. “And you looked at me like I was filth stuck to the bottom of your pristine fucking shoes. All huffy, all offended, like how dare the disgusting little snake open her mouth in the presence of Gryffindor royalty. That’s why I stole your chocolate frog. Because you sat there clutching your stupid card like it was a holy relic, and when I asked ‘whatcha reading?’ you looked at me like I’d pissed on your altar.”
He opened his mouth, shut it again, memories slamming into him—her smug smirk masking the nervous energy in the way her legs wouldn’t stop fidgeting, the way she kicked the seat in bursts like she couldn’t keep still, the way she’d plopped down next to him without hesitation but her hands had been trembling just faintly when she shoved them into her pockets.
His throat was dry. “You—” He shook his head, scoffing like he could laugh it off. “You nicked my frog.”
“Because you were looking at me like I was a roach crawling over your scripture, you self-important bastard!” she spat, eyes wet, voice rising until it cracked. “Don’t you dare stand there and act like I was the villain from the start. You’ve been the same since day one—judgmental, cruel in your own clean little way. You smile, you get praised, you’re the paragon of bloody Gryffindor—but you’re a hypocrite, Namjoon. A sanctimonious, mean, frog-hoarding, fuck-eating bastard.”
The silence after was deafening. Namjoon’s jaw locked, words lodged in his throat as the memory of that train ride burned clearer than ever, raw in ways he hadn’t allowed himself to see before.
Namjoon’s hands curled into fists, his voice cracking like thunder.
“Yeah? Well I did try to be nice to you. I did! And every single time, you treated me like I was dirt, like I was nothing. You humiliated me, mocked me over and over again, in front of everyone—like it was your bloody hobby. Don’t you dare act like you were some poor little victim in this.”
Her laugh tore from her throat, wild and venom-dripped. “Oh, sure. Nice. I’ll accept that. I’ll accept you being nice to me while you slither back to your little Gryffindor circle and call me a poisonous viper, a snake, untrustworthy, unreliable, selfish, manipulative, soulless—do I need to go on?” She stepped closer, jabbing her finger hard into his chest again, every word hitting like a dagger. “Because people talk, Kim Namjoon. Don’t think for one second I didn’t hear it all. Your little group of halo-polishing losers never shuts up.”
Namjoon’s breath hissed through his teeth. He remembered the words. Of course he did. He remembered saying them, spitting them in frustration when she wasn’t there, when he thought it was safe. The way Seokjin had frowned, Yoongi had raised his brows, Hoseok had winced but said nothing. They hadn’t disagreed. They hadn’t defended her. None of them had.
“Yeah, I said it,” Namjoon shot back, jaw tight, fury and shame blending until he didn’t know which was stronger. “I said it because every single day you proved me right! You are a viper, you are selfish, you are untrustworthy. You smile that smug smile, and people lap it up, but all you ever do is tear them down when their backs are turned.”
Her eyes burned, wet with something rawer than rage. She shoved him hard enough that he staggered back, boots slipping slightly on the wet floor.
Her chest heaved with ragged breaths, but the tears slipping down her cheeks betrayed her more than any crack in her voice ever could. She despised it—despised him—for pulling them out of her, for making her feel like this in front of him of all people.
Namjoon’s words lingered in the air, poisonous and true, replaying in her head until they were indistinguishable from her own thoughts. Viper. Selfish. Untrustworthy. The labels carved into her flesh like curses she could never scrub away. Because that’s all anyone ever saw, wasn’t it? A mask. A sneer. Something venomous and sharp, easier to fear than to understand.
And it hurt—Merlin, it hurt—that not one single person in this damned world loved her. Not her parents, who only ever reminded her she was an inconvenience. Not her so-called friends, because she never really had any to begin with. That was the price of being “untouchable.” No one could force her, no one could hold her down, no one could make her bend. But it also meant no one would reach her, no one would hold her, no one would love her.
She was alone. Alone in a castle brimming with warmth and laughter, and yet she might as well have been locked in a fortress with walls so high not even the warmest rays of sunshine could seep through.
She pressed the heel of her palm against her eye, furious with herself for letting him see the cracks, for letting her armor slip for even a moment. But the words clawed out of her throat anyway, sharp with venom even as they broke.
“You’re right,” she spat, voice trembling, bitter tears staining her cheeks. “I am a viper. I am selfish. I am untrustworthy. That’s all anyone ever says, isn’t it? So fine. That’s who I’ll be. Better that than pathetic. Better that than weak. Better that than… begging for someone to see me.”
Her eyes snapped up to his, blazing even through the tears. “So go ahead, Namjoon. Hate me. It’s what you’re best at.”
Namjoon’s tongue pressed against the inside of his cheek, words ready to spill—but they lodged there, heavy and sharp, refusing to come.
Her tears cut through him like a blade he hadn’t seen coming. She was supposed to hiss, snarl, bare her teeth like she always did. She was supposed to smirk that insufferable smirk and throw his words back at him twice as vile. That was their rhythm. That was safe.
But this—this brittle girl before him, shaking, her shoulders rigid as though she could physically hold herself together against the flood—unsettled him. She always unsettled him, but this time it was different. This wasn’t her usual venom meant to rile him until he snapped. This was raw. Wounded. Almost pleading, even if her pride would rather she bite her tongue in half than admit it.
He hated how the thought crept in, unbidden: Had I been kinder? Had I used my words differently—just once—would we be standing in the same place?
His stomach twisted. The weight of it pressed down on him, dragging his pride into silence.
“Y/N…” The name left him quieter than he meant, like a slip of weakness. He shut his mouth fast, jaw clenching.
He couldn’t look at her like this—couldn’t think about what it meant that all this time he might have been sharpening her edges with his own cruelty, feeding the viper she’d become. It was easier to hate her when he didn’t wonder what made her bare her fangs in the first place.
But he couldn’t tear his eyes away either.
“You…” he started, voice rough, breaking before he dragged it back under control. He scoffed instead, turning his face as though that would hide the shift in him. “You’re exhausting, you know that? Always tearing yourself apart before anyone else gets the chance.”
It wasn’t an insult. Not really. And he hated himself for it.
Namjoon tried —truly tryied—to be rational, to rein the storm in. But of course, she snapped, kicked his shin hard enough to make him hiss. Reflex—pure, stupid reflex—had him grabbing her forearms, yanking her closer with a roughness that normally matched their fire-for-fire exchanges.
But the sound that tore out of her wasn’t a curse or another insult.
It was a yelp. A whimper. Raw, pained, small.
His grip slackened instantly, his eyes flicking down—and that’s when he saw it. The heat radiating off her. Her skin nearly searing beneath his hands. His gut clenched as he pushed up her sleeve before she could fight him off, and what he saw nearly made his breath hitch.
Her palm was shredded. Scratches crisscrossed it, welts raised angry red, as though invisible glass had carved her open from the inside out. Blood was smeared faint against her wrist, her nails caked with dried crimson where she’d clawed herself raw.
“Bloody hell…” His voice cracked low, barely audible, horror bleeding through the usual sharpness.
She jerked, tried to wrench away, but he didn’t let her. Not this time. Namjoon’s instincts flared, overbearing, furious—not at her, but at whatever bastard spell had been etched into her since childhood. He forced her down onto the nearest bench, ignoring her growls, her twisting limbs.
“Namjoon, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING—” she screeched, thrashing.
“Shut up,” he snapped, but his tone wasn’t their usual sparring bite. It was too frantic. Too scared. His fingers clawed at the hem of her shirt, tugging it up despite her pushing, her fists pounding weakly against his shoulders.
“Stop—get off me—you disgusting—”
But then her shirt rode up enough and he saw it.
And he wished he hadn’t.
The welts spread across her stomach, her ribs, up toward her chest—angry ridges of magic-burn, pulsing faintly, like the curse was alive, feasting on her suffering. Her skin looked as though knives had been dragged across it in a hundred tiny cuts. And she was trembling, every muscle spasming under the strain.
For once, words failed him. He could only stare, his breath coming sharp through his teeth, guilt and fury warring across his face.
And she—humiliated, cornered—snarled at him, trying to cover herself, to shove him away. But her arms were weak, shaking, betraying her even as her mouth spat venom.
“Look your fill, you twisted bastard,” she spat hoarsely, eyes glistening with pain and fury. “This what you wanted? To see me broken? To see me bleed?”
Namjoon’s jaw clenched, knuckles white where he gripped the fabric at her side. His voice, when it came, was low. Dangerous.
The atmosphere between them shifted, thick with unspoken tension, as Namjoon’s hand hovered uncertainly over her injured arm. He had been frantic, moving too quickly, a tangle of nerves and guilt driving his actions. The calming spell had been his first impulse, a quick fix to something he had no idea how to handle. But as soon as it hit her skin, he saw the ripple of something worse—a terrible, immediate reaction. Her entire body stiffened, her face contorted in agony as her hands shot up, trying to shield herself from whatever new terror the spell had unleashed.
"STOP! DON'T HURT ME! PLEASE, NO!" Her voice cracked, desperate, the words tearing out like a plea she had never intended to voice. Her chest heaved with shallow breaths, a rapid rhythm that mirrored her panic.
Namjoon froze.
The air between them felt like a jagged blade, harsh, impossible to ignore. His hand had instinctively dropped back to his side, and the sudden weight of her fear pressed down on him, like a crushing weight of ice and fire. His pulse hammered in his temples as he processed her words. His gut twisted in a way he couldn’t understand. Hurt me—she thought the spell was hurting her.
He blinked, and then the reality of it hit him like a punch to the chest.
It wasn’t the spell that hurt her—it was everything else.
The pain, the trauma that had long been carved into her skin, the curse that was dragging her back to the same nightmares she’d lived through since she was five. Her life was the constant, overwhelming ache, and he had just added to it.
“Hey… hey, it’s okay,” he murmured, instinctively stepping back, holding up his hands as though to give her the space she had desperately needed. His voice softened, and despite his frustration, despite the bite of fear in his own chest, he could feel the desperation seeping through. “It’s not going to hurt you anymore. It’s okay.”
The words felt hollow in his throat, but he could only try.
She was trembling, her eyes wide with terror, tears streaking down her pale face. It was so obvious now—the curse wasn’t just something that tormented her mind, it was something that had sunk deep into her bones. She was on the edge, every part of her guarded, every muscle in her body rigid with a kind of tension he hadn’t known existed in her. And he—he had just added more fuel to that fire.
Her breath came in broken gasps, and her eyes narrowed in distrust. “Don’t,” she whispered, hoarse, raw. “Don’t you dare...”
He sucked in a breath. She was right. He had no idea what she was going through. He had no idea what she was living with, no idea how deep the damage went, no idea that his spell had just made it worse. But as much as she was breaking, as much as she needed space, she wasn’t going to give it to him. She didn’t want him to fix it. She didn’t want him to try to fix it. Not from him.
Namjoon reached for his wand, hands shaking slightly as he took a deep breath. He had no right to do this. She was still looking at him, eyes burning with defiance, but there was a flicker of something else there. It was the tiniest crack in the fortress she had built around herself. But it was enough.
“I’m going to help you,” he said again, more firmly this time. He stepped back to give her some space, feeling the weight of the moment pressing down on him. “Just for a second. I need you to breathe, okay?”
She glared at him, lips trembling with something unspoken, but she didn’t pull away. Her breath was shaky, her body still tense—but it seemed like the raw, broken part of her was finally letting him in, just the smallest bit.
Namjoon took the chance. His hand reached for the sleeve of his robe, tugging it up. He didn’t have the time to process everything that had just happened, didn’t have time to worry about what was going through her mind. He only knew one thing for certain: he had to fix it. This. Right now.
Blood rituals. He had read about them, once, when he’d snuck into the restricted section of the library. He hadn’t been prepared for something like this, though. His pulse quickened as his mind raced, running through the fragmented bits of knowledge he had from that moment in the library. He would have to do this right, or it could make things worse.
“You’re going to feel pain,” he muttered, half to himself as he took his wand in hand again. She didn’t say anything, but the slight twitch in her jaw told him everything he needed to know.
The ritual wasn’t supposed to be performed lightly, especially with a curse this deep. It required a connection, something raw and powerful to break the loop—like a sacrifice of sorts, a bloodletting. But Namjoon didn’t care about that right now. He couldn’t care about it. All he could focus on was her—her fragile, shaking form—and the fact that whatever twisted magic her parents had laid on her had only gotten worse.
Namjoon’s hand hovered above her skin, his heart hammering, before he pressed his wrist against her palm, forcing the connection.
The curse would respond to that blood. But this—this would also be dangerous.
“What are you doing?” she whispered, hoarse, her voice still trembling. There was a flicker of fear in her eyes, but something else—something that almost resembled hope. She didn’t know if she should let it in.
“I’m breaking it.” His voice was steady, despite everything.
Before she could protest, Namjoon gritted his teeth and muttered the incantation. The connection surged, the blood magic beginning to work its way into the curse. The curse had its hooks in her, but now it was fighting against the new magic—fighting him. The room buzzed with a strange, suffocating energy, and for a split second, Namjoon felt a flicker of what she had endured. It wasn’t just the physical pain. It wasn’t just the scars. It was the loss. The isolation.
The fear.
Her whole life, he realized in that moment, had been her fighting alone. She had built the walls around herself, brick by brick, and he had just kicked down the door.
And now—now, she was letting him in. Even if she didn’t want to.
Namjoon’s focus sharpened, his hand pressing down harder. His wrist throbbed as the ritual took hold, but he couldn’t stop now. Not with her looking at him like that, not with the faint tremor of hope in her eyes.
Her skin burned where their blood had met.
She winced, but she didn’t pull away. She didn’t tell him to stop.
But he felt the weight of her words echo in his mind. “I don’t need your pity…”
The process was agonizing. The burn of the spell, the press of his blood against her skin, the constant thrum of pain pulsing through her veins—it was unbearable. Every inch of her body screamed at her to shove him away, to push him off and make him pay for daring to touch her like this. The disgust was almost too much to bear, her thoughts a blur of furious rejection, of how he had no right to be this close. He was a Gryffindor. A smug, insufferable little Gryffindor who had done nothing but make her life hell since she set foot at Hogwarts.
But the pain... the raw, unrelenting agony that twisted beneath her skin was starting to fade. It was like a heavy fog lifting, the kind that made her eyelids droop with an almost peaceful, exhausted sensation. Her thoughts started to slow, becoming less frantic. Her body went limp, and the rage she had fought to hold onto slowly dissolved in the wake of the odd, almost euphoric drowsiness creeping in. The burn on her skin softened, and she barely noticed when her legs buckled beneath her, the last shred of consciousness slipping away as her body collapsed onto him.
Namjoon’s arm instinctively wrapped around her, steadying her before she could fall, pulling her against him as if she weighed nothing. His heart was hammering, the spell’s backlash taking its toll. His nose bled freely, the result of the intense strain he’d placed on his body with the ritual. He could feel the cold trickle of blood running down his chin, but he barely cared. Not when her body was so light in his arms, her face slack with unconsciousness, her breath shallow.
She was so broken, and it made him sick. Sick to his core that he had been part of that. But he had done this for her, hadn’t he? She hadn’t asked for it—hell, she had fought him every step of the way—but now, at least, the magic was broken. The curse was gone. It had to be. There was no other reason for her to have fallen into such an exhausted stupor.
He carried her through the castle with a surprising tenderness, the weight of her body pressing into his chest. Every step felt heavy, but somehow, he couldn’t stop himself. He didn’t even know why he was doing this—why he cared enough to see it through, to take her to the medical wing, to make sure she was safe. He had always believed that she was too far gone, too wrapped up in her own misery to ever let anyone close. But now, with her fragile body against his, it felt wrong to just let her go.
The journey was short, though the distance between the two of them seemed to stretch on endlessly. He reached the medical wing, the soft whisper of the castle’s stone walls guiding him as he approached one of the beds.
He laid her down gently, his breath coming in short, shaky bursts as he tried to steady himself. The air in the room seemed thicker now, the hum of the night heavy with tension. He watched her for a moment, her chest rising and falling in that slow, steady rhythm that calmed his own heartbeat.
But Namjoon’s gaze was drawn to the blood on his hands. His sleeve was stained, his fingertips slick with crimson, and the blood trickling from his nose had soaked through the fabric of his shirt. The reality of what he had just done hit him like a punch to the gut, and he couldn’t look away. He had used her blood to break the curse. That was what it took. That’s what had been necessary. And the part of him that had wanted to get this over with, that had pushed through her fear and her resistance, now felt hollow, as if something had been taken from him too.
But it was done. The spell was lifted. She was free from whatever invisible shackles had held her, and in the end, wasn’t that what mattered?
He wiped his face with the back of his hand, the blood smearing across his cheek. There was no one else here—no one but him and her. Namjoon stood for a long time, not knowing what to do with himself, with the weight of everything that had happened. But slowly, he sank into the chair beside her bed, his body feeling like it had been drained of every ounce of energy.
A part of him wanted to yell at her, to demand that she wake up and apologize. For everything. For how she had treated him, for how she had dismissed him. But another part of him, a quieter, more reluctant part, knew that the anger had never been the problem. The problem had always been how they had both been trying to protect themselves from the world. From each other.
And for a brief moment, as he sat in the quiet, watching her sleep, he wondered if they had both been wrong from the beginning.
But no answers came.
And all he could do was sit in silence, watching the rise and fall of her chest, feeling an inexplicable weight pressing on him.
When Y/N awoke, the first thing she noticed was the heat. It wasn’t the intense burn of the spell, nor the searing pain of her body’s rebellion against the curse. That was gone. The welts on her palms, the scratches that had marred her skin—those were gone too. But there was something else. A deep, throbbing heat that buzzed beneath her skin, a fever that left her drenched in sweat and uncomfortable.
She didn’t know how long she had been out, but when she reached up to touch her forehead, the coolness of the sheets beneath her felt strange. She was aware of the absence of pain, of the quiet stillness that surrounded her. And for the first time in what felt like forever, she realized she was not trapped in that constant agony.
Namjoon wasn’t there.
Her eyes flickered around the room, taking in the sterile, clean white walls of the medical wing, the soft rustling of the sheets around her. No sign of him. It was a relief, she supposed. The last thing she wanted was for him to gloat over her being weakened, to smirk at her in that stupid, Gryffindor way he always did.
But as she pulled herself into a sitting position, her limbs aching with the aftereffects of the spell, she couldn’t quite shake the irritation gnawing at her insides. She didn’t know why. Maybe it was the silence of the room, the emptiness, or maybe it was the heat surging through her veins that made everything feel off-kilter.
She had to get back at him. She wasn’t going to let him have the last word.
Grabbing her wand from the nightstand, Y/N barely spared a glance at the crumpled sheet of parchment she conjured up. It wasn’t a particularly grand spell—just something juvenile, childish, but effective. Her wand waved in the air and, with a flick of her wrist, the note appeared. It was a piece of parchment scrawled in her messy handwriting, clearly written in her haze of feverish delirium.
“Namjoon Kim, you think you’re clever, don’t you? I’ll have you know that the next time you try to fix me, I’ll shove that wand so far down your throat, you’ll wish you had never been born. Oh, and remember this: I will find out where you sleep. Consider this a warning. Oh, and don’t ever think I’ll forget what you did to me. I will find you. -Y/N.”
It wasn’t the most eloquent message, but it was effective. The venom she could barely control was clear in every word. The childish touch of her fever-induced fury leaked through the lines, making it almost endearing in a way that only a person who hated everything about the world could make it.
She sent it off with a flick of her wand, watching as it folded itself up and disappeared in a puff of smoke, the magic swirling toward the direction of Namjoon’s quarters. It took a minute for the spell to complete, but when it did, Y/N let out a satisfied sigh. She knew how he would react to it.
It was a small act of defiance. She wasn’t the girl who let things slide, especially not after what had happened. The hurt, the anger, the betrayal—everything was still there, clinging to her like the heat on her skin.
She had to make sure he knew she was not going to be treated like a fool.
Namjoon was sitting in his room, nursing a glass of water when the note appeared. The flicker of magic caught his eye, and he barely had time to register the appearance of the parchment before it unfolded in front of him. His brow furrowed as he scanned the threatening note.
His initial reaction was a half-laugh. It was ridiculous. She was clearly unhinged, writing this kind of thing while she was half-delirious. But the smile didn’t last. His fingers tightened around the glass as his mind processed the words.
“I will find you.”
She was serious. The strange thing was, the venom in her words, the way she phrased everything with that hard, sharp edge—it almost felt like a promise. Something dark and dangerous that she could and would follow through on if given the opportunity. The idea of her tracking him down, seeking revenge, didn’t sit well with him.
It wasn't just the humor or the wildness of it that unsettled him. It was the truth of it. She was capable of it. She wasn’t just a bratty little girl—Y/N was dangerous when she was cornered, and that realization made something in him tighten.
Namjoon took a deep breath and set the glass down. He wasn’t sure why her words had left him feeling strangely unsettled. She was furious with him, no doubt, but that wasn’t what bothered him. It was the fact that he couldn’t just brush this off. Not this time.
He knew it wasn’t over. And as much as he tried to convince himself that he should just ignore her threats and keep his distance, something told him that he couldn’t. Not anymore.
The last thing he expected was for this twisted dynamic between them to become... something more than just animosity.
But in that moment, with that damn note in his hand, he knew it wasn’t over. And it made him feel—strangely—like he wanted it to be.
It was ridiculous, honestly. Every single morning of that week Namjoon had woken up to a new letter waiting at his bedside. Sealed in green wax, scrawled with her ugly, jagged handwriting that always looked like it had been carved into the parchment rather than written. He didn’t need to read the signature to know who it was from.
The first one threatened to strangle him with his own Gryffindor scarf. The second suggested drowning him in the Black Lake and letting the squid use him as a chew toy. The third went into horrifying detail about how she’d carve his initials into his forehead with a spoon.
Juvenile. Disturbing. Ridiculous. And yet—he read every word. Because for all her venom, she was on bed rest. He knew it. Madam Pomfrey herself had grumbled about her being feverish, weak, and confined. So the fact that she still wasted her limited strength writing these death notes to him? Hilarious. Pathetic. Exactly like her.
He never responded. Just tucked them away in his trunk. A part of him thought maybe he should burn them. Another part of him… didn’t.
So when he finally saw her again—strolling down the corridor like she hadn’t nearly ripped herself in half with a curse—he braced himself. Not for gratitude, of course. That word had never existed in her vocabulary.
The slap landed so sharp it rang in his ear.
Namjoon barely blinked. He just stood there, cheek stinging, and stared at her with the sort of dry patience one might give a screeching raven.
“That,” she hissed, hand still raised as if daring him to flinch, “was for manhandling me like some deranged pervert and shoving my clothes up indecently.”
The accusation was loud enough to turn heads in the corridor. Students slowed, whispering. Namjoon’s jaw clenched, not because he was guilty but because—without context—that sounded damning. Exactly like something she’d twist into a dagger and jam into his ribs.
“And that,” she spat, before he could open his mouth, “was for mixing your disgusting Gryffindor blood with mine.” Her lip curled like she’d bitten into something rotten. “You sanctimonious, holier-than-thou halfwit. Do you have any idea how revolting that is?”
Namjoon exhaled slowly through his nose. Not a word of surprise. Not a flicker of shock. He rubbed the sore spot on his cheek and muttered, almost bored, “I should’ve let the curse eat you alive.”
Her eyes narrowed into venomous slits, triumphant that she’d gotten under his skin. She leaned in, close enough that he could smell the faint trace of peppermint tea still clinging to her. “You should’ve. Would’ve saved me from the eternal embarrassment of ever being touched by you.”
Namjoon smiled—tight, sharp, humorless. “Don’t flatter yourself. The last thing I’d ever want is to touch you. Saving your miserable hide was an accident.”
Her laugh was sharp, brittle, full of venom. “An accident? No, Kim, you couldn’t help yourself. Always desperate to play hero, aren’t you? Even if it means tainting me with your filthy, noble blood.”
He bristled, ready to spit something back—but he stopped himself. Because of course she’d twist it. Of course she’d make saving her sound like a crime. That was who she was. His personal curse wrapped in Slytherin colors.
Namjoon tilted his head, voice dropping low, smooth, dangerously amused. “If my blood’s such a disgrace, sweetheart, why are you still standing here breathing because of it?”
Her smile faltered. Just slightly. And that—just that—was enough of a win for him.
“Rot in hell, Kim,” she snapped, shoving past him, her shoulder clipping his with more force than necessary.
Namjoon stood there a moment longer, cheek still throbbing, lips twitching at the bitter taste of it all. Of course she slapped him. Of course she’d rather damn him than thank him.
And still, he couldn’t bring himself to burn her letters.
She had been relentless before, but now? She was unbearable. Every time she saw him, it was like she sharpened her claws beforehand. She prowled closer, spat sharper, dragged the ugliest words out of her mouth just to see him flinch.
Except he wasn’t.
Namjoon was stone-faced. Quiet. Careful. He let her hiss and spit venom, let her throw insults that could cut to the bone, and he didn’t bite back. Not properly, anyway. He’d give her one of those sighs—long, put-upon, almost bored—or a single dry remark that wasn’t cruel enough, not sharp enough, not worthy of her effort.
And it drove her insane.
Because what was she without that? Without him sneering, snapping, swearing back at her until the whole castle braced for blood? What was she if Kim Namjoon, her favorite victim and opponent, looked at her not like an enemy but… like a burden? Like a pitiful little nuisance?
The thought made her skin crawl.
She’d catch him sometimes, too—his gaze flickering, just for a second. Like he remembered. Like he pitied her. PITY. As if she were some fragile thing worth saving. As if he could look at her—her, who clawed her way up through spite and venom and cruelty—and feel sorry.
That sanctimonious cunt.
It burned. It made her want to tear his perfect Gryffindor throat out with her teeth. Because if he pitied her, if his silence meant he saw her—saw that no one else did, no one else cared, no parents, no friends, no allies—then what was left of her villainous touch?
No. She refused. She hadn’t lost it. She’d sooner die than let his lack of reaction strip her of who she was.
And so she pushed harder. Sharper insults, crueler jabs, louder scenes. Anything to make him snarl. To remind him that she wasn’t someone to pity. She was his viper. His poison. His ruin.
Because if he didn’t see her that way—then what the hell was left?
If Namjoon wouldn’t rise to her insults anymore, then she’d claw under his skin another way—through someone he couldn’t ignore.
Enter Daisy. Sweet, bright-eyed little Hufflepuff with cheeks that always seemed pink and a smile too soft for this wretched world. She didn’t need tutoring—everyone knew it, even Daisy herself—but she still perched beside Namjoon every week, quill poised, as if soaking up every syllable from his lips.
Pathetic. And yet, Y/N noticed how Daisy’s gaze lingered. The flutter of her lashes, the way she fussed with her inkpot when Namjoon leaned too close. It was enough to make Y/N gag aloud in the hallway more than once.
But it gave her an idea.
So when she slipped herself into one of their little study sessions, draping over the chair opposite like she owned the damned library table, Namjoon nearly dropped his quill.
“You,” he said flatly, his whole face tightening. “Why are you here?”
“Why else?” Y/N shrugged, all sly teeth. “I heard Daisy was here. Thought I’d keep her company.”
Daisy lit up like the sun itself. “Oh! Y/N, you didn’t say you’d come!”
Namjoon blinked. “You two… know each other?”
The disbelief in his voice made Y/N smirk so wide she thought her cheeks might split. “Of course we do,” she purred. “Daisy and I are quite acquainted.”
Daisy giggled, ducking her head in that innocent way that made Y/N want to vomit and Namjoon rub at his temple like he was seconds away from a migraine.
“You’re kidding,” he muttered, shooting Y/N a narrow look. “You and Daisy? Acquainted? How?”
“Oh, wouldn’t you like to know,” Y/N cooed, leaning back in her chair. “But I suppose it is rather shocking, isn’t it? Someone as soft and sweet as Daisy… tolerating me.”
Daisy giggled again, brushing her hair behind her ear. “Y/N’s actually very funny once you get to know her.”
Namjoon stared at her like Daisy had just claimed the sky was green. Y/N leaned in, lowering her voice, letting her eyes gleam wicked.
“What’s the matter, Joonie?” she teased. “Surprised I can charm someone who isn’t you?”
The look on his face was delicious.
Daisy and Namjoon together were like… warm milk and honey. Sweet, safe, cloying. Their conversation bubbled with politeness and gentle little laughs that made Y/N’s teeth ache. The way Daisy tilted her head, hanging onto Namjoon’s every word, and the way Namjoon softened his voice for her, like he was afraid of shattering glass—ugh.
It was nauseating.
She slumped in her chair, glaring at the stack of parchment in front of her like it had personally offended her. The sweetness in the air clung to her skin, sticky and suffocating. She wanted to scrub it off, or better yet—burn it.
Of course Namjoon would have someone like Daisy fluttering around him. It was obvious. They looked good together. Picture-perfect, wholesome, nauseatingly compatible. Daisy with her little sunshine aura, and Namjoon with his infuriating perfect prefect act. They were the kind of pair professors would nod approvingly at, whispering about how bright their futures looked.
Y/N’s stomach churned.
It made sense. Too much sense. And maybe that was why it burned. Why it made her chest feel tight.
Her lip curled as she tapped her quill against the table. This—whatever this was—was ruining her mood. Watching them share smiles, seeing the flush on Daisy’s cheeks whenever Namjoon leaned closer, hearing his low, patient explanations—it made her want to hex the both of them into oblivion.
She actually felt blanch. Like her insides recoiled at the sight of it.
And worse, Namjoon noticed. His eyes flicked toward her, catching her scowl, and he arched a brow like he knew exactly what she was thinking.
Perfect. Now she had to double down.
Every time Daisy tilted her head at Namjoon with that sweet, doe-eyed look, Y/N made sure to lean in, chin on her palm, voice dripping with false sweetness.
“Oh, Joonie,” she cooed once, batting her lashes in an exaggerated flutter, “you’re so clever. Aren’t we lucky Daisy has a tutor as brilliant as you? I mean, how could she possibly survive without your… encyclopedic lectures?”
Namjoon’s quill stilled mid-scratch. His jaw flexed. Daisy, poor thing, giggled nervously, not catching the venom laced between Y/N’s teeth.
“Don’t you have homework to do?” Namjoon muttered, refusing to look at her.
“Don’t you have a stick to remove?” she shot back sweetly.
The jabs got bolder. She “accidentally” slid Daisy’s book closer to Namjoon so their shoulders brushed. She leaned across the table, mockingly sighing, “You two are just precious. Maybe I should owl your parents and tell them you’ve found your future Gryffindor bride.”
That earned her a sharp glare from Namjoon—and a blush from Daisy, which only made Y/N smirk wider.
But the best moment came when Daisy, brow furrowed, finally asked, “Wait… I thought you two hated each other? Didn’t you—um—try to kill him once?”
Y/N didn’t miss a beat. “Lover’s spat,” she declared, nonchalant as if she were talking about spilled ink.
Namjoon choked, full-body gag. “You are deranged. Absolutely deranged. I feel bad for the poor bastard who ever ends up with you.”
She just shrugged, flashing a wicked grin. “I could always lobotomize him. Fix him right up.”
“Case in point,” he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose like she was an unsolvable equation.
Daisy looked between them, bewildered, utterly lost in the minefield of barbs and venom disguised as banter. But somehow, as the minutes stretched, Daisy faded into the background.
Because soon enough, the tutoring session turned into what it always devolved into: Y/N and Namjoon bickering, their words sharp, their tones biting, sparks flying across the table like they were destined to burn each other alive.
And Daisy, poor Daisy, just sat there clutching her quill, wondering how anyone could survive being “best friends” like this.
Namjoon hadn’t even noticed Daisy gathering her things, tucking her quill back into her little satchel, and excusing herself in a whisper. He was too busy grinding his teeth at Y/N, who had leaned in so close their noses were nearly touching, her voice a sharp little whisper of death threats and insults.
“Merlin’s balls, you are exhausting,” he hissed, dragging his hand down his face. “Do you ever stop talking long enough to breathe?”
“Oh, I breathe just fine,” she retorted, smirking as she leaned over the parchment, scribbling a ridiculous doodle of his face with little devil horns. “I just think your existence deserves constant commentary. Like…a running tally of how irritating you are.”
Namjoon winced, shifting his shoulder, and Y/N’s eyes immediately caught the small grimace. Her grin sharpened. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, you’re not still nursing that little scratch, are you? I didn’t even stab you that hard. You’re such a melodramatic prick.”
He dropped his quill with a sharp clatter against the table and glared at her like he might actually throttle her. “Not stab me that hard? Do you even hear yourself? That is not normal conversational material, Y/N!”
She rolled her eyes so hard they nearly rattled out of her skull. “Cry me a bloody river, Gryffindor. You act like I gutted you in the Great Hall. It was a little nick. Builds character. I’ve done you a favor.”
“A favor—” Namjoon choked on the word, his voice shooting up an octave in outrage before he forced it lower, leaning close enough to keep it between them. “You want to know what’s actually a favor? Daisy being here. Do you realize she just sat through forty minutes of you harassing me, probably wondering if she should call a professor, and then she left without either of us noticing because you were too busy trying to one-up me?”
Y/N paused just long enough to process that, then cocked her head. “Oh. She left?”
“Yes!” he snapped, throwing a hand toward the empty chair beside them. “Because you can’t stop needling me for two seconds. What if she felt excluded? What if she thought we were—”
“Excluded from what?” Y/N interrupted, her tone dripping with mock innocence. “Excluded from me telling you to lob yourself off the Astronomy Tower? Because I promise you, I can repeat it loudly enough for the entire common room if you’d prefer.”
Namjoon’s nostrils flared, his composure hanging by a thread. “You’re unbelievable.”
She grinned, baring her teeth like a wolf who’d just cornered prey. “And yet here you are. Still sitting next to me. Still arguing with me. Face it, Joonie—without me, your life would be boring as hell.”
He opened his mouth, ready to throw something scathing back, but all that came out was a sharp exhale. Because damn it—she was right, and that was the most infuriating part of it all.
Namjoon pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to drag back some semblance of patience. “Why are you even here?” he muttered, exasperation bleeding into every word. “You don’t need tutoring, you don’t even pretend to need tutoring. You’ve spent the last hour making Daisy uncomfortable and—Merlin—me even more so. What’s the point, Y/N? Just to piss me off?”
She leaned back in her chair with a dramatic sigh, arms crossing over her chest like a petulant queen surveying her kingdom. “Oh, so now you’re the sensitive one? What’s with the third degree, Namjoon? What, do you like her as well?”
His head snapped toward her, brows furrowing so hard it almost looked painful. “Huh? As well?”
Her smirk grew wider, sharp and knowing, like a cat playing with a particularly clueless mouse. She tilted her head, lips quirking with wicked amusement. “C’mon, don’t tell me you’re actually that oblivious.”
“What are you even—” he started, then cut himself off, blinking as something clicked. “Wait. Daisy?”
“Ding, ding, ding.” Y/N tapped her temple mockingly, as though she’d just granted him divine wisdom. “The sweet little Hufflepuff practically has hearts floating around her head whenever she looks at you. It’s nauseating. She comes to these ‘tutoring sessions’ when she doesn’t even need them. Doesn’t take a genius to connect the dots.”
Namjoon stared at her, half stunned and half irritated, heat rising to his ears despite himself. “You’re insane. Daisy doesn’t—she’s just a student who likes to learn. She’s—”
Y/N cackled, cutting him off, “Oh, my god. You really are that dense. This is painful to watch.”
Her laugh rang through the empty space Daisy had abandoned, and Namjoon’s jaw ticked as he reached for his quill again, trying to ignore how smug she looked.
Namjoon glared at her like she’d just grown three heads. “You’re just a pervert with nothing better to do,” he muttered, slamming his quill down so hard ink splattered across the parchment.
Y/N gasped dramatically, pressing her hand to her chest. “Pervert? Really? That’s supposed to be an insult?” She leaned forward, lips curling into a wicked grin. “You wound me, Joonie. Truly. Guess you’ve run out of vocabulary words already.”
He groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose, trying to reel back his temper. “Whatever. I don’t like her.”
“Ohhh, so now you’re denying it?” Her voice dripped with false sympathy, mockery laced in every syllable. She poked at his chest with her ink-stained quill, eyes glittering with mischief. “That makes it even juicier. Just admit you’ve got a thing for sweet little Daisy. Don’t worry, I won’t tell the whole school you’ve gone soft for a Hufflepuff.”
He swatted her hand away, heat crawling up his neck. “You’re unbearable.”
“And you’re deflecting.” She tilted her head, smirk sharp enough to draw blood. Then her eyes lit with an idea so evil Namjoon instantly regretted ever sitting down with her. “Fine. How about we use Veritaserum? Hm? Or are you scared?”
Namjoon froze, staring at her like she’d lost her damn mind. “You can’t be serious.”
“Oh, I’m deadly serious.” She leaned in until her nose nearly brushed his, her grin practically splitting her face. “If you’ve got nothing to hide, then prove it. What’s the matter, Gryffindor? Afraid the truth might embarrass you?”
He felt his stomach knot. It was stupid. It was reckless. It was exactly the kind of challenge she thrived on, and now she’d said it, there was no walking away without giving her ammunition for weeks. He could practically hear her voice already—Kim Namjoon, coward of Gryffindor, too scared to drink a little potion.
He clenched his jaw, glaring. “Fine.”
Her brows shot up, then her grin spread even wider, like the devil herself. “Oh, this is going to be fun.”
And that was how Namjoon, against every rational bone in his body, found himself sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with Y/N in the back corner of the library as she dug through her bag and triumphantly pulled out a small vial that definitely wasn’t legally in her possession.
“Why the hell do you even have that?” he hissed, eyes darting to the doorway.
She shrugged, all smug nonchalance. “What, you think I don’t prepare for moments like this? You never know when you’ll need to force the truth out of someone. Besides, rules are for boring people.”
“Unbelievable,” he muttered, rubbing a hand down his face as she uncorked the vial with a flourish.
“Say ah, Joonie.”
The second the cork popped, Y/N tilted the vial toward Namjoon’s lips like she was pouring wine for a guest. Except instead of a delicate sip, she tipped the entire thing, forcing half of it down his throat.
He choked immediately, coughing, eyes wide, sputtering like he’d swallowed fire. “WHAT THE—” But the words dissolved into a helpless gag as the liquid burned its way down.
Y/N doubled over in laughter, clutching her stomach. “Oh my god, you looked like a cat trying to cough up a hairball. Priceless. Worth it.”
“You’re insane,” he rasped, wiping his mouth with his sleeve, but before she could gloat any further he snatched the vial back. She hadn’t expected him to move that fast—one second she was cackling, the next he had one arm around her shoulders and was practically prying her jaw open.
“Open up, you lunatic,” he gritted, and before she could bite him he shoved the vial to her lips. The remaining silvery drops hit her tongue, bitter and cold, and she gagged, thrashing like a cat in a bath. “Nghh—bleh—YOU BASTARD!”
“That’s for trying to drown me,” he snapped, though his lips twitched like he was trying not to laugh at her dramatic retching.
She groaned, flopping sideways onto the bench, glaring at him like she’d curse him into next week if her insides weren’t burning. “Ugh, disgusting. Who brews this crap? Sadists?”
Namjoon leaned back, folding his arms across his chest, fighting the tug at his mouth that wanted to be a smile. “So,” he said slowly, with the faintest note of triumph, “now we’re both under it. Fair’s fair.”
Y/N sat up abruptly, hair wild, eyes narrowing. She plopped down beside him, their shoulders bumping, and tapped her chin with a mock-thoughtful look. “Sooo,” she drawled, voice syrupy, “how does it work exactly? I usually just hex people into telling me things. More fun that way.”
Namjoon groaned, dragging his hand down his face. “Of course you do.”
She grinned, already vibrating with ideas. “Okay, let’s test this.” She jabbed her finger at his chest. “What was your first thought the day we met?”
His mouth opened against his will, words spilling before he could stop them: “That you were loud, obnoxious, and smelled like burnt parchment.”
Her jaw dropped. “EXCUSE ME?”
“I didn’t mean to say that!” he protested, panicked.
But she was already snickering, leaning in close, eyes bright with wicked delight. “Ohhh, this is going to be so much fun.”
The firelight in the abandoned classroom flickered across their faces, throwing strange shadows across the stone walls. The half-empty vial of Veritaserum sat between them on the desk, its silvery residue gleaming faintly. Y/N leaned forward, elbows propped on her knees, eyes sharp and predatory. Namjoon, for all his pride and poise, sat stiffly with his arms folded, jaw tight, as if bracing for every question she threw his way.
And she was throwing them. Ruthlessly.
“What’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever done in class?” she asked, her grin sly.
Namjoon’s lips parted against his will. “Got called on by Flitwick while I had hiccups. Snorted mid-incantation. Blew up my own quill.”
Y/N’s laughter filled the room, loud and merciless. “Oh, beautiful. Wish I’d been there to see it. Bet you went scarlet, didn’t you? Oh, wait—don’t answer, you don’t have a choice.”
“Yes,” he ground out, scowling.
She cackled, wiping tears from her eyes. “This is the best night of my life.”
He muttered something that sounded suspiciously like “sociopath,” but she was already lining up her next strike.
“Okay, okay—” she leaned even closer, voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, “do you like Daisy?”
“No,” Namjoon replied instantly, and the sharp certainty in his tone made her pause.
Her eyes narrowed, hungry. “Do you love Daisy?”
“Isn’t that a given? NO.”
Her brows shot up. His vehemence almost made her doubt herself, but then her smirk returned. “Mmm, sure, let’s not skirt technicalities, Dickjoon. Are you in love with someone?”
The silence stretched. His throat worked, eyes flickering with panic, but his lips betrayed him, spilling the truth with a force that stunned them both.
“Yes.”
The word landed like a curse.
Her grin faltered, froze. Namjoon himself looked horrified, as if the syllables had been dragged out of him with barbed hooks.
“…Who is it?” Y/N asked softly, too softly, her voice stripped of its usual venom.
The answer came out broken, reluctant, venomous with self-disgust.
“Y/N.”
Her breath stuttered. The room seemed to tilt. For once she didn’t have a retort on her tongue, no smug remark to deflect the weight of it. She just stared, wide-eyed, as if he’d hexed her into silence.
And Namjoon looked just as undone. His chest rose and fell unevenly, his lips trembling from the effort of fighting the truth, but the Veritaserum forced it out, cruel and unforgiving.
“Who do you hate?” Y/N whispered, the question slipping out before she could stop herself.
“Y/N.”
The word cracked through the room like a whip.
Her pulse roared in her ears.
“Who scares you?”
“Y/N.”
The answer was raw, ragged, as though speaking it gutted him.
Her hand shook where it gripped the edge of the desk, nails digging into the wood. She didn’t know why she asked the last one—maybe some twisted corner of her wanted to know how deep his loathing went, whether it stretched past her and into himself.
“Who disgusts you?”
His voice broke.
“Myself.”
The silence that followed was suffocating. The only sound was the faint crackle of the fire, the faraway drip of water in the castle’s pipes.
Y/N stared at him—at his pale face, his rigid posture, the faint tremor in his hands. He looked as though he’d been flayed open. And maybe she had too.
Her throat tightened. Her chest ached. She wanted to laugh, to sneer, to say pathetic. But all that came was the shallow sound of her own breathing, ragged and uneven.
Namjoon’s eyes flicked to hers, dark and stricken. And for once, neither of them had the words.
Her lips parted, her tongue ready to spit something sharp, something poisonous to slice him open again—but Namjoon raised his hand.
“I’ll ask the questions,” he said, low, steady.
Her eyes widened. That was new. That was different.
And before she could even breathe out a protest, he fired.
“Do you love someone?”
Her throat worked, her chest tightened, and the answer dragged itself out like a confession clawed from her ribs.
“…I’m not sure.”
His jaw twitched. He didn’t give her space.
“Do you hate me?”
“Yes.” The word came fast, brutal, satisfying for a half-second—until her own ears heard the way it cracked at the edges.
“Do you hate that I saved your life?”
“…No.” The whisper scorched her tongue.
He leaned forward, eyes burning, not giving her a single moment to build her walls back. “Do you despise me?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want me dead?”
Her lip trembled; she clenched her fists. “…I don’t know.”
His nostrils flared. The firelight flickered against the hard line of his cheekbone as his jaw locked, tighter and tighter, until it looked like he might shatter his own teeth.
“What do you feel for me?”
Her voice broke. “…I don’t know.”
The words dropped like stones between them.
Namjoon sat frozen, every muscle rigid, his knuckles white against the desk. His chest rose and fell in harsh bursts, and when his lips parted again, his voice was jagged, scoured raw.
“This was a mistake.”
Her heart lurched—too quick, too sharp—and she panicked, clawed at the words. “Wait—wait, this doesn’t make any sense. How—how could you love me?”
And his mouth betrayed him. Against his will, against every frantic thought screaming in his head, the truth spilled out:
“Because when I’m with you, I feel more myself. Like I don’t have to be the golden Gryffindor, the perfect son, the model student. You rip that apart.” His voice cracked, trembling between fury and confession. “I love that you hate me. Because it makes me hate you too. Except—” he swallowed, broken— “I don’t know if my hatred goes as far as yours.”
The words sat between them like knives, cutting both ways.
Her breath hitched. She felt sick. Her chest heaved with something she couldn’t name. His eyes were on her—dark, molten, furious and bare—and for once she had nothing to spit back. Nothing but the pounding of her own heart, screaming that this was too much. Too much, too close.
She was shaking, her nails digging crescents into her palms, breaths shallow and uneven. The Veritaserum still hummed in her veins, dragging honesty like a hook through her flesh. She hated it. She hated him. She hated how her voice had trembled, how she hadn’t been able to control the shiver running down her spine.
And beside her—Namjoon was shaking too. Not visibly, not like her, but in the subtle ways she had learned to recognize over the years. The twitch of his jaw. The slight tremor in his hand as he shoved his quill back into his bag. The way his eyes refused to look at her, fixed instead on some invisible point in the wood grain of the desk.
He was disturbed. She could see it.
He wasn’t stupid, not like she always accused him of being. He knew something had slipped. Something he’d sworn to keep buried under all that Gryffindor shine and steel. He had told himself, for months—years—that the part of him softening around her, the part that almost pitied her, was weakness. That pity was all it was.
But tonight had torn that lie wide open.
They sat there, side by side on the library floor, like two battle-worn soldiers who had suddenly realized they were bleeding from the same wound. Frozen. Both unwilling to move first, because moving would mean acknowledging it happened.
Namjoon broke first.
He pushed himself up, every movement sharp, as though even his bones resented being near her. His bag was slung over his shoulder with a snap, parchment and books shoved inside without care. His jaw was carved from stone, set so tightly it made a muscle jump in his cheek.
“Stay away from me,” he said, voice low, clipped, dangerous in a way that didn’t sound like the usual sharp-edged sparring between them. No—it was gutted, raw, final. “I mean it this time.”
She blinked, her throat closing, words crawling up only to die before reaching her lips.
His eyes flickered to her then, just once, and the fury there wasn’t aimed at her—not entirely. It was turned inward, a betrayal of his own mind and soul. He had been tricked by himself, ambushed by his own mouth, dragged into an admission he never wanted to exist. And the last thing he needed—the last thing—was her smirk, her barbs, her venom mocking him for it.
So he left before she could speak.
His boots struck hard against the stone as he strode out of the library, the sound echoing through the cavernous silence. He didn’t look back. Didn’t dare.
And she sat there, still trembling, still shaking, staring after him with an emptiness gnawing her ribs. For the first time, she hadn’t even wanted to smirk.
Her nails dragged down her arms until red welts rose in their wake, because she needed something to anchor herself, something to distract from the flood rising inside her chest.
How could he love her?
Namjoon.
Golden boy. The Gryffindor who everyone adored, who people bent around like flowers turning to the sun. The boy who smiled like nothing could crack him and scowled like he could carry the weight of every expectation in the world and still walk upright. The one who called her viper, snake, poison. The one who had no issue hurling the truth at her face like blades, each sharper than the last.
And yet… love?
Her mind twisted the word, mangled it, made it ugly. Love? He said it like it was a truth as undeniable as the sky being blue, as if it had always been there. But that was impossible. It was laughable.
How could he love her when she had stabbed him? When her wand had been buried in his shoulder, when she had nearly split him open like she meant to end him? When her voice had torn from her throat like knives, screaming for his ruin, his blood, his end?
How could he love her when every time she opened her mouth it was to mock, to spit, to humiliate? When she went out of her way to ruin him in front of others, to crawl under his skin until he snapped? When she had called him fraud, hypocrite, pathetic, when she had sworn over and over again that she would see him on his knees or in his grave?
How could he love her after seeing everything?
Her parents dragging her like a doll through McGonagall’s office. The spells digging glass beneath her skin until she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. Her humiliation carved into the floor while professors watched. Her own mother’s voice ringing with disgust: have you no shame?
He had seen her limp out of that office, pale and half-bent, a pitiful creature. He had seen her parents turn their backs on her as if she were less than dirt. He had seen her bleed, sob, scream. Pathetic. Weak. Helpless.
He had seen her true nature—the shame, the rot, the origin she never spoke of, the bloodline that rejected her even in the cradle.
How could he love her when her own parents didn’t?
Her laugh cracked in the empty library, bitter and broken, too loud in the silence. It tore out of her chest before collapsing into something smaller, uglier. A whimper, almost.
No one loved her. That was the one truth she had always trusted, always worn like armor. To be untouchable was to be alone. To keep walls so high that no one could hurt her again, no one could force their hands into her, no one could leave her clawing at the dirt they buried her in.
If no one could reach her, then no one could abandon her.
But him?
She curled forward until her forehead pressed to the table, fingers digging into her hair, breath ragged against the wood. It wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be real. It was the Veritaserum, a fluke, a trick of the tongue. He was lying even when he couldn’t.
Because how could Namjoon—him, of all people—love what the rest of the world had already decided wasn’t worth the effort?
Namjoon woke with a groan and a start, the world tilted sideways, and the first thing he registered was the relentless poke. poke. poke. against his cheekbone.
He slapped the air uselessly before grumbling, voice raw from sleep. “Merlin’s saggy—what the fuck?” His hand finally closed around a wrist—warm, alive, poking him—and he cracked one bleary eye open.
Big mistake.
Y/N’s face loomed far too close, her grin shark-like in the candlelight, her wand twirling lazily in her free hand. “Oh, you’re awake. Good. Took you long enough, lumbering ox.”
Namjoon lurched upright so violently he nearly cracked foreheads with her. “WHAT THE—where the hell am I? Why does my back feel like I’ve been—” He stopped. Looked around. The room wasn’t his. The bed wasn’t his. The walls, the rugs, the faint smell of smoke and ink. He knew instantly. His pulse spiked. “You psychotic parasite, did you just—did you DRAG ME HERE?”
She blinked innocently, still perched beside him like she hadn’t committed about twelve counts of magical misconduct. “Carried, technically. Well. Magically carried.” She tapped her wand against her palm with a sly little smirk. “You’re heavier than you look, by the way. Almost dropped you down the stairs. Would’ve been funny.”
Namjoon’s voice cracked halfway between outrage and disbelief. “Carried me—? Do you have any idea how insane that sounds? Are you out of your snake-bitten mind? This is—kidnapping, Y/N. This is literally kidnapping!”
“Don’t be dramatic, Golden Boy,” she drawled, leaning back on her elbows. “If I wanted to kidnap you, you’d wake up missing a kidney and a note pinned to your chest.”
He shoved his hand down his face, trying to scrub the exhaustion and rage out of his pores. “I swear to Godric—how did you even get me here? I locked my door.”
Her grin widened, all teeth. “Oh, you know. Totally-not-illegal spell. Barely counts. Not like anyone’s gonna miss you.”
Namjoon gaped, his hands flying out in disbelief. “Barely counts?! You committed magical breaking and entering, and bodily relocation, and—oh my god, you’re going to land us both in Azkaban, and I didn’t even do anything this time!”
“Us?” she mocked, fake-gasping. “Oh no, don’t drag me into your drama, Kim Namjoon. You’re the one who made it so easy. You sleep like a bloody corpse. No wards, no alarms. It’s like you were begging to be abducted by your greatest nemesis.”
“Nemesis? More like psychotic gremlin,” he spat, finally looking at her properly—only to squint so hard he almost went cross-eyed. The world blurred. “Why the fuck can’t I—ugh, I can’t even see you right now. Where are my—”
Before he could finish, something small and metal whizzed at his face. He flinched, instinctively throwing up his arms. Clink. His glasses bounced off his collarbone and onto the sheets.
“Oi!” he barked, snatching them up and glaring once they were safely perched on his nose again. “What the fuck is wrong with you?!”
Y/N shrugged, utterly unfazed. “You said you couldn’t see. Problem solved. You’re welcome.”
“You threw them at me!” His voice pitched high, indignant, like an offended professor. “I could’ve gone blind! Do you realize how expensive these are—”
“Oh, shut up.” She rolled her eyes, sprawling dramatically across her bed as though he wasn’t still halfway between fight-or-flight. “You’re fine. You’re always fine. That’s your problem. So boring. So safe. You need a little chaos.”
He stared at her, veins throbbing in his temple. “Chaos?! You dragged me into your lair like some deranged magpie and call it chaos? You’re insane. Utterly insane.”
She smirked, tilting her head, eyes glinting wickedly. “And yet,” she sang softly, “you’re still here.”
Namjoon opened his mouth, shut it, cursed violently in every language he knew, and finally groaned, collapsing backward into the pillow. “I hate you. I fucking hate you.”
She poked his cheek again. “No you don’t.”
Namjoon pinched the bridge of his nose, glasses slipping down just enough for him to glare at her over the rims. His voice came out low, worn thin, the edge of a sigh clinging to each word.
“Guess you weren’t lying about having a personal room.”
Y/N smirked like the cat who’d dragged in a half-dead bird. She leaned back against her headboard, arms folded, ankles crossed, smugness radiating off her in waves. “Mhm. Told you. I never lie.”
Namjoon gave her the flattest look in existence. “-_- Sure.”
The silence stretched, her eyes glinting with mischief while his burned with exhaustion. Finally, he exhaled through his nose and sat up straighter, rubbing a hand down his face as though bracing for impact. “Alright. What do you want, Y/N?”
The grin slipped, not vanishing, but softening into something far less familiar. Her shoulders slumped just enough to give her away. She chewed the inside of her cheek, gaze darting toward the shadows in the corner of the room instead of meeting his.
“I wanna talk about before.”
Namjoon stiffened. His entire body went taut, like she’d just whispered a hex instead of words. The air between them grew heavy, thick enough that even she felt it. His jaw worked once, twice, before he finally said, voice tight, “Before what?”
Her eyes flicked back to him, and for a heartbeat she almost looked nervous. But Y/N never let nerves live long. A sardonic little laugh escaped her, bitter on her tongue. “Don’t play dumb, Golden Boy. You know. The library. The veritaserum.”
The words hung in the air like a curse.
Namjoon’s throat bobbed. He pushed himself off the mattress, pacing once across the room just to burn the restless energy gnawing at his insides. “There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Oh, bullshit.” Her voice cracked like a whip, sharp enough to pull him back to face her. “You don’t get to drop that on me—drop me on me—and then act like it didn’t happen.”
His lips pressed thin, his hands curling at his sides. For once, Y/N didn’t sound mocking. She sounded—almost frantic. A little too raw. It was unsettling.
He muttered, “It was the potion.”
“It wasn’t.”
“Yes, it was.”
“Namjoon.” Her tone made him falter, made his gaze finally lift to hers. “You don’t lie under veritaserum. You don’t lie when it’s your own blood dragging truth out of you. You said what you said, and now I want to know—why.”
Her voice cracked on the last word, just a hairline fracture, but it was enough. It was enough to strip away the smug, venomous girl she always wore like armor. She was looking at him like she didn’t understand him at all, like she wanted to—like she needed to.
Namjoon’s chest rose and fell, rose and fell. He looked at her the way someone looks at a fire too close to their home—entranced, frightened, ready to run but unable to turn away.
And instead of answering, he sank back onto the edge of her bed, shoulders sagging, elbows braced against his knees.
“Why do you even care?” His voice was rough, splintered. “You hate me, remember? Isn’t that easier?”
Y/N’s mouth opened, then shut. Her heart slammed against her ribs so hard it hurt. She wanted to laugh in his face, make a joke about it, stab him with words sharp enough to leave him bleeding. But the truth—it gnawed at her too.
She drew in a slow breath. “Maybe I just…don’t like not knowing. Don’t like being left in the dark.”
Her admission sat heavy between them, raw and uneasy.
Namjoon turned his head, finally meeting her eyes. His expression was unreadable, but his voice was softer now, though it cracked on the edges.
“Neither do I.”
Her frown lingered, faint but real, the kind that pulled her smugness apart at the seams. Namjoon leaned back against her headboard, arms folded tight across his chest, studying her like she was a riddle he regretted starting but couldn’t stop halfway through.
“What are you trying to achieve, Y/N?” he asked finally, his voice edged with a tired sort of suspicion. “Do you want more ammunition? Another thing to throw in my face when it suits you?”
Her gaze snapped to his, sharp, wounded all at once. “I’m not gonna sink that low, Namjoon.”
He raised a brow, skeptical, because sinking low was her specialty. But she pressed on, her voice brittle, her words weighted in a way they usually weren’t.
“I couldn’t even if I tried,” she said, softer now. “Because…despite how much I hate you—and Merlin knows I hate myself even more—you’re the first person who’s ever loved me. And I wouldn’t hold that against you. Not when it’s the only thing I ever wanted, even if I never expected it would be you.”
The silence after her confession was deafening.
Namjoon stared at her like she’d just rewritten reality, his lips parting only to press back together, his composure fraying. He wanted to laugh, to scoff, to fight her with the safety of their usual venom—but he couldn’t. Not when she looked like that.
“So rest assured,” she added quickly, like patching over her own vulnerability before it tore her wide open. “Whatever happens here, stays here.”
He blinked once. Twice. Then a low sound escaped him, halfway between disbelief and exasperated amusement. “Huh. So you do have a heart after all.”
That earned him a scowl sharp enough to draw blood. “Oh, don’t get ahead of yourself,” she snapped, but her tone lacked venom. “I’m still mocking you. Just…not in front of others.”
That—of all things—made Namjoon huff out an incredulous laugh. He tilted his head back against the wall, closing his eyes like he couldn’t quite believe this was happening, like he didn’t know whether to strangle her or hold her hand.
“You’re impossible,” he muttered.
“And you’re insufferable,” she shot back, softer than usual, her lips twitching despite herself.
The room fell quiet again, but it wasn’t the suffocating silence it used to be. It was fragile. Uneasy. But warmer than either of them wanted to admit.
Y/N leaned back in her chair, arms folded like a smug queen awaiting tribute, the faintest curl of a grin tugging her lips. Her eyes glittered with wicked amusement.
“So,” she drawled, tilting her head just enough to catch the light, “go on, confess your undying love for me.”
Namjoon’s head jerked in her direction, disbelief written across every sharp line of his face. “You’ve got to be joking.”
Her smirk widened. “Dead serious. After all, you already spilled it once. Might as well lean in and serenade me.”
He groaned, dragging a hand down his face, fingers digging into his temples. “Merlin, you are insufferable. I should’ve let you hex yourself into the lake years ago.”
She gasped, all mock horror. “After all we’ve been through? The blood ritual? The medical wing? You wound me, Kim.”
“You wound me,” he shot back, gesturing to his still-bandaged shoulder. “Literally. With your wand.”
Y/N shrugged. “Details. Now, about my confession?”
Namjoon leveled her with a flat look, dark eyes narrowed to slits. “If I had any undying love left in me, you’d have snuffed it out with that smug little face by now.”
Her grin didn’t falter; if anything, it sharpened. She leaned closer, her voice dropping to a whisper meant to dig under his skin. “Then why does it sound like you’re scared I might actually believe you?”
For just a second—one brief, traitorous second—his jaw tightened, his mask slipping before he forced it back into place. “Because believing anything you say is a one-way ticket to disaster,” he said, voice cool but strained.
She chuckled, low and satisfied, like she’d found the thread to unravel him. “Touché.”
Y/N propped her chin on her palm, watching him like he was the day’s entertainment. “C’mon, Kim. I fancy you too, soooo—speak.” Her tone was syrupy, mocking, daring.
Namjoon’s brows shot up. “I don’t believe that for a second.”
“Oh, please,” she scoffed, rolling her eyes. “You remember my answer. I don’t love you, but I don’t not love you either. Besides…” Her lips curved into that maddening grin as she let her gaze wander deliberately over him, sprawled awkwardly across her bed, blanket bunched at his waist. “…it is quite nice seeing you all lost and vulnerable in my bed.”
Namjoon immediately yanked the blanket higher, tucking it up to his chin like it was a suit of armor. His glare was sharp enough to cut glass. “You’re not gonna molest me, are you?”
Her smirk widened, voice dropping into a husky little whisper. “Don’t flatter yourself… not yet.”
His whole body stiffened. “Yet?!” he sputtered, ears reddening as he practically burrowed into the blanket. “What the hell is wrong with you?!”
“Oh, where do I even start?” she said sweetly, reclining back with all the confidence of someone who had just tossed a grenade and was waiting for the boom.
“Merlin’s saggy left—” Namjoon cut himself off, glaring harder as if that might pin her to the wall. “You’re deranged. You drag me into your room, poke me awake like some deranged pixie, demand I profess my love, and now you’re threatening me?”
She shrugged, eyes glinting with unholy glee. “Threatening? No, no. Think of it as… setting expectations.”
He groaned, shoving the blanket over his face. “I hate you.”
Her laughter spilled out, low and wicked. “And yet…” she sing-songed, “you love me.”
His muffled yell under the blanket made her laugh even harder.
Y/N was practically glowing with mischief, shoulders shaking with laughter as she leaned in, eyes sparkling with malice and something else. “Boy, this is fun. C’mon, does stuff like me and Joonie sittin’ in a tree—K-I-S-S-I-N-G— make your heart race? Hm? Hm?”
Namjoon groaned like a man condemned. “Shut. Up.” He dragged a hand down his face, muffling what might have been a scream. “What are we even doing? My parents literally hate you more than I do.”
She gasped theatrically. “More than you? My, my, that’s saying something.”
He jabbed a finger at her. “Don’t twist this. Besides, we’re both purebloods. My entire family tree will skin me alive if I even look like I’m about to marry a Slytherin.”
Her smirk sharpened into something wicked. She clutched her chest, swooning. “Awwhhh. So you’ve thought of me as your brideee.”
Namjoon’s jaw clenched so hard she swore she heard it creak. “That is not what I said—”
“You did, though,” she cut in, voice sweet as poisoned honey. “My, what a scandal. Gryffindor’s golden boy, the epitome of honor and justice, secretly daydreaming about putting a ring on the finger of Hogwarts’ resident viper.” She fluttered her lashes. “How romantic.”
He shot upright in bed, ears burning crimson. “You’re deranged. Completely unhinged.”
“Unhinged?” she echoed, giggling like she’d won something monumental. “No, no, darling. Just very, very dedicated to my craft.”
Namjoon buried his face in his hands with a groan so deep it shook his shoulders, and Y/N leaned closer, whispering, “Joonie and Y/N, sittin’ in a tree—”
He snapped his head up, eyes blazing. “Finish that and I swear I’ll hex your mouth shut again.”
“Oh, promises, promises.” She beamed, triumphant.
Namjoon’s voice was tight, the strain visible in the way his hands gripped the blanket like it was the only thing keeping him from shaking her. “What do you want, Y/N? You know how I feel, so what’s next? It’s not like you even want to be with me.”
The silence stretched between them for a moment. Y/N tilted her head, frowning—not her usual smug smirk, but a crease in her brows, a twitch in her jaw. “I don’t know, Namjoon.” Her tone was softer, but bitter, like she hated even admitting it. “Maybe I just… I’ve spent so much time being hated that now that I know someone does love me—” her lips curved into a shaky grin, though her eyes gleamed too sharp to be anything but glass over fire—“it’s making me greedy.”
Namjoon blinked, caught off guard by her candor, but Y/N didn’t let him interrupt. She leaned closer, voice lowering into a near hiss, venom wrapped around vulnerability. “Do you know what that’s like? To claw your way through every single day knowing no one—not your parents, not your house, not a single soul—would care if you dropped dead in the lake tomorrow? And then suddenly, you—” she jabbed a finger hard against his chest, “you of all people tell me you love me? Do you realize what kind of sick joke that feels like?”
He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
Her laugh was hollow, the sound of someone who’d been cut open too many times. “So yeah, maybe I’m greedy. Maybe I want to keep that love, even if I can’t return it the way you want. Maybe I just want to know that, at least once, I wasn’t completely disposable.”
Namjoon stared at her, chest rising and falling too fast, because for the first time in years of bickering, hexing, biting, and clawing—they weren’t fighting. Not really. She was confessing, in her own vicious, backhanded way.
And it left him speechless.
She stretched out over the blanket like a cat, lazy but still defiant, her gaze cutting to him as if daring him to say anything. “This doesn’t mean I’m weak,” she muttered, eyes fixed on the ceiling.
“I know,” Namjoon said simply. And he did. Her lying there didn’t strip her of the venom in her veins, it just showed the exhaustion underneath.
But then, instead of settling back, he shifted, leaning up on his elbows until his shadow fell over her. Her brows furrowed instantly, eyes narrowing at him. “What?”
He studied her, eyes tracing the curve of her cheek, the smirk that wasn’t there, the sharpness that softened against the pillow. His voice came quiet, low, like it wasn’t even meant for her to hear. “Just trying to see what has my soul this enamored by your poison.”
Her breath caught. And though she rolled her eyes, though she made a scoffing sound in her throat, the pink on her ears betrayed her. She turned her head away, muttering, “You sound like a lovesick buffoon.”
His lips curled. “Aren’t I?”
The silence that followed felt too heavy, too fragile. He sighed, eyes falling shut for half a second before he opened them again, his expression tense, almost pained. “I’m going to do something,” he admitted, voice tight, “that will probably make you stab me again.” He leaned a fraction closer, his hand braced against the mattress, his body warm and dangerously near. “But I want to see something.”
Her gaze snapped back to him, sharp, wary, but her chest rose a little too fast. “What the hell are you talking about, Joon?”
His lips curved—not a smirk, not a taunt. Something far more reckless.
His words barely had time to sink in before he moved.
No hesitation, no asking, no teasing half-measures—Namjoon closed the distance and kissed her.
It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t sweet. It was the kind of kiss born out of years of biting insults and bloodied fists, of every duel and detention, of venom spat back and forth until it blurred into something else. His mouth was warm and firm against hers, insistent, like he was staking a claim he knew she would claw to pieces the second she came to her senses.
Her eyes widened, shock freezing her for half a heartbeat. Then heat shot through her like fire under her skin, and she nearly shoved him off—nearly—but her fingers curled into the blanket instead. Her heart hammered against her ribs. She hated him. She hated him. And yet, her lips parted against his, traitorous, responding to him with the same fury that she fought him with.
He pulled back first, barely, breath ragged as he searched her face. His cheeks were flushed, ears pink, lips swollen. His voice was unsteady but defiant. “That,” he said hoarsely, “was worth the stab wound.”
Her hand twitched at her side, and he braced himself for the slap. But it never came. Instead, she stared at him, wide-eyed, her smirk gone, her armor cracked. Her voice was brittle, poisonous in its weakness. “You’re insane.”
“Probably,” he whispered, still hovering over her, eyes locked on hers. “But so are you.”
Her ears were burning now, her entire face hot, and she cursed under her breath. “If you ever tell anyone—”
“—you’ll skin me alive, I know,” he finished for her with the ghost of a smile.
They lay there in charged silence, the world outside their little chamber feeling suddenly too far away, too unreal. For the first time in years, neither one of them moved to throw the first blow.
Her palm cracked against his shoulder—hard enough to sting, not enough to push him away. He barely had time to grit his teeth at the blow before she surged up, catching his lips with hers in a kiss that was more teeth than tenderness, more challenge than affection.
It was a duel.
Her nails dug into his arm as if daring him to flinch, her tongue brushing his bottom lip with a mocking hum. See? I can do this better than you, Kim. She was winning, she knew she was—until he growled low in his throat, hands catching her wrists.
In a single, unrelenting movement, Namjoon pinned her down against the mattress, straddling her waist like he’d just claimed victory in a war. She gasped, not because of the force, but because of how easy he made it look.
“Cheating—” she spat breathlessly, writhing under him.
“Winning,” he corrected, voice low, his chest heaving. And then, to her utter horror, he tugged his shirt over his head and tossed it aside.
Her entire face went crimson. She smacked at his arm, indignant, scandalized, outraged at the nerve. “Hey—hey—HEY! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?! Put that back on, you—”
He smirked down at her, maddeningly smug, his hair falling into his eyes. “What? Distracting my opponent. Worked, didn’t it?”
Her jaw dropped. Her ears were burning. She sputtered, trying to summon up her usual venom, but it came out thin, trembling around the edges. “You—you absolute Gryffindor meathead! You think taking your shirt off is going to—ugh!—make me swoon?”
Namjoon leaned closer, his breath hot against her ear, his voice threaded with laughter and something heavier. “No,” he murmured. “But it sure as hell makes you blush.”
Her face twisted between fury and mortification, her heart hammering against her ribs like it wanted out. And yet, pinned under him, she couldn’t look away.
Her knee shot up, aiming square for his stomach, but Namjoon caught her ankle before she could land the hit. In the same motion, he leaned down, crushing his lips against hers—hard, deliberate, claiming the upper hand with a kiss that was nothing like her mocking ones before.
And then—damn him—he ground against her, slow, measured, deliberate.
The air ripped out of her lungs. She gasped into his mouth, her nails sinking into his bare shoulders, her entire body arching up before she could stop herself. A groan slipped free, traitorous, low and shaky, and she hated it—hated that he’d drawn it out of her so easily.
But two could play this game.
Her legs snapped around his waist, locking him in so tight he had to shift closer, pressing flush against her. Her smirk unfurled sharp and wicked against his lips. “Bet you dreamt about this, Jooniebear.”
He froze for half a second, just half—then his teeth grazed her bottom lip in warning. “Call me that again,” he rasped, voice low and dangerously steady, “and I swear—”
She tilted her head back, laughing breathlessly, a mix of defiance and disbelief coloring every note. “Swear what? That you’ll prove me right?”
His hands gripped her wrists harder, pinning them into the mattress, his body pressing closer, heavier, hotter. His voice was hoarse, but steady, stubborn. “That I’ll make you shut up without a single spell.”
Her smirk faltered, just slightly.
Her laugh was low, almost purring, sharp enough to cut him but sweet enough to linger in the air between them. Her wrists strained against his hold, but her legs tightened around his waist, anchoring him where she wanted him.
“You wish,” she whispered, lips brushing his jaw as her smirk widened. “As a matter of fact, I know you did. Dreamt about this—about being between my legs, trying to tame me, like I wouldn’t sink my fangs into you…” her voice dropped to a murmur, venom and velvet both, “…while you sink into me.”
Namjoon’s breath hitched. Just barely. But she caught it. Of course she caught it.
His grip on her wrists tightened, almost bruising, as if holding her still would stop her words from crawling under his skin and making a home there. His jaw flexed, teeth clenched, every line of his face screaming restraint.
“Do you ever,” he growled, leaning closer until his nose nearly brushed hers, “shut that poisonous mouth of yours?”
She tilted her chin, eyes gleaming, the pink still dusting her ears betraying her composure. “Only when someone worthy makes me.”
And for the first time, she thought she saw him break.
His lips curved into the kind of grin that wasn’t kind at all—it was dangerous, cocky, dripping with every ounce of Gryffindor arrogance she claimed to despise. His hand slipped up her thigh, deliberate, hot against her skin, until his palm cupped just high enough to make her breath hitch despite herself.
“Maybe instead of shutting your mouth,” he murmured, voice low and rough in her ear, “I could simply make you scream.”
Her laugh was sharp, defiant, the kind that set his blood on fire. She rolled her eyes like she wasn’t trembling under him, like she wasn’t arching just the slightest into his touch. “Please,” she sneered, lips curling in wicked amusement. “I could spell my wand to do better than that.”
His hand stilled for half a second, his brow ticking upward as if she’d just challenged the very core of him. Then, his grip tightened on her thigh, dragging her closer until her back pressed into the mattress, until his weight pinned her down in a way that was suffocating and electric all at once.
“You think a toy you enchanted,” he whispered, his breath ghosting over her lips, “could ever compare to me?”
Her smirk wavered—just a flicker, just enough for him to notice—and her nails dug into his bare shoulders as she shot back, “If it meant I didn’t have to suffer your sanctimonious face hovering over me, then yes.”
He chuckled, dark and low, the sound reverberating against her chest where he pressed closer. “Oh, viper,” he said, voice threading between a snarl and a promise. “I’ll make sure you choke on that answer.”
His mouth crushed against hers again, hotter, deeper, until their teeth clashed in a kiss that was more war than affection. His hands were rough when they tugged her shirt up and over her head, and the second the fabric hit the floor, he had to bite back a laugh—because despite the venom she spat, her body betrayed her. She shivered under his touch, every brush of his fingers pulling tiny, involuntary reactions out of her.
“Sensitive,” he murmured against her lips, nipping at her lower one hard enough to sting. “And here I thought the big bad viper couldn’t be touched.”
Her eyes narrowed, her smirk sharp as a blade. “Sensitive, sure,” she shot back, voice breathy and smug at once, “but don’t think for a second you’re in control.”
Before he could even retort, she bent her knee, sliding her leg between his and pressing her shin right against his crotch. The sharp grind made his breath falter—just for a second—and that was all she needed to smirk like she’d won the House Cup.
“You—” His voice came out strained, half a growl, as he shoved her wrists above her head with one hand, pinning them there. His hips instinctively jerked forward, meeting her grinding pressure. His eyes darkened, his composure cracking as he spat through gritted teeth, “You really don’t know when to quit, do you?”
Her laugh was wicked, breathless, triumphant. “And miss the sight of Gryffindor’s golden boy rutting against my leg? Never.”
He kissed her again, savage and punishing, swallowing her laugh as if he could devour it, devour her. Every movement was rough, desperate, laced with challenge.
His kisses trailed lower, down her jaw, her throat, her chest, until his teeth grazed her ribs and she gasped—not in fear, but in fury and surprise. His hands slid down her waist, gripping hard enough to bruise, and then—without warning—he tore at her skirt. The sound of fabric ripping echoed sharp in the chamber, followed instantly by the shattering snap of her panties being yanked down.
“Namjoon!” she shrieked, half indignant, half breathless. Her hands tugged furiously against his hold, wrists twisting as she glared daggers at him. “Are you insane?!”
His eyes were wild, fever-bright, the smirk on his lips feral as he tossed the shredded fabric aside like it was nothing. “Maybe I am,” he growled, voice low and rough against her ear, “but you drive me there. Don’t pretend you don’t love it.”
Her chest heaved, rage and want clashing in her veins. “Love it?” she spat, voice trembling with something dangerously close to surrender. “You just destroyed my favorite skirt, you filthy Gryffindor brute.”
“Good,” he shot back, his teeth sinking into her collarbone as his hand trailed lower, possessive and merciless. “Now you won’t be wearing it for anyone else.”
Her laugh broke on a moan, sharp and unsteady, her eyes flashing with hatred and hunger both. “God, you’re disgusting.”
“And you’re still letting me,” he murmured, his lips curving into a devilish grin as he pressed harder. “So tell me, Y/N—what does that make you?”
His head dipped lower, trailing hot, biting kisses down her stomach, her hips, until his lips brushed against the soft skin of her inner thigh. He lingered there deliberately, tongue dragging slowly, teeth grazing just enough to make her twitch. Her breath hitched, furious at herself for the sound, for the way her body betrayed her.
“Let’s see,” Namjoon murmured darkly, his voice a low rumble vibrating against her skin, “if you taste just as sweet as those poisonous lips of yours.”
Her hand immediately fisted in his hair, yanking hard enough to make him grunt. “You insufferable—arrogant—fraud! I’ll hex your tongue clean off if you so much as—”
He looked up at her from between her thighs, eyes glinting with a predator’s satisfaction, hair disheveled where her fingers tangled tight. “If you could even hold your wand right now,” he teased, breath hot against her, “you’d have already done it. But you haven’t. Interesting.”
Her thighs tried to snap shut around him, but he forced them apart, pressing them down with infuriating ease. Her face was flushed, twisted between rage and something more dangerous.
“You think you’re clever,” she hissed, though her voice trembled, “but you’re just another filthy Gryffindor who’ll choke on my venom one day.”
Namjoon didn’t give her a chance to finish that next poisonous insult. He dove in like a man starved, like he’d been waiting for this since the very first time she hissed his name across the classroom. His tongue was hot, insistent, ruthless as it slid through her folds, teasing, then plunging deeper, drinking down every sharp little gasp like it was his reward.
Her back arched violently off the bed, a strangled sound torn from her throat before she could swallow it down. She clawed at the sheets, at his hair, anywhere her hands could reach, trying desperately to yank him away even as her hips bucked forward. “Y-you—f-fuck—fraud,” she stuttered, venom spilling from her lips only to break apart into moans, “I’ll—gonna—hex your—ahh—your face off!”
He groaned against her, the vibration sending shocks through her core as his tongue flicked mercilessly at her clit before plunging back inside her heat. His grip was iron on her thighs, dragging them over his shoulders, locking her in place even as she tried to thrash away.
Her thighs trembled violently, clamping tight around his face, but he didn’t relent. If anything, he pressed closer, devouring her like she was his last meal, dragging his tongue in long, deliberate strokes that had her whimpering, squirming, her body betraying every threat that stumbled off her lips.
“N-…Nam—joon—” she gasped, her voice breaking as his mouth sealed over her clit and sucked, sharp and merciless. She was writhing now, trembling hard, her venom turned into half-choked pleas as her legs snapped tighter around him.
And still, he didn’t stop. He was relentless, feasting on her, tasting her sweetness and salt like it was proof she wasn’t untouchable, that her poison could be his cure. Every moan, every gasp, every desperate shiver of her body against his tongue drove him harder, faster, until she was nothing but a trembling mess beneath him, gasping his name like a curse and a prayer.
Namjoon didn’t even give her time to catch her breath. One second she was writhing beneath him, cursing and clawing, the next he flipped her like she weighed nothing. Her cheek hit the sheets, her ass tipped high into the air, and she let out a scandalized, breathless hiss.
“You—brute!” she snapped, voice shaking as she tried to push herself up on her elbows, her hair falling wild around her face. “What the hell do you think you’re—”
Whatever insult she was about to spit died in her throat the instant his tongue found her again. He spread her with greedy hands, gripping a handful of her ass like it belonged to him, and dove in with filthy hunger. His tongue traced her swollen folds from behind, the angle making her sob into the mattress, muffling sounds she never meant him to hear.
Her fists twisted in the sheets. Her whole body arched, fighting against him, but the betrayal was in her hips—jerking back into his mouth, chasing the way he licked and sucked and teased.
“You—Gods—fucking—Gryffindor animal—ahhh!” Her words dissolved into a scream as he tightened his grip, kneading her ass while his tongue drove deeper, his nose brushing her clit every time he pushed in.
He hummed low against her, obscene, like he was savoring every drop of her. She nearly lost her balance, knees shaking as she tried to hold herself up, the sheets damp beneath her cheek from her own ragged panting.
Then he flattened his tongue against her clit from behind, grinding circles into it, relentless, shameless, and she snapped. Her back bowed like a bowstring pulled taut, her thighs shaking violently around his head as she came with a cry that was half sob, half curse.
She creamed against his tongue, wet and sweet, her body convulsing as he licked her through it, not stopping, not slowing, just taking everything she gave.
Her face burned as she buried it in the sheets, humiliated and undone. She had never sounded like this, never felt like this—shattered apart by the one boy she swore she’d rather kill than touch.
And Namjoon? He groaned low, drinking her down like he had been starving for her all along.
She was still trembling from the aftershocks, her breath ragged, her skin flushed, but that didn’t stop her. If anything, the fury in her bones doubled. Her hands, clawing into the sheets moments ago, slammed flat as she shoved herself up and turned, pouncing on him before he could even rise from his knees.
Namjoon grunted when his back hit the mattress, her weight straddling his hips, her wild hair curtaining her flushed face as she pinned him down with her palms digging into his chest. Her lips crushed his in a feral kiss—messy, punishing, teeth clashing. She tasted herself on his tongue, and it only spurred her to kiss harder, to bite his lower lip until he groaned into her mouth.
She pulled back just enough to pant against his lips, eyes burning. “My. Fucking. Turn.”
And then she was gone—sliding down his body, her nails dragging over his ribs, making him tense. She left biting kisses over his stomach, sharp enough to sting, and then—like vengeance—she yanked at his sweats with the same reckless force he had used on her skirt. The elastic nearly snapped as she shoved them down his hips, impatient, greedy.
She froze. Blinked. Then—
“Really, Namjoon?” she deadpanned, voice dripping with disbelief as her eyes landed on the ridiculous pair of boxers. Cherry-red fabric. Cartoon cherries dotting across them. She rolled her eyes so hard her head almost tipped back. “Red cherry print? You’re serious?”
Namjoon’s ears went crimson. He shot upright, trying to grab her wrists, his dignity in tatters. “They were a gift!” he snapped, mortified, but she just shoved him back down with a wicked grin.
“Oh, this is too good. The great holier-than-thou Gryffindor, parading around in these.” She flicked the waistband with a snap, smirking down at him like she had just won the House Cup. “Cherry boy. Absolutely precious.”
He groaned, throwing an arm over his face. “I hate you.”
She leaned close, brushing her lips over his ear, whispering with venomous sweetness, “Mhm. You love me, remember?”
And before he could retort, she slid the boxers down with a snap of her wrist, smirk curling wider at the sight she revealed.
Her smirk widened the moment the cherry-print boxers hit the floor. She sat back on her knees, gaze dropping, slow and deliberate, and then flicked back up to meet his mortified eyes. The corners of her lips curled higher, her voice rich with venomous amusement.
“Hm.” She tilted her head, pretending to study him like one might a new potion ingredient. “Guess it was to be expected.”
Namjoon bristled, his cheeks blazing, his jaw tightening. “What the hell does that mean?”
She hummed, running one mocking finger down his thigh, nails scratching faintly against his skin. “It means,” she said, her tone cruel and sing-song, “for someone who runs around spouting golden Gryffindor speeches, I should’ve known you’d be all bark and…” her eyes dropped again, deliberately, “...well. You know.”
His breath hitched, half from indignation and half from the way her finger strayed too close, then retreated just to torment him. “You’re insufferable,” he ground out, trying not to buck up into her hand, “absolutely vile.”
“Mhm.” She licked her lips slowly, deliberately, watching the way his throat worked as he swallowed. “And yet you’re still lying here, letting me touch you. Letting me see you. Maybe you like my poison more than you admit, Joonie.”
“Stop—calling me that,” he hissed, but the way his voice cracked halfway through made her grin.
“Oh, Cherry boy,” she purred, wicked and sweet at once, lowering her mouth just above him, close enough that he could feel the ghost of her breath. “Don’t worry. I’ll take good care of you.”
And with that, she darted her tongue out, the barest flick, the cruelest tease, before pulling back again with a laugh. “Mm. Sweet. Just as I thought.”
Namjoon groaned, dragging his hands over his face, humiliated, aroused, furious—all at once. “You’re going to kill me.”
She grinned, leaning down until her lips brushed his ear, whispering, “That’s the idea.”
Her nails dug into his thighs, cruel and claiming, as she lowered herself onto him with the precision of a predator. Her lips wrapped around his tip first, tongue circling lazily, tauntingly slow, before she sank further, deeper, until her throat closed tight around him.
Namjoon’s head snapped back, a ragged groan spilling out of him. His hands clenched the sheets so hard they nearly tore. “F–fuck—Y/N…” His voice cracked, helpless.
She hummed around him, the vibration sending a violent shudder through his body. Pulling back, her lips glistened with him, her eyes gleaming with that devilish smirk. She dragged her teeth ever so lightly over the sensitive ridge beneath his head, making him choke out something between a curse and a plea.
“Aw, Joonie,” she cooed, voice dripping with venomous sweetness, “you sound like you’re about to cry. What happened to your Gryffindor pride, hm?”
He growled, trying to shoot her a glare, but it dissolved into another strangled sound when she swallowed him whole again—deeper this time, until her nose brushed his stomach. Her throat flexed, gagged once, and she pulled off with a wet pop just to lick a slow stripe up his shaft.
“Filthy girl,” he hissed, chest heaving.
“Vixen,” she corrected with a smug grin, wrapping her fist around the base and twisting, her tongue teasing his swollen tip with maddening flicks. “I told you I’d sink my fangs in you. Don’t act so surprised now.”
He was trembling, fighting to keep his hips from jerking into her mouth, but when she slid him back between her lips and moaned low in her throat, it was over. He bucked, swearing viciously, one hand flying to her hair to anchor himself as he spilled hard down her throat.
She didn’t flinch, didn’t falter—she drank it all, swallowing around him with obscene, deliberate gulps, then pulled back with a lewd lick of her lips. Her eyes sparkled with cruel satisfaction as she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
“Messy, Joonie,” she teased, her voice husky but sharp as a blade. “So much for your perfect control. You came like a boy who’s never been touched before.”
Namjoon covered his face with his arm, breathless, humiliated, undone. “I hate you,” he muttered, though his flushed skin and trembling thighs betrayed him.
She leaned up, lips brushing his ear, her smirk slicing through every ounce of his pride.
“No,” she whispered. “You love me. And that’s what makes this delicious.”
Namjoon’s body snapped like a bowstring—one moment trembling, trying to catch his breath, the next surging forward with fire in his veins. He grabbed her by the hips and threw her onto the mattress, the squeak that left her throat equal parts indignation and delight.
She landed sprawled on her back, hair fanning around her like a wicked halo. Her grin was feral, eyes flashing mischief. “OoOoo,” she crooned mockingly, dragging her foot up the length of his thigh before stroking his still-hard cock with her toes, deliberate, maddening. “Am I finally gonna take your flower, Joonie-bear?”
He snarled, catching her ankle in his fist, his grip iron. “You’ll choke on your words before you ever get that satisfaction.”
She tilted her head, lips curling in a wolfish smirk. “Choke, huh? You make it sound like a promise.” Her toes flexed against him again, slow strokes, teasing the sensitive tip until his jaw clenched and his whole body shuddered with the effort not to collapse back into her trap.
“Disgusting girl,” he spat through gritted teeth, but his eyes betrayed him—they were wide, dark, devouring her.
“Mm, but you love me,” she sang, foot sliding lower, tormenting him with featherlight touches. “What does that say about you?”
That snapped something in him. In a flash, he yanked her ankle higher, folding her nearly in half beneath him, her leg hooked over his shoulder as he pinned her down with his weight. His cock pressed against her slick folds, smearing her wetness as he ground into her without giving her what she wanted.
She gasped, then laughed breathlessly, tugging at his hair with wicked glee. “There’s the brute. About time. Go on, Joonie—make me scream like you promised.”
His teeth grazed her neck, sharp, possessive. “You think you’re in control, viper?” he growled, rolling his hips just enough to have her whimpering, her bravado cracking for a second. “I’ll show you control.”
Her nails raked down his back, hard enough to sting. “Try me,” she spat, breath hitching when he pressed harder, poised at her entrance but refusing to give her release. “I dare you.”
Namjoon didn’t give her time to prepare. With one savage thrust, he buried himself inside her, the stretch sudden, overwhelming. Her sharp gasp cracked into a moan, nails digging crescents into his back.
“Fuck—” he hissed through his teeth, forehead pressed to hers, every muscle in his body taut as he held himself still. She was too tight, clenching around him like her body wanted to devour him whole, and for a moment even he had to bite back the groan threatening to rip out of his chest.
Her legs locked around his waist, dragging him closer, trapping him. Her smirk faltered, replaced by parted lips and shaky breaths. “You… you—” she tried to sneer but her voice broke into a whimper. “You’re too fucking—”
“Big?” he finished for her, his tone a mix of mockery and strain, his own control fraying at the edges. He kissed the corner of her trembling mouth, cruel and soft all at once. “Don’t act surprised, viper. You asked for this.”
She laughed breathlessly, defiant even as her body shook under him. “Asked for it? Don’t flatter yourself. I’ll—” her words broke into another gasp when he shifted just slightly, grinding deeper, “—I’ll still eat you alive, Jooniebear.”
His smirk returned, wolfish and hungry. He tightened his grip on her wrists, pinning them above her head, his hips twitching forward just enough to make her cry out. “Eat me alive then,” he whispered darkly. “If you can still breathe.”
The room was filled with their ragged breathing, her thighs trembling against his sidesNamjoon’s control snapped into something razor-sharp, cruel in its patience. He drew his hips back and pressed forward again, slow—agonizingly slow—like he wanted her to feel every inch of him splitting her apart. He adjusted her, folding her tight, pushing her legs up until her thighs pressed flush against her chest, ankles hooked over his broad shoulders. The angle was brutal, steep, forcing him deeper than she thought possible.
Her back arched off the mattress, a strangled cry ripping from her throat before she bit it down, glaring through glassy eyes. “Bastard—”
He cut her off with another deliberate thrust, burying himself to the hilt, his jaw clenched so tight it looked carved from stone. A low groan slipped out, his restraint fraying. “You feel like you were made to choke on me,” he muttered, his voice rough, guttural.
Her fingers clawed at the sheets, the burn and stretch leaving her trembling, but her pride wouldn’t let her relent. She forced a smirk through her ragged breath. “Is that… all you’ve got, Jooniebear? Slow and steady? You fuck like a Hufflepuff.”
That earned her a sharp snap of his hips, her breath catching on a squeal she tried to swallow. His eyes darkened, his pace still slow but deeper, harder, every thrust dragging over spots that made her toes curl above his shoulders.
“Still running your mouth?” he ground out, his forehead dropping against hers, sweat dampening his temples. “Even folded in half… split open on my cock?”
Her smirk wavered, lips trembling as another groan broke free. “Y-You’re… insufferable—”
“And you,” Namjoon murmured, thrusting again, harder, forcing her body to quake beneath him, “are mine. For now.”
Her laugh was breathless, shaky, defiance hanging by a thread. “You’ll regret… every word of that.”
His teeth grazed her jaw as he dragged himself out to the edge, then pushed back in with a deep, punishing roll of his hips. “Then make me regret it.”, his jaw tight with restraint. They both knew the second he moved again, there would be no turning back.
Namjoon’s patience snapped like a thread pulled too tight. His grip on her thighs tightened, bruising, and he drove into her with a sudden brutal rhythm that made the bed frame groan in protest. No more teasing, no more measured control—just ruthless, relentless force, every thrust precise and punishing, dragging strangled cries from her throat no matter how hard she tried to bite them back.
Her nails clawed at his arms, his shoulders, desperate for purchase as her body jolted beneath the pace he set. “F-Fuck—Namjoon!” Her voice cracked, venom and desperation bleeding together. “You’re— ngh—trying to kill me!”
His mouth curled into a savage grin, sweat dripping from his jaw as he leaned over her, hips never faltering. “Says the girl who tried to stab me,” he ground out, each word punctuated with another hard slam of his body into hers. “This—” thrust, “is merciful.”
Her head fell back, lips parted in a half-choked moan, pride crumbling in the face of his ruthless tempo. Still, she spat the words between gasps, “You—you’re nothing but a—ngh— sanctimonious brute—”
Namjoon barked a laugh, low and sharp, never breaking pace. “And yet here you are—” he groaned, adjusting his angle, dragging against that spot that made her whole body spasm, “—taking every inch of me like you were made for it.”
Her thighs quaked where they rested against his shoulders, threatening to close around his neck, but he pinned her open, driving deeper, faster, until her composure fractured, her curses warping into broken sounds that betrayed her.
His voice dipped, rough and breathless against her ear. “Tell me, viper—” another punishing thrust made her cry out, “—still think I fuck like a Hufflepuff?”
Her head lolled back against the pillow, hair damp with sweat, but her chin lifted with that same venomous pride even as her voice broke between moans. “L-like I said,” she gasped, nails carving down his biceps, “I can—ahn—hex my wand to do a better job—hnngh—than this.”
Namjoon’s jaw clenched, his pace faltering for only a heartbeat before he slammed back into her harder, making her cry out despite herself. His teeth bared in something between a snarl and a grin. “A better job? With a wand?” His hips snapped forward, merciless, her body arching helplessly with every rut. “Then why—” thrust, “—are you shaking?” Another thrust. “Why are you dripping all over me like I’m the only one who can touch you like this?”
She tried to bite back a sound, but it came out strangled, betraying her. Still, her tongue was sharp even when her body betrayed her. “Y-you—p-pathetic—mmph—” she clawed at his shoulders, shoving him down as if she could drown him out with her nails. “You’re just—a dumb Gryffindor—full of—ahhn—smugness and self-righteous—”
Her words broke on a sob as he angled his hips, hitting her so deep and hard she nearly screamed. Namjoon’s eyes burned, dark and gleaming as he leaned down, his chest crushing hers into the mattress, his voice rasping against her lips.
“Then let me hear your wand make you scream like that.”
Her body convulsed under him, her pride cracking into ragged, furious whimpers. “Fuck—you,” she spat, but it was ruined by the way her voice pitched high, her back bowing, her thighs trembling.
Namjoon only grunted, the pace never letting up. “Already am.”
Her body snapped taut the moment he hit that spot deep inside her, the one that made every breath shatter in her chest. Her fingers, sharp and bruising a moment before, suddenly clawed at him in desperation—clutching him to her, nails digging crescents into his skin.
Her voice, usually dripping with venom and arrogance, broke into something fragile, raw. A low whimper escaped her lips, trembling and reluctant, but unmistakable.
“…Namjoon…”
The sound undid him. His face softened immediately, his thrusts slowing as if the single utterance of his name stripped the armor clean off his body. His chest tightened painfully, eyes dark and wide as he studied her.
She’d said his name before—spat it, mocked it, twisted it into insults sharp enough to cut bone. But never like this. Never in a tone that carried both pain and need, never with that crack of vulnerability running through.
And it struck him then—hard—that this was her first time. Just as untouched, if not more, than him. He could feel it in the way she clung to him, trembling, furious at her own weakness but unable to help it.
“Y/N…” His voice was softer now, the brutal edge dulled. His forehead pressed against hers, his breath ragged, his pace slowing until every movement was deliberate, careful. “It’s your first, isn’t it?”
She snapped her eyes open, fury blazing again, though wet with unshed tears. Her jaw clenched, trying to force back any confession. “Sh-shut up,” she hissed, though the quiver in her voice betrayed her.
Namjoon’s thumb brushed her cheek, almost without thought, and the tenderness in the gesture felt like another battle between them. “You could’ve told me,” he whispered, even as his hips ground into her slowly, hitting that spot with intent.
She let out another sound—half sob, half moan—and shoved her forehead against his shoulder, biting his skin to keep herself from breaking completely. “Like I’d ever—admit that to you,” she spat against his skin, muffled, but her legs only tightened around his waist.
His heart pounded, torn between anger, awe, and something deeper he didn’t dare name. “Then I’ll just have to remember for both of us,” he murmured, kissing the corner of her damp temple before driving into her again, slower, deeper—making sure she felt every inch.
Namjoon’s rhythm changed—not losing its strength, but gaining something else, something that made her chest seize up. His hips drove into her with a steady force, but his hands were uncharacteristically careful, sliding down her thighs, guiding one leg down from his shoulder so it hooked around his ribs.
The shift closed the space between them, pressed her tighter against him, and before she could sneer some new insult about him getting soft, his mouth was on hers.
It wasn’t one of their sharp, biting kisses—the kind meant to draw blood and prove dominance. This one was deep, unhurried, his tongue sliding into her mouth with devastating intent. He kissed like he was trying to unravel her from the inside out, licking against her lips until she gasped and groaned into him, unwillingly giving him more.
Her fists bunched in his hair, tugging hard enough to make him grunt, but he swallowed the sound into the kiss. His hand cradled her jaw, thumb smearing at the corner of her mouth as if he couldn’t stand the idea of pulling away, even for breath.
She broke first, panting against his lips. “You—” she started, furious at how wrecked her voice sounded, “you’re disgusting—”
“Am I?” he murmured, dragging his teeth over her bottom lip before biting it just enough to make her cry out. His other hand gripped the back of her thigh, holding her flush against him as he thrust deeper, harder, the angle sending shocks through her body that made her whimper against her will.
Her leg squeezed tighter around his ribs, not letting him go even as she spat venom into his mouth between kisses. “You’re still—hnngh—pathetic, Namjoon. Always have been.”
“And yet,” he groaned, lips brushing against hers, “you’re clinging to me like you’ll die if I stop.”
Her eyes snapped open, glassy with heat and fury. “I will kill you,” she hissed, then cut herself off with another moan as he rolled his hips just right, stealing the rest of her threat.
Namjoon only smirked into the next kiss, licking away her words as if tasting her venom was a pleasure he couldn’t give up.
Her nails raked down his back, sharp little crescents leaving marks he knew he’d feel tomorrow. But he didn’t care—not when she was clinging to him like he was the only thing tethering her to the earth, not when she was gasping and moaning his name like she hated herself for needing him.
“Namjoon—” it slipped out of her in a whimper, raw and desperate, nothing like the venom she usually spat.
His pace faltered for half a heartbeat, chest caving at the sound. His forehead pressed to hers, sweat dripping between them as he growled, “Say it again.”
Her pride fought it, but her body betrayed her, back arching, leg tightening around his ribs as he drove into her deeper, rougher. “N–Namjoon,” she gasped again, louder this time, her voice breaking.
He groaned her name back, her cursed name, like it was salvation and damnation in one. His lips brushed her ear, his voice wrecked, trembling as much as his body. “I got you. I got you, Y/N.”
Something inside her snapped at the way he said it—not mocking, not cruel, but steady, as if he was anchoring her through the storm tearing her apart. She buried her face against his neck, muffling her sobs and moans as her hips rolled up into his, frantic, greedy, begging without words.
Every thrust dragged her closer to the edge, and though she would never admit it, she was terrified of what waited when she fell. Her venom always kept people away, her claws always shredded anyone who tried to touch her. But here he was, still holding her, still kissing her like he wanted her poison coating his tongue.
She choked on his name again, trembling violently under him, clinging so tight he could hardly move. And when she shattered, he was right there with her, groaning into her mouth as his hips slammed deep one last time, spilling himself inside her like he couldn’t stop if he tried.
The world went quiet, save for their ragged breathing.
Pinned beneath him, chest heaving, she whispered hoarsely, “I hate you.”
Namjoon laughed breathlessly against her throat, kissing her there before he pulled back just enough to meet her glassy eyes. “Good,” he rasped, thumb brushing her cheek. “Then we’re even.”
Namjoon barely had time to catch his breath before her foot jabbed right into his ribs. He let out a winded groan, rolling half off her with a glare.
“You brute,” she huffed, arms crossing over her chest like a sulking child. Her hair was a mess, cheeks flushed, lips swollen—and she was actually pouting.
He blinked at her, then let out a disbelieving laugh. “You just tried to claw my back off five minutes ago, and I’m the brute?”
She turned her face away, nose in the air. “That’s different. That was artistic expression.”
“Artistic—” Namjoon sat up, dragging a hand through his damp hair, his laugh sharp and incredulous. “You’re unbelievable. You pout like a kid and then call me a brute? Do you ever listen to yourself?”
Her pout deepened, her toe nudging his side again, lighter this time but still enough to make him grunt. “Don’t laugh at me. I’m very upset with you.”
“Oh, I can tell,” he deadpanned, leaning back on his elbows, chest still rising and falling heavy. “You’re absolutely terrifying right now.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, the tiniest twitch tugging at her lips. “Mock me again and I’ll stab you with my wand.”
He smirked. “Which one?”
Her gasp of outrage echoed through the room as she smacked his chest with a pillow. “Kim Namjoon!”
He grabbed the pillow mid-swing, yanking it out of her grasp and tossing it aside. Then he leaned in, so close his breath fanned her cheek. His grin was infuriatingly smug. “There’s that pout again. You really expect me to take you seriously when you look like that?”
She shoved his shoulder, but her ears betrayed her—pink, glowing, burning. “Ugh, you’re insufferable.”
“And you’re pouting.”
“Shut up.”
“Make me.”
Her eyes widened at his challenge, and for a moment, neither of them breathed.
Then she kicked him again.
He laughed so hard he nearly toppled off the bed.
Namjoon hooked an arm around her waist and dragged her closer until half his weight pressed down on her. She squeaked indignantly, her face smushed against the pillow as she flailed weakly in protest.
“Go ahead,” she mumbled into the fabric, voice muffled and dramatic, “take advantage of my fragility. Break me while I’m weak, you beast.”
He scoffed, letting his chin rest lazily on the crown of her head. “Fragility? My back looks like I got thrown into the Forbidden Forest and lost a fight with a bear. You did that, not me.”
She turned her head just enough to glare at him, hair sticking to her damp temple. “Maybe the bear had it coming.”
He raised a brow, fighting a grin. “So I’m the bear now?”
“You’re worse than a bear. At least a bear doesn’t smugly narrate its own existence.”
Namjoon let out a low chuckle, the vibration rolling through his chest and into her back. “You’re insufferable. You try to murder me, call me every vile thing under the sun, and then pout when I don’t let you win.”
She shoved weakly at his chest, but he didn’t budge, his weight pinning her in place. “Maybe I’d stop pouting if you stopped existing.”
“Ouch,” he said flatly, though his lips twitched in amusement. “Do you even hear yourself? You sound like a kid denied her favorite toy.”
Her mouth parted to retort, but he shifted just enough that his teeth grazed her ear, and the noise that escaped her throat was closer to a gasp than a comeback.
“See?” he teased softly, low enough to make her skin heat. “Even now, you can’t decide if you want to stab me or—”
She elbowed him in the ribs before he could finish. “Finish that sentence and I’ll make sure you do lose to a bear.”
Namjoon grunted but didn’t let her go, only pulling her tighter against him, his grin smug against her cheek.
“You’re a menace,” he murmured.
“And you’re a pest,” she shot back.
“Guess we’re even.”
Her pout returned, full force, and it made him laugh again.
Namjoon shifted, finally easing off her just enough so she could breathe without her face being suffocated by the pillow. His brows were drawn together, the tension in his jaw clear as he searched her expression.
“How do you want to move forward with this?” he asked carefully, the weight of the question grounding the room. His voice was steady, but his thumb brushed absentminded circles against her hipbone, betraying nerves.
Y/N blinked at him, then let her lips twitch upward into a sly smirk. “Forward?” she echoed, tilting her head like she was trying the word on for size. “We already did. You know… moved forward. Quite enthusiastically.”
His face darkened instantly, ears tinged red. “That’s not what I meant—”
“Uh-huh,” she cut him off, leaning close enough that her breath warmed the shell of his ear. “Namjoon, darling, you already ruined me. You shoved your whole Gryffindor pride into me. If I’m a ruined maiden, then logically—”
His groan was pure agony. “Don’t say it like that—”
“You should take responsibility.”
Namjoon stared at her, deadpan, while she smiled like a cat that had just knocked over an heirloom vase. “You’re unbelievable,” he muttered.
“Unbelievably right.”
His eye twitched. “So what? Are you… are you asking me to take you out? Like—on a date?”
“NO,” she snapped immediately, eyes narrowing as if the word itself offended her. She jabbed him in the chest with a finger. “Not some place obvious, at least. Do you want the whole bloody castle whispering about me letting you climb between my legs? No thanks.”
Namjoon pinched the bridge of his nose, exhaling sharply. “So you want to keep this quiet.”
“Mmhm.” She rolled onto her back, lounging like a queen, her hair wild across the pillow. “Inconspicuous. Subtle. Secret trysts in dark corners, stolen moments, a touch here, a kiss there—oh, you know, the usual sordid Gryffindor–Slytherin affair.”
He gave her a look so dry it could have shriveled parchment. “You make it sound like a scandal.”
“Isn’t it?” she purred, turning her head to look at him, eyes glittering. “The Golden Gryffindor boy, oh-so-perfect, and the poisonous viper he can’t stop touching? Tell me that wouldn’t ruin your reputation faster than a Howler from your mother.”
Namjoon winced at the thought. “Merlin’s sake, you’re impossible.”
“And you’re stuck with me now.”
He flopped back onto the bed, covering his face with one hand, half in despair, half in disbelief. “This is going to kill me.”
“Maybe,” she said sweetly, propping herself up on her elbow to peer down at him. “But at least you’ll die in my bed. Consider it a privilege.”
He groaned again, but there was a reluctant curl of a smile tugging at his lips.
Her words hung heavy in the air, so uncharacteristic of her usual venom that Namjoon didn’t breathe at first—afraid even the slightest shift would shatter the moment.
She wasn’t looking at him. Her head was tilted just enough that the strands of her hair shadowed her eyes, her voice quieter than he had ever heard it. Almost brittle.
“Namjoon,” she said, and his name felt different in her mouth—less like an insult, more like a confession. “I might not be in love with you the way you are…” her throat worked, and she exhaled sharply like the words cut on the way out, “but… I’d like to try.”
His chest tightened.
She drew her knees up a little, wrapping her arms around them as though bracing herself. “You’ve seen me at my worst. At my best. And somehow you didn’t walk away either time.” Her lips twitched in a wry smile, humorless and self-mocking. “You’re the only one who can match my poison with your own. Everyone else just withers. But you… you push back. You stay.”
Her hands clenched tighter against her shins. She hated how raw it felt, hated how weak her voice sounded as it dropped. “I get scared easy.”
Namjoon swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. For once, he didn’t have a retort. No snide jab, no sarcastic bite. Just him, staring at her like she’d cracked his ribs open and put her words in place of his heart.
“Y/N…” his voice came low, rough with something unsteady. He sat up, the mattress dipping, and reached a hand toward her but stopped halfway—hesitant, uncertain if she’d snap at him for daring to touch her when she was so unguarded.
Her eyes flicked to his hand, then back to the blanket, as though the sight alone made her throat close up.
“I don’t need your pity,” she whispered suddenly, defensive, shoulders curling in. “Don’t you dare look at me like I’m fragile—”
“It’s not pity.” His words cut through hers, firm but gentle. “It’s… it’s me.”
Her head snapped up, eyes sharp and wet, as though daring him to elaborate.
Namjoon exhaled slowly, finally letting his hand rest over hers on the blanket. Not forcing, not gripping—just there. Steady. “I’m not going anywhere. Even if you try to stab me again.” His mouth quirked, soft but sincere.
Something flickered in her eyes—annoyance, fear, relief, maybe all at once—and she yanked her hand out from under his, though she didn’t move away. “You’re a fucking idiot,” she muttered, voice shaky.
“Maybe,” he admitted, leaning back just enough to meet her glare evenly. “But I’m your idiot now, aren’t I?”
She let out a sharp breath—half laugh, half choked curse—and buried her face in her knees.
Namjoon watched her, heart thudding, and for the first time, her silence didn’t feel like an attack. It felt like trust
Trigger Warning: Enemies to Lovers, stabbing, curses, abusive parents, cuss words, inappropriate use of a wand, penetration, sexual intercourse, oral sex, fellatio, cunnilingus, raging bitches, they want to kill each other, got them together for the plot ngl, bookstagram ahh fic.
Authors Note: HELLLOOOOO EVERYONE THIS HAD BEEN IN MY REQUESTS FOR A LONG TIME AND I FINALLY FINISHED IT. i honestly wrote this and scrapped it 5 different times before I was somewhat satisfied with it. I suck ass at writing enemies to lover honestly but eh I TRIED MY BEST OKAY TT also the banner was designed by my friend so please go support her she is an AMAZING designer and does poster and everything go check her out
here is my MASTERLIST
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synopsis:
"A Gryffindor and a Slytherin—Kim Namjoon and the girl he can’t stand—locked in a rivalry so bitter it could set the castle aflame. Every encounter is a battle of wit and venom, every glance a silent dare. But when hate burns this fiercely, it has a way of turning into something just as dangerous.
Namjoon couldn’t stop replaying it in his head.
The slap, the echo of it still buzzing in his ears. The sting across his cheek, the cut on his lip. But more than anything—her face.
He’d seen her smirk a thousand times. He’d seen her roll her eyes, heard the scoffs, endured the smug little barbs she threw like daggers. That was their rhythm. That was her. Amusement, mockery, endless baiting until he snapped.
But this time was different.
She hadn’t been smirking. She hadn’t been amused. She’d looked at him like she wanted him erased from existence. Pure fury—no game, no sly grin, no thrill in her eyes. Just hatred, sharp and unfiltered, burning so hot it made his chest seize.
Her words had cut deeper than he’d expected them to. He’d meant his jab about her parents to sting, sure, but he hadn’t thought it would hit that hard. He hadn’t thought she would hit that hard back. And she had. With every word she’d flung at him—egotistical, hypocritical, lowlife, fraud. Every one had landed like a stone hurled straight into his ribs.
And the worst part? She wasn’t wrong.
That was what twisted in him like a knife. That was why he’d sneered, why he’d bristled, why he’d snapped at her after, even though her voice had cracked and her fists had been trembling. Because she wasn’t just mocking him this time. She was naming things he didn’t want to face.
He hated it. He hated that she’d gotten under his skin deeper than ever before. He hated that the look in her eyes was burned into his memory, haunting him more than the slap. He hated that she had stripped him of his armor, ripped the amusement out of the air, and for once, left him feeling like the fraud she’d called him.
Namjoon was angry—furious, even. At her, at himself, at the whole damn castle for whispering about it. But beneath the fury was something that left him restless, pacing, chewing at his nails until they bled.
Confusion.
Because she had never looked at him like that before. And now that she had, he couldn’t shake it.
She changed after that fight.
No one missed it—the shift in her smile, the way her laughter lost its playful bite and turned into something sharper, jagged, meant to cut. The girl who once thrived on smug amusement, on teasing and tormenting Namjoon alone, became something else entirely.
Volatile. Cruel.
The whispers had barely started when she gathered the culprits, one by one. Cornered them in empty classrooms, the dungeons, even in broad daylight where no one could pretend not to notice. And whatever she said—whatever threats she hissed, whatever promises she made—worked. Because each of them walked away pale, wide-eyed, hollow. They never whispered again. Some wouldn’t even breathe when she passed.
And Namjoon noticed, even if she refused to look at him.
That was the strangest part. For a month, she didn’t glance his way once. Not in class, not in the corridors, not even when Snape paired them together in detention like he always did. It was as though he ceased to exist. She mocked others, cut them down with words so venomous even Namjoon flinched from afar, but him? She acted like he wasn’t there at all.
She wasn’t just smug anymore. She wasn’t simply that infuriating smirk he’d come to know. Now she leaned in close to trembling first years and whispered things that made them cry. She tripped students in the hall not out of playfulness but because she wanted them to fall. She dug at insecurities like they were treasures waiting to be unearthed, and her words stuck like curses long after she walked away.
It was cruelty, plain and simple.
And yet… it wasn’t random. It wasn’t wild. It was calculated, sharp-edged. She wore it like armor. If everyone already thought her a nuisance, a problem, a burden, then she’d play the part to perfection.
What was the point of trying to be more, of showing kindness, of softening around the edges—when the moment she faltered, someone like Namjoon could slice her open with a single comment about the parents who despised her?
She was tired of being mocked for existing. Tired of being treated like an inconvenience. So she gave them what they wanted. The nuisance. The snake. The villain.
Namjoon, for all his anger and confusion, couldn’t stop noticing. He couldn’t stop seeing how she turned away when his gaze lingered, how her fists stayed clenched even when she smiled, how there was no longer anything playful in the barbs she threw at others. He couldn’t stop wondering if he had caused this—if his words had shoved her off a cliff she’d been teetering on for years.
And maybe that was what unsettled him most.
Because he hated her. He should’ve felt satisfied. Vindicated, even. But every time he caught sight of that sharp, hollow look in her eyes—the one that had replaced the infuriating spark he knew so well—it didn’t feel like a victory.
The crowd was thick, buzzing with low whispers and gasps, the kind that always followed a spectacle at Hogwarts. Namjoon pushed through, irritation already rising—he didn’t have time for this nonsense, not today. But when he finally broke through the circle of students and saw who stood in the center, his chest went tight.
Her.
And in front of her, trembling and crying, were the two Hufflepuff twins—first years. The same pair Namjoon distinctly remembered catching her helping once, long ago. She had sat with them in the library, whispering explanations about potion ingredients with an odd sort of patience. He hadn’t understood it then—why she, the ruthless snake, would bother tutoring a couple of nervous badgers—but he’d remembered.
That same pair now stared at her through watery eyes, confused, broken, scared out of their wits while she circled them like a predator. Her words—low, venomous, cutting—slashed through the air, and the twins flinched with every syllable. She smirked, cruel in a way Namjoon had never seen before, not even when she went after him.
Something inside him snapped.
“Enough,” he barked, stepping forward. The crowd rippled, tension thickening, excitement mounting. Gryffindor versus Slytherin—it was always a show.
But she didn’t even look at him. Didn’t blink. Didn’t pause. She just kept circling, her words slicing sharper, ignoring him as if he were nothing more than background noise.
That burned more than he wanted to admit.
He stepped directly into her path, blocking her from the twins. “I said enough.”
Her eyes flicked up at him then—empty, mocking, but detached, like he was barely worth her time. She didn’t argue, didn’t sneer like she used to. She simply sidestepped him, fluid as water, and kept going.
Something in him roared.
Before he could stop himself, Namjoon’s hand shot out, grabbing her by the arm.
The world seemed to freeze.
Her head whipped toward him, eyes narrowing dangerously at the contact. The crowd collectively held its breath, waiting for the explosion they all knew was coming. His grip was firm, but not crushing—just enough to make her see him.
“What the hell are you doing?” Namjoon hissed, his voice low but razor-edged. He could feel her muscles tense beneath his fingers, coiled like a snake ready to strike. “These are kids. The same ones you—” He cut himself off, jaw clenching, but the memory burned hot in his chest. “What happened to you?”
Her lips curled into a smirk, but there was no humor in it. Only venom.
“What happened,” she echoed, voice dripping with mockery, “is I finally learned my lesson.” Her eyes bored into his, unflinching. “If everyone’s going to call me a nuisance, a problem, a burden—then why disappoint them?”
Namjoon’s grip tightened without meaning to, his breath sharp in his throat. The twins sniffled behind him, pressing together in fear, and for the first time in years, Namjoon didn’t feel like he was in a fight with her.
He felt like he was staring at someone who’d been broken—and was now hellbent on making the world break with her.
Namjoon’s grip on her arm lasted only a second longer before she shoved his hand off, hard enough that it stung. She tilted her head, smirk back in place, sharp and poisonous.
“Relax, golden boy,” she drawled, stepping past him with a calculated sway. “I’m just playing.”
The Hufflepuff twins flinched when her gaze slid to them again, and Namjoon’s jaw locked. He could see it—their trembling shoulders, their wide, tear-streaked faces. That wasn’t playing. That wasn’t her usual mischief. This was different. Darker.
“No,” he said firmly, voice like stone. “You’re not.”
She pivoted back toward him, eyes glinting in the dim light, a dangerous kind of amusement flickering across her face. “Awh,” she cooed mockingly, “is the fraud going to stop me?”
The crowd around them leaned in, hushed, as if the whole castle knew they were about to witness something that would end in blood.
Namjoon’s fury rose so fast he almost choked on it. He stepped closer, crowding her space, his voice a growl. “Yeah. You’re not gonna torment those kids. Because at the end of the day, you’re still just an insecure little girl who wishes mommy and daddy loved her.”
The second the words left his mouth, he knew he’d crossed a line.
Her head snapped toward him so fast it was like a whip, the smirk evaporating. Her eyes—Merlin, her eyes—were molten fury, so sharp and sudden it made his skin prickle. The twins weren’t even on her radar anymore. Namjoon had all her attention now, and it felt like being caught in the strike zone of a viper.
“Repeat yourself,” she said softly, dangerously, her voice shaking not with weakness but with the sheer effort of containing her rage. She stepped forward, close enough that he could feel the heat radiating off her. “Go on, Kim. Whatever it is swimming around in that self-righteous head of yours, say it again. Because they’ll be your last words.”
The crowd around them broke into murmurs, a ripple of anticipation like a storm rolling in. Namjoon stood rigid, pulse hammering, staring into those blazing eyes. This was what he wanted, wasn’t it? For her to turn all that cruelty on him. Because he could take it. He could handle it. Better him than those twins.
So he clenched his teeth, squared his shoulders, and leaned down until his forehead almost touched hers.
“Fine,” he whispered, low and deliberate. “You heard me. You’ll always be that little girl. The one who wasn’t enough.”
The corridor seemed to hold its breath, waiting for the detonation.
The detonation was instant.
One second they were nose-to-nose, her voice low and venomous, his words cutting like knives—and the next, she snapped.
Her fist came first, colliding with his jaw so hard his teeth rattled. Namjoon barely caught his balance before her wand was out, hexes snapping through the air with wild, reckless precision. The crowd gasped, scattering backward, but no one dared leave. Everyone knew—when Gryffindor’s golden boy and Slytherin’s viper went for each other, it was history in the making.
Namjoon’s wand was in his hand before he’d even thought, blocking, countering, spitting curses back at her. But he realized almost immediately—this wasn’t their usual duel. This wasn’t clever quips, this wasn’t showing off, this wasn’t about winning.
She wasn’t fighting him. She was trying to end him.
Her curses flew viciously, her movements wild but sharp, teeth bared as though she’d forgotten what restraint even meant. And then he saw it—her hands shaking, her chest heaving with ragged breaths, tears spilling down her cheeks even as her lips curled back in fury.
“I am not—” she screamed, her voice breaking, “—an insecure little girl!”
The force of her words slammed into him harder than any hex. She was crying, full-bodied sobs she tried to choke back with every furious strike of her wand, every kick, every slap. “How could I ever be? I am perfect! I am loved! I don’t need—” her curse whizzed past his ear, narrowly missing—“a filthy muggle pretending to be a wizard, who is nothing without Hogwarts—”
Her wand lashed, her nails caught his cheek, and the sting of her words cut deeper than the pain—“—to tell me otherwise!”
Namjoon staggered back, breath tearing out of his lungs, heart pounding in his ears. Her words dug into every insecurity he’d buried under Gryffindor pride, but he didn’t stop. He couldn’t. Because if he stopped, she’d devour herself whole.
So he fought back, harder than he ever had, blood already running from his lip, his knuckles aching, until the air between them was heavy with spells, fists, teeth, and raw, uncontained hatred.
And for the first time, Namjoon felt like this wasn’t just a fight between enemies.
It was a war she was waging against herself—and he was the only one who could stand in her way. ═══════════════════════════════════════════ ✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹ ︶︶⊹ ═══════════════════════════════════════════
The castle had turned into a warzone.
The moment her wand cut through the air, sending a crack of blue light that shattered a suit of armor into a rain of metal shards, Namjoon knew he had to get her out. She wasn’t stopping. She wasn’t even seeing anymore. Just screaming, hexing, throwing herself at him like she was possessed. And the crowd—hungry, wide-eyed—was only feeding the fire.
“MOVE!” he roared at the gawking students, blocking one curse that scorched the stone wall behind him. Another blast came so close it singed the edge of his robe.
She was chasing him now, sobbing and furious, running down the corridor with her wand raised like a blade. He deflected spell after spell, knowing if one hit full force, someone was going to end up in the hospital wing—or worse. With every hex she hurled, her voice cracked more, raw and ragged, until finally he baited her far enough from the others, down through the doors and out onto the grounds.
The night air hit like ice, but it didn’t cool her. Not one bit.
By the time they reached the Black Lake, the earth around them was scorched with the residue of their curses. Her face was streaked with dirt and tears, hair wild, hands trembling so violently the wand almost shook from her grip. Still, she screamed, still she fought.
“You think you’re better than me?” she spat, voice breaking as she threw another hex that cracked a tree trunk in half. “You think you’re noble, you think you’re holy—when really, you’re just a fraud with a savior complex who hides behind that stupid lion crest!”
Namjoon, panting, raised his wand again, his fury spilling just as violently. “Better than being a snake who lies her way through life because she’s too scared to be real!”
Her scream tore through the night, her spell hitting the ground so close the earth split between them. “At least I don’t need this castle to pretend I matter! At least I’m not a pathetic little boy playing prince—because we all know once you leave here, you’re nothing!”
Her voice cracked on the last word, but she didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop. Tears poured down her face, blurring her vision, but her aim was still vicious, still deadly.
Namjoon roared back, stepping through the dirt and sparks, wand raised. “You’re right—I’m nothing without Hogwarts. But you? You’re nothing anywhere. You could walk this whole world and it wouldn’t change the fact your parents didn’t want you, your house barely tolerates you, and everyone here only sees you for what you are—” his voice sharpened to a cruel edge he didn’t even recognize as his own, “—a pathetic little tyrant who pretends cruelty is power because it’s the only thing keeping you from falling apart!”
The words sliced through the air like a blade. She froze for half a second, chest heaving, before she lunged, scream shredding her throat.
She didn’t hex this time—she ran at him, nails, fists, everything she had, crashing into him so hard they both went sprawling in the dirt by the lake. She clawed at him, pulled his hair, sobbed in his face, spat every venomous word she had left.
“YOU DON’T GET TO TALK ABOUT ME!” she shrieked, voice raw. “YOU DON’T GET TO SAY THEIR NAMES—YOU DON’T GET TO TELL ME I’M NOTHING! I AM PERFECT, I AM LOVED—” her fists slammed into his shoulders, his chest, his face, “—AND I DON’T NEED A HALF-BLOOD MUGGLE SPAWN LIKE YOU TO SAY OTHERWISE!”
Her words hit harder than her fists. Harder than any curse.
And as Namjoon grappled with her in the dirt, blood in his mouth, pain ringing in his skull, the only thought he had was bitter and sharp—
She wasn’t just fighting him. She was tearing herself apart, piece by piece.
The Black Lake glimmered faintly under the moonlight, but the night was far from calm. Sparks of green and red lit the air as spells cracked and fizzled against the ground, trees, and water. The grass was scorched, the earth trembling with every curse that hit too close.
And in the middle of it all, she was unraveling.
Her face was streaked with dirt, blood smeared on her lip, her hands trembling so violently it was a miracle her wand hadn’t snapped in two. Her hair clung to her sweat-damp face, eyes wild and swollen with tears. She was sobbing even as she screamed, her voice scraping raw.
Namjoon had seen her fight before, seen her spit venom and bare her teeth, but this was different. This wasn’t their usual brand of hatred, the kind everyone whispered about like it was entertainment. This was her breaking apart.
“YOU THINK YOU’RE SO PERFECT!” she shrieked, her voice ricocheting across the lake. Her wand snapped forward, the spell missing him by inches, searing a line into the dirt. “You and your stupid lion crest, your stupid perfect life with your stupid perfect parents who love you and think you’re some prince—” she choked, tears dripping down her chin, “—you know NOTHING about me, Kim Namjoon! NOTHING!”
She kicked him in the stomach when he moved closer, hard enough that the air rushed out of his lungs. He staggered back, clutching his gut, but she was already on him, clawing at his arms, scratching deep enough that blood welled beneath his torn robes. Her nails carved trails into his skin like she wanted to brand her hatred into him.
“You walk around like you’re better than everyone!” she spat, her nose bleeding now, dripping down to her mouth as she screamed. “Holier-than-thou Namjoon, who thinks he’s this paragon of truth and justice—when all you are is a hypocrite. A fraud. A coward hiding behind your house colors because without Hogwarts, without your parents, you’re NOTHING. You’re WEAK.”
Namjoon shoved her off, panting, his face twisted in fury. “And you’re not? You’re the weakest of us all! That’s why you sneer, that’s why you torment, that’s why you hide behind lies and cruelty—you can’t stand the fact that deep down, you’re empty. You’re pathetic!”
Her scream was so shrill it cut through him like a blade. She didn’t even hesitate—she lunged, shoving him so hard he nearly hit the ground. And before he could recover, before he could register, she had slammed her wand into his shoulder.
Pain exploded, white-hot and searing, ripping a curse out of his throat. He clutched at the wood protruding from his flesh, blood spilling hot beneath his fingers. “HAVE YOU LOST YOUR DAMN MIND?!” he roared.
Her face was blotchy with tears, snot, and blood, but her grip on the wand didn’t falter. She pressed it deeper into him, twisting slightly as her entire body shook with fury.
“You don’t get to talk about me like that,” she hissed, every word dripping with venom. Her voice was cracking, breaking apart, but she forced it louder, harsher, spitting poison with each breath. “You don’t get to say I’m weak. I am NOT weak. I am NOT some insecure little girl begging for scraps of love. I am PERFECT. I am LOVED. I DON’T NEED ANYONE—LEAST OF ALL YOU!”
Her hand tightened around the wand, knuckles white, blood from her nose dripping down onto his robes. Then she began to chant.
Low. Shaky. Unsteady at first, but the words grew louder, clearer, and Namjoon’s blood ran cold when he recognized them. A curse no one dared utter. One that could tear through more than flesh if spoken to the end.
“Stop—” he rasped, panic slicing through the haze of pain. He grabbed at her wrist, trying to wrench the wand free, but she held fast, her nails digging into his skin. “Do you even know what you’re saying? That’ll kill us both!”
“I DON’T CARE!” she screamed, sobbing so hard she was almost choking on her own breath. Her body shook violently as the words poured out, spit flying from her mouth, her face twisted into something feral. “I don’t care if I die, I don’t care if you die—I won’t let you tell me who I am!”
Her voice was a frenzy, breaking, rising with each repetition of the curse. The wind picked up, whipping around them as if even the lake itself recoiled from what she was invoking. Namjoon could barely hear anything over the roar in his ears, the sound of his own blood pounding, the searing fire in his shoulder.
He slammed his forehead against hers, desperate, wild. “SNAP OUT OF IT!” he bellowed, the impact splitting his lip. “You’re not perfect, you’re not loved—you’re just a scared girl who can’t stand to admit it! But this—THIS ISN’T YOU!”
Her chant faltered. Just for a moment. Her eyes, blurred with tears and fury, flickered.
And in that second, as her breath came in harsh, broken sobs and her grip trembled on the wand lodged in his shoulder, Namjoon realized—
She wasn’t trying to kill him. Not really. She was trying to obliterate herself.
The night cracked open.
“FINITE!”
The spell boomed like thunder, and in an instant she was ripped away from him. Her body flew back across the grass, slammed into the dirt with such force the air left her lungs in a brutal gasp. She convulsed, her limbs seizing like the curse itself had tangled inside her veins, before her body went limp.
Namjoon staggered forward, clutching his bleeding shoulder, eyes wide as he watched her crumple. His heart hammered in his throat, his mind still reeling from the venom of her words, from the spell she had been so close to finishing.
Professor McGonagall stood a few paces behind him, wand raised, her face drawn into a tight mask that betrayed both fury and fear. Her robes billowed in the night air, her eyes flashing sharper than steel as they cut from Namjoon to the girl sprawled on the ground.
Namjoon swallowed hard, his lips split and his cheek swelling. He hadn’t been afraid of her spell, not really—not until that last second when he realized she wasn’t going to stop. And now, seeing her slack on the grass, blood streaking her face, he couldn’t stop shaking.
“Mr. Kim,” McGonagall said sharply, her voice steady but low. “Stand down.”
Namjoon’s chest heaved. His hand was still wrapped around the wand buried in his shoulder. Slowly, with a wince, he yanked it free, blood gushing down his robes. The crowd that had followed them at a distance was silent now, pale and horrified, no longer eager spectators to their endless war.
McGonagall’s gaze softened—just slightly—as she flicked her wand, levitating the unconscious girl from the ground. She hovered in the air like a broken doll, her head lolling, her tear-stained face slack in sleep.
Namjoon’s throat felt dry as ash. His whole body hurt, but it wasn’t the blood or the bruises that ached the most. It was the words she’d screamed—I am perfect, I am loved, I don’t need anyone—the way they had shattered into sobs, as though she was begging herself to believe them.
“Professor,” he rasped, his voice hoarse and unsteady, “she was—”
“I know,” McGonagall cut him off, her voice clipped. But there was something else in her tone, something grim. She looked at the girl floating beside her, her sharp features softening just enough to betray a flicker of worry before hardening again.
“Come,” she said briskly. “You’re both going to the hospital wing.”
Namjoon wanted to protest, wanted to argue, wanted to scream that this wasn’t normal, that she hadn’t just been fighting him, she’d been spiraling. But the words caught in his throat, tangled in the bitter taste of blood and something heavier.
As McGonagall led them away—one staggering, one unconscious—he kept staring at her.
And for the first time in all their years of hatred, Namjoon wasn’t thinking about how much he despised her.
He was thinking about how close she had come to breaking completely.
The hospital wing had been a blur. She’d come to, quiet and pale, no fight in her limbs, no words on her lips. No smirk, no scoff, no venom dripping from her tongue. Just a heavy, hollow silence that felt more frightening than any curse she could conjure.
And now—here they were.
McGonagall’s office was tight with tension, firelight casting sharp shadows across the walls. Namjoon sat rigid in his chair, one arm bound in bandages, his jaw still swollen. But his eyes weren’t on McGonagall. They were on her.
She sat perfectly still, hands folded in her lap, posture immaculate. But her eyes—empty. Dead. The glimmer of mischief that usually danced there, the smug little curve of her lips that always promised chaos—it was all gone. She wasn’t herself. She was… no one.
“Do you realize what you’ve done?” McGonagall’s voice cracked across the room, sharp enough to make Namjoon flinch. “Do you understand the severity of invoking such a curse? It is not childish mischief, it is not a duel between rivals—it is forbidden magic that could have ended lives!”
The words were knives, but she didn’t react. She didn’t flinch. She didn’t bristle, argue, or mock. She just sat there, staring ahead, her face a mask carved in stone.
“Look at me,” McGonagall ordered, her voice shaking with barely restrained fury.
She did. Slowly. Her eyes lifted, flat and lifeless, meeting her professor’s gaze with nothing behind them.
McGonagall faltered. For just a heartbeat, the steel in her expression wavered. Because this wasn’t the girl she knew—the troublemaker with her sharp tongue and sharper wit, the one who hissed and bared her teeth at Kim Namjoon like it was her life’s purpose. This was someone hollowed out. Someone cracked wide open.
The door opened with a slam, and Snape swept in, robes billowing, his expression tight with annoyance. But the moment his gaze landed on the girl, on the bandaged Gryffindor beside her, his usual sneer faltered into something quieter. Something sharp and calculating.
“I’ve just been informed,” he said coldly, though his eyes lingered on her face, “that one of my students attempted a curse that has not been spoken in centuries.”
Silence.
McGonagall’s lips pressed into a line. “Both of their parents have been summoned. They will arrive shortly.”
At that, Namjoon stiffened. He risked another glance at her, expecting the usual fire, the defensive bite of her tongue at the mention of her family. But she didn’t move. Didn’t twitch. Didn’t even blink.
It was as if she wasn’t even in the room.
For the first time in years, Namjoon wasn’t afraid of her. He wasn’t angry with her. He wasn’t even thinking about their endless war.
For the first time, he was afraid for her.
The office burned with the weight of McGonagall’s fury.
Her voice lashed through the room like a whip, sharper and harsher than any reprimand Namjoon had ever heard. Not even in his worst detentions had the professor sounded like this.
“This is beyond reckless,” McGonagall’s brogue cut, her hands gripping the edge of her desk so tightly her knuckles had blanched. “This is beyond childish dueling, beyond schoolyard rivalries—this is criminal. Do you understand me? Had I not intervened, had I been one moment too late, you would not be sitting here in my office. You would be in Azkaban.”
The word echoed like a curse in itself, heavy and final.
Namjoon’s heart seized at it, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from her. From the way she sat—perfect posture, back straight, her hands neatly folded in her lap as though she were some doll placed there. Not defiant. Not guilty. Just… still. Empty.
McGonagall’s voice rose, sharper with each syllable. “You dare to raise your wand with intent to use a spell that is not only forbidden but vile? You dare to chant such incantations within the walls of this school? This is not Slytherin cunning. This is not ambition. This is barbaric recklessness that could have ended not only your life but Mr. Kim’s as well. What do you have to say for yourself?”
Nothing.
Her eyes were flat, her lips pressed in a thin line.
McGonagall’s face flushed with anger. “Answer me!”
Still, silence.
Snape leaned against the wall, arms crossed, dark eyes locked on her. He didn’t interrupt, didn’t even look like he intended to. But Namjoon, who had spent years watching the subtle movements between these professors, caught it—the flicker of resignation in his gaze. The faintest tightening of his jaw.
Snape knew. He knew she was cooked.
And maybe McGonagall knew it too. Maybe that was why she was tearing her apart harder than she ever had before—because this girl had stepped past rivalry, past mischief, and into territory that could ruin her life.
“You will be suspended,” McGonagall spat, pacing now, her robes swishing in sharp arcs. “At the very least. And if the Ministry takes this seriously—and make no mistake, they will—you may very well never walk these halls again.”
Namjoon’s stomach dropped. He wanted to speak, wanted to say something—that she hadn’t been herself, that she’d snapped, that she’d spiraled—but his throat was tight, every word lodged behind the memory of her shoving that wand into his shoulder.
McGonagall turned back to her, her voice quieter but somehow heavier, like a sentence being passed. “You are not untouchable. And the sooner you learn that, the better chance you have of surviving what comes next.”
Still, nothing.
Not a flinch. Not a glare. Not a smirk.
Just those dead, glassy eyes staring at the wood grain of the desk as though she’d already left the room.
Snape exhaled softly through his nose, the closest thing he’d give to a sigh. His eyes shifted briefly to Namjoon, then back to her. He didn’t step in. Didn’t defend. Didn’t soften McGonagall’s words.
The air outside McGonagall’s office was thick, heavy, like the whole castle itself had heard every word and was holding its breath.
The door shut behind them with a sharp click. She stepped forward first, shoulders squared, chin lifted, though her steps faltered just slightly. Her limp wasn’t obvious, but Namjoon caught it—the uneven drag of her boot, the way her weight shifted to disguise it.
She sighed, long and theatrical, like she’d just been held up by some tedious errand. As though McGonagall threatening Azkaban was nothing more than a delay in her schedule.
Namjoon stared at her, disbelief and something tighter curling in his chest. She looked carved out of stone, every trace of fire gone, and it was wrong. Wrong enough to make his skin crawl.
Then—
“Come,” Snape’s voice cut low, commanding, from behind them.
Both turned their heads. Snape’s dark eyes flicked between them, unreadable, though sharper than usual. His wand hand flexed once at his side before he smoothed it into his robes.
“Not a word,” he added, already sweeping down the corridor. His robes flared like smoke trailing behind him.
They followed. Namjoon with tense, stiff steps, her with that faint, calculated limp. Neither spoke.
The path wound downward, away from the torchlight and chatter of the upper halls, deeper into the belly of the castle where the air grew cooler, damper. Shadows clung to the walls, and the scent of old stone and damp parchment grew stronger.
At last, Snape stopped before a heavy iron door, unlocking it with a flick of his wand. He pushed it open, and the dim candlelight of his office spilled out. Rows of shelves sagged beneath jars of murky liquids, bones suspended in potion, and the faint bubbling of a cauldron simmering somewhere in the dark.
“Inside,” he ordered.
She moved first again, her limp sharper now without the bright lights of McGonagall’s office to expose her. She didn’t mask it this time, didn’t even seem to care. She sank into the nearest chair like she owned the place, arms folded, head tipped back against the wood.
Namjoon stayed standing. His bandaged shoulder burned, and he didn’t trust his legs not to give if he sat.
Snape closed the door with deliberate finality before turning on them. His eyes, usually cold pools of disdain, glinted with something heavier. Not anger. Not quite. Something that pressed on the air like storm clouds gathering.
“You two,” he said softly, dangerously, “have done more tonight than most Death Eaters managed in a battlefield.”
His gaze landed on her first. “You are a fool,” he hissed, voice like venom. “A reckless, arrogant fool who has no idea how close you came to destroying yourself.”
Then his head turned, dark eyes piercing Namjoon. “And you,” he sneered, “are no better. Gryffindor bravery? No. Just stupidity. You fed the fire until it nearly consumed you both.”
Silence stretched, thick and suffocating.
Snape’s lip curled. “Sit. Neither of you are leaving until I decide what to do with this mess.”
She huffed, rolling her eyes, the sound sharp in the oppressive quiet. “What, another lecture?” she muttered, her voice flat, deadpan, but laced with the faintest edge of defiance. “You’ll have to get in line. McGonagall already tried to tear me apart.”
Namjoon saw it—the tiniest twitch in Snape’s expression, something flickering there. Not surprise. Recognition.
“Sit,” Snape repeated, quieter now.
And for the first time, she obeyed without a word.
Snape’s office felt heavier than the stone around it. The jars lining the shelves seemed to stare, the soft bubbling of his cauldron the only sound threading through the silence.
She slouched in the chair, one leg stretched forward, the other bent awkwardly from her limp. Her arms crossed lazily, head tilted back against the wood like this was just another detention, just another petty scolding she could yawn her way through.
Snape’s voice cut through like a blade. “Do you think this is a joke?”
Her gaze slid lazily toward him, lips quirking, not into a smirk but something emptier. “Not really. But it’s a little late for lectures, don’t you think? If McGonagall couldn’t hammer it in, you won’t either.”
Snape’s jaw clenched, but she didn’t stop. She leaned back further, her tone bored, dismissive, almost mocking. “Besides, you won’t need to punish me. My parents will. They’ll make sure I pay for this in ways even you wouldn’t stomach.” She let out a sharp little laugh, brittle at the edges. “Not like I had much to look forward to after Hogwarts anyway.”
The words dropped like lead.
Namjoon froze, his fists tightening at his sides. He glanced at her, but she wasn’t looking at him—she was staring at the ceiling, her expression detached, like she was talking about someone else entirely.
Snape’s face didn’t move, but his eyes—his eyes sharpened, narrowed, as though they’d caught something no one else in the world would’ve noticed. Something ugly and too close to truth.
And then his gaze slid to Namjoon.
It wasn’t just disdain this time. It was sharper, more violent, like he wanted to carve him open with a glance. Namjoon felt the weight of it slam into him, and he understood. Snape knew. He knew exactly what had been said during that fight. The insult Namjoon had hurled that tore her open.
The silence stretched, suffocating.
Namjoon shifted, lips parting like he might say something, but the look Snape gave him—cold, venomous, a promise of retribution—snapped his jaw shut. His tongue felt heavy, guilt curdling in his stomach, but he couldn’t force the words out.
She, meanwhile, just waved a limp hand like she was brushing away dust. “So go on, give me your worst. Won’t matter. Nothing does. Not anymore.”
For the first time in his life, Namjoon almost wished Snape would yell. Because the silence that followed—thick, brittle, and crawling with unspoken truths—was worse than any detention or punishment could ever be.
Two days later, the tension in McGonagall’s office was suffocating.
The fire crackled low, throwing long shadows across the walls, but it did nothing to ease the weight pressing down on the room. She was sprawled in the chair beside Namjoon, head tilted back against the wood, legs crossed like she was attending some dull dinner party rather than a tribunal. Her face was calm, bored almost, but her eyes… her eyes were dead.
And then the door opened.
Namjoon’s parents stepped inside first. They were every inch the model Gryffindor family—upright, polished, dressed in deep crimson cloaks trimmed with gold. His mother’s jaw was set like carved stone, his father’s eyes already scanning the scene like a judge ready to pass sentence. The moment their gaze fell on her lounging beside Namjoon, their faces twisted, subtle but unmistakable. Contempt.
It was almost amusing, really. Their lips pursed, their spines stiffened, as if her mere existence was offensive. Uptightness runs in the family, she thought idly, the corner of her mouth twitching—not into a smirk, but into something far meaner.
Then they noticed the bandaging on Namjoon’s shoulder. His mother gasped softly, his father’s brow furrowed in instant outrage. Their son, perfect and precious, wounded. And there she was, sitting beside him like a predator resting after the kill.
McGonagall’s voice cut through before anyone could speak. “Mr. and Mrs. Kim. Thank you for coming on such short notice.” Her tone was clipped, formal, but beneath it was steel. “As I have explained in my letters, there was a… significant altercation between your son and Miss—” she paused, her lips thinning, “—between your son and the Slytherin student seated beside him.”
Snape stood slightly back, arms folded, his expression unreadable. His black eyes flicked between the families, missing nothing.
Mr. Kim’s gaze snapped to McGonagall. “My son is injured,” he said, his voice sharp. “Gravely, by the look of it. You are telling me this—girl—was allowed to wield dark magic in your school, against him?”
The girl didn’t even blink. She lifted one hand, examining her nails idly, the movement dripping with deliberate dismissal. “Allowed,” she murmured, voice soft but dripping with venom. “That’s a funny word for it.”
Namjoon stiffened beside her, his fists clenching against his knees. His parents’ eyes burned into her like she was filth contaminating their son.
McGonagall’s lips pressed into a hard line. “The situation was contained before irreversible damage was done. But the fact remains, Miss—” another pause, longer this time, “—invoked magic that could have been catastrophic. That is why we called you here.”
Snape finally spoke, his voice low and silken. “This was not a simple duel, Mr. Kim. Your son was not an innocent bystander. He chose to engage. He provoked.”
Both parents whipped their heads toward him, scandalized. Namjoon’s father bristled. “Are you suggesting my son bears fault for this?”
Snape’s gaze flickered, cool and cutting. “I am stating fact.”
The silence that followed was taut enough to snap.
Namjoon sat frozen, the heat of shame crawling up his neck as his parents seethed beside him, their righteous Gryffindor fury ready to burn the room to ash. And beside him, she only lounged further into her chair, chin resting on her palm, her lips twitching in something that wasn’t quite a smile.
If they wanted to hate her, let them. If they wanted to see a monster, she’d give them the courtesy of wearing the mask.
Because it was easier that way.
The door opened again.
This time, the air shifted. Colder. Heavier.
Her parents entered, cloaked in green silk and silver, the Slytherin crest gleaming on their shoulders. Her mother’s hair was sharp and perfect, her father’s posture rigid, his cane tapping once against the floor like a gavel. Their presence was like ice water poured into the already tense room.
She didn’t move. Didn’t greet them. Didn’t even look up. She stayed slouched in her chair, head propped on her hand like she was bored out of her skull.
That earned her no mercy.
Her mother flicked her wand so quickly no one else caught it until it was done. A spell lashed across her back, invisible but cruel, sharp enough that it felt like shards of glass embedding under her skin. Her jaw locked, a hiss tearing through her teeth as she cursed under her breath, shoulders stiffening but refusing to rise.
No flinch. No cry. Just a muttered curse and a deeper slump into her chair.
Then, as though nothing had happened, her parents turned their attention away from her entirely. Their faces split into polite masks as they addressed the Kims.
“Mr. and Mrs. Kim,” her father said smoothly, his voice warm with a false civility that made Snape’s lip twitch. “What a terrible, terrible ordeal. We cannot imagine the distress this must have caused you. Your son…” He gestured vaguely toward Namjoon’s bandaged shoulder, his tone dripping with sympathy so practiced it was almost a performance. “Such a bright, shining example of Gryffindor honor, hurt in such a way. Unthinkable.”
Her mother chimed in with a delicate sigh, shaking her head. “It is tragic, truly. And of course—our daughter will be properly dealt with.” Her eyes didn’t so much as flicker toward the girl in the chair. “We hold no illusions about what she is capable of.”
Namjoon’s mother offered a thin, satisfied smile. His father inclined his head curtly, though the hard lines around his mouth remained.
Then her father’s tone sharpened, though the smile stayed fixed. “But naturally, we require every detail. Every little thing she said, every spell she cast, every offense. Nothing omitted. Nothing softened. We would hate to… misunderstand her behavior.”
Her stomach turned. She stared at the floor, her lips parting with the faintest sound, like she wanted to scoff but couldn’t find the strength.
Namjoon’s parents looked ready to oblige. His mother leaned forward, voice tight, already recounting how her son had been struck, how the duel had escalated. Each word sharpened her parents’ satisfied expressions. They drank it in, hungry, their faces taut with cold amusement—as if every detail was a confirmation of what they already knew.
Beside her, Namjoon sat still, his jaw clenched, his shoulder burning beneath its wrappings. His eyes flicked toward her for the briefest moment, and the sight carved him open.
She hadn’t even raised her head. Hadn’t said a single word since they walked in.
Just sat there, still and silent, while her parents carved her apart without lifting a finger.
McGonagall stood ramrod straight, hands clasped in front of her desk, her tartan robes flaring slightly with each turn of her pacing. Her voice was sharp, clipped, each word chosen with precision as she rattled off incident after incident.
Every duel. Every detention. Every brawl that had ended in dirt, blood, broken wands, or shattered corridors.
She laid it all bare.
“She has disrupted lessons, hexed fellow students, caused catastrophic damage to school property, and—in the most recent instance—raised her wand in intent to cast an Unforgivable.” McGonagall’s voice rose a pitch, as though fury was the only thing keeping her from unraveling. “This behavior is not a pattern of childish mischief. It is deliberate. Calculated. Barbaric.”
Her words sliced through the air like knives.
And across from her, her parents drank it in.
They leaned forward ever so slightly, their postures immaculate, their faces calm but alight with something beneath the surface. Not anger. Not disappointment. But satisfaction.
Her father tilted his head, his tone smooth as silk. “And why, may I ask, were we not informed of this sooner?”
Her mother’s lips pursed delicately, her eyes narrowing. “Why was such behavior tolerated this far? Inconveniences,” she said the word with scathing precision, as though it was synonymous with vermin, “should be dealt with swiftly. Decisively. Before they fester.”
McGonagall faltered. The faintest hitch in her breath. She had expected outrage, shame, apologies on their daughter’s behalf. What she received instead was the cool condemnation of people who saw their child as a problem to be disposed of.
Namjoon’s parents looked on, stiff and silent, but the tension in the room shifted—the Gryffindor fury that moments before had been directed solely at the Slytherin girl now twisted uneasily, like even they could sense something uglier in the air.
And she—she sat right there in the chair beside Namjoon, paler now, her hands digging into the armrests. She didn’t move. Didn’t speak. The faint gleam of sweat caught on her temple, but it wasn’t from fear.
It was the spell her mother had slipped into her back the moment she’d entered.
Every breath felt like shards of glass grinding beneath her skin. The rigid pain burned through her spine, her ribs, her lungs. She held her chin high, though, her expression carved into something blank and unfeeling. She would not give them the satisfaction of seeing her wince.
But Namjoon, sitting beside her, could see it. The tightness around her eyes. The stiffness in her shoulders. The way her knuckles had blanched white where her fingers curled against the wood.
McGonagall kept talking, still scolding, still lashing out with words meant to discipline, not realizing each one was another nail her parents hammered into her coffin.
And she sat there quietly, skin burning like broken glass, listening to her own execution.
The room, already taut with tension, snapped another thread.
Snape, who had until now stood in his shadowed corner like a viper waiting to strike, finally spoke. His voice was low, cutting through McGonagall’s lecture like the whisper of a blade.
“Make no mistake,” he drawled, his black eyes flickering to Namjoon, “your son was just as much at fault.”
Namjoon stiffened in his chair. His parents—upright, polished, their very posture radiating righteous indignation—bristled instantly. His father leaned forward, his voice sharp.
“Our son has been attacked repeatedly. He was stabbed, hexed, and nearly subjected to the—”
Snape raised a hand, silencing him with a look colder than the dungeons themselves. “I said just as much at fault.”
From the folds of his robes, he produced a thin glass phial, swirling with the silvery wisps of a memory pulled not long ago. He tipped it, and a moment later, the scene unfurled in the air above the desk: the chaos of two students in full, unrestrained war.
Hexes shattering the stones. Bookshelves toppling. Screams and curses flung louder than any spell.
And then—
Namjoon.
His voice raw, vicious, cursing her like a common sailor, his face twisted in fury as he yanked her hair, as she clawed at him like a wild thing. They grappled on the ground, not wizard and witch, but rabid animals tearing at each other.
And then—the bite. The memory replayed her sharp yelp, his teeth sinking into her with feral desperation, her fist flying into his jaw.
The projection flickered out. Silence slammed down, heavy and suffocating.
Namjoon’s mother turned to him slowly, her face pale with horror, eyes wide as if she couldn’t reconcile the boy she raised with the boy in the memory.
“Kim Namjoon,” she whispered, voice trembling with disbelief. “What was that?”
Her son, who never raised his voice, never missed a chore, never misstepped in all his meticulous perfection, reduced to something primal, something savage.
Namjoon swallowed hard, his lips pressed into a thin line. He didn’t defend himself. Didn’t dare.
Because in that memory—he hadn’t just fought. He hadn’t just defended. He had wanted to hurt her. And his mother, of all people, saw it.
The Slytherin girl beside him let out the faintest huff of a laugh—broken, bitter, a sound more like glass shattering than amusement. She didn’t look at him, didn’t look at anyone. Her eyes remained fixed on the stone floor, dead and lifeless, but that small, jagged laugh slipped free anyway.
Because in the end, maybe the Gryffindor prince wasn’t so golden after all.
Her parents didn’t look horrified. They didn’t even look surprised.
They looked disappointed.
Her father sat straighter, his cane balanced neatly against his knee, his lips curled into a thin sneer. Her mother, though, moved first.
In a flash she was on her feet, her hand tangling harshly in her daughter’s hair. She yanked her forward so violently the chair scraped across the stone floor.
“We didn’t raise you in a manor for this,” her mother hissed, venom dripping from every syllable. “Not for you to lose every shred of dignity brawling like some gutter rat—rolling in dirt with him.” Her gaze flicked to Namjoon like he was filth staining their carpets. Then back to her daughter. “Have you no shame? No restraint? Who am I kidding—of course you don’t.”
The girl didn’t make a sound. Her face blank, her body limp in her mother’s grip, though her scalp burned.
Her mother’s lips twisted into something crueler, and her voice dropped, icy, deliberate. “Since you think you are so untouchable… allow me to remind you what it feels like to be weak. To be helpless.”
And with that, she flung her down.
The girl’s knees cracked against the stone, and before she could catch her breath, the pointed tip of her mother’s silver-handled umbrella dug into her temple.
The spell from before—glass grinding under her skin—flared violently, agony searing through her bones. She hissed, her teeth clenched so tight her jaw ached. And then came more—sharp, punishing spells that burned across her nerves, sparking like fire in her veins.
She seized against the floor, biting down so hard on her tongue she tasted copper, refusing to scream.
Namjoon jolted up from his chair, his bandaged shoulder throbbing, fury written across his face. But before he could move—
“ENOUGH!”
McGonagall’s voice cracked like thunder. Her wand was out, sparks flying as she tore the umbrella back with a flick so sharp it nearly snapped from the woman’s hand. Her face was red, her nostrils flaring, her whole body trembling with outrage.
Snape moved just as fast, his wand raised, his shadow stretching over the girl on the floor like a shield. His eyes were molten black, his lip curling in disgust—not at her, but at them.
“This is not discipline,” McGonagall spat, her Scottish burr razor-edged. “This is torture. And I will not have it under my roof.”
Her parents straightened, unbothered, as if they’d been accused of nothing more than poor manners at dinner. Her father adjusted his gloves, her mother smoothed her cloak.
Meanwhile, on the stone floor, she lay pale and trembling, her eyes open but empty, her breath shuddering as though her body wasn’t entirely hers anymore.
Namjoon stared down at her, his fists clenched so tightly his nails bit into his palms. He had never seen anything like this. Not from her. Not from anyone.
And for the first time, the hatred he felt for her twisted into something uglier. Something heavier. Because he realized she wasn’t fighting like she had nothing to lose—
She was fighting like she’d already lost it.
Namjoon’s jaw clenched so hard it ached. His whole body was trembling with restraint, but the look he leveled at her parents could’ve turned them to stone.
How dare they.
How dare they touch her like that, speak of her like she was nothing, look at her like she wasn’t even human. Namjoon’s hatred for her had been sharp and fiery, but in that moment, it wasn’t hatred he felt—it was something colder, heavier, curling in his gut like molten lead.
He wanted to end them.
Her parents, however, didn’t so much as blink under his stare. Her mother adjusted her silver rings, her father gave a long, theatrical sigh as though this entire confrontation had bored him to death.
“This has gone long enough,” her father said, his voice a lazy drawl. “No point in wasting our breath over this filthy rat.”
The girl, still on the floor, flinched almost imperceptibly at the word—but her face stayed blank, her eyes dead.
Her mother flicked her wrist, her cloak settling perfectly into place. “Let her be,” she said, her tone so casual it twisted the knife deeper. “Or have her dealt with. It’s all the same to us. But do not call us again.”
The room froze.
McGonagall’s face went scarlet, her hands trembling around her wand, her lips pressed so thin they nearly disappeared. Snape’s expression didn’t change, but his eyes sharpened, black and cutting, like he was memorizing every word.
Namjoon sat there, burning, unable to tear his eyes away from them. His parents shifted beside him, stiff with shock and disgust, but Namjoon couldn’t even register their fury.
All he could see was her, limp on the stone floor, her hair disheveled from her mother’s grip, her temple still reddened from the umbrella’s press, her chest rising in shallow, broken breaths.
And the way she didn’t look surprised.
Like she’d known. Like she’d expected nothing less.
The heavy slam of the doors echoed long after her parents swept out, their perfume and venom lingering in the office like smoke. Silence followed, jagged and suffocating.
She was still on the floor, her hair a tangled curtain, her cheek pressed against the cold stone. Her hands trembled faintly where she’d braced them, the invisible weight of those spells making her limbs feel like lead.
Namjoon moved before he thought.
He rose from his chair, steps clipped, his jaw locked so tight his teeth ached. Every part of him screamed at the audacity of what had just happened—that anyone, let alone her parents, would dare lay her so low.
He reached for her.
“Touch me,” she rasped, her voice shredded but vicious, “and I’ll skin you.”
McGonagall pinched the bridge of her nose, her exhale tight with both fury and exhaustion. Snape let out a sharp, derisive sound, the closest thing he gave to a sigh. Even Namjoon’s parents looked like they’d had enough of this feral, endless battle.
“Of course,” Namjoon muttered under his breath. Of course she’d rather bleed out on the stones than take help from him.
But he didn’t stop.
His hand closed around her arm, firm and unyielding, and with one smooth pull he hauled her to her feet. She stumbled once, her body swaying under the phantom glass still gnawing at her bones, but his grip tightened, steadying her whether she liked it or not.
The smile that tugged at his mouth was sharp, humorless—more a baring of teeth than anything else.
Her head snapped toward him, her eyes glassy but burning, like she wanted to stab him then and there. Her voice came low, ragged, laced with venom.
“Tell me, Kim,” she hissed. “Do you feel satisfied now? Do you feel the gleam of Gryffindor pride? Knowing your words were true?”
Namjoon froze, her voice curling into him like poison. Her accusation landed heavy, dragging the memory of what he’d spat at her weeks ago back to the forefront—insecure little girl, unloved by her parents.
And now here she stood, hollow-eyed, shaking, her parents’ cruelty branded into her skin like truth made flesh.
The words tasted like ash in his mouth.
Namjoon barely had time to draw breath, the beginnings of words—sharp, defensive, maybe even guilty—forming on his tongue, when a firm hand clamped down on his shoulder.
“Zip your mouth shut, Namjoon.” His mother’s voice cut like a blade, no softness, no room for disobedience. She didn’t even look at him, her other hand already tugging him back with a force that brooked no argument. He stumbled once, caught off guard, and when he straightened, the fury blazing in his chest had nowhere to go but to sear his ribs.
He shot one last look at her.
She wasn’t looking back.
Her movements were slow, uneven. A limp she didn’t bother hiding, her shoulders bent just slightly as though even standing upright was too much weight to bear. One arm stayed pressed against her side like she was holding herself together, the other dangling loose at her hip, her wand still clutched in a pale hand.
No smirk. No biting remark. No spark of that smug defiance that always drove him insane.
Just silence.
And for the first time, Namjoon realized how much it unnerved him.
The professors lingered, McGonagall’s lips pressed into a razor-thin line as she exchanged looks with Snape. His father had already steered him toward the door, his mother still gripping his arm like a leash.
“You’ll wait outside,” McGonagall said tightly, each syllable clipped. “We will speak with your parents privately.”
The door shut hard behind him.
The stone corridor felt colder than usual, each torch flame flickering dimmer. Namjoon sat down heavily on the bench outside, his fists curling so tightly his knuckles ached. He could still hear faint murmurs through the thick door, indistinguishable words, but the tones were sharp, condemning, relentless.
And somewhere beyond that wood, she was still in there. Limping, bent, cradling her side. Alone.
The silence outside McGonagall’s office wasn’t peace—it was a taut wire, pulled so tight it threatened to snap at the faintest touch. The stone bench beneath them might as well have been carved from ice. The torches burned, shadows writhed, but it was the two of them who poisoned the air.
She shifted first. Barely a movement, just the tilt of her shoulder, but even that betrayed the ache she carried—her lips thinning, her teeth clenched hard enough to tremble. Namjoon saw it. He always saw it, even when he pretended he didn’t. And something ugly rose in him.
“You look like hell,” he muttered, too low for anyone but her to hear.
Her head snapped toward him, eyes glittering like knives. Then her heel came down sharp on the top of his shoe.
He inhaled through his teeth, a hiss dragging out as he jerked his foot back. “Sure,” he said with venom, forcing a laugh that didn’t reach his eyes. “Go ahead. That’s all you’re good for, isn’t it? Petty kicks when you don’t have the brains to land anything sharper.”
Her mouth curled into something jagged, not quite a smile. “Don’t tell me now is when you suddenly remember I’m a lady.”
“A lady?” Namjoon turned to her fully, his voice flat, searing. “You’re a viper that learned how to wear skirts. Nothing more.”
Her eyes narrowed to slits. She straightened, slow and deliberate, every ounce of mockery sharpened to a point. “Careful, Kim. I will not hesitate to stab you again.”
“It was barely a poke,” he shot back, not missing a beat. “I’ve had hangnails hurt more.”
Her laugh cracked sharp through the hall. “Is that why you’re limping? Crying into your pillow every night like a baby because a girl got the best of you?”
Namjoon groaned, dragging a hand down his face before glaring at her like she was the most exhausting thing in existence. “Merlin’s beard, act your height for once.”
She gasped—her familiar, indignant, furious gasp—and her foot lashed out, slamming against his shin.
He jerked forward with a curse, then snapped his own leg out, kicking her back hard enough to make her jolt against the bench. “Fuck you.”
“Gladly,” she spat, eyes flashing, leaning so close her breath fanned hot against his cheek. “I’d bury the knife deeper this time.”
The air between them crackled, and then—
The door behind them creaked open.
They froze, like children caught in the act, her hand still balled in the fabric of his sleeve, his shin pressed against hers. McGonagall’s voice carried first, crisp and cutting, followed by the lower rumble of Namjoon’s father.
They tore away from each other instantly, both sitting stiff, faces schooled into false composure. Her lips still curved with the ghost of violence. His eyes still burned.
Neither of them fooled anyone.
Namjoon could so much as rise, a sharp hand snagged his ear.
“Ah—!” he yelped, stumbling sideways as his mother yanked him toward her with merciless precision. He might have been seventeen, towering and broad-shouldered, but in her grip he looked every inch a scolded child.
“We talked it all out,” she said, voice sharp enough to slice marble. Her gaze flicked from him to the Slytherin girl still lounging stiffly on the bench, chin tilted in brittle defiance. “And you will both be facing severe detentions every single day until the end of term.”
McGonagall’s mouth was a thin slash of disapproval, Snape’s dark eyes unreadable, but neither interrupted as Namjoon’s mother laid down the law.
“You are forbidden to use your wands outside of class. Especially you, miss,” she added, her words like a lash as her gaze snapped to the girl. “If either of you so much as so much as think of starting another fight—”
“You’ll wish you’d been expelled,” Namjoon’s father finished gravely, arms crossed, his frown deep enough to crack stone.
A list of punishments rattled off like cannon fire—restricted weekends, scrubbed cauldrons, late nights in the kitchens, patrolling empty corridors under Filch’s eye. It was endless, a noose tightening around them both.
When McGonagall and Snape finally excused them, Namjoon barely had time to take a breath before—whack!
His mother’s palm landed square on the back of his head.
He staggered forward, clapping a hand to the spot as his ears rang. “What the—?!”
“When,” his mother demanded, her voice shaking with fury, “did you become a potty mouth?”
Heat flooded his face, the memory of the silvery projection replaying his curses still sharp in his head. He opened his mouth, ready to argue, but she cut him off with another sharp glare.
“You sounded like a dockyard drunk!”
Behind them, the girl let out a sharp snort of laughter before she could stop herself.
Namjoon whipped his head around to glare at her, ears burning. She only smirked, sharp and thin, pain still etched in her posture but her eyes dancing with cruel amusement.
“Guess Prince Charming’s crown slipped,” she drawled.
He wanted to strangle her.
She stood there like she was at the theatre, arms crossed, eyes bright with amusement as Namjoon’s mother tore into him. Every smack, every scolding word—she soaked it in like sunlight.
And when the silence stretched long enough, she slipped in sweetly, her voice laced with venom.
“Oh, don’t forget—he frequently calls me a fuck head. Unprovoked, of course.”
Namjoon’s head whipped toward her so fast it was a miracle his neck didn’t snap. His mouth opened, rage simmering, but smack! His mother’s hand landed again, and he reeled, ears burning scarlet.
“That is it, Namjoon,” his father snapped, voice cold, final. “You are not to engage with this girl again. That is a boundary you will not cross. If we have to, we’ll take you out of this school altogether.”
The girl tilted her head, smirk widening, eyes gleaming with cruel delight. “Awh, I almost feel like you love me.”
Something in him snapped. His elbow jabbed into her side—instinct, petty and sharp—only for her to double over with a stifled cry, the remnants of that glass-curse still searing beneath her skin.
His face drained of color instantly. “Shit—” he caught her before she fell, hands steadying her, his wand already muttering a stabilizing charm. She hissed, eyes wet but blazing with fire, ready to claw him raw.
His parents were on him before he could draw another breath. “Do you hear yourself? You almost died, Namjoon! And you’re still here, sparring with her like it’s some childish game!”
His jaw tightened. He looked at them, then at her, then back again. “So did she,” he said flatly.
The silence that followed cracked like ice.
“Do not speak for her,” his father thundered, voice reverberating off the stone walls. “Yes, her situation is tragic—”
Rage twisted her face at that, her smirk vanishing, her lips parting for words too sharp to contain. Namjoon saw it before it happened—saw the storm brewing—and with a flick of his wand, her mouth sealed shut with a binding charm.
Her eyes went wide, fury detonating in their depths.
“Namjoon,” his mother hissed, aghast, “have you lost your mind in the company of this viper?!”
His glare didn’t falter. His voice was quiet, but every word carried steel.
“Her name is Y/N. Do not sink to the level I have.”
Even her eyes widened at that, a flicker of shock cutting through her rage.
But his mother’s face burned red with fury. “Namjoon,” she seethed, “have you forgotten why you came to Hogwarts? You were meant to excel, to rise, to make a name worthy of our family. And instead—” her voice trembled with disgust, “—you waste it brawling with her. Running your reputation through the mud.”
Namjoon’s hands curled into fists at his sides, the echo of his own words—her name is Y/N—still hanging in the air like a challenge.
Namjoon drew in a breath, sharp through his nose, then let it out like he was forcing himself not to explode. His voice came quiet, measured, almost tired.
“I am capable of handling myself,” he said, looking between his parents, then at her slouched frame, then back again. “Whatever happened between us, we were both at fault. So, please. Let me handle it.”
His mother’s eyes narrowed, her lips thin enough to disappear. “Fine. Be stubborn. But if one more owl gets sent home—just one—you are done, Namjoon.”
He didn’t argue. Didn’t bristle. Just gave a tight nod, his jaw flexing.
Then his mother turned, her gaze pinning the girl beside him with ice-cold disdain. “And you—leave our son alone.”
Her response was immediate, sharp as a blade. She raised her hand and flipped the woman the bird, middle finger proudly extended.
Namjoon almost choked, his eyes bulging as he smacked her wrist down before his mother could even register the gesture fully. “Are you insane?!” he hissed, grabbing her by the arm and hauling her away with long strides.
She dug her heels in, spitting curses under her breath, yanking against his grip like a feral cat.
“Shut up before she hexes us both into next week,” Namjoon ground out, his hand firm on her elbow as he dragged her around the nearest corner, his heart hammering.
Because beneath all her hissing and clawing, her face was pale—too pale. The stabilizing charm he’d used was barely holding. Her breaths came shallow, her steps uneven, and the spell woven into her skin still shimmered faintly under the torchlight like shards of glass buried beneath her flesh.
Namjoon’s brain ran at a thousand miles a minute, words buzzing—counter curses, spellwork, ingredients. How to fix this. How to undo what they had done to her. How to stop her from crumbling right here in the corridor.
He didn’t even realize his grip had gentled, or that his steps slowed to match her limp.
For once, his anger wasn’t at her.
It was at them.
Her glare could’ve flayed skin, her eyes sharp enough to cut steel. The silencing curse held tight across her lips, and every ounce of judgment, disdain, and venom she wanted to spit at him boiled behind her teeth.
Namjoon, meanwhile, looked obnoxiously serene. He hummed as if he were strolling through the bloody countryside instead of half-hauling her down the empty corridor.
“I can finally hear the birds,” he said lightly, tilting his head like he was listening for them. “The wind. The calm.”
Her eye twitched violently.
“Peace at last,” he added with a sigh, closing his eyes for dramatic effect. “Honestly, I might leave you like this forever. It’s almost—therapeutic.”
She would’ve kicked him, sunk her heel into his shin until he limped for a week, but every nerve in her body was aflame, each movement making her feel like she was being carved from the inside out. Her leg trembled instead of striking, and that infuriated her even more.
He noticed. Of course he noticed.
That smug smile tugged at his lips, and she loathed it, loathed the way he looked like he’d won.
Finally, he glanced down at her, his grip still steady on her arm as he pulled her into the shadow of a staircase. His tone shifted, just enough to make her stiffen.
“I’ll lift the curse,” he said, his voice lower now, more even. “But you need to tell me the spell your mother used on you.”
Her eyes narrowed into slits, her nostrils flaring.
He met her glare without blinking, his jaw set. “Don’t look at me like that. I’m not asking for fun. That thing’s still crawling under your skin, and if you don’t start talking, you’ll collapse again.”
The fire in her gaze sparked hotter—furious that he was right, furious that he knew it, furious that she couldn’t spit the venom bottled behind her sealed lips.
Namjoon lifted his wand lazily, the smirk tugging back into place. “So. Tell me. What did she hit you with? You give me the name, and maybe, maybe I’ll let you have your voice back.”
Her nails dug into her palms, her body trembling—not just from pain this time, but from the force of her loathing.
She hated him more than anyone. But she hated the curse eating her alive even more.
The moment Namjoon lifted the silencing spell, her voice ripped through the air like broken glass.
“May your bloodline rot, Kim Namjoon. May every dickheaded Gryffindor in your wretched ancestry choke on their sanctimony, and may your sainted mother weep the day she birthed such a useless, sanctimonious parasite.”
Her words dripped with venom, spat like acid, and though her voice shook with the pain threading through her, her hatred was sharp, cutting, alive. She was panting, pale, clutching at her side as if to keep herself from falling apart, but her eyes blazed with enough fury to burn him where he stood.
Namjoon’s smirk faltered, just a fraction, but he didn’t flinch. He only tightened his jaw, as if bracing himself for the storm. “Charming as ever,” he muttered. “Go on, then. Tell me the spell.”
She gave a short, ugly laugh—humorless, hollow, and cracking at the edges. “You think I know?” She spat the words like poison. “You think I’m stupid enough to hold the key to my own torment and not do anything to end it? No, you self-righteous bastard. I don’t know.”
He frowned, but she leaned forward, teeth bared, forcing the words out even as her breath stuttered from the ache clawing under her skin.
“It was cast on me when I was five. Five, Kim. Old enough to bleed, young enough to be broken. My darling mother made sure it stuck—made sure I grew up with it crawling beneath my skin like shards of glass waiting for her to twist whenever she pleased. She doesn’t need an incantation. She doesn’t need her wand. She only has to think of me, only has to decide I’ve become an inconvenience again, and I’m writhing on the floor like a dog.”
Her voice cracked but rose again, fierce and merciless, snapping with venom as she pointed a trembling finger at his chest.
“So don’t you dare stand there with that smug look, acting like you can fix me with your Gryffindor nobility and your pathetic little hexes. You know nothing about this curse. You know nothing about me. All you’ve ever done is run your mouth with the confidence of someone who’s never actually been gutted by the people meant to love him.”
Her breath hitched, her chest heaving, her face pale as parchment but her eyes savage. “So go on, Kim. Tell me again how I’m weak. Tell me again how I’m insecure. I’ll laugh when the day comes that your perfect parents finally decide you’re not worth their devotion, and then—only then—you’ll understand what it means to be me.”
Namjoon stood there, the words clanging in the air like church bells, vicious and unrelenting. His hand twitched around his wand, but he said nothing. His silence only made her scoff, bitter and cruel.
“What’s the matter?” she snarled. “No Gryffindor sermon about hope and light this time? No shining wisdom from the boy who’s never bled?”
And despite the burn raking through her body, despite the pallor on her face, she straightened, lifted her chin, and sneered at him with all the venom she could muster.
“Pathetic. That’s what you are, Kim Namjoon. A pathetic fraud who thinks bravery means running his mouth until someone finally shuts it for him.”
Namjoon’s jaw ticked as her insults echoed between them, venom dripping from every word. He let her spit her poison until her voice cracked, until she was breathless with rage and pain. Then, with a flick of his wand, the silence snapped back over her mouth like a slammed door.
“Choke on your poetry,” he muttered, shaking his head as if her words were nothing but background noise. “Honestly, you’d talk yourself to death if I let you.”
Her eyes went wide with fresh fury, a muffled snarl tearing against the magical seal. She clawed at her throat like she could rip the curse away with her bare hands, glaring daggers at him.
Namjoon only smirked, leaning a little closer, voice low and edged with that infuriating Gryffindor smugness. “And guess what? You can’t even break free of it. Know why?”
Her nose flared, eyes narrowing to slits.
“Because you broke your wand,” he said, tapping his shoulder where she’d stabbed him not long ago. “Tried to drive it straight through my heart, remember? Snapped it in the process.”
He arched a brow, lips curling into a grin that was more teeth than humor. “So here you are. Miss untouchable. Miss nothing-can-phase-me. Silenced with a flick, helpless without your wand, and absolutely boiling because I finally got the last word.”
She stomped her foot, a strangled noise clawing out of her throat as she tried to lunge at him. Namjoon took a graceful step back, hands raised in mock innocence.
“Careful now,” he said lightly. “Wouldn’t want you to collapse again. Though, if you do, at least it’ll be the first time you’ve ever shut up gracefully.”
Her eyes went murderous, her entire body trembling, and Namjoon chuckled under his breath, utterly insufferable.
“Merlin,” he sighed, shaking his head as if she were a child throwing a tantrum. “You make this too easy.”
Trigger Warning: Enemies to Lovers, stabbing, curses, abusive parents, cuss words, inappropriate use of a wand, penetration, sexual intercourse, oral sex, fellatio, cunnilingus, raging bitches, they want to kill each other, got them together for the plot ngl, bookstagram ahh fic.
Authors Note: HELLLOOOOO EVERYONE THIS HAD BEEN IN MY REQUESTS FOR A LONG TIME AND I FINALLY FINISHED IT. i honestly wrote this and scrapped it 5 different times before I was somewhat satisfied with it. I suck ass at writing enemies to lover honestly but eh I TRIED MY BEST OKAY TT also the banner was designed by my friend so please go support her she is an AMAZING designer and does poster and everything go check her out
here is my MASTERLIST
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Synopsis
"A Gryffindor and a Slytherin—Kim Namjoon and the girl he can’t stand—locked in a rivalry so bitter it could set the castle aflame. Every encounter is a battle of wit and venom, every glance a silent dare. But when hate burns this fiercely, it has a way of turning into something just as dangerous."
From the very first day, they despised each other. Everyone else remembered the Sorting Hat’s long deliberations, the nervous laughter, the way children clutched their sweets and stared out the window of the Hogwarts Express with wide-eyed wonder. But for them, what remained carved into memory was not wonder—it was irritation, sharp and lingering, the kind that festered into full-blown hatred over the years.
Kim Namjoon, Gryffindor’s golden boy with a mind sharper than a blade, carried himself with a sense of duty so rigid it made others straighten their backs when he walked past. To her, he was the embodiment of self-righteousness, a walking lecture with spectacles and smug patience, pretending his principles put him above everyone else. She found him insufferable.
And to him, she was poison distilled into a smirk: sly, calculating, always one step ahead with her mocking eyes and her refusal to play by the rules. A Slytherin down to her marrow, untouchable and unrepentant, she schemed and clawed her way through every situation with a grin that made his blood boil. He hated her audacity, her superiority, her gleeful disregard for everything he valued.
The hatred burned so naturally between them it was as though it had been fated. And in a way—it had. Because it started the moment they first met.
He had been eleven, sitting quietly by the window of the Hogwarts Express, carefully unwrapping his very first Chocolate Frog. The card inside fascinated him; he held it close, lips moving as he read the details like he wanted to memorize every word. It was the perfect, peaceful moment for a boy who loved order.
And then the door slid open.
She stepped in with a careless swagger, eyes darting around the empty compartments until they landed on him. Without asking, she dropped onto the seat beside him, her smirk pulling at the corner of her mouth as if she already knew she was about to ruin his day. She fidgeted, kicked her feet against the seat, and eventually leaned toward him with a question spoken in the most irritatingly smug voice he had ever heard.
His reply was curt. Too curt, apparently.
Because her eyes narrowed, her smirk widened, and before he could stop her, she plucked the Chocolate Frog right out of his hand, tucked it neatly into her pocket, and left the compartment without another word.
And that, Namjoon would later insist, was the moment he decided he hated her.
Namjoon saw her again under the bright glow of the candles, the Sorting Hat waiting like a judge on its pedestal. He had just been sorted into Gryffindor—his chest still a little puffed with pride, cheeks warm with the sound of applause. It wasn’t arrogance, at least not to him; it was the relief of belonging, the quiet swell of pride that made his back straighten just a little taller as he strode to the Gryffindor table.
But then she appeared.
She skipped towards the Sorting Hat like she owned the bloody castle, chin tipped high, a smug little sway in her step that screamed look at me. Namjoon could practically feel his jaw tighten as he watched her. Even at eleven, she radiated the kind of self-importance that grated on him like nails on glass.
She plopped herself onto the stool, smirk tugging at her lips like she already knew the outcome. Of course she did. Everyone knew where she’d end up. She was practically the poster child of Slytherin—sharp, self-assured, a little too pleased with herself. The hat barely touched her head before it shouted SLYTHERIN!
She hopped off like a queen dismissed from her throne, tossing her hair as though the entire ceremony had been performed solely for her benefit.
Her eyes flicked to him across the hall, and there it was again—that same damn smirk from the train. The one that said I won.
Namjoon’s lips pressed into a thin line. He didn’t wave. He didn’t nod. He just stared back, chin high, letting the pride of Gryffindor red burn bright across his chest.
And she hated it. She hated the little gleam of satisfaction on his face, the way he looked so pleased with himself, as if Gryffindor made him better than everyone else. As if she hadn’t just stolen his frog and walked away victorious.
He thought her smugness was unbearable.
She thought his pride was insufferable.
From that moment, their pettiness took root. Childish, sharp, and unrelenting. The kind of irritation that made every glance a challenge, every smirk a spark, every step in each other’s direction a declaration of war.
And that was the beginning of how they ended up here.
Snape’s office. Again.
It had become their second home, the place they were dragged to so often that even the shadows seemed to sigh when they walked in. They stood there now, bleeding and filthy, reeking of dust and smoke, the taste of copper still fresh on their tongues. It wasn’t unusual. This was their pattern. Their curse.
Because whenever they fought—and they always fought—things escalated.
At first it would be words, venom-laced and sharp, enough to curdle the air around them. Spells followed, quick and mean, curses snapping like whips in hallways that emptied faster than you could blink. Sparks lit up corridors, desks caught fire, and more than once, the glass windows in classrooms had shattered from the sheer force of their rage.
But when wands failed, when spells were batted aside or snatched from their hands, it turned into something else. Something feral.
They would lunge at each other with fists, nails, teeth—no shame, no hesitation. She had slapped him across the face so hard it echoed. He’d yanked her hair like he wanted to tear it out by the root. She’d sunk her nails into his arm and left marks that took weeks to fade. Once, she’d even fishhooked him, and he—rabid with fury—had bitten down on her finger so viciously it bled.
Furniture became weapons too. Chairs hurled across rooms, books slammed into heads, ink spilled like blood on floors. To watch them was to watch two predators locked in a cage, tearing at each other with no thought for restraint.
And yet, there was something almost ritualistic about it now. Everyone knew: if she and Namjoon started, the only choice was to run. Teachers stormed in late, professors groaned, detentions were given out like candy. And then here they’d end up, side by side in Snape’s office, breathing hard, glaring daggers, broken and bruised but still itching for another round.
She sat now with her lip curled, still smirking despite the blood on her teeth. Namjoon’s temple was split open, his knuckles raw, jaw tight with the kind of fury that left his chest heaving.
And Snape, pinching the bridge of his nose, only muttered one word:
“Pathetic.”
The silence in Snape’s office was thick, heavy with dust, blood, and fury. The two of them stood there—filthy, disheveled, breathing like they’d just crawled out of the Forbidden Forest after a battle. Her hair was sticking up in uneven clumps where Namjoon had yanked it, his lip was split and swelling, and there were scorch marks on both their robes.
Snape’s eyes swept over them with pure disgust, his nostrils flaring, his mouth curling like he’d swallowed something foul. And then he spoke.
“Disgraceful.” His voice cut through the room like a knife. “Absolutely disgraceful. Two of the most intelligent students in this castle, and yet you carry on like—” his lip curled further, “—like feral dogs fighting over scraps in the street.”
Neither of them moved. She smirked, defiant even with blood on her chin. Namjoon clenched his fists so hard his knuckles blanched, glaring at the floor as if it had personally offended him.
“I have lost count of how many times you’ve been dragged into this office,” Snape continued, his voice rising like a whip crack. “I have lost track of how many classrooms you’ve destroyed, how many points you’ve cost your houses, how many hours of my life I’ve wasted listening to your pathetic excuses.”
His robes flared as he stalked closer, black eyes glinting. “Do you even comprehend the level of idiocy it requires to resort to biting each other in a duel? Biting?! Are you children or wild animals?”
Her smirk widened, as if the memory of Namjoon’s teeth sinking into her finger was a victory, not a scar. Namjoon’s glare sharpened, jaw twitching.
“Wipe that look off your face,” Snape snapped at her, making her sit up straighter, though the smirk didn’t fade. “And you—” he spun on Namjoon, “—the noble Gryffindor, reduced to profanity so foul it made Madam Pomfrey blush. The great Kim Namjoon, swearing like a common thug, because she knows precisely how to shred your ridiculous self-control. Pathetic.”
Namjoon’s ears burned red. He hated how true it was.
“You are both insufferable,” Snape hissed, looming over them like a thundercloud. “And let me make this very clear: the next time I see either of you in my office for brawling like deranged lunatics, you will wish I had expelled you instead of what I will actually do. Am I understood?”
Neither of them answered.
“Am. I. Understood?”
“Yes, sir,” Namjoon ground out, his voice sharp with restrained fury.
“Yes, sir,” she drawled sweetly, just to be irritating.
Snape’s eyes narrowed, his glare slicing through them both before he turned away with a disgusted flick of his cloak. “Get out of my sight.”
They left, still bruised, still bleeding, still burning with hatred. And as the door slammed shut behind them, she leaned over just enough to whisper, smug as ever,
“Biting worked, though.”
And Namjoon cursed so viciously, Peeves cheered from somewhere down the corridor.
This wasn’t even the worst fight they’d had. Not even close.
Tonight’s bloodied hair-pulling and finger-licking fiasco was just one scrap in a long, brutal history of chaos that had carved its legend into the very stones of Hogwarts. If anyone dared to whisper about them, it was never this fight they brought up. No—people remembered the great catastrophes. The ones that became folklore.
There was the corridor incident in third year, when an argument over an essay spiraled so far out of control that half the paintings in the hall fell from the walls, glass shattered in every direction, and Filch had to spend three weeks repairing the destruction. The memory of her shoving him through a suit of armor—and him dragging her right down with him—was burned into the school’s gossip like scripture.
Then there was the infamous Black Lake battle. Fourth year. What started as a duel on the grounds ended with both of them tumbling into the icy water, cursing and flailing, trying to drown each other while the giant squid watched on like a bored spectator. They came out soaked, gasping, their robes shredded and faces scratched raw—only to start swinging fists again before they even hit dry land.
But the one that still made the rounds years later—the one whispered about in dormitories and laughed about behind hands—was the dinner table disaster. It had been during a feast, the Great Hall buzzing with chatter and clattering plates. A muttered insult, a shove, and suddenly she had smashed Namjoon’s head against the table so hard that pumpkin juice splashed across half the Gryffindor bench. And then—smirking, triumphant—she sat on his head.
Namjoon, furious, humiliated, and running on pure rage, did the unthinkable. He bit her ass. Hard.
She screamed. He swore. Chaos erupted. Professors shrieked for order as mashed potatoes went flying, plates cracked, and students stood on benches to get a better view of the madness.
And when it was all over—when the dust settled and she had stormed away with murder in her eyes and he was dragged to the hospital wing for the lump on his forehead—she was left with a scar. A permanent reminder of the day Kim Namjoon’s teeth had left their mark on her.
It was obscene. It was ridiculous. And it was legendary.
Every fight after that felt like a continuation, as if they were writing their own bloody saga in fists, curses, and bite marks. And the truth was, no matter how many detentions Snape threw at them, no matter how many house points they lost, everyone in Hogwarts knew one thing:
When Namjoon and her clashed, it wasn’t just a fight. It was an event.
To everyone else, Kim Namjoon was brilliance incarnate: top of the class, steady voice in debate, the kind of Gryffindor who spoke with conviction so strong it made you feel guilty for even breathing wrong. Professors adored him, younger students looked up to him. He was the pinnacle—polished, patient, prince charming carved out of logic and ideals.
But then she walked into the room.
And in a matter of seconds, all that poise crumbled. His jaw would tighten, his hand would curl into a fist on his desk, and his noble patience would evaporate like smoke. Because she didn’t just get under his skin—she made a home there, unpacked her bags, and set fire to everything he thought he controlled.
Every presentation he gave, every answer he provided with that perfect tone, she was there in the back making faces. Cross-eyed, exaggerated yawns, silent gagging motions. She’d scribble doodles of him with a halo and horns and pass them around just as he reached his most passionate points.
Whenever he slipped—even once—on a word or a spell, her hand shot into the air, not to correct the professor but to correct him. And she did it with such syrupy venom: “Oh no, Namjoon, don’t you mean this?” The smirk on her lips every time made his teeth grind.
And the worst part? The laughter. She didn’t even have to speak sometimes. A small snort when he was trying to hold court in class was enough to throw him off. A raised brow, a slow clap, a hissed “bravo” under her breath—it all chipped away at that perfect composure he wore like armor.
To everyone else, he was untouchable. To her, he was prey. And she delighted in tearing him down.
But she wasn’t untouched either. He knew how to worm under her skin just as viciously. The way he never flinched at her smugness, the way he rolled his eyes at her dramatic entrances, the way he leaned down when she tried to get the last word, his voice low and calm in a way that made her want to scream. He’d highlight her lies in front of everyone with surgical precision, expose her little schemes with that infuriating Gryffindor honesty that made the professors beam at him.
And the way he smiled after? As if he’d won. As if being right was a trophy he carried with pride.
They were locked in an endless game of sabotage. Her, the smirking snake who thrived on cutting him down. Him, the lion who refused to give her the satisfaction of silence. Together, they didn’t just clash—they collapsed. Every classroom, every hallway, every shared breath turned into a battlefield.
The air between them was already taut, stretched thin by a day that had gone wrong from the moment Namjoon had opened his eyes.
He was irritated, raw in that way only she could worsen. He’d sat through class after class with her smirking in the corner, throwing him off when he spoke, humming under her breath whenever he tried to focus, and now—after hours of holding back—he snapped.
They were in the corridor, their voices bouncing off the stone walls, footsteps echoing from some students who had wisely decided to get as far away as possible. Everyone knew better than to stay when the two of them squared up like this. It wasn’t a duel. It wasn’t a quarrel. It was war.
“Merlin, you’re insufferable,” Namjoon snarled, his face twisted, eyes burning holes through her. “Do you ever stop clawing at people like a parasite?”
“Oh, don’t act like you don’t love it,” she shot back, stepping closer until they were almost nose to nose. “You live for it, Namjoon. You love having me to hate. It makes you feel righteous, doesn’t it? The noble Gryffindor fighting the big bad Slytherin.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” he spat, his voice rising, shaking with the fury he’d been holding all day. “You’re not some grand adversary—you’re a spoiled snake who thinks smirking makes her clever.”
Her laugh was sharp, humorless. “And you’re a pompous arse who thinks reciting rules makes you holy.”
He should’ve walked away. He knew he should’ve. But the words were crawling up his throat, bitterness dragging them out. He was done being graceful, done with pretending. And so it slipped—the one thing he shouldn’t have said, the one rumor that had lived in the back of his mind like rot.
“No wonder your parents hate you.” His voice cut through the space like a blade. “Everyone else does too. Makes sense.”
The silence after was deafening.
Her face scorched instantly, not just with fury but with something sharper, rawer. For a moment, her eyes went wide—hurt, betrayed—and then the mask slammed back down, but it was too late. He’d seen it. He’d hit where it hurt.
The slap cracked so hard it echoed down the corridor. His head whipped to the side, his cheek blooming with instant fire, the metallic taste of blood rising where her nails had split his skin. His ears rang from the impact, his vision flickered.
“You—” her voice was shrill, venomous, trembling with rage, “—you absolute bastard!”
Namjoon straightened, his cheek red and stinging, his breath ragged. “Don’t you dare—”
“No, you don’t dare,” she cut over him, spitting the words like poison. Her fists clenched at her sides, nails digging into her palms so hard they almost drew blood. “You think you’re this—this paragon, this perfect Gryffindor with his noble speeches and his righteous fury. You walk around like you’re better than everyone else, like Hogwarts should bow to you because you read more books than the rest of us. But you’re nothing.”
Her voice cracked, high-pitched and raw, her eyes prickling with hot tears she refused to let fall. “You’re an egotistical, self-righteous lowlife, dragging Gryffindor’s name through the mud every time you open your hypocritical mouth. You think you’re honest? You think you’re brave? You’re not—you’re just cruel. You’re pathetic. Your whole life started in these walls, and it’s going to end in these walls, because without Hogwarts, without someone clapping for you when you get an answer right, you’re nothing but a boy playing at being a man.”
Namjoon’s chest heaved, his jaw clenched so tight it ached. Her words sank deep, piercing through armor he didn’t even know he had. And she saw it. She saw the flicker in his eyes, the one he always tried to hide—that maybe, just maybe, she was right.
He took a step toward her, so close their noses almost brushed. His voice was low now, trembling not with restraint but with fury. “Say that again.”
She sneered, every ounce of poison she had dripping from her words. “You. Are. Nothing. Kim Namjoon. Without this castle propping you up, you’re a fraud. A joke. A coward pretending to be a hero.”
His hands twitched at his sides. He wanted to shake her, to shout, to curse—but his throat was clogged with her words. His pride was burning, his ears still ringing from the slap, and his heart—traitor that it was—thudded painfully against his ribs at the sight of her trembling fists and the furious glint in her eyes.
They glared at each other like predators, breathing heavy, every inch of air between them electric with loathing.
And then, before he could summon another word, she shoved him back hard enough to send him staggering into the wall. “Don’t you ever,” she hissed, her voice sharp as glass, “speak about my family again. Or I swear, Namjoon, I’ll make sure you bleed for it.”
He steadied himself against the stone, his cheek throbbing, lip cut, and still—still—he sneered, though his voice cracked when he said it. “Pathetic.”
Her eyes blazed, wet with fury, and she laughed, cruel and broken all at once. “Look in the mirror, Gryffindor.”
They stood locked there, breaths ragged, neither willing to give the other the satisfaction of walking away first.
When they finally did, storming off in opposite directions, the corridor still rang with the echo of her slap, the venom of her words, and the gnawing truth neither of them could forget:
They had just seen the worst of each other—and they hated how much it mattered.
They were a ticking time bomb after that corridor fight—everyone knew it. Students whispered about it for weeks, professors traded exasperated looks, and even Peeves seemed to linger around them more often, waiting for the next explosion.
When word reached Snape, though, he did something no one expected. He raised an eyebrow. Just the slightest arch, the barest flicker of intrigue.
He’d heard about the slap, about the venom in her words, about the way Namjoon had gone pale and silent, like she’d driven a knife straight through his armor. Who knew the snake could strike so sharply? Who knew she could strip Gryffindor’s golden boy bare with nothing but her tongue? For the first time, Severus Snape felt a shred of something that almost resembled pride. Just a smidge.
Not that he’d ever admit it.
Her fury hadn’t surprised him. Not at all. He knew better than most that anger like hers didn’t bloom out of nothing—it came from somewhere deeper, somewhere darker.
He’d learned that years ago, the first time he’d dared send an owl to her parents after one of her catastrophic fights with Namjoon. The brawl had been so violent—fire in the corridor, bruises on her neck—that duty had pressed him to write. A short letter, clipped and professional, addressed to the family name that carried weight and wealth like a crown.
The reply had arrived swiftly, carried by a grand owl with ribbons tied to its claws. And the words inside… Snape never forgot them.
There had been no concern, no question about her safety, not even a passing mention of her well-being. Instead, it was fury—cold, disdainful fury. They called her reckless. Useless. An embarrassment to the family name. The phrasing hadn’t even been subtle: she was a burden, a mistake. And hidden between the words, Snape could read the truth clear as day: the threats, the curses, the bruises she no doubt carried home every summer.
She was not a daughter to them. She was a pet, something to be scolded, whipped into obedience, discarded when inconvenient.
Snape had burned the letter in his fireplace after that. And he never sent another owl to that mansion again. No matter how many fights she and Namjoon tore through, no matter how bloody or destructive, he handled it within Hogwarts’ walls. Because sending word home was not punishment—it was cruelty.
So when he heard the whispers about how she’d torn Namjoon apart, how her voice had cracked with something beyond amusement, something venomous and wounded, he didn’t flinch. It made sense.
Namjoon had cut too close to bone.
And for the first time in years, Snape found himself almost—almost—glad she’d slapped the golden Gryffindor so hard his ears had rung for a week.
Because some truths deserved to be screamed into the world, even if they came with blood and broken pride.
AAAAA!!! hiii!! i just discovered ur account and im in love with your writing :3
AHEHDHHDGRDB OMG HELLLOOO AND WELCOME TO THE BLOG!!!! I'm so grateful you liked my writing there's a new story coming in tomorrow!! Be sure to check it out I hope you enjoy the experience!! (≧▽≦)
The Namjoon Hogwarts Fic should be posted by Monday I have to make few final edits and it'll be THERE I am super excited to post it and ofc like always I'll be posting all the parts together because I am well aware of how frustrating it is to wait for the new Chapters to come out ALSO if you guys are Interested if getting digital posters Based on Anime, Music bands and much more be sure to visit this blog
Minamimamiko
You can put in commissions for all sort of banners through Kofi or Directly reaching out through DMS!! be sure to like the posts and if you find the art style interesting be sure to support them !!
The sheer amount of spells I've pulled outta my ass hole while writing the damned Hogwarts fic is astonishing. TT Anyways I'm almost done and just need to do some light editing the original draft was 72k words...ANYWHO ATAY TUNED!!!!!
Idk but literally HEXED HEARTS is the best fanfiction I've ever read in my life until now. This fanfiction needs more attention. As a hardcore potterhead, I literally felt like everything is happening infront of me as I'm so into it. The choice of lines, words are incredibly amazing. And the story is just awesome. I fcking loved those teasing and dramatic scene of taekook. I always been a silent reader, but I felt like I have comment on this. I wish this was a long series, nvm I TOTALLY FCKING LOVED IT!😭😭🎀💗🤌
OMGGG POOKIE YOU GOT ME KICKING MY FEET IN AIR SHI- thank you so much for your compliments they mean the world to me as im just getting back into writing maybe I'll make Hexed hearts part 4 a priority. A little spoiler I've been working on Gryffindor!! Namjoon x Slytherin reader for quite a while now SO STAY TUNED FOR THAT CUZ I'M EXCITED TO POST IT and AGAIN THANK YOU SO SO SO FREAKING MUCH FOR YOUR COMPLIMENTS THEY FILL MY HEART WITH JOY. comments like these remind me why I started writing in the first place so thank you so much for that and im sooo sorry for the late reply I have like 6 kids, teenage pregnancy did not beat me... JUST KIDDING ITS 6 CATS I HAVE NO GAME OR BITCHES IRL LOL. I love you guys and I'm proud of you in case no one told you that yet
Pairing : Grizzly Hybrid Namjoon x Ferret Hybrid reader
Word count : ???
Trigger warning: tooth rotting fluff, joonie bears menace being a secret sap, Fake tears, use of the 'C' word (chores).
Synopsis : While clearing the closet Namjoon comes across something that was never to be discovered by him.
Authors Note : HELLO MY CHILDREN!!!!!!! am so sorry I've been gone for such a long time but BOY have i missed you guys. I've jam packed with shit irl and barely get any time to write but I've been missing writing for fun so I'll try to post more. It's so sweet to see you guys reach out to me and i love you all. on another note i Have started Graphic designing and Illustrations and I've been wanting to make some extra cash on the side because I realized that I too have become the broke artist. If you're interested please dm me so I can show you my work and I'm also Interested in ghost writing so if you guys have any idea regarding these it would be of great help. THAT'S ALL!! I hope you enjoy reading what I've tried to put together!!
Here is my Masterlist
Namjoon had been at it for an hour.
The closet was a mess, but he was making progress—folding, stacking, and trying to figure out why they had so many mismatched socks.
Meanwhile, from the bathroom, a very grumpy ferret hybrid was sniffling dramatically.
"I can't believe you're making me do this," she whined from down the hall.
Namjoon rolled his eyes as he shook out a hoodie. "Baby, it's just the toilet."
"JUST the toilet?! Do you know the horrors that thing has seen?! Do you know what—"
Her voice cut off, and Namjoon assumed she had finally accepted her fate—until he heard the unmistakable sound of fake sniffling.
He froze.
"Are you… crying?"
Silence.
Then, in the most pitiful voice:
"It’s just so hard, Joonie…"
Namjoon sighed, rubbing his temples. "Baby—"
"I just… I just can’t—"
Namjoon sighed again. "You are NOT crying real tears right now."
"YES, I AM—"
"NO, YOU'RE NOT—"
"YES, I—"
And then Namjoon tuned her out.
Shaking his head, he reached up to pull down an old shoebox tucked away on the top shelf. He wasn’t sure what was inside, but—
The moment he opened it, his breath hitched.
Inside was a small diary.
And on the very first page—
—was his name.
Surrounded by tiny hearts.
Namjoon felt his stomach flip as he carefully flipped through the pages. It was neat but messy, filled with scribbles, little doodles, and handwritten notes.
He recognized Polaroids from their dates, some of them ones he didn't even remember taking. There were pages categorizing his favorite things—his favorite foods, drinks, books, jewelry, clothes—even a list of things he didn’t like.
Then, there were birthday gift ideas, recipes she had gotten from his mom and dad, and a tiny box containing ticket stubs and receipts from all their dates.
And, at the very bottom—
—was the first chocolate he had ever given her.
Namjoon stilled.
She wasn’t the sentimental type.
She acted like she didn’t care, like she was too tough, too forgetful, too much of a menace to be vulnerable. But this?
This was soft.
This was tender.
This was love.
And it made Namjoon’s heart clench.
Carefully, he tucked everything back inside, as if handling something fragile, precious. He didn’t want her to know he found it—didn’t want to embarrass her.
So, he placed it right back where he found it.
Then, with his chest feeling warm and full, he got up, made his way to the bathroom, and leaned against the doorway.
She was still sitting on the floor, pouting at the toilet with the scrub brush in her hand.
Namjoon let out a fond sigh before walking up, crouching down, and kissing her temple.
"You're ridiculous."
"I know."
"I love you, though."
She blinked at him, confused.
"What’s gotten into you?"
Namjoon just smiled.
"Nothing."
She squinted. Suspicious.
But when Namjoon grabbed the brush from her hands and started scrubbing the toilet himself, she immediately perked up.
"Aw, Joonie, you do love me!" she giggled, hopping on his back like a koala.
Namjoon just huffed.
"Yeah, yeah."
And if he held her a little tighter than usual that night, she never questioned it.
Warning : No warning, comfort, soo much comfort, joonie is finally home
Authors Note : WE ARE BACK BITCHES OMG OMGOMGOMGOMG I CANNOT BELIEVE AFTER 18 MONTHS WE FINALLY GOT TO SEE THEM AGAINUSDHHDBDDHD THEY ALL LOOK SO PRECIOUS AND MY SHAYLA NAMJOON, I LOVE HIM SM. I wish I could heal him the way he's healed hundreds of others, and may he never go through what he went through in the military.
Synopsis : "Namjoon's finally discharged and all he wants is to go home to his girl"
The cameras are loud.
They always are, but today they feel like a storm—flashing, clicking, cheering. Namjoon smiles gently, the way he’s trained to, bowing along with Taehyung. The brass glint of the saxophone in his hand catches the sunlight, and someone’s yelling his name behind the barrier. But it’s all a haze.
He can’t hear a thing. Not really. Because all his brain is screaming is one thing, over and over:
Home. Her. Home. Her.
His uniform itches. The air smells too clean. He’s standing on the outside now, after months of dirt and orders and quiet sobs into his pillow when the dorm lights were out. After so many days when the only thing that kept him breathing was your voice—sleepy, loving, soft on the phone, like silk threads tying him back to something real.
The ride back is a blur. He clutches the saxophone the whole way.
You know he said to wait.
So you do.
You’re practically vibrating with excitement, barefoot in his favorite oversized shirt—the one, the ridiculously baggy one with the little bleach stain near the hem that you never dared wash because it still smelled like him. You cooked all his comfort food, every last bit of it, filling the apartment with the scent of home. His drink’s on the counter, ice already sweating down the glass. Your heart is racing.
Every few seconds, you check the clock. You pace. You nearly combust.
And then—
The key turns.
“Joonie—”
You don’t even let him get the door fully shut. You launch yourself at him.
The saxophone clatters somewhere on the floor, forgotten. His mouth opens in surprise and then—
“Baby?”
You’re already clinging to him, arms around his neck, legs half-wrapped around his waist, kissing any part of his face you can reach. His hair, his jaw, his cheeks, his lips—tears spilling down your face as your laughter breaks free.
“You’re really here,” you whisper, cupping his face like he’s made of something holy. “You’re really here, baby—oh my god—”
He breathes in.
You. The scent of your skin, your hair, the warmth of your body against him—soft, real, shaking with emotion.
“I'm home,” he chokes out, voice already trembling. “God, I missed you. I missed you so much.”
You laugh and cry at the same time, running your hands over his back, shoulders, hair—like if you stop, he might disappear again.
Somehow, you make it to the couch, but only barely.
He tackles you gently into the cushions, his entire body weight sinking into yours like he’s trying to bury himself inside your skin. His laugh is breathless, breaking into little sobs as he kisses you through them, your lips salty from both your tears.
“Never again,” you whisper, cupping the back of his head. “You’re home now. You’re safe. You’re mine.”
He kisses you like it’s a promise. Like he’s trying to inhale you. Like you’re the only thing anchoring him to this earth.
“I thought about this,” he murmurs against your throat, “every night. Just this. You. Laughing. Holding me. This stupid couch. I’d have given anything just to touch you—”
“You don’t have to give anything anymore,” you say, wrapping your arms tighter around him. “You already came back. That’s everything.”
And in that living room filled with the scent of home-cooked food, salt tears, and months of aching need finally met, Namjoon lets himself collapse.
Also Namjoon playing the saxophone and tae carrying the bouquet was freaking hilarious my man was so happy to gtfo of there LMAO
Also THEY LOOK SO FUCKIN' ADORABLE AND HEALTHY SBF THE FLUSH ON JIMINS CHEEKS I COULD BITE THEM. NEW SHIT COMING SOON Y'ALL KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR THE NOTIFS
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